3 Steps to Implementing Risk Management Technology

3 Steps to Implementing Risk Management Technology

Implementing a new technology is always a risky endeavor. Businesses must ensure that they use the right risk management software to minimize potential losses and disruptions. This can be achieved through the following 3 steps:

1. Mapping and identifying risks

The first step in optimizing the IT infrastructure is to identify what the company's vulnerabilities are. Thus, the IT manager must map security flaws, assess the state of equipment, and define what are the biggest problems with the systems and equipment used in the main business routines.

This routine can be done through various activities, which go beyond the monitoring of resources. One is conducting interviews with managers and professionals from various sectors.

Basically, this strategy helps the IT manager to identify the needs and main problems faced by the internal teams daily. In addition, evaluating how work is performed in each sector makes the search for problems more accurate.

And existing operational data and indicators can also be assessed. They will provide a technical view of how each system works - what software is overloaded and when the internal infrastructure is most in demand.

Thus, during the treatment of risks, the IT manager can take measures with a greater impact on the performance of the systems. And, for the mapping to be effective, it is essential that the IT manager be able to track problems according to the business profile and its traditional activities.

In this sense, a company that works with banking transactions, for example, faces a different set of threats than those that software development companies deal with.

In addition, the size of the enterprise and its internal infrastructure are also factoring that influence the main problems that a company may face.

Therefore, by defining critical processes, assessing the business profile and its main processes, the risk mapping will be consistent with the reality of the enterprise.

Potential risks - such as data loss and sudden drops in network infrastructure performance, for example - will be identified more quickly. In addition, the impacts caused by this problem will be potentially less.

2. Risk assessment and treatment

We know that just identifying risks is not enough to ensure that the company can mitigate problems with agility in the medium and long term.

In fact, faced with a scenario in which the company deals with various threats, managers must act together to prioritize the risks that have the greatest impact on business revenues. In this way, the measures taken will be based on a more effective and economical allocation of resources. And one of the factors to be considered is the probability that a problem will occur.

In this sense, each identified risk must be assessed according to the type of activity that is linked to it, as well as the chances of the vulnerability being exploited or triggered due to operational errors or ineffective management policies. So, keep in mind that any event that has a negative impact on internal processes is a risk that becomes a reality. Along with analysing the likelihood of a risk becoming an event, the IT manager must keep in mind the impact that each problem has on the business's operational chain.

And this analysis must consider which sectors will be impacted by the exploitation of a vulnerability, and how this factor will influence business revenues. In this way, the impact analysis can identify all factors that are influenced by external problems, such as financial losses, loss of market leadership and decreased market share. Thus, assessing the likelihood of a problem occurring and the impact it can have on the day-to-day business (and its revenues) make IT risk management more effective.

And the measures taken to improve the internal infrastructure will have a more precise priority distribution, making processes continuously more reliable and secure.

3. Monitoring and implementing improvements to prevent future problems

Once risks have been identified and classified according to the impact they may have on the business's operational chain, the IT sector must define and implement a set of measures that reduce the risks of the company facing problems in the medium and long term.

In other words, the IT manager must plan processes that reduce the exposure of the IT infrastructure and create a work environment with high performance and security. And all measures adopted must consider the data collected in the previous steps. Thus, the planning will consider the routine of each sector, and how the company deals with the requests of its customers.

In addition, internal processes also need to be considered, since the measures adopted must improve their execution without this significantly reducing internal productivity levels. In this scenario, the measures adopted may include restructuring processes, implementing security systems, new indicators, and control policies. In addition, new routines can be planned, including the creation of regular operational reports and the planning of more robust management policies.

The IT risk management policy must also consider the need to monitor the IT infrastructure continuously. After all, assessing the status of software and network devices is crucial for indicators and other metrics to be able to represent the real business situation.