- Guide to Good Practice is primarily aimed at those involved in planning, launching and implementing a risk management process. It follows therefore to disclose that there is no ‘one correct’ or ‘one standard’ risk management process.
This guide draws on best practices and is not prescriptive. It seeks to highlight the key issues that higher education institutions (HEIs) need to consider in developing their own risk management processes. It also can be very useful to diagnose the stages a current risk management process has reached.
Whatever stages the institution has reached in implementing risk management, this guide helps taking stock of what has been achieved so far, and to plan ahead effectively. Click here to download the guide.
- Austin Community College District uses the 'SSS Model' (the triple 'S' model) risk management process. The 'SSS Model' is a process developed and managed by the Office of Internal Audit. Click here to download the latest version of the 'SSS Model'. the password to un protect the excel worksheets is '123'. The 'Portfolio' worksheet is frequently updated. I encourage the visitors of our web site to frequently download an updated version of the 'SSS Model'.
- Risk Policy is a document specially designed to disclose Austin Community College District underlying approach to risk management. The risk policy must include, but is not limited to the following:
- purpose of the document
- underlying approach to risk management
- role of senior management and other key staff members
- key components of the system of internal control and risk management
- annual review of effectiveness.
To review a sample of the risk policy click here.
- Risk Categories: Organizing the types of risk into broad categories helps ensuring that key issues are not overlooked, helps documenting the process, and surely it helps to create a unique list of risks that is manageable.
There is no ‘one right’ or 'one standard' way to define risk categories for the institution. Each institution may define a different set of risk categories or how risks are linked. However, categorizing risk will considerably help achieving the objectives:
1- Build a balanced risk portfolio cross-institution
2- Build a manageable list of risks
A detailed list of the risk categories is included in the customized Microsoft Excel workbook referred to above.
- What is the risk assessor? The risk assess
defines the norms and rules of the consolidator;
the assessment framework; and provides the tool to assess the collected information. For a detailed copy of the risk management assessor excel workbook, click here.
