The Importance of The Roads To Ruin Publication

Airmic has commissioned an entirely unique project, undertaken by Cass Business School, investigating the impact of 18 high profile corporate crises over the last decade. 

The case studies outlined in Roads to Ruin consist of some of the world’s biggest organisations, with the risk events having considerable, often catastrophic, impacts on these organisations. In seven cases the companies faced bankruptcy. In eleven cases the Chairman and /or CEO lost their roles and a huge number of executive and non-executive directors lost their jobs. Roads to Ruin identifies key flaws within these organisations’ risk management that significantly contributed to these events.

The study identifies the key lessons associated with the failure to prevent these crises, and thereafter to manage the consequences. All of these lessons are pertinent to Airmic members, but I felt that Cass’ ‘glass-ceiling’ reference, to the barrier that risk managers can experience when addressing the risks emanating from the top echelons of their organisations, struck me as one that might strike a chord with our membership.

This report has huge value, not only to risk professionals, but to the boards of directors to which they report. Directors have to make crucial risk-related decisions impacting the future of their companies and Roads to Ruin provides them with important lessons in the flow of information, communication and corporate governance that were found lacking in the case studies investigated.

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