A critical process used in safety, quality, environment, and regulatory programs is the process that manages change. The reason for this is that change creates the opportunity for new risk to be introduced, existing risk to be modified, or latent risks throughout the organization to be exposed. The impacts of change can result in:
Mission and Strategic Risk - uncertainty in your ability to achieve short and long-term mission success
Performance Risk - uncertainty in your ability ability to achieve performance objectives
Value chain Risk - uncertainty in your ability to create existing value
Compliance Risk - uncertainty in your ability to achieve quality, safety, environmental, and regulatory outcomes
Productivity Risk - uncertainty in your ability to drive down cost and improve efficiencies
Systemic Risk - uncertainty in your ability to isolate risk and avoid risk propagation
Organizational and Structural Risk - uncertainty in your ability to maintain appropriate resources and systems needed for mission success
Reputation and Social Responsibility Risk - uncertainty in your stakeholder's ability to trust you
Innovation Risk - uncertainty in your ability to create new value streams
Transformation Risk - uncertainty in your ability to transfer new value streams to the performance zone
Audit and Certification Risk - uncertainty in your ability to pass an audit or achieve certification
That is why highly-regulated companies in high-risk sectors invest in advanced Management of Change (MOC) systems to effectively manage risk. These systems provide companies with the ability to:
quickly identify high impact changes,
develop and execute change plans tailored to the level the risk, and
monitor risk during and after the change is made.
The best companies also consider how overlapping and cumulative changes impact mission success. As is often said (but not so often heeded), it is usually not a single change but rather a series of small changes made over time that leads to a serious incident.
Make certain this doesn't happen to you. If you have a basic MOC procedure you may want to consider the benefits of an advanced process to make certain risk is properly managed.
