1. INTRODUCTION

All organisations, whether in the public or the private sector, face risks to people, property, equipment, vehicles, business continuity and effectiveness. Increasingly, reputation risk (the impact of adverse publicity), and regulatory risk (failure to achieve published objectives or comply with specific statutory requirements), are also being identified as key risk management issues.

MSP’s Board (MSPB) and its Core Team (CT) recognise that risk is the chance of something happening that will have an impact on objectives and affect service delivery to the community. It is measured in terms of consequence and likelihood.  MSPB and CT recognise that they have a responsibility to manage risks (both positive and negative). In doing so, they are committed to a risk management process, which supports a structured and systematic approach to identifying, responding to, managing and evaluating risks associated with strategic, operational,programme and project delivery from both internal and external environments.

MSPB and CT recognise that they have a duty of care to their stakeholders, their citizens, their customers, their employees and their partners. They have a duty to be efficient, transparent and accountable to local people and they need to observe high standards of corporate governance and management.

2. PURPOSE

The purpose of this framework is to ensure that risk management is an integral part of day-to-day operations for MSPB members and CT staff by:

• Providing a vision for effective management of risk
• Identifying typical risks associated with strategic, operational, programme and project delivery.
• Explaining how risk management is to be implemented:
  • Levels of responsibilities for identifying, assessing and adhering to risk
  • Methods of communications
  • Monitoring, reviewing and evaluating

3. VISION

MSPB and CT will identify, analyse and prioritise the risks. We will manage and control risks in order to maximise the quality of our service provision, to uphold our reputation and to mitigate or minimise the impact on the organisation. We believe if implemented in this way, risk management will make a powerful contribution to continuous service improvement and enable us to deliver our strategic and operational objectives that underpin our mission ‘Working together to improve the quality of life for all people through sport and physical activity 2017-2022’.

4. TYPICAL RISKS WHICH MSPB AND CT COULD FACE:

• anything that poses a threat to maintaining service delivery, or to the achievement of strategic objectives and delivery plans
• anything that could damage MSP’s reputation and undermine public confidence
• impropriety, malpractice, waste or poor value for money
• failure to comply with, respond to or manage changing social, financial, environmental and legislative requirements

5. IMPLEMENTATION

• MSPB will be asked to approve this Management of Risk Strategy on an annual basis, following a review by Compliance, Scrutiny & Nominations Group (CSNG) ⁽¹⁾

• MSP Director, MSPB Chair and Host Authority have overall responsibility for encouraging awareness of risk management issues throughout MSP. MSP Director will manage the process and be responsible for the management and notification of those risks likely to have a significant impact on the achievement of MSP objectives

• Key strategic, organisational/programme delivery risks will be recorded and managed through the MSP Risk Register. The Risk Register will be reviewed by MSPB six monthly intervals, or whenever there is a significant change to its content and form part of a report tabled at MSP’s Board meetings
• All MSPB and CT^{( 2)} have a responsibility to be alert to risks and to take appropriate action
• Decisions at all levels within MSP should be taken on the basis of adequate information, which will include an analysis of the risks and consideration of measures to manage those risks. For major projects, the project initiation document will address risks in line with MSPB and CT recommended methodology of:
  • identifying the risk by reference to Service/Business objectives
  • analysing and ranking the risk in terms of probability, severity, and magnitude
  • prioritising the action according to the existing control environment, tolerance, and the availability of resources
  • determining the course of action e.g. eliminate risk, reduce risk or accept risk;
  • controlling the risk e.g. taking appropriate action
  • monitoring the reporting on progress
• A review of the effectiveness will take place annually by MSP’s Board and Senior Leadership Team

The principles of risk management and risk management processes are the same for all MSPB members and CT staff. Risk management is dealing as effectively as possible with uncertainty and looking ahead to risks and opportunities that might arise.