The Seven Habits of Highly Successful Risk Professionals

At a session during the 2018 RIMS annual conference, Steven Sachs, EVP, Director Real Estate, Hotel and Gaming Practice, Willis Towers Watson and Tim Kraft, Consultant, Risk Management & Insurance, Warrior Consulting Ventures, lead a discussion on habits of highly successful risk professionals and how to relinquish control and create active listening.

Steven Covey’s book titled “Seven Habits of Highly Effective People” (Risk Professionals) is a wildly successful book of wisdom. There have been over 25 million copies worldwide since publication in 1989. The book stresses the “Character Ethic” and to align values with “universal and timeless” principles. The book Manifested in 7 habits: be proactive, begin with the end in mind, put first things first, think“win/win”, seek first to understand, then to be understood, synergize and sharpen the saw.

Let’s take a deeper look into each of the these habits.

1. Be Proactive and own the Risk Management discipline within your company. Anticipate needs and problems of your business. Know your company’s business and know where to find solutions. We must always look to the horizon. Be seen as a problem solver and address both “pure” and “dynamic” risk.
2. Begin with the end in mind. Move the needle! Its vital to remember the results matter – NOT activities. Those results need to be aligned with your company’s goals and values/culture. Drivers for continuous success include the three legged stool. The three legs are establish standards of success, accountabilities and measurements (metrics) to confirm results.
3. Put first things first. Risk professionals needs to understand and relish the role we play. Risk professionals are the risk busters. In simple terms, 3 focuses: process (Consistent way to conduct our business), problems (Problems are opportunities to excel and fixing problems is why they pay us the big bucks), and productions (high impact discretionary project)
4. Think “Win/Win”! Before we can create a winning solution….we must do the following:understand our company’s strategic objectives, create short and long term goals, have constraints, values, connect with leaders at all levels, align with their objectives, speak their language (including metrics) and communicate in ways they want to see data and make decisions. And then… you can deliver solutions that impact results!
5. Seek first to understand and then to be understood. Give up control to get control! The process always starts with us actively listening to our constituents. NETSIL is “Listen” spelled backwards. We listen to them first, then we respond.
6. Synergize. Risk professionals are leaders – they must act like one! Risk professionals don’t have to know “everything”, but….they are expected to be able to find the answers. Risk professionals should be able to coordinate resources to meet the company’s objectives. Be Passionate! Lead from the front! Make it fun!
7. Sharpen the saw. Always ask questions!

• Continued education.

• Business and Leadership.

• Push people up!

• Empower our teams.

• Reward them with praise and recognition.

These seven habits of highly successful professionals help with analyzing the importance of performance as you continuously increase your knowledge and competencies to optimize your position and risk management within your organization.