Risk management is emerging as a management control practice for increasing the visibility of uncertainties and threats surrounding business enterprises. Both the number and the scope of chief risk officers have expanded dramatically in the last ten years. In the light of the disastrous performance of the financial services industry during the subprime credit crisis, however, it seems that risk management has not fulfilled its promise of helping managers safeguard business enterprises from undesired losses. Balancing growth and risk objectives remains a challenge for businesses and warrants the reconsideration of risk management and governance practices, managerial incentive structures, and the ways in which risk is communicated to various stakeholders.


Through a series of case studies, Professor Mikes has examined the varied roles that risk managers play in steering the risk profile of their businesses and in making line managers more aware of the risk implications of their decisions. The objective is to enable these managers to understand different types of good risk management in their organizational settings and to uncover the constellation of organizational, cultural, managerial, and institutional attributes that support best practices.