Fundamentals of Risk Management

PART sEvEN FURTHER READINg
APM Publishing (2010) Project Risk Analysis and Management Guide
https://www.apm.org.uk
British Standard BS 13500:2013 Code of practice for delivering effective govern-
ance of organizations, 
www.standardsuk.com
London Stock Exchange (2004) Corporate Governance: A practical guide,
www.londonstockexchange.com
Office of Government Commerce (2007) Management of Risk: Guidance for
practitioners, 
www.tsoshop.co.uk
Taleb, NN (2008) The Black Swan: The impact of the highly improbable,
www.penguin.co.uk
Woods, M (2011) Risk Management in Organizations: An integrated case study
approach, 
www.routledge.com
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Risk governance
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PART sEvEN cAsE sTUDIEs
Severn Trent Water: Our approach to risk
We have set ourselves some very challenging targets and continually strive to improve our standards 
of service delivery to customers and our overall performance. The group’s risk management and 
internal control systems are vital to the delivery of these targets and enable the identification, 
assessment and mitigation of risks inherent in our business activities.
Accountability for the effectiveness of the group’s enterprise risk management (ERM) policies sits 
with the board, with oversight from the executive team, supported by operational risk owners and the 
central ERM team who are responsible for carrying out the ERM process.
Within Severn Trent Water, our approach reflects our status as a regulated utility providing 
essential services and operating as part of the critical national infrastructure for the UK. We aim to 
have a strong control framework in place to enable us to understand our risks and manage these risks 
both effectively and efficiently.
In our non-regulated businesses we take a more commercial approach to our decisions around 
which risks are acceptable. However, we recognize that we provide products and services for clients 
who operate in regulated environments. As a result, for risks that could impact on our clients’ services, 
we take a similar approach to risk as in our own regulated business.
The ERM process covers all types of risk including operational, financial, legal and regulatory. Our 
assessment of risk includes explicit consideration of the possible impact of the risk on the reputation 
of the group as a whole. Resilience of our services is vital and we regularly carry out exercises jointly 
with other agencies such as local authorities, police and fire services to test this resilience.
Edited extract from Severn Trent Plc
Annual Report and Accounts 2015