by Jbs041610 G3 — April 19, 2010—To demonstrate the level of the security industry’s understanding and adoption of enterprise security risk management (ESRM), the CSO Roundtable of ASIS International, a membership group of the senior-most executives from the world’s largest organizations, has released the results of a comprehensive ESRM survey of its members and of the ASIS membership.
While enterprise risk management (ERM) looks at the universe of risks—financial, strategic, accidental and so on—that an organization faces, it often does not take into account risks such as brand protection, supply chain management or even physical and IT security. ESRM encompasses these additional risks.
The survey, conducted in fall 2009, asked which risks were the most challenging, where organizational support for ESRM initiatives came from, which business elements were included, what security’s role in the process was, who had ultimate responsibility for risk, and other benchmarking questions. More than 80 CSOs, and more than 200 other ASIS members from around the world, responded to the survey.
The survey revealed that issues such as database theft, network failure and economic problems are top concerns for today’s security personnel, rather than traditional security issues. CSOs reported that the greatest non-security risk they face is the downturn of the economy, followed by business issues such as competition and regulatory pressures. More than half of the CSOs surveyed said they and their security departments were involved in researching, prioritizing, mitigating or evaluating these non-security risks.
Survey results indicate that the vast majority of security professionals believe that excellent business management, leadership and communication skills—not security expertise—are the traits that will lead to success in ESRM.
The CSO Roundtable followed up the survey by interviewing 11 senior security executives from some of the world’s largest companies who have first-hand experience in planning and executing ESRM initiatives. The resulting white paper, “Enterprise Security: How Great Risks Lead to Great Deeds,” is available from the ASIS Web site.
