Case Study: Risk Management Process, Its Concept

High Exposure Risk

Healthcare is one industry sector that Mubadala Development Company is also supervising and managing. Also, the company has its services sector where it delivers essential products and goods to its customers. In this connection, we can say that Mubadala is also exposed to high risk especially among its workers just like in the healthcare sectors where most workers are front-liners. Also, those in services ventures are also always expose to customers who are sources of the virus because they have to deliver essential services to their customers. According to OSHA (2018) high risk exposure includes those healthcare delivery and support staff of hospitals who entered patient’s room of suspected COVID-19 cases. Additionally, medical transport workers such ambulance drivers are highly exposed to risk because they are having close contact with patients inside and enclosed vehicles. Finally, workers in mortuary for they prepare bodies for cremation of deceased COVID-19 cases and or those suspected COVID-19 patients at the time of death.

Very High Exposure Risk

While Mubadala may be exposed to a high level risk, still, workers may have been exposed as well to a very high exposure risk because the development company manages hospitals and and other healthcare providers. Many of its workers in the healthcare sector may have been present during laboratory procedures, postmortem and specific medical activities. Among them workers include:

• Healthcare workers like doctors, dentists, nurses, paramedics, medical emergency technicians and those performing aerosol-generating procedures such as intubation, broncoscophies, cough induction procedures, some exams and dental procedures. Also, these medical workers perform as well as invasive specimen collection for suspected COVID-19 cases.
• dditionally, laboratory and healthcare personnel and those handling specimens from known suspected COVID-19 patients.
• Workers in the morgue as they perform autopsies that generally involve aerosol-generating procedures for the bodies of those who died and are COVID-19 patients and or even suspected ones at the time of death.

Job duties of people working at Mubadala affect their risk exposure level

The job duties of the workers in some of the industry sectors that are developed and managed by Mubadala may increase their risk exposure level as they perform different tasks because they move from one exposure to another. Among workers that may have increased risk exposures include:

1. Other types of positions among healthcare providers like medical transport workers, pre-hospital workers, allied medical care professional and the company support staff.
2. Emergency response team that includes fire fighters, emergency medical services workers and law enforcement officers.
3. Funeral directors and those involve in postmortem care tasks.
4. Production and research laboratory workers
5. Working in airlines such as the Aerospace of Mubadala.
6. Retail operations especially those in high customer volume environment, which Mubadala various sectors have been operating.
7. Transportation security those in charge of borders protection.
8. The construction industry where Mubadala manages and developed.
9. Water and solid waste management as part of Mubadala services ventures.
10. Janitorial services also as part of services industry sector of the institution.
11. Home repair maintenance and services.
12. Social, pastoral and public health workers and those jobs that require contact with community members who may spread the virus.
13. Those who travel to areas where virus continue to spread.
14. Delivery and transit drivers yet depending on their contacts with the public.

Why risk management is significant to Mubadala Development Company

Risk Management especially in containing the spread of corona virus among the workers, employees and staff of Mubadala Development Company is very important for the organization. It is an important business practice that supports and helps the institution identifies, tracks, evaluates and mitigates the present of risks in its business environment. It is part of the company stability to manage effectively the risk associated with the pandemic in this trying times of our world’s history. It would be losses to any business if they can not handle and manage effectively the effect of the health crisis. Furthermore, if an organization is unaware of the competitive risk can result to Mubadala losing its market share, which is a big financial risk. Meanwhile, people who work in this management institution with many industry sectors may experience low, medium, high and very high level of risk exposure hence Mubadala must be successful in its risk management effort. Any business firm that can detect any risk especially the risk caused by COVID-19 will always be an advantage. Any financial risk that can be caused by the pandemic is a signal to Mubadala to limit its investments and while the pandemic still continues, Mubadala has to strengthen first its finances until the pandemic is over. Any business that can assess the impact of a safety risk can plan a safe way to work on, which can become its competitive advantage.

Another strategy for business to survive in this times of pandemic is to make its product portfolio divert so that if one product would not be selling this time of health crisis, then it has other products that can be sourced of income for the company. While the company has very diverse product portfolio yet, Mubadala must think of products that are essentials in the abnormal situation we face today. In this regard, Mubadala must understand that risk management is the process of identifying the potholes and once it already identifies, it has then to asses the depth of the damage it can cause to various industry sector. This must be followed though with the strategy preparation how to avoid the damages. This implies therefore that a small pothole identified is a signal to business to slow down while a huge pothole determined is sure sign to avoid it completely. Allocate resources tantamount to the cost of any risk identified especially big resources for severe risk. If Mubadala is able to identify the risk that may affect the business operations seriously, then it requires most attention from the business management. Importantly, with risk management in place, Mubadala can act proactively in mitigating vulnerabilities before the worst damage is yet to come.

Techniques used to manage risk exposures by Mubadala Development Company

The basic understanding of risk management is the process where a particular organization identifies assesses or evaluates and controls the possible threats of the business investments. These investments are in the forms of business capital and revenues. Risks to capital and earnings come from various sources such as legal liabilities, financial uncertainty, accidents, strategic management and natural disasters. Additionally, risk management includes the plan to identify and control the threats that may possibly come from the sources mentioned (Risk Management defined, 2016). According to Vikram (2011), risk management is to identify, analyze and control risks related to financial interests and at the same time threatens the company assets and enterprise earnings.

To make sure that risk management will be effective, an efficient and reliable risk management plan must be in-place and this is where a particular government of any country implements its role and function by requiring any insurance companies regulatory compliance rules. Simply states, respective governments help insurance sector by scrutinizing their risk management plans, procedures and policies on how to address efficiently the risks caused by the corona virus. Mostly, governments review the adequacy of every insurance company regarding their risk management plans that can truly respond to the needs of their clients or customers. It implies then that Mubadala Company must have implemented their regular internal audits, risks analysis and other means of risk assessments to protect at all times the business’ capital and earnings (Vikram, 2011). Anyway, every organization is willing to pay the required amount covered by the insurance premiums if the risk management plan of the company promises reliable protection. Definitely, organizations believe that whatever monthly premiums they pay to the insurer can offset the company large-scale risk from any financial losses or property damages.

In the context of United Arab Emirates, while it is expected of its government to provide regulatory compliance rules to the insurance sector, it fails otherwise (Insurance companies seek improved risk management framework, 2017). This article published in the Gulf News claimed that most companies operating here and may include some industry sectors of Mubadala have no effective and clear risk management framework. While others may have, but the same article said that they must be improved otherwise to make sure for the utmost protection of organizations from risks coming from various sources especially with the present corona virus pandemic. While the insurers are the ones that lack the strong regulatory framework the idea here is what can government of UAE can do to improve the risk management framework especially of Mubadala, its very own development company While improving the framework of risk management is a challenge to many organizations, it is likewise a challenge to the government because insurers will be obliged to implement the risk management framework had the government has its clear guidelines for risk management framework. According to Augustine (2017), the regular clients of the insurance companies are the hospitals and motor insurance and complaints come from these companies as discrepancy to insurance implementation guidelines are always subject for review and different interpretations.

Mubadala Development Company Risk Management Implementation and Monitoring Process

The following steps are parts of Mubadala Development Company Risk Management Implementation. The latter part will discuss the monitoring process of the institution risk management implementation.

Step 1: Identify the Risk

It is basic for any organizations especially of Mubadala Development Company to identify the risk associated with the COVID-19 pandemic. The risk definitely concerns all the people who work for the institution who come from the various industry sectors of the company. There are many types of risks such as environmental risks, legal risks, regulatory risks and market risks. In the case of Mubadala, the most risk it faces is the financial risks because many of the business activities across various industry sectors are paralyzed because of the limited movement of the people especially of the workers of the company. The organization in review must have a risk management solution to be employed so that any information regarding the possible types of risk will be inserted directly to the system.

Step 2: Analyze the Risk

Mubadala next thing to do after identifying the correct risk for the business associated with COVID-19 is to analyze the risk. The analysis includes the determining the scope of the risk. Analyzing means understanding the different factors of the organizations that are linked to the risks. Mubadala in this regard must determine the seriousness and severity of the risks in its different industry sectors so that it is easier to give solution if the type of industry sector is identified. Some industry sectors may have only minor risks such as Aerospace, capital and energy sectors because workers of Mubadala in these sectors have less contacts with their clients unlike with the hospitality industry and health where workers, staff and employees are frequently exposed to suspected positive COVID-19 cases and patients.

Step 3: Evaluate or Rank the Risk

Risks need to ranked for prioritization purpose. Mostly of the risk management solutions have distinct categories of risk that depend on the severity and seriousness of the risk. Definitely, risks that may have catastrophic loss to the business must be rated the highest, which unlike risks that can cause only inconvenience must also be rated lowly. To gain a holistic view, it is of paramount importance to organization to determine the risk exposure and its level of risk. Even only one industry sector has been determined to have a higher risk exposure is enough for Mubadala to give immediate intervention.

Step 4: Treat the Risk (Implementation Phase)

Every single risk, whether minor or major at that must be eliminated or contained. It means that containing the risk must be done by the expert in the field in the specific industry sector where the risk is present. Treating the risk is the responsibility of all the stakeholders of the specific industry sector with the close supervision of the mother institution which is the Mubadala Development Company. Stakeholders can discuss together the best solution to contain the risk before it becomes a hazard to the business activities. Upper management, which in this case is the Mubadala Development Company will have to keep a close eye on the solutions suggested by all the stakeholders for that specific industry sector.

Step 5: Monitor and Review the Risk

Organizations such as that of Mubadala must be realistic and must accept the fact that not all risks can be contained or eliminated. Also some risks are always present and even some organizations are not aware that they exist. Environmental risks and market risks must always be monitored and this is always done by diligent employees. Professionals and experts within the specific industry sectors must keep watch and monitor all the risk factors. It is advisable that risk management system will have to monitor the entire risk framework of the mother institution. Also, see to it that everyone within the system must know any factor or any changes in the level or type of risk.

Conclusion

In summary, the paper discussed the risk management process, its concept and application especially with the chosen institution, the Mubadala Development Company. Risk Management is the assessment of the risks that can negatively impact the business operations especially on the financial risk of the business firm. In this report, risk management process refers to how Mubadala Development Company can be able to mitigate the impact of COVID-19 especially to the various industry sectors that the development company runs and manages in support of the economic development of the local government of Abu Dhabi. To mitigate the impact to the different industry sectors of the development company, first Mubadala has to assess and determine the level of risk brought about by the pandemic to the business operations especially of the institution different industry sectors. Previously, Mubadala identified that there were four level of risks that it may experience such as the lower risk level, medium risk level and high and very high level of risk exposure to COVID-19. This happens because Mubadala develops different industry sectors such as aerospace, health, financial service, capital, energy, ICT, etc. It was found out that each sector has different risk level. Finally, the research paper also discussed the risk management system and the monitoring process of Mubadala in connection with the containment of corona virus so as to cause hazard to the development company.

Recommendation

Below is the list of recommendations so that Mubadala can effectively mitigate the occupational hazards to which its workers maybe exposed to. Also, these recommendations will help Mubadala becomes more effective in its risk management process for the containment of the corona virus that may seriously affect negatively some of its industry sectors.

1. Mubadala is required all its workers especially in the healthcare sector personal protective equipment and respiratory protection.
2. Mubadala must always observe even just the minimum health protocol for all its workers regardless of the industry sector they belong but with priority to the healthcare and hospitality and real estate because most workers are exposed to suspected and unsuspected COVID-19 patients.
3. Mubadala must assess always the potential hazards that their workers may encounter with someone infected with corona virus in the course of their duties.
4. Employers (Mubadala) should determine if their workers could be exposed to environment or any laboratory samples, materials, etc which are contaminated with virus.
5. Mubadala must have professionals or experts who can help identify exposure risk for workers in order to implement appropriate control measures.