Insurer Climate Risk Disclosure Survey: 2012 Findings and Recommendations

2012 was the warmest year on record in the Lower 48 states and the second most extreme weather year in U.S. history. This is not a coincidence. Extreme weather -- stronger, more damaging storms, unprecedented drought and heat in some regions and unprecedented rainfall and flooding in others -- are the predictable consequences of rising global temperatures.Eleven extreme weather events each caused at least a billion dollars in losses last year in the United States. A single event, Hurricane Sandy, caused more than $50 billion in economic losses. Insurance companies are on the hook for tens of billions of dollars in claims as a result of Sandy and other severe weather events. And American taxpayers are on the hook for tens of billions of dollars themselves, thanks to losses sustained by the National Flood Insurance Program as well as disaster relief spendingThis raises a fundamental question: Is the insurance industry prepared? Have insurers analyzed and measured their climate-related risk? Are they planning for life in a warmer world? These should be essential questions for insurance regulators in all 50 states to be asking, and some are

A Complexity Science Based Approach to Programme Risk Management

Programme management has rapidly gained acceptance as a vehicle for achieving organisational strategic objectives and as a means of aligning projects with the overall strategy of the organisation. Managing programme risk poses challenges which are different from those in project management. Attempts to modify and apply project risk management techniques to programme risk management have experienced difficulties. The implications of the challenges of programme risk management extend beyond the tools and techniques. Recent research shows that that programme management is neither an extension, nor a scaled up version of project management. Philosophically, a paradigm shift from the predominantly mechanistic and reductionist mindset to a more appropriate paradigm based on complexity science and the theory of complex adaptive systems is required. This leads to the conclusion that the classic event based view of risk is inappropriate in modelling and analysing programme risk which need to be treated as holistic and dynamic

A Complexity Science Based Approach to Programme Risk Management

Programme management has rapidly gained acceptance as a vehicle for achieving organisational strategic objectives and as a means of aligning projects with the overall strategy of the organisation. Managing programme risk poses challenges which are different from those in project management. Attempts to modify and apply project risk management techniques to programme risk management have experienced difficulties. The implications of the challenges of programme risk management extend beyond the tools and techniques. Recent research shows that that programme management is neither an extension, nor a scaled up version of project management. Philosophically, a paradigm shift from the predominantly mechanistic and reductionist mindset to a more appropriate paradigm based on complexity science and the theory of complex adaptive systems is required. This leads to the conclusion that the classic event based view of risk is inappropriate in modelling and analysing programme risk which need to be treated as holistic and dynamic

From Iconic Design to Lost Luggage: Innovation at Heathrow Terminal 5

This paper aims to contribute to understanding of how organizations respond to risk and uncertainty by combining and balancing routines and innovation. It shows how approaches to risk and uncertainty are shaped by the contractual framework in large multi-party projects. The paper addresses a gap in the literature on how risk and uncertainty is managed to deliver innovation in large-scale ‘megaprojects’. These megaprojects are notorious for high rates of failure that conventionally evoke organizational strategies avoiding risks and uncertainties. Yet strategies for managing risk and uncertainty are essential to the routines and innovation that overcome the challenges of successfully delivering large-scale, complex projects.

Using bricolage to facilitate emergent collectives in SMEs

Starting a new business is often done in a realm of improvisation if resources are scarce and the business horizon is far from clear. Strategic improvisation occurs when the design of novel activities unite. We conducted an investigation of so called ‘emergent collectives’ in the context of a small and medium-sized enterprise (SME). Emergent collectives are networks of information nodes with minimal central control and largely controlled by a protocol specification where people can add nodes to the network and have a social incentive to do so. We considered here emergent collectives around an enterprise resources planning (ERP) software and a customer relation management (CRM) software in two open source software (OSS) communities. We investigated how the use of bricolage in the context of a start-up microenterprise can facilitate the adoption of an information system (IS) based on emergent collectives. Bricolage is an improvisational approach that allows learning form concrete experience. In our case study we followed the inception of a new business initiative up to the implementation of an IS, during a period of two years. The case study covers both the usefulness of bricolage for strategic improvisation and for entrepreneurial activity in a knowledge-intensive new business. We adopted an interpretative research strategy and used participatory action research to conduct our inquiry. Our findings lead to the suggestion that emergent collectives can be moulded into a usable set of IS resources applicable in a microenterprise. However the success depends heavily on the ICT managerial and technological capabilities of the CEO and his individual commitment to the process of bricolage. Our findings also show that open ERP and CRM software are not passing delusions. These emergent collectives will not take over proprietary ERP and CRM software all of a sudden, but clearly the rules of the game are slowly changing due to the introduction of new business models. The study contributes to the research of OSS as emergent collectives, bricolage and IS adoption in SMEs

Born to be Wild: Using Communities of Practice as a Tool for Knowledge Management

This paper looks at what happens when Communities of Practice are used as a tool for Knowledge Management. The original concept of a Community of Practice appears to have very little in common with the knowledge sharing communities found in Knowledge Management, which are based on a revised view of 'cultivated' communities. We examine the risks and benefits of cultivating Communities of Practice rather than leaving them 'in the wild'. The paper presents the findings from two years of research in a small microelectronics firm to provide some insights into the wild vs domesticated dichotomy and discusses the implications of attempting to tame Communities of Practice in this way.Comment: Paper presented at the Ethicomp 2010: The 'Backwards, Forwards and Sideways' changes of ICT, Tarragona, Spain, April, 2010, pp. 71 - 80

River basin planning project: social learning (Science Report SC050037/SR1)

This report documents the findings of a 12-month Environment Agency science project on social learning for river basin planning. Our aim was to use social learning approaches and soft system methods to inform the development of the River Basin Planning Strategy and improve the effectiveness of the Environment Agency's Water Framework Directive (WFD) Programm