A polarised and volatile business landscape could emerge in the post-pandemic economy, the World Economic Forum warned last week in its Global Risks Report 2021. In facing these challenges, experts say finance teams can play a proactive role in changing how risks are managed in organisations.
The report said that unless organisations take immediate steps to boost their financial and operational resilience, they will become increasingly vulnerable to looming economic and environmental risks. Widening social inequalities and livelihood crises also threaten to destabilise workforces in the next several years.
Small and medium-size enterprises need to ensure sustainability of their future operations by finding alternative markets and getting support for training and redeployment, according to the report.
“For business and finance leaders, building resilience to risk and investing for future sustainability has arguably never been as important as it is now,” said Peter Giger, group chief risk officer of Zurich Insurance Group, speaking at the virtual launch of the report in Geneva.
In the report, a “global risk” is defined as an uncertain event or condition that, if it…
