July 20, 2021

Richard Fenning on Tales from the Risk Business

Richard Fenning on Tales from the Risk Business

How can we manage risk in an increasingly complex world?

My guest on this episode, Richard Fenning, has spent three decades advising multinational companies on geopolitics and security crises. He’s been involved in helping to manage situations...

How can we manage risk in an increasingly complex world?

My guest on this episode, Richard Fenning, has spent three decades advising multinational companies on geopolitics and security crises. He’s been involved in helping to manage situations involving kidnappings, terrorist attacks, coups d’etat, corruption scandals, cyber-attacks, earthquakes and hurricanes in places ranging from Iraq and Russia to Colombia and Nigeria.

Richard is the former CEO of Control Risks (https://www.controlrisks.com/) a global consultancy that specialises in “helping businesses out of tight spots in difficult countries”. And of course when companies get into tight spots - and indeed when countries are ‘difficult’ - that’s usually because there are humans creating the tight spots or making the countries difficult. A perfect example of human risk in action.

Richard has just written a book called “What On Earth Can Go Wrong - tales from the risk business” in which he shares stories from his time in the field. You can find out more about that here: https://www.eye-books.com/books/what-on-earth-can-go-wrong

In our discussion, we explore how Richard came to work in this field - after all, it’s not something most of us would grow up thinking of as a career and what his experience has taught him about managing risk. Professionally and personally.

To learn more about Richard’s work visit: https://www.msp.co.uk/people/richard-fenning