With the world more attuned to risk, there is an opportunity to leverage attention and find more effective ways to identify and communicate risk to decision-makers.

This is one of the messages in the preface to the 2021 Global Risks Report produced by the World Economic Forum (WEF).

An annual report which in 2006 and 2007 highlighted the risk of a flu pandemic. The risk did not diminish, and further editions stressed the need for global collaboration on a variety of health-related topics including overstretched health systems as we entered 2020.

Yet in 2020, against a backdrop of digital, technological and scientific advancements the coronavirus pandemic rampaged across the globe savaging economies and taking lives.

With the world more attuned to risk, there is an opportunity to leverage attention and find more effective ways to identify and communicate risk to decision-makers.

The message is worth repeating.

It is not enough for internal audit to be heard.

We have to win hearts and minds to drive meaningful action.

In this piece, we address WEF’S latest global risks report and explore its relevance for audit leaders.

Top global risks

The WEF thought leadership event in Davos, Switzerland brings together the worlds of commerce, charity, politics, science, activism and academia. An esteemed collective of some of the most influential, intelligent and creative minds on our planet.

Unsurprisingly climate related risks continue to dominate the top risks in terms of likelihood. The reappearance of pandemic, a perennial risk as part of infectious diseases, is a good example of availability bias, the mental shortcut we all use that relies on our recent memory for information and decision making. The last time we saw it in the top five was in the aftermath of the SARS outbreak in 2002-4.

Look at your organisation’s risk profile…