SmartSuite for the Risk Manager
The Risk Manager conducts risk assessments, maintains the register and tracks mitigation for their scope. They score likelihood and impact with the enterprise method, link risks to the controls and obligations that treat them, and keep owners accountable for treatment plans.
What you own
The Risk Manager conducts risk assessments, maintains the register and tracks mitigation for their scope.
- Facilitate risk identification and assessment workshops
- Score risks for likelihood, impact and velocity using the enterprise methodology
- Document risks, gaps and related issues in the register
- Assign mitigation owners, deadlines and track progress
- Monitor key risk indicators and residual risk
- Map compliance obligations and controls to the risks they treat
- Prepare risk reporting for committees and leadership
At a glance
The GRC processes this role owns, touches and depends on.
Owns
accountable for the process
Touches
contributes or approves
Depends on
consumes its output
How the GRC processes connect
Three lines of defense set the frame; the chain shows where each process hands off to the next. Colors follow the role: navy is owned, blue is touched, gray is depended on.
Reporting lines
Who this role reports to, who reports to them, and the peers they work with most.
Reports to
Direct reports
Works closely with
How SmartSuite supports this role
Lead
Risk management. Runs scoring workflows for inherent and residual likelihood and impact, documents risks and gaps, and tracks mitigation with owners and deadlines in one register.
Compliance management. Links compliance obligations to enterprise risks so residual risk and control coverage are visible together.
Internal audit. Aligns compliance outcomes and audit results with risk reporting through shared records.
Issues and actions. Monitors remediation progress and residual risk through linked issue records with automated reminders.
Reporting. Builds committee-ready risk reports from the register with filters by business unit, category and owner.
Products this role uses most
Industry reference
ISO 31000:2018 defines the process the Risk Manager runs: identification, analysis, evaluation, treatment and monitoring, with the IRM and RIMS competency frameworks describing the skills. COSO ERM (2017) links each risk to strategy and to the controls and obligations that treat it.
Sector rules shape the register. Banks apply Basel operational risk principles and RCSAs; healthcare organizations must perform the HIPAA Security Rule risk analysis; US federal agencies follow NIST SP 800-30 and OMB Circular A-123; technology companies run information security risk assessments under ISO/IEC 27005 and SOC 2.
Related roles
Explore Further
Guides and definitions from the GRC Knowledge Center and the What-is glossary, chosen for this role.
Frequently asked questions
What is a Risk Manager accountable for in their scope?
The Risk Manager is accountable for the risk process within their scope: facilitating identification and assessment workshops, scoring risks for likelihood, impact and velocity with the enterprise methodology, documenting risks, gaps and related issues in the register, assigning mitigation owners and deadlines and tracking progress, monitoring key risk indicators and residual risk, mapping obligations and controls to the risks they treat and preparing the reporting for committees and leadership. It is the ISO 31000 cycle, run for one part of the organization.
How does SmartSuite help a Risk Manager score and track risks in one register?
Enterprise Risk Management (ERM) runs scoring workflows for inherent and residual likelihood and impact, documents risks and gaps, and tracks mitigation with owners and deadlines in one register, so a workshop's output is scored by the method, recorded with its gaps and assigned before the room empties. Risk and Control Self-Assessment (RCSA) brings the first line's own assessments into the same register. The Risk Manager sees residual risk move as mitigation closes, and the Risk Analyst keeps the data behind it clean.
How does this role map obligations and controls to the risks they treat?
SmartSuite links compliance obligations to enterprise risks so residual risk and control coverage are visible together, and Compliance Assessments & Testing holds the test results that say whether the controls work. For the Risk Manager that means a risk shows the obligations it carries and the controls treating it, with the last test result beside each, so a control failure found by the Compliance Manager changes the picture of residual risk immediately rather than at the next assessment cycle.
How are mitigation owners kept to their deadlines?
Issues Management monitors remediation progress and residual risk through linked issue records with automated reminders, so each mitigation action is an issue with an owner and a date, the owner is reminded as the date approaches and the Risk Manager sees what is overdue without chasing. Because the issue is linked to the risk, closing it updates the residual position the committee sees. Control Owners work the same records, so the status is theirs to update rather than the Risk Manager's to collect.
How does a Risk Manager prepare reporting for committees and the Enterprise Risk Director?
SmartSuite builds committee-ready risk reports from the register with filters by business unit, category and owner, and aligns compliance outcomes and audit results with risk reporting through shared records, so the report to the Enterprise Risk Director or a committee is a filtered view of the live register with the Internal Auditor's findings and the compliance results already attached. The Operational Risk Manager and IT Risk Manager produce their own cuts from the same register, which keeps the enterprise picture consistent.
How does a risk team move an existing register into SmartSuite?
By loading the register with its categories, scoring scales and owners first, then attaching open mitigation actions and the control and obligation mappings as each risk is next reviewed. New customers can start with SmartSuite Onboarding, a guided four-week program around one or two priority workflows; for a risk manager the first workflow is the register, with reporting from it by the first committee cycle. Teams under Basel operational risk principles, the HIPAA risk analysis or NIST SP 800-30 keep their existing method; the system records it rather than replacing it.
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