Using enterprise risk management

Cricket World Cup and FIFA U/20 World Cup tournaments

WCO operating under Sport New Zealand was responsible for ensuring a co-ordinated/whole-of-tournament approach to risk management for both the Cricket World Cup and the FIFA U/20 Football World Cup. This followed a similar, successful sector-wide approach developed during the 2011 Rugby World Cup. KPMG was engaged to support the WCO and initially facilitated the whole-of-tournaments risk identification, assessment, and facilitation of the development of mitigation strategies with key stakeholders (tournament local organising committees, local authorities, tournament suppliers, and a range of government agencies).  

Activity included:

  • strong governance oversight of the risk framework and its implementation;
  • agency and local organising committee risk assessments;
  • whole of tournament risk assessments;
  • monitoring and reporting on risks and related mitigation strategies; and
  • scenario and contingency planning.

The Cricket World Cup was a great success for all of New Zealand and those involved. Similarly, all involved in the FIFA U20 World Cup are well equipped to deliver another successful tournament which will have long lasting legacy benefits for New Zealand. 

Critical to the success of the risk management approach was:

  • Early identification of, and engagement with, key stakeholders to deliver an enterprise risk management (ERM) framework.
  • Integration of risk management into the planning process right from the outset.
  • Use of common risk language and consistent approaches across the organising committees and agencies that enabled information discussion on risk ratings and appropriate risk mitigations. The ERM framework was designed for the whole of life of the tournament with all agencies being able to apply framework consistently. This was acknowledged as being extremely important and invaluable considering the number of agencies and personnel from those agencies involved. 
  • Independent challenge based on real scenarios to test agency and local organising committee responses.