by Stephen McPhie, CA
Partner RSD Solutions Inc.
The SEC in the U.S. and the UK Financial Services Authority today jointly issued an urgent advisory containing a new risk related compliance requirement that is effective immediately.
Essentially, for public and major private companies this involves an internal peer review of risk awareness by and of key personnel. This includes the five most senior executives and, rather incredibly, the five most junior staff in a company. As there is no elaboration, we assume this even extends to the cleaners. Apologies to cleaners, who are, by some measures, the most important people in a company, but in relation to risk compliance, have little involvement. (Actually, perhaps they have!) The review involves completing a questionnaire surrounding risk awareness and is to provide an assessment by the five most junior staff, regarding the personal responsibilities of the risk capabilities and awareness of the five most senior company staff. Therefore, for example, the janitor is required to complete a questionnaire about the personal sanitary habits of the CEO.
We are not sure what the intended benefit is of such an exercise but it could be an attempt to gauge how well a risk culture has been instilled throughout an organisation. Results are then to be posted on the company web sites.
OSFI, the Canadian financial institutions regulator, plans to implement the procedures at an indeterminate future date once they have a better understanding of the meaning of “risk awareness”.
Questionnaires must be submitted this morning, which is April 1st.
No comments:
Post a Comment