People Risk: Managing Risks for Workforce and Business Resilience

Mercer Marsh Benefits’ new research examines 25 of the most pertinent threats to employers in the Middle East and North Africa today to help stakeholders identify, understand and prioritize which risks should be addressed through employee benefits plans, health insurance and other initiatives to minimize the impact to their organisation. 

By hearing first-hand from Risk Managers and HR professionals across the MENA region, we have learned which people risks would have the most severe impacts and the barriers preventing firms from mitigating them.

Building a risk management framework

The 25-people risk framework can help the Risk Managers and HR teams articulate in board-level conversations the consequences of not acting now to manage these threats, such as the rising cost of medical insurance. It starts at the top, the Executive Leadership Team needs to partner with HR and Risk Managers to help protect, equip, and motivate the organization’s critical asset; its people.

Risk and HR managers alike said the biggest difficulty in managing people-related risks was that their organization lacked skilled resources to understand the risks and senior leadership engagement.  

A shared responsibility

It is important to have the agendas of both HR as well as Risk Managers aligned to collaborate and create a greater impact.

Employee benefits can be used strategically to manage a range of threats and build workforce and business resilience. 

To get a copy of the MENA report, please fill out the form.

About the survey

The Managing the People Side of Risk survey was conducted over March and April 2021 with1,381 respondents across Asia, Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean, Middle East and Africa, North America, Pacific and the United Kingdom.

There was a split of 54% risk professionals and 46% HR professionals, with participation across a wide range of industries. The respondents also represented a cross-section of employer sizes.

Survey respondents were asked to assess the likelihood of the risk occurring in their organization in the next three years on a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 representing a risk that is not very likely and 5 a risk that is very likely to occur. They also assessed the severity of each risk’s impact on the business if it were to occur on a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 representing no impact and 5 a catastrophic impact.

The risk rating score was calculated as a product of the likelihood and severity of the risk occurring.

Respondents were also asked to assess to what extent their organization is currently addressing the risk on a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 representing not at all and 5 to a great extent.

These are the 25 people risks as grouped under five pillars: