After nearly 350 people were killed in two crashes, the Boeing 737 Max jets were grounded worldwide for 8 months, beginning in March 2019. The subsequent action unfortunately only came about after great tragedy. Were there early warning signs within Boeing and the FAA that could have helped avoid the devastating result? How did culture play a factor in allowing risks to manifest into a full-blown crisis? These are just a few of the questions that this case study will explore as we examine the crisis through the lens of enterprise risk management and seek to identify some valuable insights that can be gained for CROs and ERM professionals.

ERM requires an understanding of the company’s strategic goals and objectives to identify the risks that might derail their achievement. It is often hard to justify the time and expense of measuring something that is not easy to measure. Demonstrating or proving how a goal was met because something didn’t happen or wasn’t strongly experienced is a challenge. This session  discusses ways to present success stories and best practices for championing your ERM program to senior leadership as a part of the Agency’s overall strategy.

The HUD panel discusses the Department’s FERA policy. The FERA policy is a key tool used by HUD to buttress its risk responsibilities. This policy was developed to align with the authorities prescribed by OMB Circular A-123 , the GAO Green Book , Payment Integrity Information Act of 2019 (PIIA) , the Fraud Reduction and Data Analytics Act of 2015 , and the GAO Fraud Risk Framework . to identify, understand, prioritize, and treat programmatic risks with the potential of having the greatest level of adverse impact on a program’s ability to meet mission goals and objectives, operations, and reputation. More specifically, the FERA policy was created to facilitate the identification of risks associated with launching or substantially revising a HUD program. As such, this policy is aligned HUD’s ERM framework, which can be mapped back to the 17 principles of GAO’s Standards for Internal Control in the Federal Government, including Principle 8, which specifically addresses fraud risks.

A recent FAA initiative spanning 14 months, involved a change management effort to build a three-year organizational strategy while applying evidence-based management practices in alignment with the Federal Data Strategy and the Evidence Act. Increasing the rigor behind data collection and analysis cannot be left to the “research arm” of the organization. Risk data, risk information and risk knowledge are not synonymous concepts yet are often used as such. Informed executive decision-making means sorting through the evidence derived from the four primary sources to moderate strategic conversations and prioritize measurable activities. The result can be improved organizational outcomes in service to the American public. This presentation will cover the framework of the approach and those lessons learned offering value to federal colleagues and their ERM efforts. A White Paper is available, titled Improving Strategic Outcomes with Evidence-Based Management: An FAA Experience.