Argentina: The Red Queen Effect or the urgency to

implement Risk Management Systems and Security

Management Systems

Juan Moratto

The Red Queen, in Alice in Wonderland, told Alice “My dear, here we must run
as fast as we can, just to stay in place. And if you wish to go anywhere you
must run twice as fast as that.”

In the business world, this means

that Risk Management Systems,
angular stone of the security
systems, must evolve constantly
inside a model of Plan-Do-Check-
Act or Deming Method of
Continuous Improvement.

On the other hand, companies will

continue administering risks that
didn´t exist anymore and are blind
in front of the new risks they must
mitigate.

In spite that the ISO 31000:2018 is

explicit enough in this sense, a
short list of companies could be
successful inside the total crisis
that Argentina is suffering.

Nevertheless, the Red Queen

Effect that the actual Government
has caused could be palliated in
order that the business implement
– by the way, a lot of them for the
first time in their history- the concept of Risk Management inside their business strategies.

The ISO Standard 73 defines "Risk" as the "effect of uncertainty on objectives" and this
definition is excellent because don´t dig in the original causes of risk and don´t exclude
positive or negative risk but only says that it produces a degree of uncertainty over the
results, i.e. it treats the effects but not the causes.

At the same time, security is the science that covers all kind of undesired and harmful
incidents against people and goods, caused intentionally by men to harm people or
appropriate illegitimately of goods.

So, security pays attention to risks that affect business strategic plans and not against
those who favour them, because there could exist positive risks that could improve
entrepreneurship position or strategical positions but they are not analyzed by security
(best analyzed by the CFO or CMO instead of the CSO).

Enterprises are living in an extremely hostile context where the main adversaries are the
Government, inherited corruption and international actors.

All this evidenced through the increase of the costs of critical assets, fuel, transportation,
etc, unilaterally. Higher tax burden loans to the country in terms that exceed a century.

Shrinking of the internal market and the impossibility of gaining competition into the
external market. Add to this, the free access of China to the Latin American markets
thanks to its very “interested” financial supports.

Total unionization of the workers most of the times causes the inexorable bankruptcy of
those companies incapable of solving similar imbalances; and dozens of drawbacks that
hinder the productive activity of a country: social rupture, inaccessibility to credit due to its
interest rates, security supporting the State interests instead of the interest of the the
citizenry and polarized political estates, all at the same time.

Within this reality, risk management and security must have a serious protagonism in
private businesses.

For those who still think that business security consists of a guard at the door, an access
control and a dozen surveillance cameras I regret breaking the myth: they are completely
and definitely wrong, please, stop watching Netflix for a couple of days.

The integral management of security and business risk management go hand in hand.

Linking, as I mentioned in another article, risk management with security management is a

natural process and as such, strategies must mitigate the degree of uncertainty and lack
of protection. Security is holistic.

As we all know, the job of the security specialist is to analyze risks, vulnerabilities, threats
and consequences of any type of incident: internal - in its relationship with all the linked
departments -, external - in its relation to what they make their adversaries "criminals",
"competition" whatever they are and thus be able to face successful risk management
strategies.

Every security specialist manages the concept of "governability" of risk.

Without a vision in perspective and well structured, that integrates senior management,
finance, legal, human resources, occupational safety (security), IT and security itself, will
make impossible to mitigate the risks faced by the organization.

In short: nobody wants to suffer the "Red Queen Effect", but current circumstances
warrant it.

The time has come for Argentine businessmen to do what their peers around the world
do: develop a strategic perspective for security management and adjust risk management
measures to the real context they are going through if they want to be protagonists and
not disappear in the endeavour.

Some, and to finish, they could say that these technics are applied in other countries, in
ours, they doesn´t work. On the contrary: just as we have not yet done them in our
country, we are in a crisis of which we are co-participants.

If we had interpreted clearly the concepts of risk management and security management,
the impact would undoubtedly be much less.

Now you know, the future of YOUR Company is in your hands: implement just now a
Corporate Risk Management System and an intelligent Security Management.

If not, as the famous cat of Alicia said: if you do not

care where you want to get to, then it doesn't much
matter which way you go.