New year, new jobs? Operational risk job predictions

Is it all about IT?

Cyber is dominating the agenda and where businesses are so reliant on IT, it would seem that risk jobs will have a strong IT flavour to them in 2016. CEO’s are putting cyber, digitalisation and innovation at the top of their worry list, so it is hard to see those operational issues taking over during the year.

Conduct and integrity

Integrity issues for banking have not gone away, some 7 years after the financial crisis. Many organisations have a lot of work to do still, to see improvements and this will be a focus for those in risk jobs. We will see banks re-organise their operations in 2016 and this will also impact how those in risk jobs operate.

An increase in salaries

Those in risk jobs are in demand, especially those with strong communication and stakeholder management skills. A risk professional with just 5 years experience, could expect to command a salary of £90,000+; not rivalled by many other professions. With a limited number of people entering the industry, to meet the demand in risk jobs, salaries look set to increase even further. However, unlike cyber, job-hoppers are not necessarily welcomed and longevity is also valued when companies are deciding on salary increases.

How did our predictions fair in 2015?

The rise of the risk awareness job? We predicted that we would see more roles related to risk awareness and training. Many of the roles that came through during 2015, had a strong training element to them, with some jobs focussed solely on training and communication. Embedding the risk framework, appeared to have been a real focus for the year.

Increase in political risk jobs? Those in political risk and investigations faired well during 2015 as an increase in the amount of jobs did come through. Roles were interesting, varied, and were at all levels, from entry level to senior management jobs.


About BeecherMadden

BeecherMadden are niche global headhunters in risk, resilience & security, technology management, operations and senior appointments.