What is the Risk Management System?
The Risk Management System (RMS) has been designed collaboratively by some of the world’s leading law firms to ensure that it satisfies the needs of both national and international professional firms regulated by the Solicitors’ Regulation Authority (SRA) and or the Financial Services Authority (FSA).

The RMS is a complete solution that enables Risk Managers, Compliance Officers, Compliance Officers of Legal Practice (COLP), Compliance Officers of Finance and Administration (COFA), and professional firms in general to comply with their regulator’s requirements relating to risk management and outcomes-focused regulation (OFR). The RMS provides the tools to efficiently manage risk across the firm and demonstrate a firm’s compliance with all appropriate regulations.

The RMS is designed to allow a Compliance Team to efficiently manage risk and demonstrate to management and its regulator how it is doing so.

The RMS Risk Register, Control Procedure Register, enhanced reporting and audit trail tools track the risk management activities that a firm has put in place and present those activities in a concise format to satisfy a firm’s regulator.

The RMS is cloud-based and secure with an intuitive web interface and advanced user-management capabilities which centralises access-control, communications, follow-up, alerts, reporting and audit capabilities as a complete and dynamic solution to replace the static Excel-based Risk Registers in place at many firms.

The Benefits of the Risk Management System

• The RMS provides management and auditors with an instant overview of the firm’s risk profile and current level of compliance.
• The RMS offers multiple levels of administrative controlled access: Firm Risk Manager, Group Risk Manager (coming soon), Risk Owner, Control Procedure Responsible Person, Control Procedure Assignee and User.
• Users can be profiled and assigned to multiple custom groups that map to the firm’s internal organisational structure.
• Users and groups can be dynamically assigned to risk control procedures.
• The RMS allows Risk Managers to add unique data fields and customised communications to match the unique requirements of their firms.
• The RMS is designed to remain up-to-date and compliant with all current regulations and rules.
• Risk Managers can create their own custom presentation of the Risk Register displaying only data important to them, in the order they wish to see it.
• Individuals in the firm can be given access to unique Risk Dashboards that display only data relevant to that individual.
• Colour-coded status indicators provide an instant snapshot of completed risk control procedures and those that need attention.
• The RMS "Nagware" engine and email templates allow Risk Managers to pre-set one or a series of dynamically generated reminders, notifications or warnings based on a combination of activity, inactivity, status and date.
• The RMS has advanced searching and filtering functionality which enables fast access to existing content.
• The sophisticated reporting functionality allows instant creation of presenation-quality reports.
• The RMS offers integration with the Legal Learning Management System (LLMS), with one centralised user database and a familiar user interface.
• As a stand-alone, web-based solution, RMS implementation and support requires very limited effort from IT staff.

RMS Background
To assess the regulatory risks that a firm poses regulators want to receive information about the perception the firm has of the risks it faces. They will also want to understand what arrangements or controls the firm has put in place to mitigate those risks.

This information will usually be maintained within a Risk Register. The Risk Register will usually include all current and emerging risks and other compliance-related issues.

Many leading firms already maintain Risk Registers but these are usually written in Microsoft Word or Excel formats which:

• Inevitably lead to accessibility, currency and version management issues;
• Do not offer any dynamic tracking or status management capabilities;
• Do not integrate any communication capabilities essential to effective follow-up on risk-related activities;
• Lack a verifiable audit trail; and
• Do not allow for implementing secure access controls to all or part of the confidential data.

The RMS is designed to allow firms to more efficiently manage and maintain a real-time, auditable Risk Register whilst also providing the Regulator with the evidence it needs to regulate compliance.