published_or_final_version / Business Administration / Master / Master of Business Administration

Every business faces risks and the first step in managing risk is making an inventory of the risks that a business faces and getting measure of the exposure to each risk. There are several risks that can affect an oil refinery. Generally recognized risks related to refineries are as follows: crude oil price, crack spread, marketing margin, sales volume, exchange rate, costs, credit and counterparty risk, and hazard risk. In this thesis, among these risk factors, major market price variables, such as crude oil price and crack spread, are regarded as risks or simulation variables; some of the other risks, such as marketing margin, utilization rate, and energy cost, are treated as uncertainties; the others are excluded or fixed. This thesis develops a hypothetical refinery financial model that reasonably approximates real models encountered in practice. To measure the impacts of risk factors on the refinery, three criteria are adopted; present value of net income for ten years, present value of net cash flow, and return on capital employed (ROCE). For sensitivity analysis, five variables are selected: crude oil price, crack spread, marketing margin, utilization rate, and energy cost. In order to measure the risk exposure of an oil refinery, this thesis makes Monte Carlo simulation 10,000 times, by using @RISK software. / Energy and Earth Resources / text

Risk management has become one of the major issues facing nurses. Its role in healthcare organisations has gained increased recognition as the consequences of risky decisions have become more visible. The project was primarily concerned with exploring issues that confront one particularly group of professionals - psychiatric nurses - as they experience a particular approach to risk management. The study used the advancement of the risk management agenda as an opportunity to examine the nature of risk management and consider what nurses understood to be the nature of a proficient risk management. Case studies analyses were provided of four psychiatric units. Data were collected over four years through observation, interviews and documents. It used an integrated approach to examine the development of risk management processes in its social, environmental and clinical contexts. Drawing on sociological theories of risk, it introduced the theoretical framework of arena concept and explained how this concept affect the decision making process. It was suggested that the decision making process is a social process in which regulative, normative and institutional effects influence the perceptions and management of risk. The processes were shown to involve a dynamic interweaving of certain structured interests mixing with both clinical and societal considerations inside and outside the healthcare settings. Risk was considered to be the outcome of a complex process of social construction comprising of cultural and political elements in which both the influence of institutions and individual evaluation can be discerned. The findings showed that psychiatric nurses presented a creative and critical understanding to the issues involved in risk management by adopting and absorbing new approaches to risk management in order to advance their professional work. This study formulates a new conceptual framework of understanding risk management in organisational context and contributes by drawing together previously unrelated research and shows how it provides the basis for a theoretical model risk management that is more complete.

This thesis is concerned with the assessment, perception and insurance of credit risk. The thesis aims to make contributions both within these areas, and at specific points of interface between them. No attempt is made to develop a single unifying thesis. Rather, a series of partial models are developed, both theoretical and empirical, that develop and connect particular facets of financial economics. The first model demonstrates how movements in market risk produce movements in lender risk-assessment effort. It is demonstrated that deleterious movements in market-wide risk can actually produce a fall in assessment effort. The capricious nature of risk assessment causes changes in the lender's perception of the weights placed on determinants. This has important implications for borrowers' attempts to minimize risk premiums. Time-variability of signal-weights is tested using structural break tests on ordinary least squares and fixed effects panel models. Results suggest a fluid relationship between risk and determinants. Central to empirical investigation is the measurement of perceived risk. A critique of potential measures rejects the use of interest rate spreads - the most commonly used measure - on the basis that they do not take into account the possibility of credit rationing. A model is then constructed to reproduce the standard explanation of credit rationing - Adverse Selection induced Credit Rationing Equilibrium (ASCRE). This model is then extended to include classificatory risk assessment. Assessment is found to reduce the scope for ASCRE, and to cause favourable selection. Credit insurance is then included, and it is found that insurance cover makes risk assessment less of an imperative to lenders, and reduces the utility losses from raising interest rates. The parallel implication is that credit insurance weakens ASCRE, to the extent that full insurance with flat-rate premiums removes the possibility of ASCRE altogether. If the terms of insurance are made contingent on the terms of the loan, a new form of credit rationing emerges: Contingent Insurance induced Credit Rationing Equilibrium (CICRE). CICRE is separate, but not mutually exclusive, to ASCRE. A theoretical model of the demand for loan insurance is developed, and empirically estimated, in the context of the UK mortgage market. Inter alia, the model examines the role of auto-perception of risk determining credit insurance demand. Results reveal the take-up of credit insurance to be relatively insensitive to the borrower's perception ofhis/her own risk.

This research explores the management of risk in operations. It explores the different structures influencing the treatment of risk and the influence on managerial risk taking behaviours. There is limited understanding within the extant literature of the different treatment strategies for risk in operations and what influences selection of treatment strategy. This research employs an abductive approach iterating between the theoretical and empirical. There are four levels of analysis: the firm, the function, the group and the individual. The research was conducted in two European Energy companies. The research found that there is a complex interaction between organizational structures and individual perceptions in managing risk. Corporate risk structures have limited influence on the selection of risk treatments. The specification of business function (service or asset focus) informs the process of risk management and use of systems. Use of systems and valuation techniques underpin the risk prioritization process and specifically the assessment of risk. There is an order of decision influences that reflects the Levers of Control (Simons, 1995; 1998): Risk treatments are prohibited by boundary systems. Secondly, individual’s beliefs influence positive selection of treatment, and third where a treatment has not been selected through beliefs, the performance system is consulted. The performance system is most likely to influence selection of risk acceptance or risk mitigation. It is found that classification of risk has more than a semantic influence on perception and risk treatment; it can prohibit uses of certain treatments and inform priority. Understanding of the decision process matures and increases in complexity in senior managers. It is found that the performance system has influences on manager’s beliefs and in the long term, reflecting vision and mission the implementation of boundary conditions.

The field of modern project management is not new, and what seems to have changed over the past decade is the evolution of techniques applying theory into practice. This had as a consequence for the need to standardise and structure different processes of project management, in a detailed, documented and formal manner. On the other hand, change management seen as an integrated process within project management is a rational process for exploring decision and behaviour alternatives in an attempt to realign the course of ‘derailed’ deliverables due to change and ensure project success. However, models contained in such frameworks often lack formal semantics and clarity; generally fail to address and assess organisational change management risk reasoning, in a rather detailed way as they do for the majority of the project management processes. Since, uncontrolled changes might have an effect on the projects’ success, it is vital to assess the probability of materialisation (risk) of success before the decision is made and whether to proceed with the change or not. For example, if the change dramatically increases the risk of failure then it is logical to assume that avoiding that implementation is the right decision. Ideally, a change or consequence based upon a decision should have a low impact and a fairly high level of predictability. This research, takes the challenge to propose a novel modelling approach, which will contribute significantly to the missing formality of business models especially in the change risks assessment area. The introduction of Change Risk Assessment Model (CRAM) allows the identification and definition of speculative relationships, between change risks in the form of hierarchical risk tree analysis. Overall, the method is dynamic and flexible enough that can be tailored to various project requirements, taking into account significant environmental risk factors which influence project deliverables. Project success is a key objective for today’s organisations; professionals can make use of a new methodology for risk assessment, compatible with project management frameworks which currently seems to be missing from literature. Project management methodologies are not a panacea against project failure; nevertheless, CRAM can be regarded as a comprehensive modelling approach which combines both quantitative and qualitative risk criteria analysis in decision making processes.

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Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited / Since the end of the Cold War, reduced budgets have limited technology growth in the defense industry making the use of Commercial Off-The-Shelf (COTS) software the accepted way to build systems. Twenty years ago, almost all DOD software-intensive systems were built by awarding large multimillion-dollar contracts to defense contractors to build systems from scratch. Consequently, with dwindling budgets, the military has recognized that they can no longer build an infrastructure independent of commercial industry. The use of commercial items does not reduce or eliminate the risks associated with the traditional development of software systems. Numerous programs have stumbled for the lack of careful consideration and identification of the unique risk factors imposed by commercial items. Even though the types of programs are diverse, there are common risk factors that can be identified from the past experiences of these programs. This thesis focuses on the critical risk factors and lessons learned associated with integrating commercial items into DOD software programs. It summarize lessons learn from programs that have made extensive use of commercial items, provides a risk checklist/questionnaire to assist PMs and developers in understanding the risks associated with their developments of a system using commercial items, and suggests mitigation strategies, which can be used as guidelines for the risk factors, to consider when adopting commercial components. Providing the starting point for a systematic structure approach to the risk management of commercial items. / Major, United States Army

M.Com. / Please refer to full text to view abstract