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The Public Organisation Risk Management concept challenges managers to develop a means of systematically identifying and managing key features of the organisation’s uncertainty field (its risks, uncertainties, the unknown and emergent, and the human perception/behaviour component). This presents an immense challenge, as it seems an organisation would need – in some sense – to identify all aspects of the environment before then isolating that subset of the most important risks and uncertainties. Clearly this is impossible, but a conscious awareness of this limitation might be valuable in its own right.

Assessment and analysis refers to the systematic and ongoing process by which a public organisation identifies, analyses, and measures the key components of its uncertainty field. A foundation concept that governs assessment and analysis is the view that public organisations are, in effect, collections of contracts, obligations, commitments, and agreements between the government and resource holders. Those arrangements serve as means by which the public organisation becomes exposed to the elements of the uncertainty field. Those elements, in turn, arise from the physical, social, political, economic, legal, operational, and cognitive environments.

A more detailed exposition of assessment and analysis appears in both Chapters Six and Seven. Here, in Chapter Five the goal is to set the foundation for such an exploration. Key terms and concepts are presented, and some core issues are introduced. As with all chapters, the discussion will address what have been identified as ‘traditional’ as well as enterprise risk management influenced perspectives. This in turn will lead to some coverage of alternative thinking about the assessment and analysis process.

In this chapter we chart the evolution of the theory of the multinational enterprise (MNE) from Buckley and Casson’s original depiction to Buckley’s conceptualization of the global factory. Within that context we consider the issues of risk and uncertainty which continue to challenge firms in the international context. Indeed, despite the explosion in access to greater wealth of digital sources of information and knowledge, risk, uncertainty, volatility, complexity, and ambiguity remain constraints on the ability of firms to function effectively in the international arena. Theoretical development around the nature of the MNE must deal with such enormities, but also other demands in the global context. The evolution of the global factory has been recognized as the disintegration of the MNE through the externalization of many of its previously core activities, including parts of production and marketing, but this form of the MNE will not be the end-game. Ultimately, it may be questioned whether the MNE is becoming, or has become, just a global super-manager of value activities orchestrating the internationalization of production.

Ours is a complex world. On these five words will be built a foundation for an alternative way of framing our thinking about risk management. Complexity means many things, but a key feature is that outcomes cannot be predicted with certainty. In the best cases, opportunities arise to analyse and develop some understanding of the uncertainty within a complex system, and in the most fortunate of such circumstances it is possible to anticipate specific outcomes with some degree of accuracy. The authors call such circumstances risks – that is, measurable uncertainties. Complexity, however, consists mainly of interconnected uncertainties and unknown/unknowable possible outcomes or effects. And, of course, complex systems can include humans whose (in)ability to perceive and interpret such environments makes things – well – more complex.

This book ultimately will focus on how the authors construct a way to lead and manage in this environment, but first it is critical that the terminology and description of this world be given some precision. Therefore, Chapter One begins with an introduction to the idea of complexity, including some mention of the principles and concepts that inform our understanding of it. In turn, this discussion introduces uncertainty. Risk, as a category of uncertainty is discussed and the implications of its measurability are presented, which leads to a discussion of human perception and behaviour under conditions of uncertainty. Attention is then drawn to the unknown and the unknowable, and to emergent phenomena. Since the focus of this book is on public sector risk management, the chapter concludes with a brief discussion of the idea of public risk.

This study finds evidence that a stock return is inversely correlated with downside risk, confirming a pattern of risk-aversion behavior. Evidence from testing a stock return's response to a change in economic policy uncertainty indicates a significantly negative effect in the Chinese stock market; this conclusion holds true for testing the impacts of changes in fiscal and monetary policy uncertainties. However, the data produce a mixed effect for the change in fiscal policy uncertainty. The evidence produced from examining the geopolitical effect on the stock market strongly supports the presence of an adverse effect on stock market performance.

This paper aims to study the impact of geopolitical uncertainty on corporate cost of debt and the moderating role of information asymmetry between creditors and borrowing firms.

This study uses 5,223 firm-quarter observations on German-listed firms spanning 2010:Q1–2021:Q4. This study regresses the cost of debt financing on the geopolitical risk, accounting quality and other control variables. Information asymmetry is measured using the performance-matched Jones-model discretionary accrual and the stock bid-ask spread. It uses interaction terms to check if information asymmetry moderates the impact of geopolitical uncertainty on the cost of debts and control for the moderating role of business risk. For the sake of robustness check, it uses long-term cost of debt and bond spread as alternative dependent variables. In addition, this study executes instrumental variables regression and propension score matching to control for potential endogeneity problems.

Estimation results show that geopolitical uncertainty exerts a positive impact on the cost of debt. This impact is found to be more important on the cost of long-term debts. Information asymmetry is found to exacerbate the positive impact of geopolitical risk on the cost of debt. These results are robust to the change of the dependent variable and to the mitigation of potential endogeneity. At high levels of information asymmetry, this impact is more important for firms belonging to “Transportation”, “Automobiles and auto parts”, “Chemicals”, “Industrial and commercial services”, “Software and IT services” and “Industrial goods” business sectors.

Geopolitical uncertainty should be seriously considered when setting strategies for corporate financial management in Germany and similar economies that are directly exposed to geopolitical risks. Corporate managers should design a comprehensive set of corporate policies to improve their transparency and accountability during increasing uncertainty. Policymakers are required to implement innovative monetary and fiscal policies that take into consideration the heterogeneous impact of geopolitical uncertainty and information transparency in order to contain their incidence on German business sectors.

Despite its relevance to corporate financing conditions, little is known about the impact of geopolitical uncertainty on the cost of debt financing. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, there is still no empirical evidence on how information asymmetry between creditors and borrowing firms shapes the impact of geopolitical uncertainty on the cost of debt. This paper tries to fill this gap by interacting two measures of information asymmetry with geopolitical uncertainty. In contrast with previous studies, this study shows that the impact of geopolitical uncertainty on the cost of debt is non-linear and heterogeneous. The results show that the impact of geopolitical uncertainty does not exert the same impact on the cost of debt instruments with different maturities. This impact is found to be heterogeneous across business sectors and to depend on the level of information asymmetry.

New business practices and the globalization of markets force firms to take innovation as the fundamental pillar of their competitive strategy. Research and Development (R&D) plays a vital role in innovation. As technology advances and product life cycles become shorter, firms rely on R&D as a strategy to invigorate innovation. R&D project portfolio selection is a complex and challenging task. Despite the management's efforts to implement the best project portfolio selection practices, many projects continue to fail or miss their target. The problem is that selecting R&D projects requires a deep understanding of strategic vision and technical capabilities. However, many decision-makers lack technological insight or strategic vision. This article aims to provide a method to capitalize on the expertise of R&D professionals to assist managers in making informed and effective decisions. It also provides a framework for aligning the portfolio of R&D projects with the organizational vision and mission.

This article proposes a new strategic approach for R&D project portfolio selection using efficiency-uncertainty maps.

The proposed strategy plane helps decision-makers align R&D project portfolios with their strategies to combine a strategic view and numerical analysis in this research. The proposed strategy plane consists of four areas: Exploitation Zone, Challenge Zone, Desperation Zone and Discretion Zone. Mapping the project into this strategic plane would help decision-makers align their project portfolio according to the corporate perspectives.

The new approach combines the efficiency and uncertainty dimensions in portfolio selection into an integrated framework that: (i) provides a complete representation of the stochastic decision-making processes, (ii) models the endogenous uncertainty inherent in the project selection process and (iii) proposes a computationally practical and visually unique solution procedure for classifying desirable and undesirable R&D projects.

Uncertainty management (UM) in projects has been a point of attention for researchers for many years. Research on UM has mainly been aimed at uncertainty analyses in the front-end and managing uncertainty in the construction phase. In contrast, UM components in the design phase have received less attention. This research aims to improve knowledge about the key components of UM in the design phase of large road projects.

This study adopted a literature review and case study. The literature review was used to identify relevant criteria for UM. These criteria helped to design the interview guide. Multiple case study research was conducted, and data were collected through document study and interviews with project stakeholders in two road projects. Each case's owners, contractors and consultants were interviewed individually.

The data analysis obtained helpful information on the involved parties, process and exploit tools and techniques during the design phase. Johansen's (2015) framework [(a) human and organisation, (b) process and (c) tools and techniques)] was completed and developed by identifying relevant criteria (such as risk averse or risk-taker, culture and documentation level) for each component. These criteria help to measure UM performance. The authors found that owners and contractors are major formal UM actors, not consultants. Empirical data showed the effectiveness of Web-based tools in UM.

The studied cases were Norwegian, and this study focussed on uncertainties in the project's design phase. Relevant criteria did not cover all the criteria for evaluating the performance of UM. Qualitative evaluation of criteria allows further quantitative analysis in the future.

This paper gave project owners and managers a better understanding of relevant criteria for measuring UM in the owners and managers' projects. The paper provides policy-makers with a deeper understanding of creating rigorous project criteria for UM during the design phase. This paper also provides a guideline for UM in road projects.

This research gives a holistic evaluation of UM by noticing relevant criteria and criteria's interconnection in the design phase.

This study investigates the impact of economic policy uncertainty on corporation innovation in innovative cities. The study sheds light on different results from the previous literature by testing the moderator effects of entrepreneurial risk appetite on such impact.

A static panel estimator is applied to a Chinese sample of 416 firm-year observations from 2010 to 2019. This paper uses regression model to test the impact of uncertainty on enterprise innovation in innovative cities, and to test the regulatory role of entrepreneurial risk appetite. For a series of robustness analysis conducted by the author to deal with endogeneity, the results are robust.

The author finds reliable evidence that the economic policy uncertainty can promote corporations to invest more in R&D in innovative cities. In addition, the role of the entrepreneurial initiative is significant, and there is a positive moderating effect of entrepreneurial risk appetite between policy uncertainty and corporation innovation.

From a practical point of view, this study examines the impact of economic policy uncertainty on corporation innovation in innovative cities for the first time. It emphasizes the role of entrepreneurial risk-taking in the development of corporation innovation in Shenzhen, an innovative city. This research is of great significance to the formulation of government policies and the innovative choice of entrepreneurs. In addition, the research shows that the entrepreneurial risk appetite in innovative cities can have a positive impact on enterprise innovation. Therefore, when formulating policies, the government should take the subjective factors of entrepreneurs into account and support enterprises with innovation potential. The evidence of this study also helps entrepreneurs make innovative decisions and enhance their confidence in enterprise development.

By studying the impact of economic policy uncertainty on enterprise innovation under the regulation of enterprise risk appetite, this study shows the subjective and positive role of entrepreneurs in risk grasp in innovative cities for the first time. In addition, it fills the gap of the impact of policy uncertainty on innovative urban enterprises. In fact, although it is traditionally believed that economic policy uncertainty has a negative impact on enterprise innovation, the sensitive findings of this study reveal completely different results from previous studies.

This study aims to examine factors influencing potential commercial innovators' intention to innovate with open government data (OGD) via a risk perspective.

The authors develop a theoretical model that explains how different forms of uncertainty (i.e. financial, technology, competitive, demand, and data) and their inter-relationships influence potential commercial innovators' intention to innovate with OGD. The model is tested using survey data collected from 144 potential commercial innovators from a developed Asian country.

The results suggest that all other forms of uncertainty, except competitive uncertainty, negatively influence potential commercial innovators' intention to innovate, mediated by their perceived risk of innovating with OGD. The results also show positive relationships between different forms of uncertainty, i.e. competitive and financial, demand and competitive, data and financial uncertainty.

This paper identifies major forms of innovation uncertainty, perceived risk, their inter-relationships, and impacts on the intention to innovate with OGD. It also finds support for a unique form of uncertainty for OGD innovation (i.e. data uncertainty).

This paper provides a practical framework for managers to develop a sustainable supply chain. Given that rapid globalization has increased supply disruption risk, managers have been forced to establish efficient and responsive supply chain strategies. Nevertheless, diverse uncertainty factors, such as risk perception of strategies, have made practical management difficult. Quantifying managers' risk perceptions and applying them to supply chain strategies allows the authors to propose a structural and practical model for managing supply disruption.

The existing structural model is refined by taking subjective factors into account using the analytic hierarchy process. The applicability of the refined model is demonstrated through a comparative case study.

Managers' risk perceptions vary not only among companies but also between managing divisions within a company, which necessitates possible changes in strategy due to environmental turbulence. The principal component analysis (PCA) characterizes managers' risk perceptions that illustrate companies' emphases on disruption risk.

The proposed approach quantifies risk perception, which enables practitioners to deal with subjective information in quantitative form. Comparative studies clarify differences in perception given different business backgrounds. The results provide managers with in-depth insights for establishing supply chain strategies reflecting their risk perception.

Quantification of managers' subjective risk perception clarifies both the trend and the individual features for uncertainties. The results allow the authors to conduct the PCA, which characterizes companies. Comparative studies generalize the results of extant work, shedding light on cross-sectional differences given different business backgrounds. The effectiveness of the approach is confirmed through retrospective interviews with practitioners.