Horizon Scanning Tool
USING AI TO SAVE YOU TIME

There are plenty of challenges for risk leaders who are tackling the process of horizon scanning and who want to be confident that they are identifying the correct threats and opportunities. This is because emerging risks, by their very nature, are hard to define and are “out there” in the distance.

Emerging risk has become a much bigger focus for companies in the wake of the pandemic, and we have received feedback from members that they are very interested in trying to work out what is on the horizon.

The emerging risk tool collates information that would otherwise take members a long time to put together, and presents in an accessible, easy-to-understand format – users can either employ the tool to complete a brief scan of relevant data, or drill down further to focus on the detail they are really interested in.

For risk managers who are new to emerging risk and are just starting to build up their organisation’s horizon scanning capabilities, the tool represents a good starting point. Equally, experienced risk leaders can use the tool to find the data they need quickly, saving time and resources, whilst validating their approach.

Some companies (although not all) include emerging risks in their annual report. We feed the data from these reports into the tool, along with emerging risks highlighted in reports by associations, consultants and global organisations (e.g. the World Economic Forum or the European Commission). We then use natural language processing tools to align risks to our three tier taxonomy: PESTLE category, then trends within each category, then specific risks.

The newest version of the tool (March 2023) introduces a new taxonomy, based on requests from members, and validated by experienced risk leaders.

The taxonomy breaks risks into PESTLE categories first, then each of those is further broken down into trends, and then specific risks.

This allows users to see how emerging risks are changing over time.

For example, the transition to a low carbon economy (a trend within the environmental PESTLE category) accounted for almost 19% of reported emerging risks in our tool in 2022, up from about 7% in 2021, showing that it's becoming increasingly important to businesses.

There are also options to filter by year and source (e.g. industry, company report or external report) to provide a more focused view of emerging risk trends.

The tool will constantly be iterated with new features added regularly.