Toronto
The principal risk advisor for the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC), Mohamed Ismail led the development and implementation of enterprise risk management for North America’s third largest transit organization. “The application of enterprise risk management in the transit industry is relatively new,” he says. “It’s quite a challenge to make the case for ERM in an operationally heavy industry like transit.”
In the 21st century, Ismail’s risk management efforts focus on three key areas: aging infrastructure, sustainable funding and climate change. “The mid-20th century saw unprecedented investment in transit building, which means that many of these assets are now past their expected life. Without continued investment in state of good repair programs, many transit agencies are faced with degraded reliability and in some cases serious safety issues,” he says. “Funding, or lack thereof, is another risk that contributes to reduced service levels, reliability and low customer satisfaction. [Also], the impact of climate change on the infrastructure…”
“It’s quite a challenge to make the case for ERM in an operationally heavy industry like transit”
With TTC’s Five-Year Corporate Plan guiding the modernization of TTC’s services and the renewal of culture, equipment and processes, the organization is focused on emerging risks to ensure the success of the corporate plan. “By integrating ERM throughout the governance structure and embedding the culture across the organization, the executive and senior management teams are better equipped to make risk-informed decisions, resulting in the TTC ERM Program being awarded the RIMS ERM Award of Distinction for 2017,” he shares.
