Risk Management Module Handbook 1 V3 2025-26 | Leeds Business School

Risk Management Module Handbook

Introduction from the Module Leader

Hello and ‘Welcome’ to this module on Risk Management!

This module is used in many degree pathways across the Postgraduate provision in Leeds Business School (LBS). These include:

• Corporate governance
• Supply chain management and logistics
• Management
• Business Administration

Just as several pathways use this module, there are many ways in which we can address Risk Management. This programme is based on the textbook for the Chartered Governance Institute (CGI) UK & Ireland core text on Risk Management, which is part of the reading list for the module.  The CGI curriculum is focused on Board Governance. This is a specialist area of corporate management mixing many disciplines and needing a mixture of legal, ethics, strategy, accounting, etc. skills. This will be our starting point, and we will focus on applying knowledge to situations and communicating the consequences to the organisation’s board level.  

Due to the range of programmes that take this module, we will be referring to other approaches to risk and contexts within which risk is understood. It is hoped that through this diverse approach to the topic, you will gain crucial skills and capabilities for your future career progression. 

The students coming to this module are from diverse backgrounds, and it is recognised that board governance hasn’t necessarily been part of their working experience.Therefore, we will be looking at Risk Management from the perspective of three disciplines: 

The lectures will focus on Risk Management across the three areas, and in seminars you will analyse case studies that lend themselves to multiple angles of consideration. I have taken on board feedback from previous student cohorts regarding the salience to different career aspirations and industrial contexts. As a result, the specific cases we look at will be kept up to date and may include current affairs and business developments occurring during the teaching semester. 

At the time of writing this module handbook, the intended issues we will address include:

1. Global supply chain disruptions and shortages
2. The Titan Submersible disaster
3. Boohoo Clothing Company
4. Barclays Bank
5. The use of Bitcoin and Cryptocurrencies in general
6. Tik Tok in the United States
7. Environmental Sustainability and Shell Oil Company
8. Southwest Airlines

I do stress that if something happens that is particularly important, we may change incorporate that issue as well or instead of one of the above.

Section 1: Module Aims and Format

Mode of Delivery

There will be an online lecture released each week on a Monday morning. This will be pre-recorded and available for you to watch from 9am that day ahead of your seminars. Please ensure that you view the recording and do the recommended reading ahead of your seminars.

An on-campus lecture will extend and support the online recorded session. This is an essential session that looks at the topic in more depth. It is a chance for you to ask questions about the material, and to clarify any points.

Seminar sessions are scheduled throughout the week. You will need to ensure that you check your timetable for the exact timing and location of each session. Please ensure that you have prepared for the session. The pre-reading / exercises will be detailed on the module page.

In section 2 below you will find a summary of each week’s focused activity.

During the seminar sessions you may be split into groups and will be expected to undertake a discussion on the issues raised during that week’s activity and from this to report back to the whole group on your reflections and suggestions. This means that you will have to ensure that you plan in reading and reflection time. The issues being considered are complex, can be considered from multiple angles and do not have a black and white answer.

Please note: we will be using digital tools in some of the seminars, but not all. If you are tasked with discussing a topic in a group and are asked to not use digital aids such as ChatGPT or Google searches , then please respect the request. The emphasis should be on the people in the room discussing and making decisions. This is to teach you about when it is appropriate to use digital tools, and when it is not.

Module Aim 

The module aims to develop skills in independent thinking and collaborative working as students analyse and apply both the classic concepts and contemporary approaches to how strategy pertaining to risk is carried out in today’s organisations.

Module Learning Outcomes

1. Understand how to advise the board on the use of risk frameworks as a basis for appraising, evaluating, and supporting risk management
2. Be able to critically evaluate approaches to risk management
3. Be able to critically evaluate the management of risk and provide professionally appropriate advice to those responsible for governance
4. Understand how to critically examine the impact of the business environment on risk regarding legislation, policy and industry changes
5. Be able to critically evaluate the impact of organisational conduct, behaviours and culture on risk management practices.

Module Learning Activities 

The module strongly emphasises peer-to-peer learning. We therefore expect you to be an active participant in this module, contributing to a positive atmosphere by questioning, sharing and helping out others, engaging in meaningful discussions where we learn together.  You will need to read each and every week on the topic for the next week.  Resources will be placed online to assist you, while each week you should review the textbook.  You will be expected to apply knowledge and come up with options for Board consideration.

Regarding attendance, we expect you to keep on track by regularly attending class in order to benefit from learning within a community. This module is meant to be a place where you learn with and from, others. In this sense, we would like you to experience collaboration and peer-feedback, so please make sure you follow up with your peers to enrich the overall learning experience.

Follow ‘MyBeckett’ and respect the module and course policies and the general moral code of academia. Any attempt to engage in plagiarism or academic misconduct will be viewed dimly and dealt with in accordance with the University’s regulations.

Communication

The tutor will guide you throughout the course, providing weekly content, promoting and engaging in discussions during seminars, and providing regular feedback and support.

During weekdays, your tutor will aim to respond within 48 hours to questions on the module content. 

The Module Leader is Greg Barnes, whose email is g.r.barnes@leedsbeckett.ac.uk. Also teaching on the module is Ella Smith, who is available at E.Smith@leedsbeckett.ac.uk 

All answers to common questions regarding assessment will be posted on MyBeckett for the benefit of everyone. Please carefully read this module handbook before emailing the tutor.

You must notify your Course Administrator if you are absent for more than one day (for example for an interview, emergency unforeseen circumstances, or for compassionate leave).  If you are going to apply for mitigation you will need to provide written evidence of the reason for your absence (see Extenuating Circumstances and Mitigation for further information).

Please note: the module leader and module team are NOT able to grant an extension and you must follow the Extenuating Circumstances route.

Contact Hours

Please see the specific support and contact hours for each seminar tutor on the module page. 

Your timetable will have the lecture and seminar that you have been assigned. For reference, the lecture is running on:

• Wednesday 12pm in RB241 Sagar Wright Lecture Theatre (Rosebowl)
  Greg Barnes will be holding ‘Office Hours’ for the module:
• Wednesday 10am to 12pm on campus by appointment
  Ella Smith will be holding ‘Office Hours’ for the module:
• Thursdays 2pm to 4pm on campus by appointment

Key Resources to Support Learning

The module has been built around the requirements of the Corporate Governance Institute (CGI) risk management curriculum, and therefore we have adopted their core textbook which is available digitally from the library. We are also using an excellent book on the Fundamentals of Risk Management that has a good overview of enterprise level risks:

Ashby, Simon (2022) Risk Management. https://leedsbeckett.on.worldcat.org/oclc/1181166609
Hopkin, P; Thompson, C (2022) Fundamentals of Risk Management, Sixth Edition. Kogan Page https://leedsbeckett.on.worldcat.org/oclc/1300754988 

These textbooks are additionally supported by material from the University Reading List system that is linked from the module page on MyBeckett. The week-by-week breakdown below outlines what basic reading is required by students prior to the seminar. 

There will be more supporting material also available on the module page that you can engage with if you wish to extend your knowledge

You will be requested to bring laptops for some of the sessions (either personal or borrowed from the library) or we may utilise the university computer labs in the Leslie Silver Building for computer-based work. Please ensure you pay attention to the module announcements and your timetable to stay up to date with locations.

Disability Advice and Support

Disabled students requiring additional support or alternative arrangements must declare and provide evidence of their disability to the Disability Advice Team as early as possible: https://www.leedsbeckett.ac.uk/student-information/disability-advice/. 

Section 2 : Weekly Schedule

Assessment Summary

Assessment Details 

Coursework 

The coursework for this module is an analysis of a real company. The company’s information will be provided for you to analyse, and the material in this case study must be used in your work. 

The company we will be analysing this semester will be: Taylors of Harrogate

You must analyse the case study company. Do not write your assignment for any other company.

Students on the ‘MSC Corporate Governance’ programme ONLY may choose to analyse the risk profile of their employer. This is subject to approval by your module leaders.

Assessment Company Information

The assessment company materials will be available on the Module page w/c 27 October 2025 (  Week 6).
The company has agreed to be interviewed for the purpose. The materials in the case study are bespoke for this exercise and based on their current and emerging risk profile.
The case study information will include:

• An interview with the company’s representative
• Publicly available financial and trading information
• Internal policy documents from the company
• Contemporary current affairs materials relating to the company and the emerging areas of uncertainty they are concerned with.

Course Work Assessment: Written Risk Report (100% of module grade)

You have been asked by the board of the company to analyse their main risks and prepare a risk report. This will entail four major elements and offer a strategy for the company to respond to their risk profile: 

The structure of the report should be as follows:

Describe the risk identification ‘tool’ you have used, and how it was used to identify the risks to the business, and why this tool was the appropriate choice for this business (around 500 words excluding figures)

Risk identification ‘tools’ are structured processes that a manager follows to identify risks to a company. We will be covering a number of these tools during the module. Each tool has an ‘output’ – for example, a root cause analysis may be expressed using an ‘Ishikawa’ diagram. You must include the diagram or other ‘output’ from the tool you use.

You are NOT permitted to use a PESTLE or SWOT (or other version of the same tools) in your assignment.
The tool selected should be one of the following:

• Root Cause Analysis (RCA) and Ishikawa Diagram
• Risk Breakdown Structure (RBS) and RBS table
• Process Mapping and a Swimlane diagram or system flowchart
• Strategic Risk Identification and a Strategy/Risk Wheel

A detailed assessment of the top 5 risks that the company is currently facing and an explanation of
the mitigations that you will put in place to control for the risk exposure to these risks (circa 2000 words)

• You must give full details of the risk, the implications and impacts. The mitigations should be clearly linked to the risk and the company’s overall strategic approach.

A recommendation to the board on how ERM or ISO31000 may be used in this company to ensure
that the risks and mitigations are effectively managed. This section should clearly link to the risks and mitigations from the previous section (circa 500 words).

A full reference list for all the sources you have used for your assignment.

• An appendix that includes your ‘prompt history’
   
  This module is using AI tools to help analyse documents to support your decision making. In order to judge how you have used AI in this assignment, you will need to provide a prompt history. Please see the section below on ‘Generative and AI tools’

A separate EXCEL spreadsheet should be provided via a second Turnitin link on the module page.
This will contain your full risk register.

This spreadsheet must conform to the standard approaches we have followed in the module. It must be in Microsoft Excel format and be presented on ONE sheet. It should contain a minimum of 25 clearly defined risks, the inherent exposure, mitigations and residual exposure

To write the assignment, we recommend the following workflow which is based on the risk management cycle:

• Use a risk identification tool to structure your analysis of the company
• Complete the risk register to assess and prioritise the risks you have identified
• Write in detail about the top five highest ‘scoring’ risks to the company, and their mitigations
• Contextualise your comments within ERM / ISO31000 and think about the strategic implications for business operations.

In the seminars, we will be working on examples and practice exercises that follow the same processes that are used in the assignment so you will have opportunity to practice and get feedback on this way of working.

Reference MUST be made to the academic content of the module and include the use of concepts detailed in the reading list for the module. In particular, this should include the module textbook Ashby (2022) Risk Management and Hopkin & Thompson (2022) Fundamentals of Risk Management. Page numbers MUST be used when referring to any books or journal articles.

Reference MUST be made to the Assessment Company materials. There will be information that is only available to our module and is not in the public domain. If you do not use the Assessment Company materials, then you will not demonstrate your ability to apply the learning from the module.

Word Count

The word count for the report (Word Document) is 3,000 words +/- 10%.
 
You need to complete the Risk Register (Excel spreadsheet) with a minimum of 25 risks that clearly link to the Assessment company. There is no word count limit for the Excel spreadsheet.

Assessment Submission

The deadline for submission of this assessment is 14:00 on 6th January 2026. Please note that you can submit this assessment before the deadline.

The Business School are operating a flexible assessment submission policy during 2024/25. This means that if you require additional time, you are permitted to submit up to 5 working days after the deadline, without late submission penalties being applied and without applying for an extension. This means the final date and time for submission without late penalty is 14:00 on Tuesday, 14th January 2025.

If you require more time beyond the additional 5 working days flexible submission period, you can apply here for an additional 5 working days (making 10 working days from the original deadline) or apply for Mitigation to request to defer your assessment to the next module assessment period. Please note that both a 10-day extension or mitigation request must be accompanied by appropriate documentary evidence, for example a doctor’s letter and will be reviewed. Further information on the flexible assessment submission policy and mitigation in general can be found here.

Student Instructions for Submission of Coursework

This module requires you to submit your work online.

You MUST submit your work through MyBeckett using the link set up by the tutor. Receipt of your work will be recorded.
Your "Turnitin assignments" in MyBeckett can be set up so that you can check your assignment yourself as you submit it. This checking is done by creating a "Similarity Report".  If this report shows that there are some problems with your work, such as un-cited quotations, you should be able to make corrections and re-submit the work again before the due date. More information about Turnitin is available online here: https://libguides.leedsbeckett.ac.uk/it_support/mybeckett/turnitin
Please note: Tutors will follow up any suspected breach of academic integrity found after the submission date as per University policy. Late penalties will apply as per University Regulations.

To be clear, your module tutors cannot grant an extension for submission and you must instead follow the process outlined above regarding mitigating circumstances if you are in need of more time to submit your work.

Instructions to Students

Please read carefully the assessment and grade/marking descriptors overleaf. You should aim to evaluate your own work against this rubric, and the rubric is the grading system that will be used by your tutors when marking your work.

Use of Artificial Intelligence

The use of Generative AI is not permitted in this assignment. This is due to the particular nature of the bespoke case study you are analysing. If you wish to use AI, and AI based translation or proofreading tool, or other such service or product, then you must reference its use in your reference list at the end of the report. Failure to do so may result in a deduction of marks. 

Assessment Title: Risk Report