Taking a new path is never easy. In
order for GC to properly fulfill their
role, there will be the continuing need
to challenge strategy and proposed
decisions where the risks are great
and there is real legal exposure. It
was acknowledged that there can be
tension between a legal perspective
and a commercial point of view.
These areas of possible conflict were
reported by 78% of Canadian GC.
Conversely, only 6% suggested that
such tension never exists. Despite
this tension, there appears to be a
payoff from GC spending more time
anticipating legal risks related to
business decisions. The reduction
of disputes, litigation and regulatory
problems was believed by 53% of
Canadian GC to be a benefit of their
enhanced and expanded involvement
in business decisions. Only 18%
believed that such GC involvement
would not reduce tangible costs
and risks.
There are contrary views. One GC said:
“Not so sure that lawyers ought
to develop non-legal skills. Some
commentators are saying that the
legal team should be more careful
about pruning out non-legal tasks
and outsourcing them to more
efficient providers, and focus its
efforts on true “legal” tasks where
it can leverage its expertise.”
Facing the risk
Risk is one of the top agenda items for
senior management and directors. All
choices and decisions come down to
recognizing, assessing and measuring
risk and balancing those risks against
the resulting benefits and returns.
It is entirely understandable that risk
permeates the life and perspective
of GC in Canada. As a key advisor to
executive management and directors,
GC are focused on the most critical
risks and their impacts.
In Canada, the number one risk for GC
was seen to be “risk to reputation”
while this risk only ranked fourth on
global basis. Specifically, 53% of
Canadian GC saw reputation risk as
being significant compared to 38%
of global GC. This difference in the
perception and importance of reputation
risk between Canadian and global GC is
reinforced by the percentage of GC who
said that this was not an area of any risk:
in Canada only 2% of GC said reputation
was not a risk area while 19% of global
GC took this view.
Regulatory risk was the area of
greatest concern to GC globally and
was the second most risky area for
Canadian GC. There is no question
that Canadian regulatory requirements
have increased dramatically in the past
© 2013 KPMG LLP, a Canadian limited liability partnership and a member firm of the KPMG network of independent member firms
affiliated with KPMG International Cooperative (“KPMG International”), a Swiss entity. All rights reserved.
At Risk
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Volume 7, No. 1
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