CRIMS celebrates RIMS 50th year

The focus for risk managers in the year ahead continues to be about education. But, according to Risk & Insurance Management Society (RIMS) president Susan Meltzer, the organization will focus on continuing education for professionals, not necessarily on designing new curriculum for new risk managers.

Meltzer, assistant vice president of Sun Life Assurance Company of Canada, is the first Canadian woman to helm RIMS. She, and CRIMS chair Joe Restoule, outlined for CU the goals of the two organizations for the year ahead. Meltzer disclosed news of a RIMS program planned for 2000 to take place in Toronto bringing together risk managers and chief executive officers from all levels of corporate Canada. The program, which will be run in June and October next year, will provide CEOs with the opportunity to discuss with one another the importance of hedging risk within their respective organizations.

Meltzer believes RIMS must harness the educational offerings made available at conferences such as the CRIMS conference, and create a handbook of informal continuing education for risk managers. “The caliber of education offered at this conference has exceeded our wildest dreams. We’ve engineered a pretty comprehensive formal education curriculum at the university and institute level. Now we must focus on continuing the education of our members.”

Restoule, the risk manager at Nova Corporation, says the organizations are not abandoning focusing on curriculum for new risk managers. With RIMS entering its 50th year of operation, and the new millennium approaching, Restoule says he would like to see risk managers re-engineer the course offerings to greater reflect the changing profession. “We hope to continue our steps forward in innovations with regard to course structures and curriculum at the Institute of Risk Management.” He would also like to see present-day risk managers re-write the textbooks and manuscript new courses. “We have to bring together the brightest minds and pool the professions resources to rewrite the industry heading into the 21st century.”

The adversity between RIMS and members of the sister Canadian organization is an issue of the past, both Meltzer and Restoule insist. With RIMS adopting the Canadian fellowship standards in creating its Global Institute for Risk Management, and with Canadian leadership at the helm, there is a feeling among Canada’s risk managers that their participation within the North American-wide organization is as strong as ever. “The CRMC is highly motivated to provide creative ideas to RIMS. We have done so in the past and our ideas and programs have been acted upon. Knowing this only perpetuates greater involvement by our members,” notes Restoule.