Risk assessment
Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal
ISSN: 0951-3574
Article publication date: 4 January 2011
Abstract
Purpose
This short poem seeks to encapsulate a cynical view of the value of risk assessment.
Design/methodology/approach
The poem was written at the time of the collapse of the banks, despite their elaborate risk assessments. It juxtaposes modern belief in risk assessment with other historical and fallible means of prediction. The poem is a triolet, a medieval French form comprising one eight‐line stanza with a regular rhyming scheme and repetition of lines. It is concise, with nursery rhyme simplicity, and a refrain that sinks into the conscious.
Findings
The images of runes, the tarot, and astrology counterbalance the scientific language and basis of risk assessment and the hard‐nosed, factual business of insurance.
Research limitations/implications
The poem reminds us that the greatest risk is the one that is impossible to foresee.
Originality/value
The poem is unique in its use of a medieval French form to examine a modern phenomenon.
Keywords
Citation
Butt, M. (2011), "Risk assessment", Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 24 No. 1, pp. 131-131. https://doi.org/10.1108/09513571111098090
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2011, Emerald Group Publishing Limited