The Committee of Sponsoring Organizations of the Treadway Commission (COSO) has announced the release of ‘From Guidance to Action: Exploring Practical Enterprise Risk Management’. This new paper is ‘designed to help organizations strengthen the strategic relevance, decision making and real-world impact of their enterprise risk management (ERM) programs’.
Commissioned by COSO and authored by Ryan Luttenton, Stefany Samp, and Alexa Stone of Crowe LLP, the paper draws on a global survey of risk leaders and practitioners, as well as in-depth conversations with senior executives across industries and regions. The research examines how enterprise risk management is experienced in practice today, including where it delivers value, where it becomes overly abstract or compliance driven, and what differentiates risk programs that meaningfully support strategy and decision-making.
Organizations today face unprecedented complexity, and ERM must evolve to keep pace. This paper provides practical, experience-based guidance that helps leaders move beyond risk documentation toward embedded, real-time decision-led practices that strengthen performance, resilience, and governance.
Lucia Wind, Executive Director & Chair of COSO
The survey findings reveal a clear implementation gap. While ERM programs often mature and generate extensive documentation, their influence on real decisions remains inconsistent. More than half of survey respondents said their ERM programs are still viewed primarily as compliance or assurance functions, and only 7% reported that ERM is fully integrated into strategy decisions. Yet 98% believe ERM should play a more strategic role—one that accelerates decision-making by clarifying trade-offs, triggers, and ownership.
From Guidance to Action provides practical steps to close this gap. The paper outlines how organizations can apply the COSO ERM Framework as a toolkit for embedding risk thinking into everyday decision-making. It includes real-world examples of ERM in action, a model for linking strategy and risk at key decision points, and a set of operating disciplines that help teams deliver timely, decision-ready insights even under real-world constraints.
