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What is Risk Management?
Risk management means using strategies and resources to handle threats to objectives. Organizations may have risk management programs to identify, assess, and mitigate potential risks to their assets, including threats from natural disasters, accidents, legal trouble, and financial hardships.
The Jindal School of Management offers a Risk Management and Insurance Concentration to the Bachelor’s in Business Administration, Finance, or Global Business degrees. Students who pursue this concentration can establish careers as risk analysts, claims professionals, underwriters, and more.
RMIS courses are open to students who are interested in learning more about risk management regardless of their major. A popular starter course in risk management is the Foundations of Risk Analytics and Applications class (RMIS 4338). This course has no prerequisites and is taught by professor Steven Haynes.
What is the Foundations of Risk Analytics and Applications Class Like?
Professor Haynes created RMIS 4338 to provide undergraduates with a baseline understanding of how data is used to make decisions. During the class, students explore how data is collected, analyzed, and applied to help businesses prosper.
“The course is really engineered to be a course that focuses on the tools that we use to help solve problems.” Professor Haynes says. “One of the things that students are always interested in is how do we use data to figure out what’s right and what’s not right.”
Professor Haynes encourages students to apply what they learn in class to modern problems that companies encounter. Every class begins with a discussion on what’s happening in major current events and how it relates back to risk analytics. The class projects are based on case studies from actual business data problems. Professor Haynes gives his students a basic description for their project and then provides them with room to think about how to solve the data problem.
“To me, what it comes down to is real-world problem solving with data.” Professor Haynes says.
What do students find challenging about the course?
Students who take RMIS 4338 may face a paradigm shift in their way of thinking. Professor Haynes leans into case studies and class discussion to help students break away from simply memorizing concepts and move toward applying skills in a meaningful way.
“I think that has been really hard for some students, especially some of my finance students, who have been so task-focused through the years.” Professor Haynes said.
Arya Sefidgar-Djedi, who took RMIS 4338 during the first semester of his junior year, says that the course helped him change his academic perspective.
“I think that professor Haynes is a unique guy because he wants you to dig deeper.” Sefidgar-Djedi explained. “Previous classes were just like, come in and do the assignment and then you graduate or whatever. But it was a lot more of like diving deeper and figuring out my own thought process from him.”
What do students take away from RMIS 4338?
Professor Haynes feels that his role as a professor is to educate and inspire students. He loves when he can help students find and turn on their passion.
“I’ve had students go on to be data analysts for major sports organizations and students that have gone in and decided that they’re going to grad school.” Professor Haynes explained. “I’ve had students who say, ‘Hey, I really want to go get more training on this. Where do I go?’ Those are the things that keep me excited about this class.”
To learn more about the Risk Management Concentration at the Jindal School of Management, visit the Risk Management and Insurance Concentration page or contact professor Steven Haynes.
