By A.V. Riswadkar, liability line of businessdirector, Zurich Services Corporation

In 1938, Zurich NorthAmerica (then Maryland Casualty Co.) wrotepublic liability coverage for a record-setting event where aprofessional baseball player dropped a series of balls from the topof a 708-foot tower to teammates scattered below.

In the intervening years, risk management—like baseballitself—has evolved into a much more sophisticated game.

Today's organizations face a very different risk landscape thatranges from more defined first-party property losses and businessinterruption to less transparent liability from law suits and brandreputation damage. If such an event were organized today, many morerisk factors would be considered in assessing the risk and inplanning for it.

Risk assessment has evolved into a systematic process. Forexample, Zurich's proprietary Zurich Hazard Analysis (ZHA) is a team-based, systematicmethodology helping identify hazard scenarios with their respectiveseverity and likelihood to determine and graphically display thelevel of risk. This risk profile helps organizations prioritizetheir risk management actions and strategy to minimize risktransfer and plan for the remaining acceptable level of risk.

For an organization, the risk of first-party property damage andbusiness interruption losses is likely to be low, but the risk ofliability from litigation and reputation loss from any adversedevelopment at an event may be very significant. Planning forthe event should consider various actions before, during andafter.

See next page for an infographic on the 1938 Skyballevent.

Pre-event risk planning should consider various aspects of siteselection and preparation, such as the type of ground surface, itsrebound characteristics for a baseball not caught by a catcher,potential tripping hazards for the catcher on the ground, andclearance zone for spectator safety. Traffic flow, contracts andpermits may also have to be considered.

At the time of the event, real-time weather conditionsmonitoring for wind speeds, precipitation, overcast conditions andtemperature will be important for the safety aspect of go/no godecision for the event.

The visibility and ability to track the ball during its descentpath will help increase the chance of a successful catch with “highvisibility” balls such as optic yellow or baseballs with a brightred stripe around the seam laces—similar to what is used duringbatting practice. Appropriate protective gear for the catcher alsowill be important.

Often neglected, but the one of the most important aspect of aneffective risk management strategy, is the crisis management andcommunication planning in an unlikely event of any unexpecteddevelopments.

Much like the evolution of professional baseball players frompart-time athletes to multi-millionaire icons, risk management hasevolved into a much more sophisticated, systematic process over thelast century. This lens on the vast risk landscape may be theprimary reason why we don't see Major League Baseball playerslining up to recreate the “Skyball” catch of 1938 each year. We'll simply have to marvel at the feat from a wiser perch decadesremoved.