Abstract
This paper explores the interplay of formal and informal practices in dealing with well-known
but insidious risks that can emerge from everyday business activities. Micro-level events and
implicit behavioral factors may have harmful spillover effects. This study investigates how
such risks are managed by salespeople seeking to comprehend and respond to behavioral
phenomena among clients. The sensemaking and sensegiving perspectives are employed in
analyzing such ‘riskwork’. The empirical investigation focuses on how wealth managers
construct a holistic view of each client and how they match clients’ risk preferences with
asset risks to prevent client dissatisfaction and other disruptive reactions. This paper claims
three contributions. Primarily, this study adds to behavioral and communicational literature
on riskwork by showing how business risks are managed beyond intra-organisational
dynamics through client-specific expectations and perceptions management – by the
nuanced deployment of both simplified and sophisticated portrayals of risk. Secondly, this
study contributes to riskwork literature by illuminating the temporal dimension of riskwork,
including prospective practices, real-time reactions, and retrospective reviews. Thirdly, this
paper contributes to the discussion on the integration of riskwork by highlighting the
nuanced roles of wealth managers in co-producing risks through their dual roles as
salespeople and de facto risk managers
Introduction
Research on riskwork has drawn increasing attention to the everyday practices through which
organisational actors identify, interpret, and respond to risks. Power (2016) introduced the
concept of riskwork to describe risk-related activities that extend beyond compliance procedures,formal risk management frameworks (e.g. COSO 2004; 2012, ISO 31 000 2009), as well as speci
f
ied risk management functions. Riskwork highlights how risks are socially constructed and acted
upon in contexts that may lie beyond dedicated organisational risk domains and tools. It requests
attention to the interpretative and improvisational activities through which managers and employ
ees handle risks in their day-to-day work. The socially constructed nature of risk implies that the
challenges of modern riskwork would relate more to implicit aspects – such as perceptions, rather
than technically valid and accurate descriptions (Taarup-Esbensen 2019).
Recent studies on riskwork have shed light on the role of particular risk tools (Jordan et al.
2013; 2018), the communicational aspects of riskwork (Tekathen and Dechow 2013, 2020, Esh
raghi and Taffler 2015), and behavioral dynamics among managers (Taffler et al. 2017, Gendron
et al. 2021, Carlsson-Wall et al. 2021). Certain studies have covered riskwork with stakeholders,
such as how wealth managers construct client risk preferences (Vargha 2011; 2016), how risks
are constructed through discourse and interpretation among consultants and clients (Brivot
et al. 2017), and how broader reputational concerns are addressed (Brivot et al. 2017). Together,
this body of work has illuminated how riskwork is rarely limited to the domain of professional
risk managers. Still, relatively little is known about how riskwork unfolds in contexts where risks
evolve insidiously – that is, gradually and indirectly through mundane interactions rather than
sudden failures or explicit rule violations.
This paper focuses on such insidious risks considered as objects of riskwork. On the surface,
these risks appear as familiar and obvious categories. For instance, reputational damage and
costly legal disputes may well be recognised by the whole organisation, the board of directors,
and formal risk management systems. In the contemporary world, regulations and rule-based risk
practices intend to prevent obvious misconduct and protect shareholders as well as notable sta
keholders. However, the origins of well-known risks may still lie in mundane grassroots activi
ties – peripheral to formal compliance procedures and risk frameworks. For example, a minor
client dissatisfaction or disorientation can trigger a domino effect that escalates into reputational
harm and financial losses thereafter. Such ‘co-production’ of risks (Taarup-Esbensen 2019) is
particularly salient in sales activities and client relationship management, where organisational
actors have a challenge to manage expectations, perceptions, and behaviors that extend
beyond the organisation’s formal controls. In this regard, interactions between salespeople and
clients constitute a critical site of riskwork with insidious risks.
The objective of this paper is to investigate interactive client relationship management as a
form of riskwork. This study focuses on the practices of sales personnel that aim to ensure con
gruence between client preferences and product risks. Activities of analyzing the client and
responding to their behavior constitutes a central task behind managing expectations and percep
tions – and preventing insidious risks from escalating. Wealth management business provides a
fruitful case for investigating these phenomena due to the long-term orientation of client relation
ships. The empirical setting responds to Vargha’s (2016) call to further explore the work of con
structing client risk preferences, while also linking these processes to the broader risk concerns of
the wealth management company.
Accordingly, this study is guided by a research question: How did the salespeople govern
their company’s insidious risks arising from client relationship management? The main question
will be specified by two sub-questions: (1) How did the salespeople seek to comprehend different
behavioral aspects in client relations? and (2) How did the salespeople respond to the behavioral
aspects identified?
Empirically, this study draws on a case study of Wealthco (a pseudonymised publicly listed wealth
management company) based on 23 interviews with 15 key informants, complemented by a range of
secondary data sources. The case analysis was carried out abductively, following the method of ‘sys
tematic combining’ (Dubois and Gadde 2002) to iteratively connect theory and evidence