Best Practices Managing Operational Risk in 2025

SAI360’s latest white paper uses the January 31, 2025 Barclays outage as a clear reminder that digital service failures can rapidly escalate into financial disruption and lasting reputational harm. When customers were locked out of their accounts on payday, the issue became a trust crisis, not just technical. Even after Barclays confirmed the outage wasn’t cyber-related, frustration, financial stress, and public backlash spread quickly.

The incident reflects a much bigger trend, where outages are becoming more frequent, costly, and visible. Beyond direct financial loss, operational failures now trigger significant market reactions and shake investor confidence. Regulators worldwide have taken notice, with frameworks like DORA (EU), FCA Operational Resilience (UK), APRA CPS 230 (Australia), and MAS BCM Guidelines (Singapore) all pushing firms to demonstrate that they can withstand and recover from disruption without causing undue harm to customers or the financial system.

To meet these expectations, organizations need to:

• Strengthen governance and accountability at senior levels
• Identify critical business services and map their dependencies
• Set and test clear impact tolerances
• Conduct realistic scenario testing and continuity planning
• Closely manage third- and fourth-party suppliers
• Continuously monitor risks and adapt controls

Many firms are still far from this level of maturity, largely due to siloed systems, manual workflows, and limited visibility across their operational landscape.

The takeaway is that operational resilience is now a continuous capability, not a response plan. SAI360 highlights how integrated risk platforms can centralize data, streamline incident response, and support real-time decision-making to reduce downtime and protect customer trust.

Download the full white paper to explore how organizations are shifting from reactive operational risk management to proactive resilience strategies built for 2025 and beyond.