Capability assessments - How to make them useful for decision-making

Capability assessments are becoming increasingly common as part of risk management activities worldwide. Despite this, there is no consensus concerning how these assessments are best conducted and presented. Recent studies suggest that two factors may influence the usefulness of capability assessments for decision-making: namely, whether the assessment includes descriptions of the resources available to an actor, and how well this actor can accomplish specific tasks. The present study was carried out to investigate the importance of including information on these factors in capability assessments. The experimental study conducted involved four fictive versions of capability assessments, differing in whether they included information about resources and tasks. Over 200 risk management professionals rated how useful they perceived each version to be as the basis for decision-making. The results show that it is important to include specific information on resources and tasks in capability assessments, and that the assessments including both were most useful, from a decision-making perspective.