The global meltdown in 2008 has left behind a deep and indelible devastation for everyone. What started off as a simple mortgage loan crisis spread its tentacles around the globe. It is time we went beyond numbers and looked at the crisis not just via the financial prism but beyond it. Bad decision making coupled with lax governance and inefficient risk management caused the 2008 catastrophe. CEOs and business leaders have an important task ahead of them—to ensure that their organizations do not act as contributories to similar tsunamis in the future. It is time we went `back to basics' and revisit the principles of `agency theory' and `moral hazard' and renourish our decision-making systems, governance systems and monitoring systems.

The global crisis has been truly global and far-reaching in its effect. A few important lessons emerge from the crisis which CEOs and managers should understand and internalize:

• We no longer live in a decoupled world—we are in fact heading towards a deeply coupled world where a crisis in one sector has direct or indirect impact on other sectors. (Refer Box 2)

• What started off as a simple mortgage market crisis in the US banking sector spread worldwide and affected all sectors, industries, communities and countries – financial markets, industries, services, government policies, regulations all interact closely and decision blunders in any of these sectors can have a `domino effect' on other sectors.

•It is our duty to ensure that such crises do not hit us again—CEOs should learn to look at the current crisis in a wider context and go beyond the financial prism—understand what are the basic reasons behind such absurd decisions that led to the crisis and revisit the decision and governance systems of their organizations.

Global CEO Magazine, Global Meltdown, Financial Prism, Mortgage Loan Crisis, Risk Management, Decision Making, Business Leaders, Governance Systems, Monitoring Systems, US Banking Sector, Mortgage Market Crisis, Global Gross Domestic Product, Federation of Indian Export Organizations, FIEO, Organizational Structures, Strategic Risk Management.