20 They may have longer and more complex value chains with multiple forms of relationships, some of them entailing more human rights risks than others. The policies and processes that a large enterprise needs to ensure respect for human rights by the enterprise as a whole will need to reflect all these factors. They will need to extend to all those in the enterprise who deal with the activities and relationships with which its human rights risks are associated. The significance of embedding respect for human rights across all relevant functions and units of the enterprise is discussed further under Guiding Principle 16. Small and medium-sized enterprises may have less capacity and more informal processes and management structures than larger companies, so their respective policies and processes will take on different forms. With fewer employees, communications across functions may be easier and less formal. Internal systems and oversight functions will typically be less complex. In many instances, the approaches needed to embed respect for human rights in a smaller enterprise’s operations can mirror the lesser complexity of its operations. However, size is never the only factor in determining the nature and scale of the processes necessary for an enterprise to manage its human rights risks. The severity of its actual and potential human rights impact will be the more significant factor. For instance, a small company of fewer than 10 staff that trades minerals or metals from an area characterized by conflict and human rights abuses linked to mining has a very high human rights risk profile. Its policies and processes for ensuring that it is not involved in such abuses will need to be proportionate to that risk. The commentary to Guiding Principle 17 discusses further how external expertise and pooled resources can assist all enterprises, and particularly small and medium-sized ones, in conducting human rights due diligence that is both effective and proportionate to their human rights risks and their resources. Q 15. How is an enterprise’s sector and operational context relevant to its responsibility to respect human rights? All enterprises have the same responsibility to respect all internationally recognized human rights (see Guiding Principle 12). That said, an enterprise’s sector and its operational context will typically determine which human rights it is at greatest risk of having an impact on in the normal course of its operations.