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Identifying and Managing Risks in 5 Steps - A Typical Risk Log

November 24, 2008 | Author: PM Hut | Filed under: Project Management Best Practices, Risk Identification, Risk Management, Risk Quantification & Analysis

Identifying and Managing Risks in 5 Steps - A Typical Risk Log
By Ron Rosenhead

This brief article has been designed to help you identify and manage risks in your projects (or business as usual activities). How does it work? Use the risk log below and go through the steps below:

Step 1: Identify either with a group or with your team what could possibly go wrong in the project. Do not worry how obscure or irrelevant the suggestion is - it may happen!
Step 2: Use your findings to complete the risk template on the next page. You need to decide the likelihood of the activity going wrong allocating it a score of 1 to 3. Do the same with the impact the risk will have on the project also allocating it a score
Step 3: Multiply out the likelihood and the impact and place the score in column 4 in the Risk Log below.
Step 4: Identify a person who will manage each risk or a group of risks. Their role is to ensure that the risk does not get any worse and if possible is managed so that the score is reduced.
Step 5: Regularly review all risks with your team to ensure that the risks are being managed (you will need to decide the frequency).

Risk Log

Score as follows, for Likelihood and Impact: High = 3, Medium = 2, Low = 1. Multiply the scores using column 4 below and develop a process for managing and monitoring each risk.

Nature of Risk or Uncertainty Likelihood Impact Likelihood x Impact [Score] Actions required. Who will manage the risk + date of next review
incompetent team 2 3 6 team should undergo training courses

About Ron Rosenhead (In his own words)

I first became involved in Project Management quite accidentally! While working in a large organisation which was going through huge change I realised that these changes would only be successful if people delivered projects effectively. But, no one had received any training in this area!

I ran a series of workshops and saw that this was an important area - working to help organisations deliver projects on time and to budget.

I have personally trained many thousands of people to deliver projects effectively. In addition, I have spoken at conferences, coached individuals and worked with project teams. After encouragement from a couple of grateful workshop participants I wrote Deliver That Project - a practical guide to delivering projects.

Alongside this my big project is to make my company Project Agency even more successful. We work with a wide range of clients providing them with Project Management training alongside developing in-house Project Management systems to ensure a uniform approach to project delivery.

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This entry was posted on Monday, November 24th, 2008 and is filed under Project Management Best Practices, Risk Identification, Risk Management, Risk Quantification & Analysis. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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