In your project management journey, you will run into problems, this is inevitable. But most of these problems are able to be quelled early by managing risk within your project. Project risk management is the process of discovering and tracking risk in your project to help it stay on track and meet the deadlines imposed. There are several easy steps to help you manage risk within your project.
The first step in project risk management is to identify and analyze risks. You need to know what risks face you and this is done by identifying risks, one helpful document is a risk register. A risk register is a document such as a spreadsheet where you will brainstorm all the potential risks that face your project. This document serves as a constant reminder of the things you should be looking out for throughout the lifecycle of your project. Once you have identified risks facing your project you are ready to then analyze those risks. The process of analyzing risks involves going through your risk register and determining how likely each risk are to happen, these notes should then be placed with each risk on your register. Using both quantitative and qualitative risk analysis you can determine the overall risk factor of your project.
The second step in project risk management is to prioritize your risks. In this step, you will again go through your risk register and group all the risks into buckets. These buckets can be categories such as acceptable, low-priority, and high-priority. Assigning priority to each
risk will allow you to create a line of thought of how you will begin to tackle each risk. High priority risks should be dealt with first then low priority and so on. This step is a stepping stone to addressing each risk and keeping your project on track.
The third step in project risk management is responding to and monitoring risks. Now your planning will come into play, for each risk you respond to you should first quantify it as a positive or negative risk, you will then create a plan with the involved parties to mitigate the risk or use it to your advantage for the betterment of the project. Once a risk is being responded to it is imperative that it is also monitored. Monitoring a risk involves tracking its progress towards a state of resolution; by staying updated you are able to re-determine the overall risk factor of your project and hopefully bring it to a point where risks that can halt the project are non-existent.
Overall, project risk management is essential to the lifecycle of any project. Large and small risks alike can cripple a workflow and have disastrous consequences for your team. By identifying, analyzing, and responding to risks as they arise you can help ensure a safety net surrounds your project and keeps it on track.
Comentarios