Project Risk Management

  • Length: 1 or 2 Days ( 7-15 PDU's )
Improve business decisions and project performance
Avoiding all risks means avoiding all opportunities. Risk management increases the odds of success.

Course Description

"Failure to actively manage project risk” is one of the most often cited origins of project failure. This course enables project managers to systematically manage the uncertainty that is inherent in every project so they can minimize the threats without undermining the opportunities.  Risk management is a fine balance that the best project managers know how to achieve.

Participants will learn a step-by-step process to pinpoint and respond to project risks that happen throughout the project life cycle, from the initial case through implementation. They will also learn to create specific budgets to account for both known and unknown project risks.

Benefits

  • Improve the bottom line with more accurate cost and schedule estimates.
  • Use past successes and pitfalls to improve future performance.
  • Recognize and avoid problems before they occur.
  • Build executive support for your project through accurate, meaningful reporting.
  • Learn to energize your team members by involving them in risk management activities.
  • Understand the power and availability of risk management software tools.

Course Objectives

Upon completion of this course, participants will be able to:
  • Understand the components of a project’s business case.
  • Identify project-related risks and develop appropriate response plans.
  • Prioritize risks based on probability, impact and expected value.
  • Use analysis techniques to lead groups of people through risk management activities.
  • Develop contingency budgets to account for known project risks.
  • Use Earned Value Management techniques to quantify cost and schedule progress during a project.

Audience

Senior project managers and others who have experience executing the principles of project management. This course requires previous education or experience with the principles of project management.

Course Outline

1. Introduction to Risk Management
What is a risk? How do you handle known risks versus unknown risks? How does risk management work within project management principles? Are risks opportunities or threats?

2. Managing the Business Case
What is a business case, what are it’s elements and how does it differ from a statement of work? How can a business case help you set priorities and establish the risk tolerance for a project? What financial concepts does a project manager need to know?

3. Risk Identification
How do you identify, qualify, document and prioritize a risk? What are the sources and inputs to risk identification? Why is risk identification and response development an iterative process?

4. Risk Analysis
What is the core of the risk management process? How do you use probability, expected value, root cause analysis and decision trees to analyze a risk? What do you do when you can’t get good estimates? What is PERT schedule analysis?		 5. Developing a Risk Management Plan
How do you prioritize risks, select a risk strategy and create a risk management plan? Why should you select a risk officer? How do you create a risk log and risk summary reports? How do you negotiate contingency and reserve budgets?

6. Continuous Risk Management
How do you execute a risk management plan? What is earned value management? What cash flow considerations do you need to keep in mind while managing risk? How do you close out a risk-managed project?

7. Success Factors in Risk Management
How to determine if you risk management has been successful and how to create high reliability organizations.