Discussion
Risk management is generally considered to be a process which is associated with the identification of potential risks along with assessing the probability as well as the severity of the various risk assessments. This is initially followed by the planning of the responses for the risks events which are having high importance (Pritchard, C.L. and PMP, P.R., 2014). The major objective of this report is to implement a successful risk management upon an IS or Information Security Project so as to establish a new Capital Management System or the CMS for Fortune 500 Company. The IS project consist of some objectives and the major one includes the Creation of a new and customized software package which would be based upon the internet and would be used for the purpose of managing the capital budget along with the expenditures (Kerzner and Kerzner 2017). The most important of the objective of the client sponsor included the completion of the project by considering the budget which is initially followed by the functionality and finishing the project within the schedule.
The risk identification process involves the gathering of the information which would be helping in the determination of the risks that are likely to affect the project along with identifying the characteristics of each of the risk event (Turner 2014). The characteristics of the risks mainly includes the following:
- The frequency of occurrence of the risk event which are possible,
- The various kind of risk along with the range that the outcome are having
- The risk impacts along with the symptoms that the risk events are having.
There exists several ways of determining the risks associated with the project and they have been listed below:
- Brainstorming: In this technique the ideas flow in a freely and this ideas are generally used for the purpose of generating a list of potential risk events. The key aspect of brain storming is not to judge any of the idea unless and until the brainstorming session is completed.
- Checklist: This is process of listing the events which are generally encountered in a project of certain type or a class. Once the checklist is prepared the team associated with the project reviews the entire checklist, and is done mainly before initiating a new project so as to recognize the various kind of specific risk events which are likely to occur (Ashuri et al. 2015).
- Interviews: This is the stage which includes the doing of discussions with the entire team associated with the project along with the other stakeholders which can be helpful in the process of identifying the risks that were not previously identified during the normal phase of planning (Xing, Y. and Guan, Q., 2017).
- Flowchart: This is process which involves the making of diagrams so as to display the relation between different elements of a project. Thin in turn is also associated with illustrating the ways in which the risks events and the causes are related to the impacts of potential risk (Marcelino-Sádaba et al. 2014). This helps in better understanding of the causes and the impact of the risk.
Risk |
Risk event likely to occur |
Cause of the risk |
Impact of the risk |
1. |
Key personnel’s of the project are lost |
Job opportunities for the programmers who belong to top-notch category |
Results in higher cost along with long schedule |
2. |
Underestimates results in increase in cost |
The contract related to the time and material with the software vendor |
Higher project cost |
3. |
Key requirements of the project would be missing |
The database manager would be having multiple number of assignments which would be responsible for lack of time to look into the CMS project. |
There would exists a lock of functionality which is needed in the new system |
4. |
Would be associated with increase in cost because of the changes in the scope |
Late changes in the requirements |
Higher cost of the project |
5. |
The launching of the system would be done without the necessary materials required for training |
Lack of resources required for training |
Poor quality of the data due to presence of untrained users who enters the data that are totally incomplete. |
6. |
Leading to the lack of space in the present server so as to provide support to the CMS system |
The projects of the other systems are underway |
Need of purchasing a new system |
7. |
The risk that might occur due to this is the inability of doing automatic transfer of the existing project data to the new CMS |
Data fields are being used inconsistently associated with the capital budget which is existing |
Extra manual work along with cost for the purpose of moving the data of the existing project to the new system |
8. |
The cost of obsolete legacy which are being used in the different sites |
This would lead to inability of feeding the actual cost related data to the CMS |
There would exists the need of extra manual work for the purpose of loading the actual cost data each and every month |
9. |
Lack of estimations and proper scheduling of the tasks |
Poor planning and negligence along with lack of estimating of the requirements by the managers of the project. |
This would be initially leading to delay in project completion and increase in the budget of the project. |
10. |
risks related to the procedure |
The major cause of this risk is the improper planning and improper scheduling of the tasks. Another major reason is the improper distribution of the responsibilities. |
The operational activities would be hampered because of the implementation of the improper processes which would be create conflicts in the priorities. |
Mitigation is considered to be the biggest response technique which is to be used by the CMS project team. This technique would be associated with the reduction in the expected value of the risk event which would be done either by means of reduction in the impact or probability of occurrence of the risk. In case of high probability of the risk the team would not be sitting ideal but would be associated with developing of methods so as to reduce them (Carvalho and Rabechini Junior 2015). Along with the contingency plan, team associated with the project also makes contingency plan even if the risk event does not occur. This would be allowing the users to respond quickly to any kind of risk. The project team would be associated with reviewing the risk spreadsheet on the team meetings conducted every week.
Risk |
Risk event likely to occur |
Risk Mitigation |
Contingency plan |
1. |
Key personnel’s of the project are lost |
This risk is to be eliminated by have an alternative personal assigned with the same task |
It is necessary to remain prepared for this situation and assigning a particular person for doing the tasks who is capable of doing that. |
2. |
Underestimates results in increase in cost |
Proper estimations are to be made regarding the cost by adaptation of proper planning and cost management tools |
Extra budget need to be added before starting the project so as to eliminate the risk related to need of extra cost for completing the project. |
3 |
Late changes in the requirements |
Changes are to be tackled in a proper way and along with this it is essential to include a change management plan in the planning process of the project. |
Certain steps are to be included while planning the entire project so as to tackle any kind of problems related to the changes that would be occurring in the project along with including an extra cost in the budget so as to use them in case of any kind of changes. |
4 |
The cost of obsolete legacy which are being used in the different sites |
Adding of extra cost would help in elimination of this problem |
Cost management tool is to be used so as to avoid this problem. |
5 |
Lack of estimations and proper scheduling of the tasks |
Proper scheduling of the tasks need to be done by assigning of proper deadline for the tasks. Another way of eliminating this risk is by taking of extra time for each task so as to complete the task before the assigned time. |
Proper planning needs to be done along with correct estimations. Various project management tool can be used in order to mitigate this risk. |
6 |
Risks related to the procedure |
For mitigation of this the planning should be done properly along with identifying the appropriate person for doing a particular task |
Examining the skills of the persons associated with the project so as to assign them with proper tasks which they are capable of doing. Proper planning is to be done before initiating and assigning the tasks. |
7. |
The risk that might occur due to this is the inability of doing automatic transfer of the existing project data to the new CMS |
Adaptation of automatic tools for transferring of data along with assigning tasks to specific persons skilled to do so. |
Transferring of the data is to be done quickly and correctly by appointing of extra manpower so as to do the work along with adaptation of automated transfer tools. |
Below are the list of the identified residual risks along with the mitigation and contingency plan of those risks.
Risk event |
Mitigation Plan |
Contingency plan |
Requirements of the project are missing |
This risk is to be mitigated by including of the detailed estimates of the various activities ad hours that are needed by the requirements in the resource plan (Hopkinson 2017). Along with this it is necessary to get the management commitment to the key personnel’s who are dedicated to the project. |
In case if the problems exists then it is necessary to elevate the issue to the project sponsors. |
Lack of space in the server to provide support to the CMS |
This is to be mitigated by having commitment from the system support regarding the space that is required (Hopkin 2018). |
Extra budget is to be added in order to add any kind of extra requirement like the extra server. |
Lack of resources required for training and the system launches without necessary training material |
Can be mitigated by having commitment from the dedicated key personnel’s of the project |
Investigations are to be done regarding the training companies so as to prepare proper materials required for the training |
Conclusion:
The report helps in concluding to the fact that the project team would be successful if it includes the risk management in the plan of the project. The chances of success that the project is having is totally dependent upon the proper structuring of the project plan which would also be including the risk management as its part. The CMS or the Capital Management System IS project would be using the risk management so as to ensure that a successful project is going to be delivered after all the phases of the project are completed. By adaptation of appropriate risk management strategies, the project would be completed within the estimated time and cost.
References:
Ashuri, B., Kingsley, G., Rogers, J., Gahrooei, M.R., Ilbeigi, M., Sung, E.J.Y. and Toroghi, S.S.H., 2015. Streamlining Project Delivery through Risk Analysis (No. FHWA-GA-15-1305).
Carvalho, M.M.D. and Rabechini Junior, R., 2015. Impact of risk management on project performance: the importance of soft skills. International Journal of Production Research, 53(2), pp.321-340.
Hopkin, P., 2018. Fundamentals of risk management: understanding, evaluating and implementing effective risk management. Kogan Page Publishers.
Hopkinson, M., 2017. The project risk maturity model: Measuring and improving risk management capability. Routledge.
Kerzner, H. and Kerzner, H.R., 2017. Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and controlling. John Wiley & Sons.
Marcelino-Sádaba, S., Pérez-Ezcurdia, A., Lazcano, A. M. E., & Villanueva, P. (2014). Project risk management methodology for small firms. International journal of project management, 32(2), 327-340.
Pritchard, C.L. and PMP, P.R., 2014. Risk management: concepts and guidance. Auerbach Publications.
Turner, J.R., 2014. Handbook of project-based management (Vol. 92). New York, NY: McGraw-hill.
Xing, Y. and Guan, Q., 2017, March. Risk management of PPP project in the preparation stage based on Fault Tree Analysis. In IOP Conference Series: Earth and Environmental Science (Vol. 59, No. 1, p. 012050). IOP Publishing.