Risk refers to the possibility of failing to meet overall program objectives within budget, time, and technical constraints. There are two main elements:
- Probability
- loss
Risk management entails developing a strategy, identifying and assessing risks, dealing with specific hazards, and tracking progress toward risk reduction. Risk management involves recognizing decisions that may result in future events that cause a terrible impact and devising a strategic strategy and operational risk abatement methods to allow for proper risk management and control. Risk management is a management technique based on identifying and controlling those areas and events in the systems engineering life cycle or process that can cause undesirable changes in the process or result. There are different approaches in risk management:
Inactive Risk Management
In this approach, you do not consider risk factors at all. You do not confront, much less be concerned about, the potential that things may not turn out as planned. It’s easy to say that this isn’t risk management. You agree. However, you prefer to refer to it as poor risk management.
Reactive Risk Management
You try to mitigate the effects of risks that have materialized through post-mortem measures. This could include crisis management attempts to get an organization out of a bind. It is most commonly involved with getting rid of defective products before they are given to consumers, often through inspections.
Interactive Risk Management
Throughout the life cycles of numerous systems engineering activities, you are worried about risk. This means that we pay special attention to requirements like configuration management and project controls to ensure that each phase of the life cycle is as risk-free as feasible in terms of the risk associated with the phase’s product.
Proactive Risk Management
In Proactive risk management, you plan and anticipate risk potentials, then implement systems management actions for the technical direction that control risk potentials throughout all organizational life cycle processes to the extent practicable. In an ideal world, you would manage risks so that any unnecessary risk is improbable to arise.
All these strategies are beneficial in reducing the effects of risk. To apply any of these risk management strategies, we need system engineering processes. System engineering in risk management processes helps to mitigate the chances of risk. It involves the following steps:
- Risk planning
- Identification of risk
- Risk analysis
- Handling risk
- Monitoring risk
Risk Planning
We forecast and evaluate risk potential. This entails procedures such as formulation, analysis, and interpretation. We identify potential risks, define alternate courses of action that may mitigate the implications of the various risks, and assess the risks’ influence on these alternative courses of action. Then we evaluate and prioritize them so that we can build plans to minimize unacceptable risks and operational risk control or reduction measures to mitigate the negative consequences of those risks that do occur.
Risk Identification
The process of reviewing project goods, processes, and requirements to identify and document candidate risks is known as risk identification. At both regular periods and following substantial program changes, risk identification should be made continuously at the individual level and through previously established events. Risk assessment should focus on identifying dangers, risks, vulnerabilities, and other factors that could jeopardize work efforts or plans. The following are steps in the risk identification process:
- The requirements specification is examined and analyzed.
- The interface requirements specification was reviewed and analyzed.
- In all appropriate product life-cycle phases, identify the risks associated with cost, schedule, and performance.
- Other risks to consider are those related to labor strikes, technological cycle time, and competitiveness.
- Examine the lessons you’ve learned.
At the end of this process, a document is prepared which includes the details like:
- Risk title
- Description of risk
- Strategy applicable for risk
- The root cause for the risk
- Related information
- The team responsible for the risk
Risk Analysis
The process of carefully evaluating each recognized, approved risk to assess the chance of occurrence and consequence of the event (impact) and then converting the results to a corresponding risk level or rating is known as risk analysis.
Technical risks are frequently assessed using risk scales, a related matrix, simulations, and probabilistic risk assessments. In contrast, cost risk is assessed using decision trees, simulations, and payoff matrices, and scheduling risk is assessed using simulations. Approaches to risk analysis are sometimes divided into qualitative and quantitative categories. For risk analysis, you can use either a qualitative approach or a quantitative approach.
Handling Risk
Risk Handling is the act of identifying and selecting possibilities and implementing the preferred option to minimize risk to an acceptable level within program limits. Assumption, avoidance, control, and transfer are all methods for risk management. For each risk, all four options should be assessed and the best one chosen. After that, an appropriate implementation strategy is determined for that choice. Hybrid solutions with many risk management options, but a single implementation strategy can be established.
Risk Monitoring
Risk monitoring is used to assess the success of risk management operations against established metrics and to offer feedback to the other processes in the risk management process. The outcomes of risk monitoring could be used to update RHPs, develop additional risk management options and methodologies, and re-analyze hazards.
Monitoring outcomes can be utilized to detect new risks, revise an existing risk with a new facet, or revise some components of risk planning in specific instances. Earned value, program metrics, TPMs, schedule analysis, and fluctuations in risk level are some risk monitoring techniques that can be used.
