What is a risk register and how do you keep it live?

Columns to include

• Risk description, in one clear sentence.
• Cause and effect on cost, time or quality.
• Chance of it happening, from low to high.
• Size of the effect, from low to high.
• Action to reduce it, and the owner.
• Status: open, reduced, closed or happened.

Checklist for the weekly review

• Add any new risk raised that week.
• Check each action is done or on time.
• Update the chance and the size of each risk.
• Close the risks that have passed.
• Move any risk that happened to the change register and the contingency.

A register opened only at the start of a job soon goes out of date. When a risk happens, the cost and the notice both need a record.

Score each risk the same way every week, such as low, medium or high for chance and for size. Then the top ten is easy to sort.

Focus on the top ten risks. A list of two hundred items gets ignored. Give every risk one owner by name. A risk owned by a team has no owner.

A worked example

Say a product design team is taking a new handheld device to production. One risk reads: the main chip supplier may deliver late, which would push back the first build.

The buyer owns the risk. The action is to approve a second supplier by the end of the month. The buyer reports progress in each weekly meeting.

In week five the first supplier gives a later date. The risk has now happened. The team records the cost and time effect and switches the order. The second supplier is already approved, so the switch takes days. The first build slips one week, and the weekly report shows it.

Related answers

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