Author: Neftaly Malatjie

The installation plan must identify risks, assess and provide strategies of management them. A common definition of risk is an uncertain event that if it occurs, can have a positive or negative effect on the software installation goals. The potential for a risk to have a positive or negative effect is an important concept. Why? Because it is natural to fall into the trap of thinking that risks have inherently negative effects. If you are also open to those risks that create positive opportunities, you can make your project smarter, streamlined and more profitable. Think of the adage –“Accept the inevitable and turn it to your advantage.” That is what you do when you mine project risks to create opportunities.

All risk management processes follow the same basic steps, although sometimes different jargon is used to describe these steps. Together these 5 risk management process steps combine to deliver a simple and effective risk management process.

Step 1: Identify the Risk. You and your team uncover, recognize and describe risks that might affect the installation process or its outcomes. There are a number of techniques you can use to find project risks. During this step you start to prepare your Project Risk Register.

Step 2: Analyze the risk. Once risks are identified you determine the likelihood and consequence of each risk. You develop an understanding of the nature of the risk and its potential to affect project goals and objectives. This information is also input to your Project Risk Register.

Step 3: Evaluate or Rank the Risk. You evaluate or rank the risk by determining the risk magnitude, which is the combination of likelihood and consequence. You make decisions about whether the risk is acceptable or whether it is serious enough to warrant treatment. These risk rankings are also added to your Project Risk Register.

Step 4: Treat the Risk. This is also referred to as Risk Response Planning. During this step you assess your highest ranked risks and set out a plan to treat or modify these risks to achieve acceptable risk levels. How can you minimize the probability of the negative risks as well as enhancing the opportunities? You create risk mitigation strategies, preventive plans and contingency plans in this step. And you add the risk treatment measures for the highest ranking or most serious risks to your Project Risk Register.

Step 5: Monitor and Review the risk. This is the step where you take your Project Risk Register and use it to monitor, track and review risks.

Can you imagine starting a long car trip to an unfamiliar destination without a map or navigation system? You’re pretty sure you have to make some turns here and there, but you have no idea when or where, or how long it will take to get there. You may arrive eventually, but you run the risk of getting lost, and feeling frustrated, along the way.

Essentially, driving without any idea of how you’re going to get there is the same as working on a project without a schedule. No matter the size or scope of your project, the schedule is a key part of project management. The schedule tells you when each activity should be done, what has already been completed, and the sequence in which things need to be finished.

Luckily, drivers have fairly accurate tools they can use. Scheduling, on the other hand, is not an exact process. It’s part estimation  part prediction, and part ‘educated guessing.’

Because of the uncertainty involved, the schedule is reviewed regularly, and it is often revised while the project is in progress. It continues to develop as the project moves forward, changes arise, risks come and go, and new risks are identified. The schedule essentially transforms the project from a vision to a time-based plan.

Schedules also help you do the following:

• They provide a basis for you to monitor and control installation activities.
• They help you determine how best to allocate resources so you can achieve the project goal.
• They help you assess how time delays will impact the installation process.
• You can figure out where excess resources are available to allocate to other installation projects.
• They provide a basis to help you track project installation progress.

Resources allocation systems are made up of various components which collectively achieve the desired goals of the organisation:

• Human resources (operators, supervisors, technicians)
• physical resources (equipment, data, environment, consumables) processes (tasks, workflow)
• Intangibles (time, skill levels).

The types of business resources necessary to effectively operate an organisation will include a basic range that is uniform across most organisations. The variations will occur in the actual content, design and operation of these systems. These include:

• Communications (telephone, fax, email)
• Equipment (computers, photocopier, binder, shredder, plant and equipment)
• work and storage space (inventory stores, office space)
• financial (wages, loan funding)
• purchasing (stock, consumables, amenities)
• Employment (temporary staff, recruitment, staff training).

The installation plan must specify milestones and estimates of time and resources required for the installation process.

Milestones

A milestone is a specific point in time within a project lifecycle used to measure the progress of the installation toward its ultimate goal. Milestones are used as signal posts for: a project’s start or end date, a need for external review or input, a need for budget checks, submission of a major deliverable, and much more. Milestones have a fixed date but no duration.

When selecting milestones be conscience of these parameters:

• Frequency – As a project manager, you may be tempted to overuse milestones as a motivation tool to keep the team moving along the ladder to reach the surface of success, but don’t fall into the trap of labelling every task completion as a milestone. In turn, don’t adopt the other extreme approach by ignoring or not recognizing significant and relevant events as milestones particularly at junctions of the critical path. A good compromise is to consistently designate important deliverablesas milestones.
• Timing – Milestones that are spaced too far apart will not have the benefit of the momentum derived from motivating team members by recognizing their major achievements. As a rule of thumb try to space milestones at intervals for no longer than every two weeks for projects of several months in duration.
• Visibility – Milestones need to be placed prominently in the project’s schedule and tracked periodically. Make sure that your milestones have been incorporated into your project scheduling, calendar, or other project tracking software program.
• Accountability – Milestones are commitments that must be met on time. If a milestone is missed, it needs to be addressed immediately by re-examining the resources to determine if they are properly matched to the objectives.
• Fallibility – It may sound counter-intuitive, but you should select challenging milestones that carry a degree of risk for failure. 

Resources

Resource can be defined as anything that an organisation needs to ensure the software installation is successful. These resources can be everyday usage items (e.g. stationery, motor vehicles, inventory, employee time and skills) or those needed to achieve a specific project (e.g. specialist software or equipment).

There are several components of a feasibility:

• Technical feasibility – lays out details on how the system will be delivered.
• Financial feasibility – a projection of the amount of funding or start-up capital needed, what sources of capital can and will be used, and what kind of return can be expected
• Organizational feasibility – determines the ability of the organisation to effectively implement the system.