It is important for project risks to be stated as undesirable events. For example, equipment is not an undesirable event so equipment is not a logical description of a risk. Backhoe still being used on Project Y on first day of excavation task of Project Z, on the other hand, is an undesirable event related to equipment. When not stated in this way, a tremendous amount of time and energy will be consumed in wasteful communications and clarifications throughout the project related to why equipment is identified in the risk register, in project status reviews, and in activities related to monitoring risks.

Identify a real or hypothetical project and summarize it briefly. State three risks facing this project in the form of undesirable events. While project risk management is primarily concerned with negative risks, it is also concerned with positive risks. In this light, also state one positive risk in terms of a desirable event that could occur and positively impact schedule, cost, or quality of deliverables.

Assume you are the project manager and will facilitate the analysis of these risks with the project team (your classmates). You will be collaboratively using judgment to rate the likelihood and impact of each risk on a scale of 1-5. Provide a definition of each value from 1 to 5 for impact for your team so that team members will be using a common understanding of each score when arriving at consensus relative to the impact score for each of the four risks.