Mitigation planning for implementations – Relationship One

January 26, 2022 Stan

When it comes to building an implementation plan, the project manager works with their team to list out steps from beginning to end, who owns what, and notes how long each step will take — the project plan. Easy right? All the steps are laid out and all should occur as planned to launch on time, on budget, and in perfect quality. In most cases, however, projects don’t pan out exactly as the team anticipated.

So what kind of tool can a project manager utilize to monitor and address any setbacks? A risk mitigation plan.

Just like building out a project plan, you’ll want to work with your project team to identify any risks at the beginning and again as the project progresses. It could be anything from anticipated capacity constraints, 3rd party integration readiness for testing, to available funding for an extended contract if migrating out of a platform.

Once the risks are assessed, identify the triggers that would cause the risks to become issues and next steps to address them, including owners to each risks. Note: risks can either be a threat or opportunity. In some cases, when project teams implement a new platform they may run into threats more than opportunities. Responses to threats include: avoidance, mitigation, or transference. While avoidance and transference may be straightforward, mitigation is most often sought after as implementations typically are given higher priority and create higher impacts within organizations.

The goal of choosing to mitigate risk is to reduce the height of the risk, so that the show can go on. For example, if one of your testing team members loses internet connection due to a snow blizzard, you reach out to their resource manager and request the planned backup to continue testing. Or if your project team identifies ten issues during testing; however, they have no impact on a technical launch and can be addressed post-launch those issues are moved to address at later dates.

In general, a mitigation plan will not be effective if the project manager does not review risks and discuss new risks with the project team on a regular basis. Just as building a project plan is important to help keep the team, monitoring risks helps the team stay focused when the anticipated surprises occur.

Need help building an effective project plan that includes risk review and mitigation planning? Relationship One is here to help, contact us today!

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