Mrs

Running head: ABI PROJECT RISK MANAGEMENT PLAN

ABI Project Risk Management Plan

Mr. Scott De Clue

Alice Sinal

University of Phoenix

ABI Project Risk Management Plan

Risk management attempts to recognize and manage potential unforeseen trouble spots that may occur when the project is implemented (Gray and Larson, 2006). In most decision situations, project stakeholders go through a number of stages that help them think through the problem and develop alternatives solutions. Under conditions of certainty, project managers are simply faced with issue to identify the consequences of available options and selecting the outcome with greatest potential benefits. Adverse factors contribute to expose the project stakeholders to uncertainty conditions where the outcomes of options are unpredictable. Although managerial intelligence and competence are widely available, the ability to deal with uncertainty is compared to a walking through a minefield, a single wrong step can lead to a disaster. Introduction of new technologies or new markets are the most common occasions for decisions making under uncertainty.

American Banking of Indiana (ABI) is a regional bank based in Indiana. Presently ABI has been acquired by the First American Financial Services group (FAFS) and is adopting the latest technologies to improve its reach and widen its portfolio of financial services.

The present paper assesses the Integra project management risk focusing on aspects related to management response, perception of the risks to ensure that the project risks are identified, analyzed and a mitigation plan is put in place. The measurement of the project performance describes how ABI during the Integra project life-cycle escalated the issues and decisions, managed the shared resources to ensure the Integra project success and meet customer values. The conclusions emphasize the importance of considering the work culture and organizational history when merging and integrating new technology platform. According to Gray and Larson, (2006), when a risk event is identified and assessed, a decision must be made in concern to which response is appropriate for the specific event. Response to risk, as described bellow, can be classified as mitigating, avoiding, transferring, or retaining.

Management Responses

The dynamic and complex environment in which project manager operates requires careful consideration during the planning process. However, project stakeholders tend to assume that conditions in the environment will remain unchangeable. In order to plan effectively, the project manager need a clear understanding of which resources the ABI can utilize in order to attain the purpose, mission , and goals while managing changes in the business environment. According to Gray and Larson (2006), there are basically two strategies for mitigating risk: (1) reduce the likelihood that the event will occur and/or; (2) reduce the impact that the adverse event would have on the project. Based on the word of advice from ABI CEO stating that, delivering Integra project on time is our first concern. This is crucial since the acquisition will take exactly six months to be completed. Additional resources may not be available during this period. Therefore, use the schedule, cost, or effort variance limits as performance measures and not additional reserves. The responses given by ABI to mitigate the risks involving resources constrains such as, database specialists not showing up and change in management objectives followed the first strategy and were not aligned with word of advice given by ABI CEO. The risk mitigation increased the possibility of overrunning the cost and schedule. Instead ABI could have taken the database development documentation, sort of best operation practices and knowledge share approach and reduce significantly the risk impact on the project. This approach does not compromise a schedule and also does not require more investment. Change in management objectives can imply change in ABI priorities, requiring relocation of scarce organizational resources. If the acquisition process is stalled, the Integra project will not be implemented and the Integra project can be canceled incurring costs. Among the list of risks, ABI project team selected the five most critical risks and assigned appropriate measures to manage the risk impact then built weighted perceived risk plan taking into consideration the impact, probability, and exposure.

Weighing of Perceived Risks

In ideal risk management process, a prioritization process is followed whereby the risks with great impact, capable to create loss, and the greatest probability of occurring are handled first, and the risks with lower probability of occurrence and lower capability to produce loss are handled later. ABI weighed the perceived risks by assigning the probability of each risk occurring, and its possible impact on the project objectives. In practice the process can be very difficult, and balancing between risks with a high probability of occurrence but lower loss and a risk with high loss but lower probability of occurrence can often be mishandled and can mislead the decision process. Table 1 - ABI weight risk recommendation illustrates how and why ABI should have weighted the perceived risks in the managing project risk. Risk management includes identification; analysis and response so the ABI goals can be pursued. The identification is crucial as it determines the risks that might affect the project and document the risks characteristics. Not all risks were identified on the Integra project as discussed bellow.

Looking to the Future

Information technology projects are renowned for their high failure rate. Risk management is an essential process for the successful delivery of IT projects (Management of risks in information technology projects, Emerald 2006).

Network equipment manufacturers face both a technology and a market squeeze due to short life-cycle. The first crucial risk not considered by ABI is the dependency on the supply of the network equipment. The vendors are entities out of control of ABI or FAFS. This risk can be mitigated by creating incentives such as payments of premium if the network equipment devices is delivered on time, or create key performance indicators bonus and include them on the service level agreement for network equipment devices supply.

As devices continue to become connected, network security for wireless and wired