Waltzing with Bears - Managing Risk on Software Projects
by Tom Demarco & Timothy Lister

The business of believing only what you have a right to believe is called risk management. Say you have a schedule set for the project and you believe that it is reasonable. But do you have the right to believe that? You can’t just say “yeah, I believe I can do it!” and just hope the result will be what you want. You have to do you best to make sure that what you want will be the result. That’s “risk management”.

If a project has no risks, don’t do it. If you do it, you have to manage the risks of it. There are 4 main tasks in risk management:

• Create a risk list and assess the risks on it. You have to determine the impact and probability of the risk materialization, its exposure, contingency and mitigation actions for it. Keep refining the list should be a continuing part of the project.
• Create risk diagrams to express the uncertainty. This book provides a tool for doing that.
• Create an incremental delivery plan and an earned value running diagram. This is used to track the progress of the project.
• Monitor all risks for materialization or expiration and EVR diagram for any deviation.

This book provides detailed steps in risk management. It tells you what you should do but not how to do it. To learn how, you have to practice in your projects.