Project Risk Management – Sample Table for Data Collection Category Sub Category Project Phase Risk Event Risk Description Internal / External Positive / Negative Likelihood Impact Reference / Source Health Infection Throughout Injury Throughout Depression During Travel sickness Travel I have had a few questions about the layout of the data collection phase, in particular whether or not to use a table. Remember you need to provide the evidence / argument that this is a risk that is worth considering (citing articles, case studies, reports etc). Then you will have a strong case for including and classifying the risk in your report. But this might mean a fair bit of text, which will start to make a table look untidy. You might consider a standard section in an MS-Word document for each sub-category, using the headings of the spreadsheet as sub headings. Or you might think having all these heading is unnecessary. This gives you more flexibility and readability. On the other hand, tables have the advantage of density. It's up to you. This is worth 30% of the semester marks, so there should be some substance behind it. It needs to provide a clear rationale for including the risk in your final report, so I expect to see supporting evidence for the risks you include. I have not specified a length for the data collection: make it sensible and appropriate for being worth 30% of the marks. I envisage about 4 -5 risk categories, perhaps 2 – 3 sub-categories of risk (i.e. thereby constituting a risk breakdown structure) and perhaps 2 risks per category. But don’t put trivial risks in, and don’t subdivide risks too finely.