Pre-workshop activities Pre-workshop activities are very important, to have a successful risk workshop. Planning is the key to any successful endeavor. You must do some preparation before calling that risk workshop. If you are organizing it, you are responsible for a successful opening and closure. Identify all the required stakeholders in to participate in the risk workshop. Book their calendar well in advance and plan for their travel and stay arrangements as required. Get acquainted with the participants in advance. Know their areas of specialization and where they could contribute. Understand the objective of workshop and communicate it well among the participants. A cost contingency planning workshop would be entirely different from a business case strategic workshop. Stay updated on the processes to be followed regarding Risk Management Policy, Project Management Policy, Organization Chart etc. Don’t go with a blank risk register, try to have a list of risks identified yourself which could be discussed during the meeting. You should be well versed with the subject to lead the topic in the workshop. Share the agenda and list of risks identified with participants beforehand. Welcome them to share their feedbacks beforehand to be incorporated into the meeting agenda. Prepare to act as a moderator, to enable to handle dominant people invited in the meeting. You should be able to capture input from all the participants without the discussion being carried forward by just one person. Arrange for meeting room in advance. Check the functionality of the room with projector, lightning and other necessary equipment working well. Arrange for anything required during the workshop, well in advance like marker, flip chart etc. Also, plan for the break and associated snacks and order them well in time. Do not invite everyone to the workshop, it should never exceed fifteen members. Have your supporting staff ready to help you during the meeting. You cannot work on all the things simultaneously. Have a central repository ready, with all the inputs and accesses in place. Upload all meeting related documents in this place and share the links with everyone to have easy access. Risk workshop agenda Date: Date when Risk Workshop need to be held Participants: List all the participants required in the risk workshop. Facilitator (usually the Project Leader) Workshop Goals Discuss and Identify Project Risks Discuss and reduce the number of unknowns in the project Discuss and update impact and probability of the risk Rank the risks as per their probability and impact of occurring Discuss and plan on mitigation plan for respective risks Assign owner of each risk who shall be responsible for having mitigation and contingency plan for that risk. Discuss and agree on communication plan to update on risk management plan to all stakeholders. Workshop Agenda Agenda Item Objective Presenter Duration Introduction To give a brief introduction on purpose of the risk workshop and intended project for which risk workshop is being held. Project Leader 9:30 – 10:00 Brainstorming Session All participants submit their list of risks to Project Leader to be assessed during the workshop. All Participants 10:00 – 11:00 Risk Planning and Mitigation Project Leader presents the risks one by one on screen and discuss its likelihood and any mitigation plan for the respective risk. All Participants 11:00 – 13:00 Break Lunch Break -- 13:00 – 14:00 Risk Planning and Mitigation contd… Project Leader presents the risks one by one on screen and discuss its likelihood and any mitigation plan for the respective risk. All Participants 14:00 – 16:00 Communication Plan Discuss and confirm on communication plan for the updates on risk management plan. Project Leader 16:00 – 16:30 Workshop Closure Confirm on action items and their owners from the risk workshop and take decision on follow up meeting to discuss further plan. Project Leader 16:30 – 17:00 Following are the step by step procedure to run a risk workshop. In start of the session, plan a mixer where all participants are free to talk to each other and get acquainted to each other. It can be a common coffee station. Let each participant introduce themselves, with their area of niche and specialization. Divide the participants into small groups, say of four to five members in each group. Initiate the brainstorming session, where each team should come up with their list of risks identified. You could provide them with a flip chart, where they could jot down all the list. You could give them the list of type of risks (attached in appendix of this document) for their reference. Ask each group to come and present their list of risks to other participants and justify its impact and probability. They can also come up with the mitigation plan. You or your support could record all the meeting outcomes and present it after the meeting. Conclude the workshop, with key areas discussed and present final risk register to all participants. Ask everyone if they could think of the risk that need to be catered to have a successful project. Display the project schedule for easy reference to all the participants. Highlight the top-rated risks identified in the workshop. Update the action items and final risk register in central repository and share the link with all. Risk Register Below is the list of five threats and three opportunities identified in the case: - BRITISH PETROLEUM (PLC) AND JOHN BROWNE: A CULTURE OF RISK BEYOND PETROLEUM (A) Have presented the risk with their due impact and probability and sorted the table by the risk score (which is received by multiplying impact and probability). The Threats are highlighted in shades of red and opportunities are highlighted in shades of green. Risk Category Risk Details Impact Probability Impact x Probability Risk Owner Risk Mitigation Threat John's retirement would impose all the safety hazard measures related accounts on new CEO and other board members. The new CEO will not be able to take up the new responsibilities effectively within short span of 18 months for John's retirement. 5 5 25 HR and Board of Directors Need of identifying a CEO who would be able to take the company in new direction in a manner better than John and plan the change well before introducing into the company. Threat A large share of money to be paid to John Browne as retirement package will impact company's overall P/L account adversely. 4 5 20 CFO CFO to evaluate the impact and discuss contingency plan with the rest of board of directors. Threat Pressure from Government to update company's safety measures will have additional burden on the company's P/L account 4 5 20 CFO and Board of Directors Company should plan the measures they need to take to enhance the safety in their facility and communicate it within and outside organization to keep up the shareholder’s confidence. Opportunity With new CEO, BP can leverage the new ideology and clear the company's reputation installing new confidence among the shareholders. 4 4 16 HR and Board of Directors New CEO can be used as an agent of changes that BP wants to leverage upon. Need to plan this change well in the organization. Opportunity By improving the safety measures in the company, surely BP could leverage on higher stock prices. 4 4 16 Board of Directors Company should plan the measures they need to take to enhance the safety in their facility and communicate it within and outside organization to keep up the shareholder’s confidence. Threat Firm's reputation and good will, to be impacted due to John Browne's resignation. 3 4 12 Board of Directors John have set the clear vision for the organization and this need to be handed over to new CEO well before John leaves. Opportunity The previous hazards enable company to negotiate on retirement package that it should give to John and could utilize it to improve safety measures in the company. 4 3 12 HR and Board of Directors HR could leverage on this to negotiate the retirement package with John. He being the individual contributor in the company is also responsible for the fallacy. Threat BP might lose its sight and vision with introduction of new CEO after John. 3 3 9 Board of Directors John have set the clear vision for the organization and this need to be handed over to new CEO well before John leaves. Evaluating Impact and Probability: - The risks with high impact are scored 4 and 5, the one with moderate impact are scored at 3 and with lesser impact are scored at 1 and 2. The risk with absolute probability of occurrence are kept at 5. The one with high probability are scored at 4. Risks with moderate probability are kept at 3. The risks with low probability of occurrence are kept score 1 and 2. Risk 1 - John's retirement would impose all the safety hazard measures related accounts on new CEO and other board members. The new CEO will not be able to take up the new responsibilities effectively within short span of 18 months for John's retirement. This risk has high impact and highly probable since John is leaving for sure and there is no-one yet identified to be the new CEO to take his place. Hence it is scored 5 in both impact and probability. This cannot be ignored and need an absolute mitigation plan that too to be implemented before John leaves the organization. Risk 2 - A large share of money to be paid to John Browne as retirement package will impact company's overall P/L account adversely. This risk has high probability of 5 as John is leaving and he will certainly claim his retirement bonus. The impact is kept at 4 since there are some chances that company will be able to absorb this risk as generally company’s plan and invest in such packages progressively with time. It could an opportunity for company to negotiate over this package to save some amount for their use. Risk 3 - Pressure from Government to update company's safety measures will have additional burden on the company's P/L account. This also have high impact and high probability. Since the situations have already worsened, the company ought to plan to invest into improving safety and hazard measures in the company. The risk is scored 5 in probability as its absolute and cannot be ignored any further. The impact is kept at 4 as company could plan to invest progressively and do not have to invest complete amount at once. Risk 4 - With new CEO, BP can leverage the new ideology and clear the company's reputation installing new confidence among the shareholders. This risk is kept at probability of 4 since it can be made possible by combined action of HR and Board of Directors. They need to plan the change well and in advance to take place. The impact is also kept at 4, since there will be some chances that certain stakeholders do not have complete faith in new leadership and hence will not be able to impact such section of people. Risk 5 - By improving the safety measures in the company, surely BP could leverage on higher stock prices. This risk is a true opportunity. With ever increasing stocks of oil prices, the improved safety measure will encourage the employees to come back to the work and enhance confidence into stakeholders to keep investing into the company. This is kept at high impact and probability of 4. Risk 6 - Firm's reputation and good will, to be impacted due to John Browne's resignation. Although company do not rely completely on single person however it is stated in the case study that he was a visionary for the organization. Hence the risk installs that with his resignation, company should struggle to keep up the performance under new leadership. Hence the impact and probability of this risk is kept at 3 and 4 respectively. Risk 7 - The previous hazards enables company to negotiate on retirement package that it should give to John and could utilize it to improve safety measures in the company. Company often pay incentives to its executives for company’s performance. Similarly, they are also penalized when company do not perform well. Same is the case with John, although company have seen new heights under his leadership however, he has never paid attention to this ever-increasing hazard of safety in the facilities. Its mentioned in the case study that, rather than investing into improving the safety measures in the facility, the company imposed 20% cost reduction to improve its profits. This have now grown to such a level and all this also happened under John’s supervision. Hence he is bound to be penalized for the same. Risk 8 - BP might lose its sight and vision with introduction of new CEO after John. The change of CEO is a big step especially when company was souring heights under John and now is under tremendous pressure and risk due to Safety and hazard cases reported while John is leaving. This could be somewhat mitigated as new CEO is also an opportunity to show new shine to the company. Hence have kept the impact and probability at 3.