First you need to discover these “untoward events”. There are many approaches you could take and a lot depends on where you are at. The very start of a project, is when you know the least about it. As a result, a simple brainstorm is a great approach to risk discovery at this point and I frequently do this with teams at the start of the journey.

Since so many folks get freaked out and over-think when you ask them about risk, you can use alternative words to guide questions that pull out concerns.

 

Group brainstorm models

• Anchors and Engines a.k.a. Ropes and Fuels
• Fears, Uncertainties and Doubts

 

Alternative wording

I often, during various other early stage activities, ask team members “What are you most afraid of?”, “Where do you think the black holes are?”, “What was the worst or most annoying things that happened on your last project?”. Each of these can elicit a number of potential risks, or areas to investigate further

Don’t overthink – don’t worry too much about capturing risks in an “appropriate” way, it’s more important to capture the item in such a way that it makes sense. You can sort out the details later.

Every conversation has the potential to surface new risks. Key sources for me include team stand-ups, iteration meetings, targeted risk discovery sessions and retrospectives. If you’re a bit of an introvert (like I am) “what are you afraid of” is both a great conversation starter as well as a good way to discover risks you were previously unaware of. I also eavesdrop a lot.

Consider creating a way for the whole team to contribute to risk discovery – maybe a wall or electronic log, accessible by everyone, that everyone can add to. If you do this, find a way that people can do some of the estimation and understanding work for you. Have cards pre-printed with something like this. Another option for the likelihood / impact scores, is to make your risk log show risks on two axis – likelihood and impact