After our SBW Berlin scholarship recipients learnt last week, how important it is, to set and carefully define areas of attentions in project management and in terms of their own project development, this week’s workshop on March 1 dealt with risk assessment. That’s why Abner Peña suggested that project managers as well as any companies must identify and analyze risks of a project to strengthen and reinforce its strategic plan. Risks here mean the same as problems that may occur during the project development or during its implementation. Risk assessment is a method to solve these problems to guarantee a continuously smooth operation of the project. To do this, one looks at and evaluates the project’s impact in terms of its affordability, time, and work commitment. Thus, during Step 1 one analyzes the strategic plan (idea, vision, budget, and areas of attention, etc.) and points out any risks the project currently has, had, or might have. During Step 2 (risk identification) these risks need to be further defined because in Step 3 (system development) the project manager will reflect on which changes within the work process or within the project’s impact are needed to solve or eliminate the risk (=problem). During Step 4 (risk assessment ideation) new strategies or an alternative plan are proposed, which will then be implemented and tested during Step 5 (risk mitigation). If through the re-designing of the system, the risk is now eliminated the risk assessment successfully ends here and the project’s strategic framework is reinforced. However, if the problem continues to exist, a decision must be made, if the project is worthwhile enough to be continued, or if it should be terminated, or if other risks should be identified and analyzed. In the last case, the risk assessment begins anew, and the project manager must decide, if the strategy plan (e.g., through adjusting of the target group etc.) needs to be changed or if he/she should identify other risks and try to solve them using the risk assessment method. In project management risk assessment often utilize various matrixes to clearly identify the project’s characteristics and to rank those according to their value identifying problems anywhere and solving any possible risks faster. While risk assessment remains an important task in project management, it is by no means an easy task often causing challenges and frustrations for the project manager as well as the stake holders; for example, when proposed strategies fail to solve the problem resulting in proposing yet again new strategies which must be again tested and piloted. When risks are identified and finally solved using risk assessment is all the more satisfying. Handouts and summaries are available for all scholarship recipients in a shared folder. Adding to this week’s topic risk assessment the next workshop focuses on funding.