Risk Analysis Related Topics: Risk Analysis Project management decisions are concerned with the future. While planners hope to influence the outcome of events by the decisions they make, everything about the future is, to a greater or lesser extent, uncertain. Defining Activity Risk To use the risk analysis feature in Open Plan, you must enter duration probability information for at least one activity in a project. More typically, you enter probable durations for all activities that involve at least some degree of uncertainty in their planning. Risk Analysis Operations You can perform a risk analysis of a project at any time. In many ways, the risk analysis function in Open Plan is similar to the time analysis process. Interpreting the Results of Risk Analysis Open Plan provides a number of views that you can use to display the results of risk analysis. The Effect of Risk Analysis on Start Dates In general, the early start dates calculated by risk analysis will be later than those in a project using standard time analysis. How Risk Analysis Calculates Finish Dates Open Plan does not generate the mean and standard deviation values of the finish dates for each activity directly during risk analysis. How Risk Analysis Interprets Durations In general, risk analysis interprets the value in the Original Duration field as the mode (most likely) value. Probability in Durations With Open Plan, you can estimate the durations of any uncertain activities by using different types of information to create a probability distribution. Progress and Duration Probability By conducting risk analysis on projects that have already recorded progress, you can accurately gauge the reliability of the remainder of the project schedule. Combining Probabilities In addition to enabling us to analyze a single process, probability theory also provides the analytical tools to combine probability distributions in ways appropriate to specific circumstances. Risk Analysis Output Files The results of an Open Plan risk analysis are potentially extensive, requiring some method to summarize this information for later use. Risk Histograms A risk histogram view presents the detailed picture of the probability distribution for calculated dates for a key activity. The Concept of Sampling Error Because the mean and standard deviation of a probability distribution are based on the sampling of Monte Carlo simulations, they are only estimates and, therefore, have a possible error. Monte Carlo Simulation Technique If we could perform a process a large number of times, we could build up a histogram to represent the probability distribution from the individual outcomes of each trial. Probability Some Background Information Tabs and Dialog Boxes Related Procedures Parent Topic: Project Analysis
