Portfolio Planning
Help Center: Risk & Issue Management
What are Risks and Issues?
Risks are potential events or conditions that, if they occur, could have a positive or negative impact on an initiative’s objectives. These are uncertainties that need to be identified, assessed, and managed proactively to ensure success. Issues, on the other hand, are problems or obstacles that have already arisen and are currently affecting or hindering the project's progress. Effective management of both risks and issues is crucial for organizations to navigate the complexities of initiative execution, ensuring timely resolution of problems and mitigation of potential threats. Kiplot empowers organizations to efficiently manage risks and issues, providing the tools and insights needed to anticipate challenges, make informed decisions, and maintain momentum towards achieving strategic goals.
Risks and Issues in Kiplot
In Kiplot, Risks and Issues are tracked at the initiative level. You can add these to an initiative by opening up the initiative page and navigating to the Risks and Issues tab.
Default fields:
These fields are available on all risks and issues entered in Kiplot.
| Name | Type | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Key | Text | Automatically assigned, un-editable.. |
| Status | Dropdown | Click on the three dots to the right of the Key to perform the following actions on a Risk or Issue: – Escalate – De-escalate – Change initiative – Convert to issue (risks only) – Convert to risk (issues only) – Close – Archive |
| Summary | Text | Provide a short summary of the risk / issue. |
| Description | Text | Provide a more detailed explanation of the risk/issue. |
| Impact | Sliding scale | Select a score between 1 (insignificant) and 5 (severe). |
| Probability | Sliding scale | Select a percentage that reflects the probability of the risk / issue occurring. A score between 1 (very unlikely) and 5 (very likely) will automatically be assigned. |
| Score | Number | Automatically assigned, un-editable. See further down in this article for more information on how this score is generated. |
| Owner | Dropdown | Assign an owner. They must exist as a user in Kiplot. |
| Mitigating Action | Text | Provide detail on the action(s) taking place to mitigate the risk/issue. |
| Comment | Text | Add additional comments to the risk/issue. |
| Created | Text | Automatically assigned, un-editable. |
Optional fields:
As well as the default fields available on the Risks and Issues tab, you can enable / disable the below on the Initiatives Configuration page.
| Name | Type | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Action date | Date | Date when the mitigating action is due. |
| Action RAG Status | Dropdown | The qualitative status of the mitigating action. |
| Critical date | Date | Date when the resolution of a risk becomes critical. |
| Impact date | Date | Date when the impact materializes. |
| Theme | Dropdown | Theme or area that the risk/issue impacts. You can manage the list of themes from the Configuration page. |
Risk/Issue score
Once you’ve entered a risk against an initiative, a score is calculated from the Impact and Probability properties of the Risk/Issue.
- Score = Impact Level x Probability Level
- Impact Score levels are stepped from
1to5 - Probability Percentage values run from
0%(0.0) to99%(0.99) - Probability Percentage for Issues is always
100%(1.0) - The score is rounded to the nearest whole integer
Impact score
| Score |
|---|
| 1 – Insignificant |
| 2 – Minor |
| 3 – Moderate |
| 4 – Major |
| 5 – Severe |
Probability level
In the UI the probability percentage value is translated to a probability level from 1 to 5
| Percentage | Level |
|---|---|
| 0% | No Level |
| 1%-10% | 1 – Very Unlikely |
| 11%-35% | 2 – Unlikely |
| 36%-65% | 3 – Possible |
| 66%-90% | 4 – Likely |
| 91%-99% | 5 – Very Likely |
Risk/Issue score examples:
This table is designed to show how the risk scoring works. It contains some arbitrary examples of risks with impact and probability multiplied together to reach a score.
| Impact | Impact Score | Probability | Probability Level | Calculation | Risk Score | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Example 1 | Insignificant | 1 | 70% | 4 (Likely) | 1 x 4 | 4 |
| Example 2 | Moderate | 3 | 15% | 2 (Unlikely) | 3 x 2 | 6 |
| Example 3 | Severe | 5 | 95% | 5 (Very Likely) | 5 x 5 | 25 |
| Example 4 | Moderate | 3 | 50% | 3 (Possible) | 3 x 3 | 9 |
Adding a risk/issue
- On the Initiative Detail page, navigate to the Risks and Issues Tab
- On the Risks/Issues section click “Add risk/issue”
- Fill out required Summary, Impact and Probability (for risks only) and optional Owner
- Click Add
Updating information for a risk/issue
- On the Initiative Detail page, navigate to the Risks and Issues Tab
- Risk/issue section properties in the table can be edited directly
- Changes are automatically saved
Calculated/fixed properties such as the Score and Created information cannot be edited.
Escalating/ De-escalating a risk/issue
The escalated status is used to highlight specific risks/issues in reporting.
- On the Initiative Detail page, navigate to the Risks and Issues Tab
- On the risk/issue section click on the 3-dot button at the start of a risk/issue row
- Click “Escalate”/”De-escalate”
- A red exclamation mark automatically gets added/removed based on the action
Reassigning a risk/issue to a different initiative
- On the Initiative Detail page, navigate to the Risks and Issues Tab
- On the risk/issue section click on the 3-dot button at the start of a risk/issue row
- Click “Change Initiative”
- Type to search and select the initiative
- The Risk/Issue will get reassigned when selecting the initiative
Closing/Opening a risk/issue
- On the Initiative Detail page, navigate to the Risks and Issues Tab
- On the risk/issue section click on the 3-dot button at the start of a risk/issue row
- Click “Close”/”Open”
- The Risk/Issue Status will update with a completed/open icon when triggering the action
Archiving a risk/issue
- On the Initiative Detail page, navigate to the Risks and Issues Tab
- On the risk/issue section click on the 3-dot button at the start of a risk/issue row
- Click “Archive”
- Click the red bin-icon to confirm
The Kiplot Help Center is currently in ALPHA. It is actively under development.
