An unowned risk becomes a 14-week delay with a fixed track window

Risk versus issue. A risk is an uncertain event which, if it occurs, affects objectives; it is managed through probability, impact, an owner and a planned response. An issue is an event that has already occurred and requires action now. Once the supplier confirmed the 14-week delay, the matter became an issue and had to be managed as one - with an issue owner, impact analysis, resolution actions and a decision deadline. Leaving it in the risk register as a 'high risk' delays action and is a category error.

What failed:

• No owner. A risk without a named owner is not being managed; nobody was monitoring supplier capacity.
• Rating by anecdote. 'We used them three years ago' is not evidence about current capacity, backlog or the factory relocation that was evidently foreseeable.
• No response plan. No mitigation (contractual milestones, progress surveillance, buffer) and no contingency defined.
• No review cadence. The entry was never challenged as circumstances changed.
• Escalation without analysis. Asking for reserve without impact assessment transfers the problem upward instead of informing the decision.

The residual consequence - further slippage, or integration risk once the software arrives - should now be re-entered as a new risk with an owner.

Convert the issue into an analysed decision package.

1. Assign an issue owner and record it in the issue log, referencing the originating risk entry.
2. Perform a dated impact analysis: which milestones move, which contractual obligations and penalties are triggered, what the funder must be told, what the knock-on is for the next possession window, and what work can proceed regardless of the software.
3. Develop and cost the options: keep the Easter possession and compress later work (extra shifts, parallel working, additional safety and assurance burden); cancel and rebook (GBP 300,000 plus loss of the pre-winter window); re-sequence the possession to non-interlocking work; or accept delay with sponsor, funder and regulator agreement.
4. Recommend one option with reasons and state the decision required, the decision-maker and the consequence of deciding late. Friday is a governance deadline, not a project manager's call.
5. Handle reserve properly: distinguish contingency held for identified risks from management reserve held for unknown work, and request release only against an assessed impact, with approval at the level that owns the reserve.
6. Communicate to the funder proactively, before their quarterly assurance cycle forces the disclosure, and state the recovery position.

Root causes are ownership, evidence and escalation discipline, not bad luck.

• Mandatory risk ownership: no risk is accepted into the register without a named owner, a response and a review date; ownership is confirmed by the individual, not assumed.
• Supplier performance surveillance: contractual progress milestones, evidence-based reporting from the supplier, and a defined intervention point well before a lead time becomes critical. Single-source dependency should be recorded as a strategic risk with a sponsor-level owner.
• Risk review as a standing agenda item with challenge: ratings justified by evidence, reviewed on a fixed cadence and at every phase gate.
• Defined escalation thresholds and decision rights, including who may release contingency and management reserve and on what evidence.
• Issue management discipline: a separate issue log with owners and resolution dates, and a rule that a materialised risk is transferred out of the risk register.
• Assurance reporting: the funder's quarterly assurance should be fed by the same data the steering committee sees, so no second version of the truth exists.

These changes should be recorded as actions with owners and dates, and their implementation checked at the next steering committee rather than assumed.