Ithuta JV

Source - Article by Bob Andrew

Britain’s Royal Society, one of the oldest and most prestigious scientific bodies, has selected 12 key issues, which they believe will shape science in the 21st century and might gives us some idea of what we can expect in the years to come. Third on the list is how to cope with uncertainty.

Dealing with uncertainty is a major concern in all aspects of business, politics and socio-economics. It is also a major problem in project management, where the focus is to produce fixed deliverables against predefined budgets and schedules, all in unpredictable project environments.

One of the problems in project management is that uncertainty is often confused with risk, especially in complex projects.

Risk management is a fundamental element of project management, with the understanding of risk as an uncertain event or condition that, if occurring, will have a positive or negative effect on the project’s objectives. This understanding implies that risk is a potential future event that has the possibility of affecting project outcomes.

In contrast, uncertainty is not a future possibility but a present reality. For example, if a project scope is vague and unclear, the present reality is that the scope is uncertain, rather than being a risk, as if you can’t define something, how can you determine what risks there could be?

Resolving the uncertainty, for example seeking clarity and definition of the scope, is a different thing than identifying risks. It is true, however, that there is a risk (future)to achieving project objectives if the uncertainty (present) is not resolved.

The concepts of uncertainty and risk should be dealt with separately in managing a project. In risk management, the project team needs to plan and accommodate future events that may or may not happen. To manage project uncertainty, there has to be a proactive effort to fully understand the context of the project and to reduce ambiguities and confusion. Managing uncertainty implies exploring and understanding the origins of project uncertainty before seeking to identify and manage any perceived risks that may be embedded in the project context.