The Risk Maturity Model

The UK MoD Defence Procurement Agency (DPA) commissioned HVR to conduct a full programme of risk management capability assessments for the Integrated Project Teams (IPTs) responsible for its thirty major military equipment acquisition projects. The total acquisition value of these projects is approximately £60 billion. The projects affect all three armed services and include Eurofighter, Bowman, CVF and the Astute class submarines.

The DPA had identified a need to measure risk management capability when it recognised that project approvals had been achieved on a number of projects on which risk had subsequently proved to be too high. As a result, the proportion of projects exceeding their envelope of cost and/or schedule estimates was higher than forecast. The implications were that either risks were not being adequately managed following project approval or that the risk assessments provided at project approval decisions were not realistic.

The HVR Risk Maturity Model was used to assess the risk management capability of each IPT. These assessments were used to identify and monitor improvements to the DPA’s management of risk at both project and “corporate” levels. It is now the DPA’s policy that any project larger than £20 million must have a risk maturity level 3 capability prior to seeking “Main Gate” approval.