Spectra Tech has an immediate need for an experienced Senior Project Risk Manager to lead, administer, and continuously improve the ALS-U integrated risk-management program in Berkeley, CA.
Responsibilities
- Maintain and periodically update the ALS-U Risk Management Plan , supporting procedures, risk taxonomy, scoring criteria, and governance cadence.
- Maintain the project risk register and associated configuration-controlled records.
- Serve as the principal project advisor on risk-management matters.
- Provide independent and objective assessments of threats and opportunities affecting:
- Project scope
- Cost and schedule
- Technical performance
- Achievement of Key Performance Parameters
- Facilitate the ALS-U Risk Management Board and focused risk reviews.
- Develop meeting agendas, document decisions, track assigned actions, and elevate unresolved or inadequately managed risks to project leadership.
- Establish and maintain a disciplined risk-management process in which assumptions are explicit, ownership is assigned, mitigation commitments are traceable, and material information is communicated promptly.
- Facilitate project-wide risk workshops, subsystem risk reviews, schedule-risk sessions, lessons-learned reviews, and targeted risk deep dives.
- Participate in technical, procurement, vendor-performance, installation-readiness, commissioning-readiness, staffing, space, logistics, and other project reviews.
- Develop and maintain risk statements that clearly identify the causal event, affected condition, and potential consequence.
- Ensure risk entries include defensible probability, cost, schedule, technical, and programmatic bases.
- Maintain complete and current risk information in Safran Risk Manager or another approved system.
- Document risk ownership, affected Work Breakdown Structure elements, triggers, handling strategies, mitigation actions, due dates, retirement criteria, residual exposure, and supporting rationale.
- Identify cross-cutting, systemic, correlated, and compounding risks that may not be visible within individual control accounts or technical systems.
- Reconcile risk assumptions with the Integrated Master Schedule, Basis of Estimate documentation, procurement plans, technical maturity assessments, staffing plans, change-control actions, funding assumptions, and other project-control records.
- Develop and maintain integrated cost and schedule risk-analysis models using Safran Risk or other LBNL-approved tools.
- Perform:
- Sensitivity analysis
- Estimate-uncertainty analysis
- Schedule-uncertainty analysis
- Confidence-level assessment
- Evaluate the realism and quality of probability distributions, risk impacts, estimate uncertainty, schedule uncertainty, correlation assumptions, mitigation assumptions, and retirement timing.
- Coordinate with Project Controls to map risk events and mitigation actions to P6 activities, milestones, cost estimates, control accounts, critical and near-critical paths, schedule margin, and contingency forecasts .
- Evaluate cost and schedule contingency adequacy and changes in exposure.
- Reconcile modeled exposure with available contingency, realized risks, retired risks, emerging threats, and approved baseline changes.
- Interpret quantitative results for technical and nontechnical audiences.
- Support baseline-change proposals, recovery plans, acceleration strategies, funding scenarios, independent cost reviews, and DOE reviews.
- Assist risk owners in developing specific, measurable, time-phased, and adequately resourced mitigation plans.
- Evaluate whether proposed mitigation actions are likely to reduce probability or impact as intended.
- Track mitigation commitments, trigger conditions, due dates, retirement milestones, effectiveness measures, and residual exposure.
- Identify overdue, stalled, inadequately resourced, or ineffective mitigation actions.
- Escalate material concerns when risk information is not maintained, mitigation actions are not progressing, exposure is increasing, or project decisions are inconsistent with the documented risk posture.
- Distinguish risks from realized issues, assumptions, constraints, opportunities, and management actions and ensure each is addressed through the appropriate project process.
- Preserve the responsibility of Technical Project Managers, System Leads, CAMs, and designated risk owners for executing assigned mitigation actions while maintaining accountability for the integrity of the overall risk-management process.
- Conduct forward-looking assessments of critical-path and near-critical-path work.
- Evaluate:
- Vendor-delivery exposure
- Staffing constraints
- Workspace limitations
- Technical interfaces
- Construction readiness
- Assess risks associated with design maturity, procurement performance, fabrication, installation, testing, commissioning, and transition to operations.
- Evaluate proposed management decisions, baseline changes, recovery strategies, and acceleration scenarios for secondary effects and changes in risk exposure.
- Monitor external dependencies, including DOE actions, funding profiles, regulatory approvals, tariffs, supply-chain conditions, institutional commitments, labor availability, and interfacing organizations.
- Support management assessments and focused analyses requested by project leadership.
Reporting & Communication
- Prepare monthly risk reports identifying:
- Changes in exposure
- Matters requiring leadership action
- Develop and present risk briefings to project leadership, Laboratory management, DOE representatives, review committees, CAMs, and technical teams.
- Provide risk-analysis inputs to monthly reporting, forecasting, change control, rebaseline documentation, project reviews, and management decision packages.
- Maintain auditable records of Risk Management Board decisions, risk acceptance, ownership changes, mitigation commitments, retirement decisions, model assumptions, and quantitative-analysis results.
- Respond to review recommendations, information requests, and corrective-action requirements affecting the risk-management program.
- Support development of DOE-facing narratives and presentations concerning project risk posture, contingency, and mitigation effectiveness.
- Develop and deliver role-based risk-management training for project personnel.
- Establish practical guidance and quality checks for risk statements, impact estimates, mitigation plans, ownership, triggers, residual exposure, and retirement criteria.
- Benchmark ALS-U practices against DOE capital-project experience and recognized project-risk-management standards.
- Recommend improvements appropriate to the project’s execution phase.
- Support lessons-learned activities and continuous improvement of risk-management tools, procedures, and reporting.
Required Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree in Engineering, Construction Management, Project Management, Business, Economics, Applied Mathematics, Statistics, or a related discipline .
- At least 8 years of progressively responsible experience in project risk management, project controls, cost estimating, scheduling, or management of complex capital projects; or an equivalent combination of education and experience.
- Experience leading or administering risk management for a large, technically complex capital project, construction program, scientific facility, infrastructure program, aerospace or defense program, or comparable high-consequence undertaking.
- Experience developing and maintaining project risk registers.
- Experience facilitating risk workshops and senior-level risk reviews.
- Experience assigning and tracking risk ownership and mitigation actions.
- Experience performing or directing quantitative cost and schedule risk analysis.
- Experience with Monte Carlo simulation, estimate uncertainty, schedule uncertainty, sensitivity analysis, and contingency confidence-level assessment .
- Experience integrating risk information with an Integrated Master Schedule, cost estimate, Estimate at Completion, change-control process, and project performance reporting .
- Experience producing executive-level risk assessments and defending methodology, assumptions, and results before senior management or independent reviewers.
- Experience working across technical, project-management, project-controls, procurement, construction, operations, and institutional support organizations.
- Strong analytical writing, presentation, facilitation, and executive-communication skills.
- Ability to challenge unsupported assumptions, raise unfavorable information, and escalate material concerns while maintaining constructive working relationships.
- Strong records-management and configuration-control discipline.
Preferred Qualifications
- Experience supporting a DOE Order 413.3B capital asset project or comparable federally governed major project.
- Working knowledge of DOE Guide 413.3-7A or comparable capital-project risk-management guidance.
- Experience with Safran Risk Manager and Safran Risk .
- Proficiency with Primavera P6 .
- Familiarity with earned-value systems and EVMS concepts .
- Experience supporting a project rebaseline, baseline deviation, recovery plan, independent cost estimate, external review, or major corrective-action effort.
- Experience with accelerator facilities, scientific user facilities, installation-intensive projects, industrial construction, aerospace, defense, or other highly integrated technical programs.
- Professional certification such as PMI Risk Management Professional, Project Management Professional, AACE certification, or equivalent .
- Advanced degree in a relevant technical, analytical, or management discipline.