Managing Software Risk – A Lifecycle Approach

In a technology driven area of study, software project risk management has become relevant over time and indicates the importance and complexity of the issue they are addressing. The major objectives of software risk management includes identifying, addressing, and eliminating potential elements of risk before they become either threats to successful software operation or major sources of software rework. In order to develop risk free software, it appears to be worthwhile to incorporate risk management within the development process as part of project management. A process of risk management consisting of six phases including identification, analysis, prioritization, planning, resolving and monitoring has been introduced in this paper. In order to prevent project runaways, meet deadlines, stay within the project's budget, and simultaneously maintain the product's high quality standards, it is essential to timely identify, analyze and mitigate risks associated with each and every phase of software development life cycle. For that, a framework has been proposed to integrate risk within the development life cycle.