Senior Risk Manager

About the Role

Spectra Tech is seeking an experienced Senior Project Risk Manager to lead, administer, and continuously improve the ALS-U integrated risk-management program in Berkeley, CA.

Responsibilities

• Risk Management Program & Governance
  • 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
    • Installation readiness
    • Commissioning
    • 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.
• Risk Identification & Assessment
  • 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.
• Quantitative Cost & Schedule Risk Analysis
  • Develop and maintain integrated cost and schedule risk-analysis models using Safran Risk or other LBNL-approved tools.
  • Perform:
    • Monte Carlo simulation
    • Sensitivity analysis
    • Scenario analysis
    • Estimate-uncertainty analysis
    • Schedule-uncertainty analysis
    • Risk correlation
    • 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.
• Risk Mitigation & Monitoring
  • 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.
• Forward-Looking Risk Assessment
  • Conduct forward-looking assessments of critical-path and near-critical-path work.
  • Evaluate:
    • Vendor-delivery exposure
    • Staffing constraints
    • Funding scenarios
    • Workspace limitations
    • Installation sequencing
    • Technical interfaces
    • Construction readiness
    • Commissioning readiness
    • Off-project dependencies
  • 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:
    • Top project risks
    • Emerging risks
    • Changes in exposure
    • Mitigation status
    • Contingency implications
    • 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.
• Training & Continuous Improvement
  • 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.

Requirements

• 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.