Project: Q3 Compliance Training Rollout · Method: pre-mortem (assume it failed, work backward) · Risks scored: 6
I imagined it’s the end of Q3 and the rollout has gone badly, then worked backward from that failure using your project plan, the retro from last year’s rollout, and the stakeholder map in the Knowledge Center. Six failure modes explain most of the ways it could go wrong. I scored each as likelihood × impact on a 1–5 scale, so the risk score runs from 1 to 25. Two sit well ahead of the rest: low completion before the deadline (20) and content that’s outdated against the current regulation (16). Those are where I’d put your attention first.
Risk score by failure mode (likelihood × impact, 1–25)
Low completion before deadline20
Content outdated vs regulation16
Manager buy-in missing15
Localization delays12
LMS/SSO access issues9
Survey fatigue6
Low completion before the deadline — score 20. Likelihood high (5), impact high (4). Last year’s retro shows completion stalling near 61% two weeks out, and this cohort is larger. If the week-two figure is under about 50%, treat it as the failure already in progress. The fix is to stagger assignment by team with a hard mid-quarter checkpoint and give each manager a weekly completion list for their own reports.
Content outdated against the current regulation — score 16. Likelihood high (4), impact high (4). The source policy was last reviewed before the latest rule change, so the course could teach a superseded requirement. The signal to watch for is no compliance sign-off on the final script; the fix is a dated legal and compliance review before build freeze rather than after launch.
The full ranking, with an early warning sign and a concrete mitigation for each, is below.
| Risk | Likelihood | Impact | Early warning sign | Mitigation |
|---|
| Low completion before the deadline | High | High | Week-two completion under about 50% | Stagger assignment by team with a hard mid-quarter checkpoint, and give managers a weekly completion list for their own reports |
| Content outdated vs the current regulation | High | High | No compliance sign-off on the final script | Get a dated legal and compliance review of the content before build freeze, not after launch |
| Manager buy-in missing | High | Med | Managers not forwarding the kickoff note to their teams | Brief managers first and hand each one a two-line script plus their own team’s list |
| Translation and localization delays | High | Med | Localized files not back by build freeze | Lock the source copy early and run localization in parallel with build, not after it |
| LMS and SSO access issues | Med | Med | Login failures for the test group in staging | Run an SSO smoke test with a small pilot group two weeks out |
| Survey fatigue skews feedback | Med | Low | Post-course survey response under about 20% | Keep the survey to three questions and embed it at the end of the final module |
If you harden two things before you build, make them the completion plan and the compliance sign-off — together they carry the two highest scores. The lower four (manager buy-in at 15, localization delays at 12, LMS and SSO access at 9, and survey fatigue at 6) each deserve a mitigation but shouldn’t hold up the launch.
