Risk Attributes for the Value Streams Inventory - Value Streams Inventory and Attributes

Risk Attributes for the Value Streams Inventory

(Chapter 26 of Value Streams Inventory and Attributes)

Executive Summary: Chapter Overview

IF4IT

The Bottom Line

Risk attributes capture the known risk profile of each Value Stream. Assessed Risk and Key Risk Factors make it possible to identify which end-to-end flows are most exposed and why, so mitigation planning can focus on risks that threaten value delivery.

Core Concepts

Concept	Definition & Strategic Role
Assessed Risk	The practitioner assessment of the likelihood and impact of value stream failure, degradation, or material disruption.
Key Risk Factors	The specific conditions that drive the overall risk rating, such as bottlenecks, hand-offs, vendor dependencies, or control gaps.
Mitigation Focus	Risk attributes translate portfolio-level risk ratings into actionable improvement and control priorities.

Quick Q&A

Question: How do risk attributes differ from performance attributes?

Answer: Performance attributes describe how well the value stream is currently operating; risk attributes describe where future failure, degradation, or disruption may occur. Both are needed because a value stream can perform acceptably today while carrying risk factors that threaten future delivery.

Risk attributes capture the known risk profile of each Value Stream — the likelihood and impact of value stream failure or degradation.

Attribute Name	Maturity	Description and Notes
Assessed Risk	Walk	Description — The practitioner’s overall assessment of the risk associated with this Value Stream. Benefit(s) — Surfaces high-risk value streams for priority attention in governance reviews and improvement decisions. Source — Manual Examples — Very High, High, Medium, Low, Very Low Notes — Valid values: Very High
Key Risk Factors [Multi-Value]	Walk	Description — The specific factors driving the Assessed Risk rating. Benefit(s) — Translates the overall risk rating into actionable intelligence for mitigation planning. Source — Manual Examples — Single vendor dependency at a critical stage; Manual hand-offs between stages; Long-cycle bottleneck with no redundancy Notes — Separate multiple risk factors with semicolons.

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