Risk Manager

International Executive Service Corps; Berkeley, Northern (CA, KY); Hybrid; USD 140,000 - 190,000; Full time

Job summary

Spectra Tech in Berkeley, CA seeks a Senior Project Risk Manager to lead and continuously improve the ALS-U integrated risk-management program. The role involves identifying, assessing, and reporting threats and opportunities across scope, cost, schedule, and technical performance, in alignment with DOE guidance and project plans.

You will coordinate with project leadership, risk owners, and review committees, develop risk strategies, and ensure timely escalation and governance of risk actions

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in engineering, construction management or related field and 8+ years of risk-management experience.
• Experience leading risk management for a large, technically complex project or program.
• Experience maintaining project risk registers and facilitating risk workshops.
• Experience performing quantitative cost and schedule risk analysis and Monte Carlo simulations.
• Experience integrating risk information with schedule, cost estimates and performance reporting.

Responsibilities

• Maintain and update the ALS-U Risk Management Plan and risk taxonomy.
• Maintain the project risk register and governance records.
• Provide independent risk assessments to project leadership and reviews.
• Develop risk statements with clear causality, condition, and consequences.
• Facilitate risk reviews and risk-management board activities.
• Track mitigation actions, ownership, and due dates; escalate unresolved risks.

Skills

Risk management

Quantitative analysis

Stakeholder communication

Executive-level reporting

Project controls

Education

Bachelor’s degree in engineering or related field

Tools

Safran Risk Manager

Primavera P6

Job description

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.

The work shall support identification, assessment, quantification, mitigation, monitoring, escalation, and reporting of technical, cost, schedule, procurement, installation, operational, organizational, and external project risks and opportunities. The Senior Project Risk Manager shall provide independent, objective, and decision-ready risk information to ALS-U Project leadership and shall work closely with the Project Director, Project Manager, Chief Engineer, Technical Project Managers, Project Controls Manager, Control Account Managers, functional leads, risk owners, Laboratory management, the Department of Energy, and external review committees. The work shall be performed in accordance with applicable requirements and guidance, including DOE Order 413.3B, DOE risk-management guidance, the approved ALS-U Project Execution Plan, the ALS-U Risk Management Plan, and applicable policies and procedures.

Responsibilities shall include

• 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, schedule, technical performance, installation readiness, commissioning, and 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.

Responsibilities shall include

• 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 to identify relevant risks and opportunities.
• 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.

Responsibilities shall include

• 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, estimateuncertainty analysis, schedule-uncertainty analysis, risk correlation, and 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, including principal risk drivers, assumptions, limitations, sensitivity, and changes from prior analyses.
• Support baseline-change proposals, recovery plans, acceleration strategies, funding scenarios, independent cost reviews, and DOE reviews.

Responsibilities shall include

• 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.

Responsibilities shall include

• 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, and 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.

Responsibilities shall include

• Prepare monthly risk reports identifying top project risks, emerging risks, changes in exposure, mitigation status, contingency implications, and 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.

Responsibilities shall include

• 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, and at least eight 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 elevate 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 riskmanagement 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.