Join us for our Monthly Lunch & Learn, the 4th Wednesday of the month at noon CST. 

Hosted by our PMI Emerald Coast FL Chapter Board Members. 

Attendees of this event will earn 1 PDU.

Topic: 

A pre-mortem in project management is a strategic, proactive exercise held before a project launches, where the team imagines the project has already failed and works backward to identify potential causes. It combats overconfidence, encourages honest risk identification, and helps teams create mitigation plans before risks become real. 

1. Welcome & Objectives (5 minutes)

• Quick welcome & speaker intro
• Session objectives:
  • Understand Project Pre-Mortem
  • Learn a simple facilitation framework
  • Apply it in a real-world scenario

2. What is a Project Pre-Mortem? (8 minutes)

• Definition: “Assume the project failed—what went wrong?”
• Origin (Gary Klein)
• Why it works:
  • Counters optimism bias
  • Encourages candid input
  • Surfaces hidden risks early

3. Pre-Mortem vs. Traditional Risk Management (7 minutes)

Quick contrast:

• Pre-Mortem = narrative, forward-failure thinking
• Risk Mgmt = structured identification (RAID log)

Key insight:
Pre-mortems enhance—not replace—risk management by improving input quality.

4. How to Run a Pre-Mortem (10 minutes)

Lean Facilitation Model:

1. Set the Scenario (2 min)
   • “It’s 6–12 months later—the project failed.”
2. Silent Brainstorm (3 min)
   • Individuals write failure reasons
3. Share & Group (3 min)
   • Rapid round-robin
   • Cluster similar risks
4. Prioritize (1 min)
   • Quick vote (top 3–5 risks)
5. Mitigation (1 min)
   • Convert to actions / RAID entries

5. Interactive Exercise (15 minutes)

Scenario (example):
Cybersecurity platform rollout / ERP upgrade / enterprise system migration

Activity Flow:

• 5 min: Individual + small group brainstorming
• 5 min: Group consolidation & prioritization
• 5 min: Report-out (top risks + mitigations)

6. Key Takeaways (3 minutes)

• Best used at project kickoff or major phase gates
• Drives better risk identification vs traditional brainstorming
• Works best with:
  • Psychological safety
  • Cross-functional teams
  • Timeboxed facilitation

7. Q&A + Close (2 minutes)

• Rapid Q&A
• Closing remarks / PMI update