Project Risk Checklist: 30 Control Points to Prevent Project Failure (Free Template)

Experienced Project Controllers know that most project failures are predictable — and preventable. The difference is whether you're systematically checking the right signals at the right frequency.

This 30-point checklist covers the full spectrum of project health: schedule, budget, resources, governance, scope, and stakeholder management. Use it in project reviews, weekly health checks, or as a diagnostic when a project is showing early distress signals.

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SECTION 1: SCHEDULE HEALTH (8 points)

☐ 1. SPI ≥ 0.90 — Schedule Performance Index is within acceptable range

☐ 2. SPI not declining — No consecutive week-over-week decline of more than 0.05

☐ 3. Critical path tasks on track — All critical path tasks have adequate float or are on schedule

☐ 4. No silent dependencies — All tasks with delayed predecessors have been rescheduled or mitigated

☐ 5. Milestone forecast valid — All upcoming milestones have a completion probability above 60%

☐ 6. Baseline is current — Project baseline has been updated after any approved scope or schedule change

☐ 7. No overdue tasks without escalation — No task is more than 5 business days overdue without a documented mitigation or escalation

☐ 8. Velocity is stable — Team completion rate variance is within 25% of mean over the past 4 weeks

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SECTION 2: BUDGET HEALTH (6 points)

☐ 9. CPI ≥ 0.90 — Cost Performance Index is within acceptable range

☐ 10. Budget burn not accelerating — Week-over-week variance growth is less than 2 percentage points

☐ 11. EAC within approved tolerance — Estimate at Completion is within ±10% of approved budget

☐ 12. Contingency reserve status known — Remaining contingency has been reviewed against outstanding risks

☐ 13. No unauthorized expenditures — All actual costs have corresponding approved budget allocations

☐ 14. Invoices and accruals current — No pending invoices or accruals more than 30 days old that haven't been accounted for

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SECTION 3: RESOURCE HEALTH (5 points)

☐ 15. No overallocated resources — No team member is allocated above 100% across all projects

☐ 16. Critical path resource backup exists — For each resource owning 2+ critical path tasks, a backup or escalation plan is documented

☐ 17. Upcoming resource needs confirmed — Resources required for next milestone are confirmed and available

☐ 18. Resource concentration acceptable — Top-3 most utilized resources own less than 60% of critical path tasks

☐ 19. Team capacity matches project demand — No planned crunch period (>120% utilization) without a documented plan

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SECTION 4: RISK & ISSUES HEALTH (5 points)

☐ 20. All high risks have mitigation plans — No risk rated High or Critical exists without a documented, assigned mitigation action

☐ 21. Risk register is current — All risks have been reviewed within the last 14 days

☐ 22. No unresolved issues older than 10 days — All open issues have an owner and target resolution date within 10 business days

☐ 23. AI-detected risks reviewed — Any AI-flagged anomalies have been reviewed and either mitigated or accepted

☐ 24. Risk escalation path is clear — Every team member knows which risks require escalation and to whom

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SECTION 5: GOVERNANCE & SCOPE HEALTH (4 points)

☐ 25. Scope creep within tolerance — Total scope change since baseline is less than 5% without approved change request

☐ 26. All change requests processed — No change request has been pending review for more than 5 business days

☐ 27. Governance meetings are current — Steering committee has met within the last scheduled period

☐ 28. Action items resolution rate >70% — At least 70% of governance action items are resolved within agreed timeframes

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SECTION 6: STAKEHOLDER HEALTH (2 points)

☐ 29. Sponsor engagement active — Project sponsor has been in contact within the last 10 business days

☐ 30. No stakeholder communication gaps — No key stakeholder communication thread has been unanswered for more than 5 business days

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How to Use This Checklist

Weekly health check: Run through all 30 points at the start of each week. Projects scoring below 24/30 should be flagged as yellow; below 18/30 should be flagged as red.

New project onboarding: Use as a baseline assessment in the first 2 weeks of a project to establish the starting health profile.

Crisis diagnosis: When a project is in trouble, this checklist quickly identifies which dimensions are contributing to the problem.

Governance gate review: Use as a structured input for milestone gate reviews and phase approvals.

Automating the Checklist

The most time-consuming part of this checklist is data collection — pulling the metrics for each point from your various project tools.

My Virtual PCO monitors most of these 30 points automatically, in real time, across your entire portfolio. Rather than completing this checklist manually each week, you can review the AI-generated health scores and get the same intelligence in seconds.

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