Most teams say they want to work on the most important items first, yet their boards still fill up with low impact tasks while real risks quietly pile up. Deadlines slip, critical defects escape, and everyone feels busy, but not necessarily effective.

Our December 2025 Agile103 session, “Risk Based Approach,” is for Scrum Masters, Product Owners, delivery leads, and risk partners who want a more honest way to prioritize work, not just by size or stakeholder influence, but by risk and value.

Why a risk based approach matters for Agile teams

A risk based approach starts from a simple idea, not all work carries the same level of uncertainty or impact. Guides from PMI on project risk management show that teams that identify and manage risk early deliver more predictably and with fewer surprises.

In software and product work, this thinking carries into testing as well. ISTQB describes risk based testing as focusing efforts where the likelihood and impact of failure are highest, so scarce testing time protects what matters most.

Frameworks like ISO 31000 treat risk as anything that affects objectives, positive or negative, which fits naturally with agile ideas of learning and experimentation.

In this event, we translate these ideas into everyday agile practices, from backlog refinement to release planning.

Practical ways to apply risk based thinking

During the session, we will explore simple patterns you can use right away, such as

• Adding basic risk attributes to backlog items, impact, likelihood, detectability

• Using lightweight risk workshops during planning to surface dependencies, constraints, and assumptions

• Connecting risk based thinking to test strategy, observability, and incident response

• Visualizing risk on your boards, so the team can see where attention is needed next

You will receive worksheets and examples in the Agile103 Resources Library and can revisit similar topics in the Agile103 Event Archive.

Join the December 2025 “Risk Based Approach” session

This session is ideal for teams working in complex, regulated, or high stakes environments, as well as anyone who feels their current prioritization approach is not telling the whole story.

Check dates and registration details on the Agile103 Event Calendar and consider joining the Agile103 Community of Practice to keep learning with peers.

Share this listing with your product, engineering, and risk partners, ask them which risks feel most misunderstood today, and bring those examples into the session so we can work on them together.