Event Operation Risk Assessment: Rhyme & Reason Music Festival

This report assesses the potential risks associated with organizing the "Rhyme & Reason" music festival, a non-profit event held in Melbourne. It identifies key risk factors including crowd management, fire safety, technical failures, financial risks, and medical assistance. The report suggests mitigation strategies such as crowd control measures, fire safety protocols, backup plans for technical issues, financial oversight, medical support, and equipment safety checks. The analysis emphasizes the importance of a structured approach to risk assessment to minimize potential hazards and ensure event safety. The report also highlights the need for wiring insulation and truss safety to prevent accidents. The conclusion underscores that a well-structured event plan can significantly reduce risks, aiming to create a safe and successful event. References to relevant risk management literature are provided to support the analysis.

Running Head: Event Operation-Risk Assessment
Event Operation
Risk Assessment

Risk Management & Assessment P a g e | 1
Introduction:
The “Rhyme & Reason” Music festival is one of its kind and for all the ages. It’s a not for profit music
festival which has the sole purpose of raising funds for the musicians and some of its causes the
stakeholders are supporting. It’s an absolutely gala affair spread across the city of Melbourne and
Melbourne exhibition centre. The venue has a total capacity of 10,000 odd individuals and the entire
venue is divided into 6 parts including the main stage, food stalls, infusion stage, park & the market.
In the essay we will focus on assessing the risk associated with organising of such extravagant
events.
Risk Management: It can be understood as forecasting and evaluation of risks attached
before commencement of any business activity/event/ start of an operation (Haimes, 2015). As part
of a great event planning, process hazards have to be identified and risks have to be assessed and
controlled in order to minimize the potential for injury or harm (Rausand ,2013) For the purpose of
the Musical event “Rhyme & Reason” some of the possible risk assessment factors can be:
 Crowd rush: As mentioned above, the Melbourne exhibition centre has a total capacity
of 10,000 PAX which is the max, but looking at the type of event, and the artist associated
and the promotions, marketing & sponsorships the event has gotten itself into, there is
bound to be more crowd gathering than the expected. Hence, necessary steps have to be
taken to control the crowd, the same can be achieved by: Locking the venue 2 hour after the
event commences, putting necessary barricades to control the crowd, getting security
personal to manage the crowd and also to prevent any chances of stampede.
 Fire: The festival will have a lot of electrical equipment, hence necessary safety has to be
taken care of, and getting a fire brigade outside the venue with a separate exit would help in
the risk mitigation.
 Technical failure: It is no surprise that, electrical equipment do have chances of power
failure or some other technical failure, hence genets and plan B should be kept ready for
such situations, also , a day prior a full-fledged dry run would be of great help.
 Financial Risk: Planning of such big events have a major costs attached to them ,in
order to foresee the expenses not going out of hand or the budget allocated to exceed, a
separate team has to be made to control only the finance and raise the alarm to the
committee, in case the expenses is crossing the line(Hopkin, 2017)

Risk Management & Assessment P a g e | 2
 Medical assistance: A medical ambulance to be parked at the entrance of venue, to
take care of any medical emergency.
 Equipment & Truss safety: The truss, which holds all the heavy equipment, in itself
is very heavy, hence an in ground basement team is a must and should to establish the
sturdiness of the truss and other heavy equipment’s which are hanging(Li, 2014)
 Wiring insulation: Special efforts have to be made to take care of proper insulation of
wiring in order to prevent from any damage to an individual.
Conclusion: A well layered structures plan of the event can help in assessment of the probable
risk associated with the event. All the points mentioned above have covered all of the possible
grounds where the risk of things going out of the place is present, keeping in mind, the above
mentioned points can reduce the chances of risk to almost zero.

Risk Management & Assessment P a g e | 3
References:
Haimes, Y.Y 2015, Risk modeling, assessment, and management, John Wiley & Sons.
Hopkin, P 2017, Fundamentals of risk management: understanding, evaluating and implementing
effective risk management, Kogan Page Publishers.
Li, W 2014, Risk assessment of power systems: models, methods, and applications, John Wiley &
Sons.
Rausand, M 2013, Risk assessment: theory, methods, and applications (Vol. 115), John Wiley & Sons.