Responding to risks: Concentrating risks

Concentrating risks is the opposite of diversifying - it means deliberately 'putting all your eggs in one basket'.  The effect is opposite too:  it increases the severity of potential impacts, but reduces management overheads, variables, unknown factors and dependencies.

An example of concentrating risk would be assigning a single person to a project full time, rather than assigning a small team part time. 
The time and cost of running the project might well be reduced, and the project might well be reduced, and the project may be run in a more coherent way, but there is a risk that the key individual will move on, damaging the chances of delivery.

The equivalent in financial terms is investing heavily in one or two stocks or products that you believe are sound, rather than spreading risk around because you are less sure of your market knowledge.

Concentrating risk depends for its success on the skill and knowledge of decision makers.  With fewer chances to correct mistakes, people need to get it right first time.