• Define the geographic boundaries for the DWMP areas
• Establish a group of stakeholders who can help guide the rest of the process
• Identify which of the company-level performance commitments, set as part of the 25-year corporate vision and the five-year periodic reviews, are relevant to the DWMP

• Define what the DWMP will cover
• Assess the current performance of the DWMP area against the relevant performance measures set out in the risk-based screening
• Assess the trends that will affect future performance

• Define current and future flood risk to properties
• Assess the risk for annual floods between a probability of 1:1 and 1:50
• Implement no regrets solutions like clearing blockages and repairing ineffective pumps straight away

• Identify which flooding and pollution issues group together geographically and have common causes
• Prioritise the clusters of issues
• Follow the appropriate DWMP methodology

Follow a straightforward approach familiar to any project, using simple scoring methods initially and then progressing to detailed modelling of the potential options:

1.  Generic
2.  Unconstrained
3.  Constrained
4.  Feasible

• Develop your strategy, the first part of the plan will be schemes that are justified irrespective of uncertainty
• Define the trigger points for further investment
• Set future options out as a range of investments to cater for uncertainty in trends