Eight simple steps to successfully manage a project

June 3, 2009 from itBusiness – “…Businesses of all sizes embark on thousands of projects for new products and services every year. Unfortunately, most projects are doomed to fail outright, or at launch, because the original success criteria were not met. Some project failures lead to delays in product launches, such as the AirBus A380; others, like Boston's Big Dig, incur huge cost overruns. These examples, as well as the results from survey after survey, show that American businesses have not been able to figure out how to consistently get products and services delivered on time, on budget and with the highest quality…”

1. Definition

It is critical to start with a solid foundation. The foundation must be built at the organizational level and not with individuals. It is imperative that, from the CEO down, there is understanding and buy-in when it comes to defining or redefining the following items:

• Roles and Responsibilities: This can be painstaking, but the effort will pay off when it's time to execute. The exercise may outline the need to develop new organizational structures to better support efficiency and communication within the delivery teams…"

180 View – There are some good points in the article. We would like to emphasize and expand on the first one – defining roles and responsibilities. You need to be very specific about responsibilities. Consider for example the issue log. Many projects will have an issue log to track issues that arise during a project. Who is responsible to prepare it? Who is responsible to review and give feedback? Who is responsible for approving it?