Notes for Project Boards > The Money

So we agreed that money might be an interesting criterion to keep track of to see if a project is on target. You might say this is the easiest one, maybe besides the planning. Is the project ready in time and on (or below) budget. But what is the case?

Projects tend to start with a limited amount of information. This is evident. Projects start because the existing organization is not capable of doing the thing that is expected to be done. If that was the case we would not have started a project. See a posting some while ago. So in the beginning the budget is a bit fuzzy.

During (starting-up and initiating) a project, things become clearer. No problem so far. Get used to that being a normal situation within a project. And even on the go, information and circumstances can change so budget will need adjustments. But at a point in time your Project Manager will say: 'This is it. This is the money I need'. At that point in time you should wonder: 'What is he talking about?'

In many (not all) cases the money is based on spending for labor and purchases. How many hours will the team members spend on the project and what will we buy during the project. Sounds fine, doesn't it? Well, ok it is reasonably fine but not complete. You should expect an insight in the cost of the deliverables. The cost of a project product is a sum of costs of all separate products that will add up to this one final project product.

Do not settle for an overview of hours, cost per hour and a total. Ask for price per product. I will come back on this.

Notes for Project Boards > Freedom to move

When you have a project team and a Project Manager to manage this team, you would like to spend just enough time on managing your project. A widely used approach to achieve this is criteria and tolerances. Critical Success (or failure) Factors (CSF's) and Key Performance Indicators (KPI's). This sounds familiar doesn't it? Kaplan and Norton? Balanced Scorecard?

When you have a project, you in fact have a temporary organization with directors (you), management (PM) and organization (project team). And for this organization you will need some indicators to measure the performance of this organization. Will it work towards the desired result? And does it achieve this result within defined limits? A classic set of criteria consists of money, organization, quality, information and time. But it is up to you to drop or add any criterion you like.

Better is it not to just do what you like but what is good for your organization. Doing better what you already do very well is not useful. To improve what needs to be improved is much better. Therefor one can do a SWOT analyses on your organization and the project team. Where are the strength and weaknesses? Where are the opportunities and threads? This will help you understand what criteria you should pay attention to as they could go wrong and where you should not spend to much time on as your organization is very strong in that area.

A further nuance can be given through tolerances. Bear in mind that you can have different tolerances on different criteria and between positive and negative deflection. The interesting question is: 'What are good tolerances to work with?' I will come back on this n a next posting.

Notes for Project Boards > The Senior Supplier

'Well, if you know what you want, I will make it'. Is it as simple as that? A good supplier will not just make what a Senior User wants but take responsibility for that product. It is not only the Senior User who has requirements. There are requirements that the Senior Supplier should, or better, is obliged to consider when making the project product.

One has to bear in mind that the Senior User (in many cases) is not the specialist when it comes to the product. A pilot is not the specialist when it comes to plane construction. He will know how to fly one and might understand how it is constructed but being the specialist requires other competencies. Those competencies are to be expected from or at least represented by the supplier of the plane. In many cases those requirements are applied by law, regulation, good practices and so on.

In a Project Board the Senior Supplier should represent those requirements and when needed explain the consequences of those requirements. So both Senior User and Senior Supplier represent interests, requirements, restrictions of different kinds and origins that sometimes conflict with each other. And, as stated before, these should be discussed in the Project Board.

Notes for Project Boards > The Senior User

Who should be the Senior User. An interesting question that should be addressed very carefully. One can also wonder if the Project Manager is the one to decide on this question. I think not.

Senior Management or a program gives a mandate to an Executive. In both cases it is expected that it is clear who will use the final project product. This can range from a minor department in the organization up to all employees and even external parties like customers and suppliers. Users are important stakeholders of the final project product as in many cases they are expected to achieve the profit mentioned in the business case. It is therefor important that they are represented in the Project Board where discussions about what is produced and what is needed can be settled. The Senior User is the representative of all users. This can also be a department the will manage the product after handover.

To be able to take that representing role the Senior User should be given the right authority. He should be able to negotiate on the behalf of the users meaning that he should guard the requirements and he should be able to accept changes in the organization or processes to achieve the agreed profit.

In many cases it is not clear who is capable and in the position to take that role. It is therefor important that a Project Board takes time to seek and find the best suited functionary and arrange all needed mandates for him to take the role of Senior User. The Senior User role can be taken by more than one functionary. Make sure their responsibilities do not overlap. Keep the Project Board as small as possible.