Main elements of a project

The following elements should be described in a project specification but for a small project, some can be omitted. They are :

1. Vision - what will things look like when the project has completed successfully?

2. Objectives of the project - why are we doing this? Same as Goals.Are they realistic, clear and measurable?

3. Stakeholders - who has an interest in this project?

4. Deliverables - what are the products and results of the project?

5. Team members, their roles and responsibilities

6. Plans - phases and tasks within each phase

When the project spec is agreed, create a PID (Project Initiation Document) :

1 State the need and justification.

2 Decide how to run project meetings to review progress, how progress will be recorded and how problems and issues are managed.

3 Stakeholders - those with an interest in the success of the project.

4 Hold a kick off meeting so those in the project know what to do and why.

5 Create a risk register, agree who is accountable for it and at what intervals will it be reviewed (typically monthly), [see Risk Management]

Planning :

1. Project phases : high level, identifiable sub-projects each of which delivers some benefit. Without phases, the project will drift without delivering anything until the very end, by which time key members may have left.

2. Project plan : list of tasks within each phase, who is accountable for each, their start date and completion date.

3. Progress meetings : must track the status of each task. A common and simple approach is to assign a RAG status to each task. If a task or phase is Green, then it is on track in 3 ways : on schedule, within budget and able to deliver what was specified. If Amber, then it is in danger of not complying, if Red it will fail on 1 or more of those 3 criteria. The project team must take steps to move Red tasks to Amber and Amber tasks to Green, by changing the schedue, budget or specification.