Terrapin Agrada

Project and change management expertise

DEFINING SCOPE WHEN…

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DEFINING SCOPE WHEN NO ONE UNDERSTANDS WHAT SCOPE EVEN IS

A project’s success or failure usually hinges on scope management – how well scope was defined, understood, agreed, monitored, controlled, communicated about and delivered. This (along with risk management, in my opinion) is one of the biggies in project management.

So, what happens when you’re a project manager and you’re the only one who knows or understands what scope actually means? Ask any lay person and you’ll get several, varied, sometimes conflicting definitions of scope.

Time to get out your coach-consultant-trainer-facilitator hats on to help progress the project towards gaining a common understanding of what scope is, what it means to project success and how it should be/is going to be managed. Only when everyone (Sponsor, project board, project team and project stakeholders) understands what scope is, can scoping discussions, workshops and consultations begin in earnest.

DEFINING SCOPE WHEN NO ONE HAS TIME TO DEFINE SCOPE

Quick question: “I don’t have time right now, there are other more important/urgent things going on. Can’t you just do it? When you’re done, I’ll just review it really quick and sign it off. You know what I want better than me, anyway!”

Short answer: “NO!”

Longer answer: “I may have done similar projects in the past and can guess fairly close to a scope definition that would meet a lot of your needs, but I don’t do what you do, I don’t think what you think, nor do I mind-read to understand what you need. If you don’t dedicate the time, you’re not going to get what you want, you’re going to get what I want and I am not you. I will not be an end user. At the end of this project, I will be on to my next and you will be stuck using something that I wanted, but will never use. Make time…please!” [Read more…]

Sponsor: Scope-licious? Me: Scope Lessons.

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tennis-court-443276_1920Not writing Scope down is the biggest regret of Project Managers around the world. The biggest regret. Here are a few other learnings, mainly learned the hard way. And as much as I would not like to admit it, they were learned over several instances… several instances of Scope Creep and heartache (the name of my band!)

 

Training – part one

My first day on the job as a Project Manager, my Sponsor invited me to a meeting between himself and the other senior managers/stakeholders of the project. My Sponsor had $12m for a new systems upgrade. He wanted to use it for the new systems upgrade. The other senior managers in the room, however, wanted the system upgrade and all their staff trained.

The main argument revolved around who was paying for training. The Sponsor wanted to build the best systems solution that the organisation had ever seen. One that would finally take care of the many fundamental root causes with our existing antiquated systems. The business units, who already had their annual budgets allocated, were more concerned that there wasn’t enough left over for training all the staff (and it was going to be all the staff!) on the new system.

Arguments ensued. There was yelling. There was screaming. There was me, second-guessing my recent career choices. Finally, after all the commotion calmed, there was compromise. The project budget would pay for half of the training; the business units would pay for the other half. That was my introduction to project management and to Scope!

Lesson: Agree Scope with Stakeholders upfront and there will be negotiations.

[Read more…]