Project planning should also consume about 60% of the time the project manager is going to invest in the project.That way, we can invest sufficient thought and anticipate problems and think through alternative ways of doing the project. The best practices call for a very detailed planning effort followed by execution which requires as little adjustment and adaptation as possible. That's what allows efficient production of project deliverables.
The project plan document can be as brief as one side of one piece of paper for a small project as long as it identifies the major deliverables, the most significant risks and provides rough estimates of the resources' cost and hours we will consume. In larger projects, the plan could be quite large. The most common mistake in project planning comes when the project sponsor sees the plan as a waste of time and wants to start work as quickly as possible. The sponsor brushes off objections from the project manager with the novel idea of planning as we go. Starting fast without a plan is not the way to produce the needed project deliverables as quickly as possible. This approach causes a great deal of wasted time and effort as people produce the wrong deliverables and waste considerable amounts of time trying to figure out what they should be doing and how all the pieces should come together. Even in emergencies, starting work without a plan is a dumb thing to do. We always finish earlier and produce better results with a plan.
How to Plan Your Project |
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Step # |
Responsibility of |
Actions to take |
1 |
Project manager and sponsor |
Define the scope of the project. It is a clear objectively measurable deliverable. |
2 |
Project manager and sponsor |
Deconstruct (decompose) the scope into 4 to 7 major deliverables which are required to deliver the previously defined scope. |
3 |
Project manager and stakeholders |
Further subdivide the major deliverables down to the level of individual assignments for team members, each of which is also a deliverable not an activity. This lowest level of decomposition is the work breakdown structure which will be the basis for the scheduling and other project management activities. |
4 |
Project manager and team members |
Meet to estimate the amount of work and duration that each task in the work breakdown structure will require. The team members should participate in these estimates so they have some “skin in the game” on their assignments. |
5 |
Project manager |
Track actual results versus the plan and report variances and corrective action options to the project sponsor. |
6 |
Project manager and sponsor |
As each deliverable is produced, the sponsor and stakeholders formally accept it. When the last deliverable is produced and accepted the project is finished. |
Deep Dive on this Topic with Additional Articles:
Accepting a New Project Assignment
