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Equipping the Project Executioner

Equipping the Project Executioner

How to kill runaway projects before they kill the company

Sidebar | Figuring the Benefits

Deciding whether to repair or terminate is the issue

The UK’s Office of Government Commerce (OGC), which developed ITIL and Prince2 for project management, has also developed and released “MSP” Managing Successful Programs.

Within it is what Shayne Phillips, director, ICT strategic programs, Investment & Assurance for the South Australian government, describes as a well documented publicly available approach to the art of portfolio management.

OGC suggests matching program investments that help define work efforts designed to change, grow, transform or adjust the business against business benefits which prove the value of doing the overall work of the program [project].

Generally, this should be done by a leadership team (the sponsoring group) from within the business. The team prioritizes the work efforts based upon analyses of the business cases, requesting use of limited business funds for a program against a stated set of succinct business benefits that will be realized by the business if the investment is made.

“The key is to not shelve the business case straight after the program initiation decision has been made, but to measure and track the business benefits via a business benefits realization management practice,” Phillips says.

“The practitioners — business change managers, rather than project or program managers — should declare and monitor any risk to the original set of business benefits that warranted the original investment from the business.”

When programs cease producing benefits, or when the risk profile is such that benefits are highly unlikely to materialize, the original sponsoring group should make the call to either repair or terminate.

“A benefits profile will define how each benefit will be measured and what the starting point for this measurement activity is. These should be done as part of the business case development and used as the basis for monitoring during the lifecycle of the program.

“Program benefit reviews should be conducted regularly and cover both expected benefits and those benefits that should have been realized to date — if there are any. Some benefits do not materialize until after the change program has taken place. Knowing when to hit the off switch in these cases demands a lot more maturity of the sponsoring group.”

Phillips says while the feelings and concerns of the key suite of stakeholders and senior management within the sponsoring group count most, that shouldn’t stop the sponsoring group from being totally pragmatic about flicking the kill switch. Gut feel won’t cut it, he says.

“Facts from the original business case will materialize from the original assumptions and this is where the detail is that defines success or failure of a work effort, it is also what will determine killing or repairing,” Phillips says.

— S BUSHELL

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More about Ajilon AustraliaDeutsche TelekomIBM AustraliaLeaderLeaderOffice of Government CommerceSouth Australian GovernmentSpeedSUNGARDVIA

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