EFFICIENT PROJECT START-UP

Transcription

1 EFFICIENT PROJECT START-UP AGNAR JOHANSEN (SINTEF Industrial management productivity and project management) OLAV TORP (NORWEGIAN UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY) 1. INTRODUCTION The Norwegian Centre for Project Management (NSP) is a forum for cooperation and experience exchange within the field of project management [1]. One of the main activities in NSP is research within prioritized project management knowledge areas and processes, both in the short and long term [1]. From September 2002 until July 2003 NSP financed a research project focusing on how to succeed with efficient project start-up. Many of the problems occurring in projects are due to failure in the project start-up phase. The project start-up phase is a critical point in the project life cycle. When the decision to go ahead with the project is made, a project team will be established, and goal-oriented work to secure the results. A project in the start-up phase will compete with on-going projects regarding resources, attention and focus in general. Projects will always try to make the start-up as fast as possible. It is then a challenge to make this process as good as possible, and give the process the right focus. The main objectives of the research project were to establish a generic start-up process for projects, and to develop a project start-up toolkit. The target group of the project was project managers in general (NSP member organizations in particular), and especially project managers dealing with challenges related to project start-up The project-start-up toolkit is based upon existing tools from the participating organizations and tools developed or collected by the members of the task force (authors of this paper) in the project. 2. WHAT IS PROJECT START-UP? Project start-up is defined in different ways in Project Management literature. Samset [2] divide the project into two main phases: The front-end and the implementation phase. Front-end is what is done in the project prior to the final decision of starting-up the project. The research program Concept ( is focusing its research effort into front-end problems. The aim of project start-up is as quickly as possibly to establish a basis for management and control of a project [3]. A kick-off meeting (or meetings) can be used as an efficient arena for such project start-ups. The meeting(s) should have a meaningful content to make the start-up efficient. Project start-up could be defined as the period of time from the final decision to start the project is made until conditions are formed so that project participants can work efficiently with implementation, which typically is documented in a project handbook [4]. A challenge when choosing our approach to project start-up was that the participating organizations recruit the project manager at different stages in the project. Based on that project manager was our target group, we defined project start-up to be [5]: Project start-up is a process starting when the project manager is recruited, and terminated when a steering document is developed, an d the steering document is anchored in the project organization. 3. SIX FOCUS AREAS WITHIN PROJECT START-UP PHASE The research project has emphasized establishing and describing a generic start-up process of projects, and developing tools to support project managers in this process. Focus was on project management processes. A number of activities that should be a part of the start-up process were identified. These were merged into six main processes or as we call them, focus areas, within the project start-up phase, see figure 1.

2 Input to project start-up will vary from organization to organization, and from project to project within one organization. Input should at least consist of a mandate that the project manager has received, and possibly a business case that is to be verified through the project start-up. There could also be goal statements and more or less detailed plan documents, considering some of the other focus areas within project start-up. All this should be reviewed, and verified, and the project group must through the start-up process achieve a common understanding of the goals and plans. Pro je c t b a sis at the time Project start-up Unc erta inty Stakeholders Project goals Organization Project basis at the time - What basic demands is the project going to solve, and which terms and assumptions does the project build on? It is essential that the project manager understands what the project owner expects from the project, which deliveries the project is responsible for, and terms and assumptions made prior to the start-up. The project manager must go back to the parties that have been involved in the project prior to the start-up, to clarify the current basis and the project mandate. Uncertainty Which opportunities and risks do the project face, and which flexibility exists? The uncertainty is large at such an early stage. An essential task is to identify and analyze what uncertainty the project will face, and to find out what decisions are made prior to start-up, and what the basis for these decisions was. Figure 1: The project start-up process Systems for plan and control Stakeholders Which internal and external s must the project be aware of, and what strategies should the project manager establish to handle these s? Project goals Which project goals exist and how should they be understood? The project manager must have a clear understanding of the goals of the project before he decides how to go further and who to go with (the project team). If the goals are vague or do not exist, they have to be developed together with the project team. Organization What sort of competence and skills are needed to solve the project? The questions of organization touches many different problems. The project manager should evaluate and take advantage of both professional skills, social skills and personal skills in the project organization. Systems for planning and control What is the scope of work and what is the time and cost frames of the project? When project start-up is terminated, it should be documented what the deliveries from the project are expected to be. It should give an overview of what the deliverables are, when they should be delivered, the quality of the deliveries and how to measure whether or not the goals are achieved. The output of the start-up process will be a steering document some will call this a project plan or a project hand-book. Fangel [4] states that the output of the process should be a document (hand-book) and that there should be conditions in the project that are so that the participants can work efficient together with implementation of the project. An aspect of this is implementing and anchoring the steering document. The research group stated, as a part of the definition of project start-up, that the steering document should be anchored in the project organization. This promotes motivation within the project organization and common understanding of the project problems and how to solve them. This is important and should be given attention in the start-up process. 4. PROJECT START-UP TOOLKIT Results from the work were put together in a short hand-book, with a CD enclosed. For each focus area we defined some core questions to be asked and identified some success factors. The core questions and the success factors were meant to help the project manager ask the right questions, and to focus on important parts of project

3 start-up. We collected/developed 25 tools (templates, presentations, MS Excel sheets and descriptions of analysis methods) that can be used to help the project manager do the start-up of projects in a more efficient way. Project basis at the time - It is not unusual that a project has been developed for years before the project manager is pointed out. The first step in our project start-up process is to develop a project charter between the Project sponsor and the project manager that clearly states the project manager s responsibility and main deliverables during the project. Key question for the project manager are: What is the project sponsor's expectations from the project? What is main deliverables from the project and what is the project constrains (timeschedule, budget)? What is the background for the project and which historical decisions are important to be aware of? What is critical to satisfy the customers of the project and what are the project success factors? Who must be involved in the review and approvel process? How well is the project defined -review of existing goals? Expectations to the organization of the project? Other project impact, dependece? The project charter is an important tool for clarifying the project sponsor's expectation to the project and it should be made in such a way that the project manger knows what he/she responsibilites are. Regarding uncertainty, 6 tools have been collected/developed, from a simple procedure of uncertainty management, to a somewhat more complex MS Excel-sheet (Figure 2) to support the project manager during performance of an uncertainty analysis. The procedure of uncertainty management consists of the following steps (where at least bullet 1 to 4 is a natural part of the start-up process, and the last two bullet are more a part of the project implementation): 1. Identification of uncertainties that can affect the project goals. 2. Analysis of probability and consequences of possible outcomes of the most important uncertainties. Probability and consequences could be quantified (probability as a number or in a range from example 1 5, consequences as cost estimates or in a range from example 1 to 5). 3. Ranking quantitative and qualitative uncertainties by establishing a top ten -list. The basis for the list appears by multiplying probabilities and consequences. The uncertainty with the highest number would be on top of the list. 4. Planning actions to reduce probability and/or consequences of risks (downside). Increase probability of positive outcomes and their consequences (upside). 5. Implement actions. 6. Update the uncertainty analysis during the project period. Ma jor C R I T I C A L I T Y Min im a l 25.mar jun sep des mar.03 Figure 2: Time base chart Project Description 18.jun sep des mar jun.04 TRIGGER 10.sep.04 9,5 Bubble size represents Manageability 6,5 Larger means more Manageable 3,5 0,5 SORT Impact Date Trigger Date Handling s is an important task in a project, and a natural part of project start-up. PMI [8] defines s as individuals and organizations who are actively involved in the project, or whose interests may be positively or negatively affected as a result of project implementation or successful project completion. This includes customers, external parties, and internal s. [15] Stakeholders can be defined as Key or Non- Key for the purpose of planning for how they will be managed: Key Stakeholders are those individuals or groups whose interest in the project must be recognised if the project is to be successful - in particular those who will be positively or negatively affected during the project or upon successful completion of the project.

4 Non-Key are Stakeholders who do not need to be recognised for the project to be successful, but who will be identified as a result of identifying all Stakeholders. Three tools for helping the project manager analyzing and handling s as a part of the project start-up process is included on the CD. Template for a analysis is one of the tools, consisting of: 1. Identification who are s/costumers of the project deliverables? 2. Grouping s in key/non-key s Who is most important? 3. Role clarification what sort of role do the have in the project? 4. Effect of the project what effect does the project have on the? 5. Evaluation How does the analysis impact further development in the project? The analysis focuses on the primary needs of each and positive and negative impact from the project on each. Another tool helps the project manager analyze and develop strategies for handling the different s to the project. Based on what impact each could have on the project (example: High Medium Low) and what attitude the has to the project (for against), one could choose between different strategies: Involve the, Monitor the s actions, Minimize dependencies and/or Cooperate with the. All these analyses could be done by using templates developed in the research project, see table 1. Strategies Roll Involved in the project Supportive Marginal Non supportive Mixed Involve the Table 1 Stakeholder strategies Monitor the s actions Minimize dependencies Cooperate with the The main key to success in project execution is the ability to understand what the main problem is and making clear and specific goals". Everybody that has been involved in project start-up knows that clear and specific goals are very important, and equally hard to make. Regarding the project goals, some core questions to be asked were defined: What are the needs of the project s costumer (if more than one costumer the main)? What goals do the costumer have (if more than one costumer the main)? What are the primary deliverables from the project? Who approve and accept the deliveries? Success factors of the goal process were defined to be: Clear, precise, time related and measurable goals. Common anchoring of the goals among costumers and the project team. Goals correspond to the frame conditions. The project group has to be motivated to achieve the goals. When it comes to organization, the area covers many different problems in the start-up process. The project manager must consider what resources are needed in the project organization. We have presented 3 tools helping the project manager getting the right people in his/her project, among them [9]. Regarding systems for planning and control, we have collected two tools: a template to be used to develop a project handbook, and a document stating demands to the contents of the steering document. The first one has been in use in one of the organizations involved in the project for a while, and includes everything needed to develop a handbook. The last one is developed by Ministry of Finance in Norway, and is since 2001 used in all public projects with costs above 500 Million NOK. 6. Conclusion The research has resulted in advice and tools to make project start-up more efficient. The results are based on experience with project start-up in member organizations of NSP. Our project has to a large extent had a applied

5 approach, with focus on project management processes. Project start-up phase is defined with focus on the project manager s tasks. Project start-up is often thought of as a kick-off meeting. Our suggestions is that a kickoff meeting or some kick-off meeting(s) is an arena used for project start-up processes. One has to fill the meetings with meaningful content, and one has to focus on the right things in the right sequence at project startup. We have identified activities in the start-up process, and merged these into 6 processes/focus areas of importance in the start-up process. We have given them a content that could help project managers performing their start-up phase more efficient. Most of the tools are used today. The main results of our research are the way the tools are put together in a systematic way, and the focus on project start-up we have placed during our work. The start-up process, as described in chapter 3 and 4 in this paper is adapted to project start-up as defined in chapter 2. Project start-up phase is described through 6 processes, which will not often be performed in a stated sequence. In a start-up process it is natural to perform these processes partly in parallel. Project manager and the team often have to adjust and adapt their work a number of times during the start-up phase. As mentioned earlier, projects could be at different stages when the project manager is recruited. Clearly, the project stage defines the project manager s needs for support tools during project start-up. Complexity is another parameter that should be taken into consideration when deciding the scope of work and the focus of the project start-up. The start-up phase is the project manager s responsibility, and he/she has to figure out what tools he/she needs in his project, and fit those tools to his project, the complexity of the project and the competence in the project organization. We have given some suggestions to the project manager. An important question is whether or not an external facilitator should be hired to help the project manager performing project start-up. Statoil has a separate unit in their organization, supporting the projects with start-up help, while the other organizations participating in the research project do not have such a unit. They would either run the project start-up themselves (project manager) or hire a facilitator to lead the process. Literature says a lot about advantages of using an external facilitator [10] and [11]. The research project concluded that to hire an external facilitator outside the project has so many advantages that it is recommended. Whether or not the facilitator is from another unit in the same organization or hired from an external organization is of minor importance. The process described could be developed further, taking advantage of research results in other projects performed by NSP and others. We have identified project close-out, or termination as a field where corresponding research could have been done. Some of the elements of the process suggested are in use today. It would be interesting to test out the whole process in some case projects, and then improve the process, based on experience from the case studies. 7. REFERENCES [1] Asbjørn Rolstadås, Some Norwegian PM Initiatives cooperation between Academia and Industry, 17th World Congress on Project Management, Moscow [2] Knut Samset, Konseptvurdering i tidligfasen, Tapir, Norway, [3] Tor Willy Hetland, Praktisk Prosjektledelse anvendelser, Norwegian Assosiation of Project Management, [4] Morten Fangel m.fl, Effektiv tilblivelse af projekter, Danish Association of Project Management, [5] Olav Torp og Agnar Johansen, Project start-up and termination (in Norwegian only), Norwegian Centre for Project Management, july [6] Olav Torp og Agnar Johansen, Tips and advice to efficient project start-up (in Norwegian only), Norwegian Centre for Project Management, july [7] Agnar Johansen og Mari Standal, Målanalyse, PTL, Norway, [8] PMI, A guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge, [9] [10] Ole Jonny Klakegg, Trinnvis-prosessen, NTNU Institut for bygg, anlegg og tranport, Norway [11] Lichtenberg, Steen, Proactive Management of Uncertainty using the Successive Principle, Polyteknisk Press, Denmark, [12] Karlsen J T, P003 Prosjekt og omverden håndtering av interessenter [13] Clerland I D, Project management journal Sept 1986 Project Stakeholder Management [14] Mikkelsen, Riis Grundbog i prosjektledelse 5 udgave oplag [15]

6 Bio summaries Author: Agnar Johansen Affiliation: Researcher, SINTEF Industrial Management, Productivity and Project Management Contact information: Co-author: Olav Torp Affiliation: Assistant Professor, Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), Department of Civil and Transport Engineering Contact information: