Essential Secrets to Ensure Project Planning Is Ongoing

Despite all the best project management processes in the world, projects can go wrong. Sometimes, projects are prepared too far ahead, planning is incomplete or estimates are too far away from reality. This is why projects may be treated as an ongoing planning process and refined with accurate data until the job is complete and then reviewed. 

Why project planning almost never ends

Unless you are able to provide realistic estimates for time, costs, resources and the management of the risks involved in the project, people, materials and planning will change.

By planning too far ahead, you will be spending far too much time on planning around subjects that will change in the future and your project and presentation accuracy will disappear.

Expert project planners understand that a project and its execution cannot run smoothly without taking account of all of the possible circumstances that may change.

Built into your plan is the possibility that the planning team itself may alter, technology may improve and many outside influences will affect the schedule and the budget.

Managing your rolling wave planning

Once you understand that many details of your planning can vary between the first day of project planning and the completion of the entire process, you will be able to accommodate the different elements of your development.

Project planning is an evolutionary tactic where the different waves of the project are detailed nearer to their use in the timescale, which means that work packages will gain more detail when they become closer to the project’s current activities.

This is a constant refinement of the details over time. Although the best estimates are offered during the early stages of the project planning, you will almost certainly be able to highlight a range of uncertainties so that you can factor in contingencies to help keep you on target for people, time, costs and obligations.

 
[bookboon-book id=”60ab2987-67c5-43e8-9ad9-a5d100daccb0″ title=”This article is based on the following eBook:” language=”en”]
 

Project planning and re-planning

Your processes will include all of your original planning and then updates as situations change. These will be reflected by;

• the detail of the plan
• how far you are planning ahead
• keeping the process streamlined
• ensuring the data is accurate and up-to-date
• considering when you should re-plan
• managing the administration of your changes
• calculating ways to minimise the overall effects of your changes within the work in progress

Your project management plan will specify a range of detailed information and your executive summary will highlight the need to reassess the project and consistently update the plan so that it remains on target, especially, with the part of the process that is to be activated next.

Great project managers will collectively detail how they believe the costs and human resources may alter, but ensure that the change management plan can be a fluid operation within the original parameters and risks assessed.

How soon will you impart these secrets throughout your project team?

 
[bookboon-recommendations id=”60ab2987-67c5-43e8-9ad9-a5d100daccb0″ title=”You might also find these books interesting…”]