Keeping the Project on Track

After you have analyzed the source of problems with your projects, you can make the necessary adjustments to the project plan to get the project back on track. Although our assumption is, of course, that projects tend to run over budget and behind schedule, believe it or not, some projects may run under budget and ahead of schedule. In both circumstances, you have to decide what to do to correct the variances and bring the project back in line. In Chapter 1, we introduced you to the concept of the project triangle: time, money, and scope. Every decision you make about how to adjust the project affects one or more sides of the project triangle and ultimately impacts quality. Notice that we do not say that a change negatively impacts quality. Whether you are ahead of or behind in your plan, you can make adjustments that have an ultimately positive or negative impact on project quality.

If you find that you are in the enviable position of having more time or money than you anticipated, you can choose to offer your client the option of broadening the scope of the project. Depending on whether your client is an internal or external customer, you may decide it is better to maintain the current scope and save the company some money. If the project is progressing faster than you planned, you might decide to free up some of your project’s resources to work on another project.

If, on the other hand, you are running out of time or money, you need to look at ways to reduce scope, streamline tasks, or trim down costs. You might be able to renegotiate the project scope with your clients by dividing the project into phases or by eliminating non-critical tasks. To keep a project on schedule, you might need to add additional resources to regain control of slipping tasks. Whatever choice you make, be sure to review the implications of each decision to scope, time, money, and quality.



Mastering Microsoft Project 2002
Mastering Microsoft Project 2002
ISBN: 0782141471
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2006
Pages: 241

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