Since there is no hard and fast rule to define a successful project because of the various reasons like different project standards used in the different projects and different acceptance criteria being used in different projects, different client expectations, etc.. etc…
Still, I have tried my level best to give you some guidelines to decide whether a project was successful or not?.
Well, again, some of the conditions might be partially met. Then, in that case, you can award points for each question on a scale of 1-10 and decide whether the output or the outcome of a project was satisfactory or not !!!.
- The first and the most important is whether or not the project has delivered all the promised deliverables ?.
- Whether the Project completed within the timeframe of the project schedule or not?
- The project cost was within the approved budget Project?
- Whether the project products met the Quality specs agreed or promised?.
- Whether all the expectations of the key Stakeholders were met, and they accepted the project outputs?.
Who is Responsible for Sucess or Failures?
Whenever we speak of project success, we always blame project managers for the project’s failure.
But,
do you seriously feel the project manager alone is responsible for the success or failure of the Project?
I don’t think the same, and as a matter of fact, it can never be right. While we are talking of a project, we talk of the team effort from top to bottom. It is not an individual who can decide the Project’s fate alone, though its level of influence can be different.
Only one man can not be blamed for the project failure, I mean ..the scapegoat. We always look for scapegoats, and the poor project manager is the one who is always supposed to bear the burnt.
Yeah !! The easy target is always the project manager. Still, we need to understand that the projects do consistently well if the organizations have a very high level of competency at several levels and not just the excellent project managers who are actually not the case in most the cases.
Lack of which has resulted in higher project failure rates, like 70-80%.
Let us sample a few key areas where the organizations should have a high level of competency….
- The Executive should play its role well and develop a clear strategic framework within which the project manager(s) and project team members are supposed to operate. There will always be room for scope creep if there is no proper framework, leading to higher project failure rates and poor success…
- The Senior Managers should set the project priorities right, and there should be proper resource allocation according to these priorities.
- The management should ensure that the feasibility study is not done by the team, which will do the Project; otherwise, the team involved can be biased. The organizations should treat the feasibility study as a separate project and be carried out by a different team.
- The project target dates/finish dates are supposed to be practical and impossible to achieve.
If organizations want to consistently achieve a higher success rate, they need to get these basic steps right. Once this system is in place, we can expect a higher success rate from the project manager and the project team.
Readers are invited to comment on the post as usual…..
One Small Request:
Being a Project Management guy, I know how little time we have to play around on the internet. But if you have found this information useful, please share it with your colleague so that more people can benefit from it. If you have any questions, then comment below, and I am glad to take it.