Who? What? When? Where? Why? How? How much? Say what?

How do you know if you are still in control of a project?

One way is to ensure you know the answer to the following:

1. Who are the stakeholders in the project?
2. What are their interests?
3. What is the purpose of the project?
4. How much is the budget for this project?
5. How much is this project going to take?
6. How long will the project take?
7. What is the project schedule?
8. When is it to be completed?
9. What is the project plan?

RISK AND OPPORTUNITY

Are risks and opportunities completely different notions or they simply different faces of the same coin? Can you capitalize on a potential risk beside just avoiding the eventuation of that risk? For example, if there's a risk that your top programmer will leave for another job, and he doesn't, therefore the risk doesn't eventuate. But apart from heaving a sigh of relief, is there an opportunity there that you could take advantage of?

Suppose in your project you are expecting a lot of active opposition from environmentalist groups, and therefore allocated an extra $10,000 for the purpose of public relations and legal expenses. But for some reason, the expected opposition did not materialise and you find yourself with extra project funds and the *opportunity* to use those funds to accelerate the project. In this example: - the risk did not eventuate, and opened up an opportunity - the opportunity was there only because you planned for the risk. - you have the basic option of acting as if the risk did not materialise (business as usual), or the more advanced option of seizing the opportunity that opened up and turning it into something beneficial.

Things to Ensure When Running a Project

I'm compiling a list of things to ensure while running a project. The list will be relevant to me. Yours may be different. A complete list will be infinitely long.

This list will be updated as often as I recognize a need to do so.  Currently, it stands as:

1. Make sure you have a clear delineation of the project scope.
2. Make sure you have a clear and complete list of stakeholders and their expectations of the project deliverables and execution.
3. Make sure the project team is clear on the project plan.
4. Corollary to 3, have a project plan.
5. Always have a valid, real, working schedule and stick to the schedule for as long as the schedule is valid. Update the schedule when needed.
6. Have frequent completions and starts (ie, have milestones). This is intended to instill in the team the plan for the next segment of the project.