Success Is No Secret Companies who have successfully managed change and completed critical projects on-time and on-budget have used and adapted the ideas elaborated in the Starting Point. Their benefits have included: Makes productive use of staff and management efforts Eliminates confusion Clarifies roles and responsibilities Builds consensus amongst key players Creates common view of tasks and objectives Manages expectations against budget Chartering an initiative involves gaining consensus amongst the people responsible for funding a project as well as those people responsible for implementing the changes and managing the project. Consensus must be gained around the following topics: What is the purpose of the project. What results are expected. Why are the results useful or valuable to the enterprise. When are the results desired (what is the time frame for the project). How will the enterprise measure success. In other words, what changes will occur to tell you the project is successful. What are the "boundaries" of decision making for the team chartered with implementation. What is the implementation team empowered to do. What are the major project "milestones" when the sponsors and implementors need to review the projects progress, take corrective actions and keep the initiative on course. Guidelines for Effective Project Chartering These guidelines are critical requirements for starting any major initiative for several reasons: Any group who is responsible for implementing change must have an exact objective or result in their collective mind in order to coordinate the multiple activities required and ensure the group is moving towards the objective. The measurements used to evaluate success are required to ensure all participants have a clear understanding of how they will be evaluated and what the goal is. Gaining consensus amongst all Team participants is critical to work out conflicts and gain understanding prior to starting a project. Any disagreements or mis-understandings that exist among the key sponsors and managers will always cause costly problems. A lack of team consensus ensures poor results, wasted efforts, morale problems and budget overruns. Defining the "boundaries" for the implementation team is very important to avert situations where those people responsible for implementing the solution do not have the required authority, resources or skills to effectively carry out their charter. The sponsors must define for the implementation team where their authority and decision making responsibilities begin and end. Rules must be established explaining what should happen when a situation arises which moves beyond a "boundary". Establishing a rough project schedule or milestones when the implementation team needs to update the sponsor team (or steering committee) ensures the appropriate level of communication and oversight. These rules being worked out at the start of a project helps minimize problems and keeps them from becoming crises. Learn From Others' Common Mistakes Our experience helping businesses of all types, sizes and levels of sophistication strongly suggests that these "rules of chartering" a project are usually overlooked and not effectively followed. Several very common mistakes that we have seen, time-and-time again, include: The sponsors of an initiative define the objectives in very general and nebulous terms. Little thought of how the group will measure the results is done prior to beginning the project. These project situations rarely are considered successful because no one clearly understands what has to happen to be successful and therefore coordinating activities and accomplishing valuable goals are impossible. The sponsors call together a group of people whom they make responsible for implementing an initiative. Little group discussion occurs so that consensus on the project objectives, measurements, resources, boundaries and such never happens. Cost-justification or budget "boundaries" are not clearly determined. These projects typically become "activity traps" consuming time and money and rarely accomplish much of anything valuable. The people charged with implementation almost always feel frustrated and powerless because the issues that should have been resolved at the start continue to victimize the initiative throughout the life of the project. A business opportunity or problem necessitates a major change to the enterprise. The Sponsors and implementation team begin an initiative to do something. What needs to be accomplished is important so no cost-justification is performed at the start of the project to define what the economic payback should be. The lack of specific cost-justification haunts the project when the implementation team comes back to the sponsors with a plan-of-action and preliminary budget. The costs of change are usually significant. Since the specific payback of the proposed investment is poorly defined projects often ground to a halt because of indecision amongst the Sponsors to commit the resources with no guarantee (or clear definition) of the specific results the enterprise will receive. Starting projects properly is a first and critical step to ensure successful technology, business or change initiatives in your business or organization. Properly chartering an initiative will help you "cover all the bases" at the beginning and therefore minimize the problems throughout a project. If you have any questions or want further information, please feel free to contact Jon C. Liberman at 847/251-3327 or send an e-mail to jon@rainmkrs.com. purpose & promises | services | partners | clients & case studies | resources common questions, uncommon answers | ideas you can use | homepage site design by grupomarin.net | © 2001-2007 JONCORR, INC. All rights reserved.