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Streamlining the Work Plan Process
Michael R. Wood is a Business Process Improvement & IT Strategist Independent Consultant. He is creator of the business process-improvement methodology called HELIX and founder of The Natural Intelligence Group, a strategy, process improvement and technology consulting company. He is also a CPA, has served as an Adjunct Professor in Pepperdine's Management MBA program, an Associate Professor at California Lutheran University, and on the boards of numerous professional organizations. Mr. Wood is a sought after presenter of HELIX workshops and seminars in both the U.S. and Europe.
If you are like me, one of the most tedious parts of a new project is creating the work plan. Most of us have our own devices for getting through the process, usually including a lot of editing a previous plan or template, or searching for a template based on the same type of project we are working on (CRM, ERP, package evaluation, data warehouse, etc.).
What has recently occurred to me is that all projects are basically comprised of predictable and pre-definable groups of tasks. The gestalt really happened when doing my taxes using the leading tax return preparation software. The interview process was like a super-wizard that, based on my circumstances, helped me to create a custom return. Using that idea as a basic premise I set out to see how much of the concept (sans the software part) could be defined for project work plans. This article presents the results of that effort.
To begin, it will help to define what is meant by a work plan in context to this article. A work plan is the part of the overall project plan and typically includes the following:
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Phase
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Task
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Task Status
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Task Prerequisites
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Effort Level (hours or days)
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Resources Assigned
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Start Date
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End Date
Virtually every project management tool out there supports…
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