Putting a Project On-Hold, pros and cons, how much to accept a cost increase?

Cost Management Portfolio Management Strategy

Mario Ernesto Cadena Briones Program Manager Director| Independent Professional - Sr Project Management Advisor Cuautitlán Izcalli, Estado De Mexico, Mexico

Does anyone has any definition or criteria to declare a Project on hold, what could be pros and cons of putting it on hold (as sometimes due to regulatory issues or Customer delays, it is not possible to progress with Project) and also any criteria to accept cost increase as a maximum in a Project already in progress?

Posted: Dec 3, 2019 7:21 PM

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Mario Ernesto Cadena Briones Program Manager Director| Independent Professional - Sr Project Management Advisor Cuautitlán Izcalli, Estado De Mexico, Mexico

Dec 06, 2019 9:31 AM

Replying to Wade Harshman

...

There are many valid reasons for putting a project on hold. The reason I've most often seen is that the people or resources needed for the project are needed more on a different, more important (or more urgent) project. The stakeholders don't want to cancel the project, but they accept their lower priority.

There are many costs of delay. After all, projects typically have some sort of financial goal or metrics. But any project that's been placed on hold has a very significant risk that it will never resume. It's already been de-prioritized once, and will take significant effort to resume activities.

Hi Wade,

Thank you for your comments, would you mind to list some costs of delay you are referring to?

Thank you in advance,

Best regards
MC

Posted: Jan 6, 2020 7:48 PM

Peter Rapin Subject Matter Expect; Project Delivery| Independent Consultant Ontario, Canada

I have read many of the comments but have not seen any thoughts on the proper mothballing of a project. A hold means that there is a probability of a continuation at some point and you want to mitigate the negative impacts as much as possible. I would consider a wrap up plan with skeleton closure team to make sure all commitments are addressed (bills paid), critical documents and installations protected, records updated with every effort made to facilitate a re-start assuming a new team and only slightly revised deliverable. This may be easier said then done as the stakeholders and participants (team members) are quick to move on and may have little motivation to wrap things up properly. As others have noted there are costs associated with a hold order regardless on its source but there is also a responsibility to mitigate.

Posted: Jan 6, 2020 8:21 PM

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Putting a Project On-Hold, pros and cons, how much to accept a cost increase?

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