Project Management Central

Please login or join to subscribe to this thread SHARE Topics: PMO, Scope Management

Managing Scope Creep Without Stifling Innovation Ashwin Kumar H M Community Champion Consultant| Canarys Automation Ltd Bangalore, Karnataka, India This discussion thread focuses on strategies for managing scope creep while still encouraging innovation within projects. How do you strike a balance between maintaining project scope and allowing room for creative ideas and improvements? Share your experiences and tactics for keeping projects on track without hindering innovation. Let’s discuss practical approaches to managing scope changes effectively. Saving Changes... Posted: Aug 23, 2024 12:07 AM

Sort By: Newest First Chronological Votes Kiron Bondale Community Champion Retired | Mentor| Retired Welland, Ontario, Canada Ashwin - Innovation is found in two main ways - the requirements or design of the product or service, and how the product or service is created or delivered. The latter poses a low risk of scope creep however the former certainly can introduce it. Good practices include ensuring the team and other stakeholders are well aware of the change control model for the project (and have had input into its development), picking an appropriate delivery strategy (e.g. adaptive vs predictive) based on the project's context, and where it is expected that there will be the potential for late stage innovations that will help the customer to negotiate with the customer for establishing a change budget (upfront) to fund valuable changes. Kiron ... 1 reply by Ashwin Kumar H M Aug 23, 2024 2:13 PM Ashwin Kumar H M ... Kiron, thanks for sharing your insights! I completely agree that innovation in the product or service design is often where scope creep can sneak in, while process innovations usually carry less risk in this area. Your point about involving the team and stakeholders in developing the change control model is spot on. When everyone understands the process and has a say in its creation, it not only helps manage expectations but also empowers the team to suggest meaningful innovations without derailing the project. I also like the idea of negotiating a change budget upfront. It’s a proactive approach that allows room for flexibility and creativity while maintaining control over the project's scope and budget. Do you have any examples from your experience where establishing a change budget made a significant difference in balancing scope control and innovation? It would be great to hear more about how that has worked in practice. Saving Changes... Posted: Aug 23, 2024 9:24 AM Sergio Luis Conte Helping to create solutions for everyone| Worldwide based Organizations Buenos Aires, Argentina Both are totally different things. To avoid scope creep is simple: put clear the change management process at the very begining. Just everybody has to stay clear: all changes are welcome just take into account the change will face the change management process. That´s all. Innovation and improvements are different things too. You can improve without innovate. But the key thing is to create rooms or spaces or visible tasks in your initiative to run this spaces. And to take into account that outcomes must be things to do in the initiative list of things to do. ... 1 reply by Ashwin Kumar H M Aug 23, 2024 2:17 PM Ashwin Kumar H M ... Thanks for your input! You make a great point about the importance of a clear change management process right from the start. Having that process in place certainly helps everyone understand that changes are welcome but must follow a structured path, which is key to avoiding scope creep. I also appreciate your distinction between innovation and improvement. You're right—improvements can happen without being groundbreaking innovations, but both require careful management within the project. Creating dedicated spaces or tasks for innovation and improvement within the project plan is a smart approach. It allows the team to explore new ideas while ensuring that these ideas are evaluated and integrated into the initiative in a controlled manner. How do you usually structure these "spaces" for innovation and improvement within your projects? Do you find that setting aside time for these activities leads to more successful outcomes? Saving Changes... Posted: Aug 23, 2024 11:38 AM Ashwin Kumar H M Community Champion Consultant| Canarys Automation Ltd Bangalore, Karnataka, India Aug 23, 2024 9:24 AM Replying to Kiron Bondale ... Ashwin - Innovation is found in two main ways - the requirements or design of the product or service, and how the product or service is created or delivered. The latter poses a low risk of scope creep however the former certainly can introduce it. Good practices include ensuring the team and other stakeholders are well aware of the change control model for the project (and have had input into its development), picking an appropriate delivery strategy (e.g. adaptive vs predictive) based on the project's context, and where it is expected that there will be the potential for late stage innovations that will help the customer to negotiate with the customer for establishing a change budget (upfront) to fund valuable changes. Kiron Kiron, thanks for sharing your insights! I completely agree that innovation in the product or service design is often where scope creep can sneak in, while process innovations usually carry less risk in this area. Your point about involving the team and stakeholders in developing the change control model is spot on. When everyone understands the process and has a say in its creation, it not only helps manage expectations but also empowers the team to suggest meaningful innovations without derailing the project. I also like the idea of negotiating a change budget upfront. It’s a proactive approach that allows room for flexibility and creativity while maintaining control over the project's scope and budget. Do you have any examples from your experience where establishing a change budget made a significant difference in balancing scope control and innovation? It would be great to hear more about how that has worked in practice. ... 1 reply by Kiron Bondale Aug 24, 2024 5:47 AM Kiron Bondale ... This was very common on system integration projects early in my career where both the team and customer acknowledged early on that there were a lot of unknowns and rather than setting everyone up for a painful budget change authorization process it was better to establish that budget upfront. This did not mean than changes were accepted blindly but it did reduce the level of external funding governance involved which kept the project's timeliness on track. Kiron Saving Changes... Posted: Aug 23, 2024 2:13 PM Ashwin Kumar H M Community Champion Consultant| Canarys Automation Ltd Bangalore, Karnataka, India Aug 23, 2024 11:38 AM Replying to Sergio Luis Conte ... Both are totally different things. To avoid scope creep is simple: put clear the change management process at the very begining. Just everybody has to stay clear: all changes are welcome just take into account the change will face the change management process. That´s all. Innovation and improvements are different things too. You can improve without innovate. But the key thing is to create rooms or spaces or visible tasks in your initiative to run this spaces. And to take into account that outcomes must be things to do in the initiative list of things to do. Thanks for your input! You make a great point about the importance of a clear change management process right from the start. Having that process in place certainly helps everyone understand that changes are welcome but must follow a structured path, which is key to avoiding scope creep. I also appreciate your distinction between innovation and improvement. You're right—improvements can happen without being groundbreaking innovations, but both require careful management within the project. Creating dedicated spaces or tasks for innovation and improvement within the project plan is a smart approach. It allows the team to explore new ideas while ensuring that these ideas are evaluated and integrated into the initiative in a controlled manner. How do you usually structure these "spaces" for innovation and improvement within your projects? Do you find that setting aside time for these activities leads to more successful outcomes? ... 1 reply by Sergio Luis Conte Aug 23, 2024 3:51 PM Sergio Luis Conte ... Thank you for your feedback. As you know, if you are using some methods/frameworks inside the definition you will find a specific activity about that. For me, in my personal experience, is a day to day activity. But the key thing is to create, just if applies, an activity or some space on team capacity to allow that. Saving Changes... Posted: Aug 23, 2024 2:17 PM Sergio Luis Conte Helping to create solutions for everyone| Worldwide based Organizations Buenos Aires, Argentina Aug 23, 2024 2:17 PM Replying to Ashwin Kumar H M ... Thanks for your input! You make a great point about the importance of a clear change management process right from the start. Having that process in place certainly helps everyone understand that changes are welcome but must follow a structured path, which is key to avoiding scope creep. I also appreciate your distinction between innovation and improvement. You're right—improvements can happen without being groundbreaking innovations, but both require careful management within the project. Creating dedicated spaces or tasks for innovation and improvement within the project plan is a smart approach. It allows the team to explore new ideas while ensuring that these ideas are evaluated and integrated into the initiative in a controlled manner. How do you usually structure these "spaces" for innovation and improvement within your projects? Do you find that setting aside time for these activities leads to more successful outcomes? Thank you for your feedback. As you know, if you are using some methods/frameworks inside the definition you will find a specific activity about that. For me, in my personal experience, is a day to day activity. But the key thing is to create, just if applies, an activity or some space on team capacity to allow that. Saving Changes... Posted: Aug 23, 2024 3:51 PM Kiron Bondale Community Champion Retired | Mentor| Retired Welland, Ontario, Canada Aug 23, 2024 2:13 PM Replying to Ashwin Kumar H M ... Kiron, thanks for sharing your insights! I completely agree that innovation in the product or service design is often where scope creep can sneak in, while process innovations usually carry less risk in this area. Your point about involving the team and stakeholders in developing the change control model is spot on. When everyone understands the process and has a say in its creation, it not only helps manage expectations but also empowers the team to suggest meaningful innovations without derailing the project. I also like the idea of negotiating a change budget upfront. It’s a proactive approach that allows room for flexibility and creativity while maintaining control over the project's scope and budget. Do you have any examples from your experience where establishing a change budget made a significant difference in balancing scope control and innovation? It would be great to hear more about how that has worked in practice. This was very common on system integration projects early in my career where both the team and customer acknowledged early on that there were a lot of unknowns and rather than setting everyone up for a painful budget change authorization process it was better to establish that budget upfront. This did not mean than changes were accepted blindly but it did reduce the level of external funding governance involved which kept the project's timeliness on track. Kiron Saving Changes... Posted: Aug 24, 2024 5:47 AM

Please login or join to reply