Malcolm JacksonSenior Project Manager| Inland Revenue DepartmentParaparaumu, New Zealand
I am currently at the thesis stage of my Masters in Project Management. I am researching how different stakeholders view "success" of a project. For example, a project at an academic institution here in New Zealand was proclaimed (by the Project Sponsor) to be "the most successful project this institution has ever run." He also said that it was a good example of how to involve users. However, the personnel involved in data input to the resulting system had a different view "We had no training, the system has less features than our old system, we were not consulted".
I'm interested in examples such as this. All will be acknowledged and anonymity will be preserved where requested. Saving Changes...
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Michael WoodProject Manager / Business Analyst / Business Process Improvement Guru| Independent ContractorGig Harbor, Wa, United States
Malcolm, in my experience each stakeholder has a different expectation for any given project. Therefore, success can be defined by the expectations of the stakeholder at the commencement of the project. Defining those expectations before the project begins can set forth the metrics needed to measure success at the end. Without these metrics most success will be judged based on the emotional feelings people have at the end of the project. So the view of success is really a function of the expected outcomes to be achieved.
In the post project reviews that I have conducted we measured four things. 1 Was the project completed on time and within budget? 2 Did the project deliver what was promised (stakeholder expectations)? 3 Did the stakeholders approve of the project process used? 4 Would the stakeholders work with the project team in the future?
In a way it is a four way test of success that incorporated the financial with the social dynamics aspects present in all projects. Saving Changes...
John ZacharProduct Dev Manager| Association for Project Management (APM)Brackley,, Northamptonshire, United Kingdom
Well, what is project success? I am a PM professional, a consultant, and run education programmes, and this question is one that I am asked at least a couple of times a month.
I think there are three ways to demonstrate success as a PM. First, demonstrate to anyone that wants to observe, that the objective and CSFs have been met. This is of course dependent on the quality of the objective and CSFs. Lousy, unmeasurable objectives and CSFs prevent this happening.
There is also demonstrable benefits acquisition / realisation. Unfortunately this is difficult to do during the project; however, if you can show that the benefits have been realised, frequently success is accomplished, even if the objective and CSFs (why then were they critical) weren't met.
All that said, the best way to accomplish success as a project manager is to have all the products of the project, accepted by the users, implemented, and used. This is what will spawn the benefits, so would be an incidental step to accomplishing the benefit realisation thing. This of course takes the most time, as it concentrates on stakeholder management. A trivial pursuit question that I and my colleagues wrestle with is what percentage of a PM's time should be spent in stakeholder management? Our considered opinion is that it should consume about 75% or 80% of the PM's time. Inside this quantity of time is of course things like requiremetns elicitation, acceptance criteria agreement and documentation, etc.
The organisation I work for, CITI (www.citi.co.uk)has undertaken a great deal of research over the years. We are the only commercial organisation in the UK to hold university status - that is where our research base comes from. Within our research base we have created what we call our 'high profile' project manager group.
In order for these PMs to become part of the group, they had to be successful, three times in a row, without gaps, in terms of time, cost and quality (scope and product acceptance). And, they had to be seen to be successful not only in the eyes of the sponsor, but the senior user, the project team and the users of the new products.
Hope this provides some food for thought. If any of the stakeholders don't like your work, regardless of how well you and the team have peformed, your project will not be considered successful in their eyes, and they are the ones that operate the grapevine.
Malcolm Jackson Success in project management isn’t one-size-fits-all—it depends on who you ask. While leadership may focus on timelines and budgets, end-users care about usability and training. A truly successful project should balance both strategic goals and user needs. Your research highlights the importance of stakeholder engagement and feedback in defining success. Saving Changes...
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