PRINCE2.com Blog

Embed PRINCE2, and it can help deliver successful projects as well as deliver success to your organisation. Here are some of the ways it can help.

1. Avoid Scope Creep. The bane of many a project manager, this can scupper anything from a multi-million-pound shopping centre construction to a grandly-designed dream home. You know the kind of thing, you start with a few tweaks and before you know it you’re engaged in gold-plated changes. At one time, University of Western Australia Library projects were poorly scoped then it discovered PRINCE2 and now both complex and simple projects were scoped and the University is reaping the benefits.
2. Watch those Risks. OK, it’s a tricky task but it’s got to be done if a project’s to have any chance of success as evidence shows. So use PRINCE2 to identify the context and risks, estimate and evaluate them, plan for them, communicate them to relevant people and then control them through actions. VocaLink knows you can’t engineer out all risk but as a specialist payments partner to banks, their corporate customers and government departments, and therefore involved in everything from ATMs to electronic payments, it’s no wonder that it plans extensively for them.
3. Improve People Performance. Everyone involved in a project needs a guiding hand now and then and PRINCE2 delivers that at every level. For example, it provides guidance for project board members and senior stakeholders and it facilitates the management of the reasonable – and not so reasonable – expectations of all stakeholders. The Australian Department of Parliamentary Services (DPS) feels that PRINCE2’s strong governance principles have enabled more effective engagement of stakeholders in the process of project approval and management.
4. Embrace Consistency. Imagine that you work in an organisation where you and your fellow project managers use your own project management approach. Now, what happens if someone leaves? How easily can project managers move from one project to another? What happens if a project manager needs to manage a group of projects? What happens to communication if you’re all using different terminology? PRINCE2 fosters standardisation and predictability within project management, a benefit not to be sniffed at in unstable economic times.
5. Tailor it to Fit You. PRINCE2 allows you to tailor it to suit project environment, scale, complexity, anything you want and companies know this. Transpower spent three months tailoring PRINCE2 to suit its business. Environment Canada’s CIO and former NATO man implemented PRINCE2 knowing that it had been successfully used in both the private and public sectors.
6. Recruit the Best. Projects are only as good as the people who run them. Right now you’re spoilt for choice, what with the global pool – or rather ocean – of PRINCE2 professionals and today’s economic crisis. So to get the best, make the UK’s de-facto standard your baseline qualification, then stipulate variables like experience, location and industry, before sitting back and waiting for the applications to roll in. The Australian DPS is able to engage more easily experienced project officers and project managers with PRINCE2 qualifications from throughout the Public Service and industry.
7. Retain Good Employees. Once you’ve got great staff you want to hold on to them. So use PRINCE2 to map out a career path for them, laying out the experience and qualifications that will take them to the top. For example, after certification, employees can improve knowledge, skills and career prospects by following it up with APMP for PRINCE2 Practitioners and then progressing to qualifications such as Managing Successful Programmes.
8. Use Cost-effective Training. At a time when training firms are competing on everything from product and delivery to support, you’re calling the shots; so get the best! ILX offers a comprehensive package. First, there’s any number of ways to learn including e-learning, mobile learning, live virtual classroom, blended learning and classroom learning. Then there’s loads of assistance with free downloads, games, a forum, Twitter , Facebook, a blog as well as ILX Connect to guide companies through the training process and Support to help individuals get the most from training. Remember, though, when you’re organising training, it’s all about matching the right individual to the right role.
9. Create a Project Management Culture. How successful are organisations where everyone doesn’t understand or share values and practices and where these are not aligned with strategic objectives? What happens if project management is seen as something that project managers do and not something that involves everyone in the organisation? Exactly. PRINCE2 can help by giving staff an appreciation of how your organisation runs projects so you’re all pulling together as a team. HR and training managers can play their role by embedding best practices in the business.
10. Employ a Methodology Developed by You. Thanks to expert input from users like you, from academics and standards bodies PRINCE2 is an evolving, organic methodology that fits the economic times it operates in. At the same time the product is well supported through its owners the OGC which has a responsibility for its management and updates, through APMG which handles the accreditation and certification of organisations, processes and people and through publisher TSO.

Useful Links

1. For a complete picture of PRINCE2 and what it can do, head to the Office of Government Commerce.
2. The APMG provides a slew of useful information about PRINCE2 accredited training options.
3. TSO publishes a range of material for PRINCE2.
4. KPMG NZ Project management survey 2010 offers an overview of the New Zealand scene from the point of view of experience project management practitioners.
5. University of Western Australia Library, VocaLink, Australian Department of Parliamentary Services (DPS), Transpower and Environment Canada have all reaped the benefits of using PRINCE2.
6. The PRINCE2 e-learning experience may be the perfect option for those with an eye for cost-effective, rich and collaborative training that includes a blog, a forum and social media such as Twitter and Facebook. Head over to PRINCE2.com for an overview of everything we offer.

Fed up with cost and schedule overruns? Confused by the mish-mash of project management approaches your organisation uses? Don’t suffer in silence! Try these ways of convincing your company and colleagues to adopt PRINCE2.

1. Make ‘em want it! The first step is to accept that you may have to change the long-held, entrenched mindset of individuals and the organisation. So softly, softly does it. Remember change is scary so it’s a big ask for people unfamiliar with PRINCE2 to embrace it. A good way to begin is to provide them with a clearer understanding of the methodology and its benefits so that they see the light and buy into it themselves.
2. Face prejudices head on. Dispel the myth that PRINCE2 is about filling in forms or doggedly following a methodology. Emphasize that the paperwork is to keep track of a project, that the methodology is to provide a flexible framework and that neither runs the project; that’s what the people are for. If they’ve got a sense of humour, you could throw in something about a bad work-person blaming his or her tools – or methodologies!
3. If only you’d used PRINCE2. When you’re socialising at the water cooler do a little detective work on past project failures and successes. Then look for an opportunity to demonstrate how using PRINCE2 would have brought greater success and give specific examples. If you can’t think of any try the case studies on our Downloads page to illustrate your point. We’ve included some under relevant headings here.
4. And why exactly are we doing this? Always an unsettling question and one that’s worth asking until you get an answer. Dig about to see if the Business Case was developed with real rigour and then discuss the PRINCE2 approach.
   Case Study: The Australian Department of Parliamentary Services found that PRINCE2’s business case requirements meant that it could identify different options which resulted in better decision making.
5. Is this project still viable? Another awkward and valuable question to ask. Use it as an opportunity to explain how PRINCE2 is managed in stages. Detail how at the end of each stage, project status is assessed, Business Case and plans are reviewed to gauge project viability and a decision is made about whether to proceed. Finally, if you add that this gives senior management control points at crucial periods in a project, it’ll probably swing the argument in your favour, after all, which manager doesn’t like control!
6. Log it! If there isn’t a Lesson Log, start one to note lessons learned throughout the current project. Refer to a Lesson Log you’ve used to prove its practical use. Don’t forget the Daily Log either. Use it and explain that it helps ensure that no action, however small, is forgotten and that it’s a good repository for other things such as individual observations.
7. Do they ‘get’ tolerances? One way to showcase tactfully PRINCE2’s advantages is to quiz team members on tolerances. Ask how far things are going to be allowed to deviate outside the plan’s target, for time and cost for instance, before matters are escalated to the next decision level. The six tolerance areas are time, cost, scope, risk, quality and benefit.
8. Houston, we have a problem! OK, it’s not Apollo 13, but any issue can have a serious effect on a project. So raise issues, see if a consistent approach is used for dealing with them and demonstrate how PRINCE2 assists project managers to handle them comprehensively. Remind colleagues that it’s not just a question of remembering things like MoSCoW – if only!
9. What if it all goes pear-shaped? Research risks that scuppered past projects, then look out for likely risks to the current one and highlight them. Find out if there’s a risk register, if all the risks have been identified, what their likely impact could be, what countermeasures are envisaged, and so on; you know the drill. Remember risks can be good too, so point out opportunities companies might have missed.
   Case Study: While VocaLink knows you can’t engineer out all risks, it uses PRINCE2 to plan extensively to deliver projects. The company processes domestic and international automated payments and provides ATM switching solutions.
10. Er, is this tailored? It’s worth being specific and asking if the method colleagues are using is allowing them to tailor for project environment, size, complexity, and so forth. Describe PRINCE2’s universal nature and relate it to the current project; make sure you back it up with facts and examples!
11. Lead by example. If anyone asks you how to do something, elucidate using PRINCE2. If you have an opportunity to use PRINCE2 yourself then do so clarifying what you’re doing and why. If you’re discussing the project over a coffee, whip out the PRINCE2 Health check list and show how this flexible tool allows project professionals to manage successfully.

Useful Links:

• For a complete picture of PRINCE2 and what it can do, head to the OGC.
• The PRINCE2 Downloads page has a wealth of case studies on how it has transformed the way companies do things. They include the British Council and Suffolk County Council which provide some valuable insights into using PRINCE2.
• When Environment Canada realised that it needed to tackle cost and schedule overruns it adopted PRINCE2.
• A hybrid project management method was identified at Transpower New Zealand as having inefficiencies to those employed in the project management to those employed in the project management space. So for this and other reasons it switched to PRINCE2.
• ILX Group deliver PRINCE2 Foundation and Practitioner e-learning, classroom and blended learning to suit every situation.
• The APMG provide a slew of useful information about PRINCE2 accredited training options if you’re not yet PRINCE2 certified.
• The PRINCE2 e-learning experience may be the perfect option for those with an eye for cost-effective, rich and collaborative training that includes a blog, a forum and social media such as Twitter and Facebook.
• If your company sees the light and decides to adopt PRINCE2, you might like to tell them about ILX Connect which holds an organisation’s hand as it implements PRINCE2 training.
• For a practical example of how ILX can deliver training whatever the situation and whatever the weather have a look at the experience of KCA Deutag Drilling Group.