Project initialisation

There are many approaches and methodologies that are widely used across industry with organisations favoring standard industry ones (PRINCE2, PMBOK, Agile etc) or usually a modified version of these they make their own.

Setting up a project for success. A business case is the key.

The purpose of the Business Case is to establish mechanisms to judge whether the project is (and remains) desirable, viable and achievable as a means to support decision making in its initial and continued investment.

• Provides a factual base for key decision makers to decide if the project should be undertaken.

• Demonstrates how the project adds value to the organisation

• Has a set of pre-defined standard organisatinal characteristics (costs, benefit, risk, etc.)

• It is not all about size - size depends on the cost/benefit.

• It is a living document throughout the project that should be reviewed and signed off at key stages.

A business case contains

• Exec summary

• Reasons why its required

• Business options

• Expected benefits

• Expected dis-benefits

• Timescale

• costs

• Investment appraisal

• Major risks