Chapter 11: Change Flashcards
What are changes identified as in PRINCE2 and define it
Issues
The term issue is used to cover any relevant event that has happened, wasn’t planned and requires management action during the project
Look at Table giving examples of types of issues
Look
What are the two reasons to implement change
- introduce a new benefit
- protect a new benefit
Sometimes the appropriate response to an issue could be to reject it and do nothing (instead of changing scope, cost etc)
Change can only be assessed in terms of its impact in an agreed current situation. What is the ‘current situation’ represented by?
The ‘current situation’ at any point in time is represented by a snapshot of all the management and specialist products produced during the project lifecycle
At any point in time, each of these items will be in a know state or ‘baseline’
What is a baseline
Baseline
- reference levels against which an entity is monitored and controlled
A prerequisite of effective issue and change control is to define a way of creating baselines of products and allowing appropriately controlled changes to those baselines
- the complexity of this depends on project size, complexity and sector
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What are configuration items
Whatever name is given to the process of prevent unauthorised change, PRINCE2 calls the things that need to be controlled and baselined ‘configuration items’
- information on their state and status should be collected and may be held in ‘configuration item records’
What is a configuration item record
Record that describes the status, version and variant if a configuration item and any details of important relationships between them
What 2 products does prince2 require to be produced and maintained
Issue register
- captures and maintains info on all the issues that are being formally protected
Change control approach
- identifies how and by whom the projects products will be controlled and protected
What is an option if the issue register doesn’t contain sufficient detail
If the issue register doesn’t contain sufficient detail, a separate issue report can be used but this is an optional management product
What is the responsibility of corporate, programme management or the customer regarding change
- provide the strategies for issue resolution and change control
What is the responsibility of the executive regarding change
- determine change authority and change budget
- set the scale for rating severity of issues
- set scale for priority ratings for requests for change and off specifications
What is the responsibility of the senior user regarding change
- respond to requests for advice from PM
- make decisions on escalated issues
What is the responsibility of the senior supplier regarding change
- respond to requests for advice from PM
- make decisions in escalated issues
What is the responsibility of the PM regarding change
- create and maintain change control approach
- manage issue and change control procedures
- maintain the issue register
What is the responsibility of the project assurance regarding change
- advise on assessing and resolving issues
What is the responsibility of project support regarding change
Administer change control procedures
What is the starting point for change control
The starting point for all projects will be to identify whether there are any program management or customer policies that need to be applied and incorporate into the projects own change control approach
How does managing product baselines differ for more complex projects
All products need an appropriate approach to creating maintaining and controlling product baselines for both management and specialist products .
For simpler products document management procedures generally suffice.
More complex projects usually need some form of configuration management, asset management or product management process, often supported by specific tools
What does the project team need to determine
- appropriate level at which product needs to be baselined
- How configuration items are identified (generally a coding system)
- the specific authorities and authorisations needed to approve and baseline configuration items
- what information about configuration items needs to be captured and maintained in configuration item records
Info regarding project delivery approach
It’s important that approach to managing issues and change works with, and supports the projects chosen delivery approach, rather than working against it
Example:
- a change control approach that defines that there will be a monthly review of proposed changes is unlikely to effectively support an agile delivery approach where delivery may be happening every week
What is a change authority
Project board is responsible for reviewing and approving requests for change and off specifications
- for projects where there are likely to be many changes, the project board may choose to delegate some decisions to a person/ group called change authority authority
Who’s usually the change authority
The PM and/ or people with delegated project assurance responsibilities may act as the change authority
- it’s important to ensure that the change authority for work packages has sufficient authority so that changes can be made without always having to escalate decisions to the project board for approval
What is a change budget
Sum of money that the costumer and supplier agree will be used to fund the cost of requests for change and possibly also their analysis costs
Unless the anticipated level of change on the project is low, it’s advisable for a budget to be set up for changes
What is the order of princess for the recommended issue and change control procedure
- capture
- assess
- propose
- decide
- implement
What happens in the capture stage
Undertake an initial analysis to determine the type of issue that has been raised and whether it should be managed informally or formally.
- PM makes an initial assessment of the issues severity and priority
What is the purpose of distinguishing between issues that can be managed informally and formally
- ensure decisions are made at an appropriate level within the project management team
- avoid the project board being inundated with too many issues and therefore diluting the time it has available ti deal with key issues affecting project
What happens in the assess stage
Assess the issue by undertaking an impact analysis
The impact analysis should consider the impact the issue has (or will have on):
- project performance targets
- project business case
- any other dependent products produced by the project
What should assessment of impact cover
Assessing the impact of issues can be wrongly taken to mean only the impact on the customer
Impact analysis should cover the three areas of:
- business
- user
- supplier
Having undertaken the impact analysis, the severity or priority of the issue should be re evaluated
Issue register should be updated to include the above information and the person who raised the issue should be kept informed if it’s status
What happens in the propose stage
Proposing corrective actions
Consideration should be given to the effect each of the options will have in the projects time, cost, scope, benefits and risk performance targets
- there should be balance between the advantage to be gained by implementing the option and time, cost and risk of implementing it
What occurs in the decide stage
Deciding on corrective actions
PM may be able to resolve issues without the need to escalate them to the project board
- e.g. a minor change to an approval detailed designed document that doesn’t affect any other products could be handled by the PM, as long as it’s formally recorded
- other issues may need to be escalated to the project board for a decision
What occurs in the implement stage
Implementing corrective actions
- Take the necessary corrective action
- create an exception plan for approval by the project board
What must be endured in the imp,emendation if corrective action
Implementation of the corrective action must ensure that baselined products are updated in a controlled manner and with appropriate authorisations.
- if a product has been baselined is to be changed, a new version should be created to accommodate the change and the baseline version is kept unchanged
What must happen to the issue register when an issue has been closed
The PM should update the issue register
