Behind the scenes: Organisation Health Check explained

The organisation of the project is one of the factors that can make a project a succes or a failure. Make sure that you have the right team and the right project board (steering committee).

The project usually consists of a Project Board (steering committee) and a Project Management Team (PMT). The steering committee consists of at least 1 person, although at least two people to recommend. The Steering Committee contains the following distinct roles:

• The Business Executive is the sponsor of the project and the owner of the business case. In general, this is the line manager of the department where the change takes place, but if the project is about for example replacing obsolete hardware it can also be the line manager of the IT department.
• The Senior User represents the users who will have to work with the outcome of the project. He is also responsible for providing users who can be interviewed in order to establish functional specifications, and is also responsible for providing to users to perform, for example, acceptance tests.
• The Senior Supplier is responsible for providing the necessary resources for the project. He is responsible for the allocation of the resources in the project, the availability of a project environment and any necessary hardware and software.

The project leader is not part of the Project Board. The Project Board takes decisions about releasing the budget for the next phase of the project on the basis of the updated Business Case. They also set out what the stage boundaries are in terms of turnaround time and investment for the next phase.

The Project Board will therefore meet at the end of a phase (End Stage Report), but also when an Exception Report is submitted by the project manager: Management By Exception.

The questions to be answered in the organisation health check are:

1. Is there a Project Board?
2. Are any limits to the authority of the Project Board documented?
3. Is it clear to whom the Project Board reports?
4. Which member of the Project Board reports to senior management?
5. Does the Senior User adequately represent all user areas?
6. Are PB members contributing fully to all Mid Stage Assessments and End Stage Assessments?
7. Are PB members carrying out their other project duties?
8. Is there a Project Manager (PM)?
9. Have assurance roles been agreed?
10. Has any role for Project Support been clarified?
11. Does each person have a job description?
12. Has each person agreed/signed their job description?
13. Was the organisation agreed by the end of SU?
14. Is the documented version of the organisation correct?
15. Is the role of the Supplier(s) clearly defined?
16. Have any changes to the management team been recorded?
17. Has the Project Board received training for its roles?
18. Is the team manager role used effectively?
19. Are job descriptions agreed with any late appointments?

Interested in performing the organisation healt check? Click here!

Written by admin on June 10th, 2008 with 1 comment.
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