Business Investment and Governance

A Project does not exist in isolation; it is conducted within an environment which is subject to change, and there are likely to be many external influences, pressures and constraints.

A project governance structure is required to control how the project is positioned within its external environment. There are three stages to consider:

Business commitment
Business investment
Business benefit

Business commitment starts before the project begins, and carries on through project initiation up to the point where a decision to invest is made. This stage is often driven by a 'champion', i.e. by someone who is personally motivated to get the business to invest in this 'idea'.

Business investment is the period from the point when the decision to invest is taken through to the closure of the project. During this period, a formal governance structure is needed. Typically this will consist of:

A sponsor

senior executive representation
chair project board
escalation route for project manager
front the publicity
recognition of achievements

A project board

appoint / guide the project manager
appoint auditors / assurers
approve plans and commit budgets
sign-off completion of stages or products
decide change requests
monitor progress
close the project

Executive Senior User Technical

sponsor -
represent
executive

proj mgr
auditor represent
the users /
customers

represent
designers /
developers /
providers

Business benefit is the period after the completion of the project during which the benefit is made to happen. It is essential that the project delivers benefit realisation plans, and that responsibility for achieving them and monitoring or auditing them is committed at project completion.