(1) Traditional models define project success as finishing on time and on budget and meeting requirements, challenge as reaching completion but with cost overruns or delays, and failure as being abandoned. (2) Kerzner proposed a model incorporating project management and portfolio perspectives, defining various levels of success and failure. (3) The proposed model adds "reasonably" to constraints, includes recoverability, and differentiates projects based on management/portfolio success and recoverability/non-recoverability.
(1) Traditional models define project success as finishing on time and on budget and meeting requirements, challenge as reaching completion but with cost overruns or delays, and failure as being abandoned. (2) Kerzner proposed a model incorporating project management and portfolio perspectives, defining various levels of success and failure. (3) The proposed model adds "reasonably" to constraints, includes recoverability, and differentiates projects based on management/portfolio success and recoverability/non-recoverability.
(1) Traditional models define project success as finishing on time and on budget and meeting requirements, challenge as reaching completion but with cost overruns or delays, and failure as being abandoned. (2) Kerzner proposed a model incorporating project management and portfolio perspectives, defining various levels of success and failure. (3) The proposed model adds "reasonably" to constraints, includes recoverability, and differentiates projects based on management/portfolio success and recoverability/non-recoverability.
(1) Traditional models define project success as finishing on time and on budget and meeting requirements, challenge as reaching completion but with cost overruns or delays, and failure as being abandoned. (2) Kerzner proposed a model incorporating project management and portfolio perspectives, defining various levels of success and failure. (3) The proposed model adds "reasonably" to constraints, includes recoverability, and differentiates projects based on management/portfolio success and recoverability/non-recoverability.
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How to Measure Projects Success: Successful vs.
Troubled vs. Failed Projects
Traditional Models There are a lot of rating models out there that attempt to define project success or failure. There is the traditional one:
Success: Finished (more or less) on time, within budget and met all requirements
Challenged: Reaches conclusion, but with cost overruns and schedule slippages; possibly not all specifications are met
Failure: Project was abandoned or cancelled due to project management failure
I cant say that I am a big fan of it, because it fails to incorporate the value (i.e. the project portfolio management) perspective into the model. Recently I came across the one I really liked a model that considers both project management (PM) and project portfolio management (PPM) sides proposed by Harold Kerzner:
Complete Success: Project met success criteria, value was created and all constraints were adhered to
Partial Success: Project met the success criteria, the client accepted the deliverables, value was created, not all of the constraints were met
Partial Failure: Project was cancelled. But some IP was created that can be used on other projects
Complete Failure: The project was abandoned and nothing was learned
Proposed Model My view of a successful project is slightly different. I basically like to (1) add word reasonably to the adhering to constraints sentence and (2) include the recoverability variable into the equation:
Project success is a function of:
Business value is realized
Project is delivered reasonably on-budget
Project is delivered reasonably on time
Project scope is delivered within reasonable limits
NOTE: reasonable = does not negate the business value
Projects should also be differentiated by their recoverability
Regarding the first point, let us examine the following famous examples:
Titanic movie (cost -$200 million vs. revenues - $2 billion)
First iPhone (cost - $150 million, revenues $2.7 billion)
Grand Theft Auto 5 (cost - $265 million, revenues US $1 billion in its first three days!)
Would we call Titanic a troubled project if it was released on 18-Jan-1998 instead of the original 18-Nov-1997? Would we think of the iPhone as a failure if its development ended up costing $160 million instead of the original $150 million? Of course, not!
So, what happens if we try to look at projects from the PM success/failure, PPM success/failure and recoverability/non-recoverability perspective (see Table 1)?
Table 1 In the upper left corner (green) we have projects that are on track both from the PM and PPM perspectives. These ventures should be just properly monitored and controlled until their successful completion.
The next(yellow) layer contains the troubled projects (either on the PM and/or PPM side), but these projects can still be saved by adjustments to their scope, schedules, budget, governance etc.
Finally, the last layer is comprised of the projects that are so deep in trouble from PM and/or PPM viewpoints that the only option available to the stakeholders is to kill them, unless they are stay-in-business or regulatory initiatives.
Questions:
What do you think of this project success/failure rating?
