ABSTRACT
This glossary contains many terms, along with cross-references to related topics, that you may encounter when managing or working on a project. Many cross-references will point you towards the entries for main topics in the manual where you will find a full explanation of a technique and can read about the term in its proper context.
Activity
Work to create or review a project output or deliverable. May also be known as a task in some organizations.
ACWP
Actual Cost of Work Performed – the cost of work done on the project. See Earned Value Analysis.
AOA
Activity on Arrow network diagram.
AON
Activity on Node network diagram. See also Precedence Diagram.
Approval
Formal acceptance that a deliverable or output is ‘fit for purpose’.
Authorization
Permission to start and incur expense on a project or stage, once you have gained approval for the plan and/or budget.
Back-filling
The provision of one or more temporary staff, normally to cover the work of those seconded to a project.
Back-scheduling
Calculation of latest finish and start dates, working backwards from an end date through latest to earliest tasks. Also referred to as a ‘backward pass’ through a network.
Baseline
An approved product that is ‘frozen’ and kept available for comparison with future statuses or positions. For example, 10when a Project Plan is baselined, this version should be retained even though the plan may evolve and change, so that you can conduct progress reviews against an approved ‘yardstick’.
Benefits
Statements of advantageous project outcomes, such as increased revenues, reduced costs, performance and efficiency improvements. Note that benefits should be quantified where possible, so that they are tangible and provide a basis for measurement. Note that less precise benefits may be intangible, or even indeterminable.
Budget
A budget sets out your plans in cost terms, for either a project (Project Budget) or a stage (Stage Budget), in order to gain authorization for the expenditure and to provide a basis for financial control of that work.
Budgetary Control
Procedures to track ‘actual’ and ‘committed’ expenditure against that planned and identify variances, which should trigger both investigation of any significant variances and any subsequent corrective actions.
Budgeted Cost of Work Performed (BCWP)
The extra dimension gained by using EarnedValue Analysis, linking your original budget (Budgeted Cost) to actual performance (Work Performed) and expressing the result in currency terms or work hours. See EarnedValue Analysis.
Budgeted Cost of Work Scheduled (BCWS)
The project or stage budget, showing costs and timing. See EarnedValue Analysis.
Business Case
Documented justification for setting up and continuing a project, defining the benefits being sought, the likely investment, the constraints and the timescales to answer the question: ‘Why should we do this project?’
Business Case Review
A review, normally at the end of each stage, to maintain the relevance and realism of your Business Case, and to assess its ongoing viability. You should also review it when any exception situation occurs or is forecast.
Champion
This is not a formal project role, but if there is a senior individual prepared to suffer considerable sacrifice to ensure that a cause (in this case, a project or programme) in which he or she fervently believes is communicated, promoted, supported and ultimately successful, you will have a great ally.
11 Change Control
Control of the status of a project’s baselined deliverables, to ensure that change is justified, authorized and recorded.
Change – Request for Change (RFC)
A Request for Change (RFC) is used in PRINCE® and non-PRINCE® environments, when a stakeholder asks for a change to a product, or to one or more of its ‘Acceptance Criteria’.
Closure
If your project is a set of co-ordinated activities with definite start and end points, there must come a time when you have to undertake ‘close and dispose’ tasks and bring it to an orderly end. Closing a project is also known as ‘close-out’ or ‘shutdown’. ‘Termination’ tends to be used when a project is brought to a premature end, usually by a decision of the Steering Group.
Communications Plan
A scheme, based on the Project or Stage Plan, to help ensure that specified stakeholders know what is going on, when, and why, enabling feedback, questions and input from them.
Configuration Library
A central point for safe storage of baselined project outputs, whatever their form. The role of a Configuration Librarian, or that of the Project Office, might be to add items, make sure they are uniquely identifiable, store them, whether on paper, electronically or otherwise, control access to them, and maintain status records.
Configuration Management
The procedures used to take care of the products or outputs of a project and to ensure that each is uniquely identifiable, protected from harm or loss, that only the most recent approved version can be used, and that any proposed changes are authorized, managed and recorded.
Constraints
Confinements, limits or restrictions that may adversely affect a project.
Contract Management
Management of the external suppliers of products or services to the project. The project manager will also need to ensure that management procedures are established for any contract placed by the project for the operational supply of services or products.
Control
Control in a project is a continuous process which addresses such aspects as timing, spending, quality, project risks and issues.
12 Control Against Budget
Tracking of ‘actual’ and ‘committed’ expenditure against that planned, identifying variances, and triggering both investigation of any significant variances and any subsequent corrective actions.
Control Against Schedule
Control is a term for the collection of tasks that you undertake to help ensure that a project or a stage makes progress in line with its plan, or to spot any variances so that you can take prompt corrective action.
Cost Performance Index (CPI)
How much value you have earned from the amount you have spent. See EarnedValue.
Cost Variance (CV)
The difference between budgeted cost and actual cost of work performed. (BCWP – ACWP). See EarnedValue.
CPM
See Critical Path Method.
Critical Path
Any route all the way through a network diagram that has the longest duration, and where any delay is likely to extend the project.
Critical Path Method (CPM)
A diagrammatic network technique to enable structured analysis and management of complex projects.
Critical Success Factors
Factors identified to enable tracking of the business value of project or programme outputs, particularly when the benefits are largely intangible or indeterminable.
EarnedValue
A generic performance measurement term for the concept of representing physical work accomplished in terms of financial worth accrued. EarnedValue is also known as Budgeted Cost of Work Performed (BCWP).
EarnedValue Analysis
EarnedValue Analysis shows how much of the budget you should have spent to achieve the amount of work done so far, based on the budgeted cost of the task.
Estimate
Preliminary statement of the possible duration or cost of a project, stage or task.
Estimate at Completion (EAC)
Forecast of total project cost at completion. See Earned Value.
Estimate to Completion (ETC)
Forecast of how much more a project will cost to complete from now. See Earned Value.
13 Exception
A variation between ‘plan’ and ‘actual’ that goes beyond a level deemed in advance as acceptable (falls outside agreed Tolerance), and which thus needs to be reported to management (escalated) for resolution.
Exception Management
A ‘hands-off’ management philosophy which allows Project Managers to get on with the work of delivering the project without the need for frequent authorization, provided that any variances being experienced or forecast are within a clear and pre-defined range set by the Project Board, Steering Committee, sponsor or other project authority.
Feasibility Study
An early, high-level assessment of whether it would be practicable, desirable and worthwhile to grasp an opportunity or solve a problem and, if so, how. It should identify and evaluate optional solutions, their viability, and how each might be implemented. The study needs to provide sufficient information to justify recommendations on whether to proceed and, if so, how.
Financial Control
See Control Against Budget.
Gantt Chart
A bar chart used to develop and illustrate project and stage schedules. Named after Henry Gantt (1861–1919), a pioneer American management consultant.
Gateway Review
An independent assurance review used in UK central government civil procurement projects at pre-identified key points, to help ensure that the procurement is in good order and to make confidential recommendations for any remedial work.
Health Check
Brief examination to determine how ‘healthy’ a project is, and to prescribe any treatments that might improve or avoid deterioration in its condition.
Impact Analysis
A forecast of the possible effects of risks, issues, events, changes or maintenance of the status quo on a project or stage, so that decision-makers can have the opportunity to consider implications before committing to any course of action.
Implementation
Putting a project’s outputs into operation, making them available for whatever use or purpose they are to have.
Investment Appraisal
An estimate of the cost of a project and of the possible future costs and benefits that may flow from operational use of its 14outputs, which should enable an organization to determine whether the investment will be worthwhile.
Issue
An existing situation or set of circumstances which is affecting the ability of a project, stage or even programme to arrive at its intended outcome.
Lessons Learned
An exercise to recognize and document any lessons that might help improve the running of future projects. The main users of a ‘Lessons Learned’ report will include the Steering Group or Project Board and Project Team. Such a report might also be circulated to: the Corporate Standards function, or those responsible for Quality Management Systems and Project Management Standards; the Project Office; and managers of future projects.
Life Cycle
The main stages, phases or steps that a project might progress through, from the time someone has an idea that, if progressed, would need a project to turn it into a reality until that reality has been delivered, the project that delivered it has been closed down, and final reports, disposals and evaluations have been completed.
Matrix Management
A term normally used to describe an approach that uses ‘borrowed’ project team members who report to the Project Manager on project matters, and to their line manager on all other matters, such as ‘pay and rations’.
Milestone
A significant, measurable event during a project that can be used to monitor progress or assess status at that point.
Non-conformance
The status of a deliverable that does not meet its specification.
Objectives
Purposes, goals, aims, intentions, intents. Wherever possible, ensure that objectives are Specific, Measurable, Agreed, Realistic andTime-based (SMART).
Off Specification
A PRINCE® term used to describe a product that does not, or is forecast not to, match its specification, or that should have been, but has not been, produced and is not forecast to be produced.
Opportunity
A situation where a project might benefit from favourable consequences of future events, affecting one or more of costs, timescales, benefits and quality, if the opportunity is recognized and acted upon.
15 PBS
See Product Breakdown Structure.
PERT
See Programme (or Project) Evaluation Review Technique.
PFD
See Product Flow Diagram.
Phase
See Stage.
PMBOK
The Project Management Body of Knowledge.
Post-project Review
An appraisal to determine whether the expected benefits, as documented in the Business Case, have been achieved or are being achieved, normally planned after a settling-in period during which the achievement of benefits would be expected to become measurable.
Precedence Diagram
Activity on Node (AON) network diagram.
PRINCE®
A project management method, PRojects IN Controlled Environments, established in 1989 by the Central Computer and Telecommunications Agency for Government projects. Because it concentrates on project management ‘best practice’, it is widely used on many different types of projects, both in the UK and abroad. PRINCE® is a registered trademark and all references to PRINCE® throughout this text acknowledge this trademark.
PRINCE® Project
At the end of the PRINCE® Process ‘Initiating a Project’
Initiation
(IP) you will need to have drafted a vital product (document) known as a Project Initiation Document (PID), which will form the foundations on which you will gain authorization to develop and manage the remainder of the project.
Procurement
The purchasing of goods or services to satisfy a defined requirement that might include quality, quantity, availability and price, and usually with the aim of achieving best value for money.
Product
‘Product’ has a specific meaning in PRINCE® terminology, being a generic term for every project and stage input, deliverable, output or outcome.
Product Breakdown Structure (PBS)
A PRINCE® term for a hierarchical list or diagram, showing how the planned outcomes of a project are to be broken down into component products. Likely to be used in 16the creation of a Product Flow Diagram, showing sequence and dependencies.
Product Checklist
A list of the products to be delivered during a Stage Plan, showing relevant important dates.
Product Description
A PRINCE® term for a document that describes a product s
(PD)
‘purpose, composition, derivation and quality criteria’. You produce PDs during the planning process.
Product Flow Diagram
A PRINCE® term for a network diagram showing the
(PFD)
production sequence and dependencies of the products that you have identified earlier on a hierarchical Product Breakdown Structure (PBS) diagram.
Programme
A co-ordinated portfolio of projects.
Programme (or Project) Evaluation Review Technique (PERT)
A planning technique that uses time-based networks to show the relationships and dependencies between project tasks.
Progress Control
See Control Against Schedule.
Project
A unique set of co-ordinated activities, with definite start and end points, undertaken by an individual or organization to meet specific objectives within defined schedule, cost and performance parameters.
Project and Programme Reports
There are a number of typical reports and major documents in and around projects, falling into two main categories. Here are some examples.
Action – to identify the need for and to facilitate decisions:
Feasibility Study Report
Project Start-up Document (or Project Initiation Document if using PRINCE®), including plans, the Business Case and budgets
Exception Report or other report of serious variance from plan or budget
Stage End Report.
Information – to keep stakeholders up to date, reporting progress and status:
Progress or Status Report (or Highlight Report if using PRINCE®)
Lessons Learned Report, which may need some actions outside the scope of a project
End of Project or Project Closure Report.
17 Project Board
A PRINCE® Project Board has well-defined roles and responsibilities so that its members can represent the managerial interests of the:
business, in ensuring there is a business need to satisfy and that the project will and eventually does satisfy it and provide value for money
user, who represents the ultimate users of the final product in one way or another, who perhaps need the product to achieve a Key Performance Indicator or objective
supplier, who is responsible for creating and/or delivering the final product and who may be internal or external.
Project Brief
A PRINCE® document providing foundation information prior to initiating a project. See also Statement of Work.
Project Office
A function established to supply project support within a project-based organization, or an organization that regularly runs several projects side by side.
Project Owner (PO)
A role in UK government projects similar to that of a Project Sponsor. See also Senior Responsible Owner (SRO) and Sponsor.
Project Plan
A relatively ‘soft’ outline plan for the whole project when you start, but which you will firm up with the delivery of outputs and knowledge gained from each stage. Your high-level plan might include the following:
Work Breakdown Structure or Product Breakdown Structure
Work or Product Flow Diagram
Network Diagram with high-level estimates showing overall duration
summary-level schedule (bar or Gantt Chart) with main milestones
Budget
Resource Plan.
Quality
Fitness for purpose (Juran).The totality of characteristics of an entity which bear on its ability to satisfy stated and implied needs. (The author’s view is that there should be no room for implied needs in project work.)
Quality Review
A PRINCE® term for ‘an inspection with a specific structure, defined roles and procedure, designed to ensure a document’s completeness and adherence to standards’.
18 Request for Change
See Change – The Request for Change (RFC).
Request for Proposal (RFP)
Similar to an Invitation to Tender, where your organization formally asks suppliers to submit competitive tenders to meet a requirement.
Responsibility Matrix
A table identifying accountability and responsibility for project tasks.
Risk
A possible future event or situation that, if it happens, may affect the ability of a stage, project or programme to arrive at its intended outcome.
Risk Management
Whenever you are dealing with change or innovation, things may not always turn out as planned and expected. You will use Risk Management to put procedures in place to identify and record those things that might throw your project off course if they happen or fail to happen, and some measures ready to deal with such eventualities.
Scaling (of a Project Management Approach)
This important concept ought to be self-evident, but experience suggests that it is not. Projects of differing size, complexity and risk need different approaches in organization (Who is responsible for what?), structure (How many stages are needed?), planning (How many plans are needed, and at what level of detail?), risk and issue management, change and configuration control, and so on. If you use the same approach on large, complex projects as for small, simple ones, you will either fall dangerously short on some, create unreasonable overheads for others, or both. Scaling, also known as ‘tuning’, is the process of putting appropriate factors in place for each unique project, according to its importance, size and complexity. Many organizations provide project templates, setting out different approaches for projects of varying size and complexity.
Schedule
A timetable, plan, programme or scheme; an arrangement for something to happen at a specified time, normally presented as a Gantt or bar chart, showing activities on the vertical axis with horizontal bars opposite each, showing start, duration and end, related to dates across the top of the chart.
Schedule Control
See Control Against Schedule.
Schedule Performance Index (SPI)
Percentage of work complete. See Earned Value.
19 Schedule Variance (SV)
The difference between Budgeted Cost of Work Performed and Budgeted Cost of Work Scheduled. (BCWP – BCWS). See Earned Value.
Scope
The boundary defining the area in which a project or stage has to operate.
Sensitivity Analysis
A ‘What if … ?’ examination in which you analyse the consequences of variations in costs and benefits on the financial viability of a project.
Small Project
An undertaking below the threshold at which your company would usually wish to use formal project procedures, approaches and organization.
SMART Objectives
Acronym to help you remember that objectives should be checked to see that, as far as practicable, they are:
Specific – clear and unambiguous
Measurable – numbers preferred to adjectives
Agreed – all main stakeholders have bought in
Realistic – achievable given available resources
Time-based – stated target date(s) for delivery.
Sponsor
A senior individual in the organization, normally a person who will seek investment in a project, contribute to and endorse the Business Case justifying the project, in order for her or his part of the organization to benefit from the project’s outputs. This individual is often the customer-in chief, without whose sponsorship there might not be a project.
SRO
Senior Responsible Owner – a role in UK Government projects similar to that of the PRINCE® Senior User. See also Project Owner (PO) and Sponsor.
Stage
A sub-division of a project to aid effective management, also known as a phase in some organizations. Note that technical divisions of a project are often referred to as stages or phases, such as the Analysis Stage or Analysis Phase, and so on.
Stage Plan
A hard and detailed plan for a Project Stage, which might include:
Work Breakdown Structure or Product Breakdown Structure diagram
Work or Product Flow Diagram
Network Diagram with estimates showing duration
Schedule (bar or Gantt chart)
20specifications or Product Descriptions
Budget
Resource Plan.
Stage Start and End
We create a series of opportunities, between stages, where those accountable for steering the project must check two important matters: that work from a previous stage has been satisfactorily completed; that the justification for the project is still valid; and that the plans and budgets for the next stage and for the remainder of the project are complete, clear and realistic.
Stakeholder
Any person or group involved in or likely to be affected by a project or its outcome, or its failure to deliver the required outcome.
Starting a Project
At the end of this stage, you will need to deliver documentation that:
fully defines the requirements the project must meet, confirms their justification, and sets out a scheme for their delivery; these will normally consist of a Project Start-up or Project Initiation Document (PRINCE®) and a Project Justification or Business Case
provides a baseline, or yardstick, against which you, as the Project Manager, and the Project Board can monitor progress
provides an agreed basis for a Post-project Review.
Statement of Work (SOW)
Sets out the objectives, scope, organization, roles and responsibilities of a project, and identifies the constraints it faces, in a similar manner to a Terms of Reference document or a PRINCE® Project Brief.
Steering Group
A Steering Group’s usual responsibility is to steer a project to a successful outcome. It needs to have an ultimate authority and decision-maker, who will normally chair any Steering Group meetings and may nominate the members and appoint the Project Manager. Note that terms such as Steering Group, Steering Committee and Project Board are normally synonymous, though Project Board has a specific meaning and make-up under PRINCE®.
Task
A piece of work to produce a pre-defined deliverable or output. May also be known as a task in some organizations.
Task Checklist
A list of the tasks to be completed during a stage, showing relevant important dates.
21 Terms of Reference
A structured guiding statement that defines the objectives, scope, constraints and reporting requirements of an investigation or assignment. It should also contain any assumptions, until these have been resolved.
Tolerance
A term for the range of permitted deviation from a project or stage plan or budget, without having to seek prior approval.
Tranche (of a Programme)
Usually a group of projects within a programme that will deliver a distinct outcome, capability or benefits to the sponsoring organization or its customers.
Tuning (of a Project Management Approach)
See Scaling (of a Project Management Approach).
Two-level Planning
Use of a detailed plan for each stage, and an outline plan for the remaining stages. As you approach the end of a stage, you can plan the next stage in detail, and firm up the outline plan for the remainder of the project. These are known as ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ plans. Also known as ‘rolling wave’ planning.
Variance
Difference between that which a plan intended and an actual situation. Note that variances are almost inevitable in project work, so we need to define points at which variances become unacceptable and require correction.
VFM
Value For Money.
Web Project
Any project which includes the publication of pages on the Internet or an intranet among its outputs.
Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)
A planning structure, usually a list or diagram, showing how work to deliver a project is to be broken down into work packages, tasks and sub-tasks. See also Product Breakdown Structure.
Work Distribution Model
A high-level estimating model, based on the historical distribution of work across past projects. Used most commonly in organizations that repeat projects broadly similar in characteristics and structure, and which maintain project histories recording the effort and duration of projects and their stages.
Work Package
A group of work activities identified during WBS development in a Phase or Stage Plan, supported by an information set, normally relating to a key deliverable, with a named individual accountable for its delivery.
