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Kicking off a project

Written by: Lisette Howlett

Article Overview: This article draws attention to an area of project leadership and project working that can often be rushed and yet, with appropriate attention, goes a long way to setting the project on a path to success.

Kicking off a project

Good project management requires team leadership, organisation capability, subject matter understanding, good project structures and protocols, communication and reporting. The normal approach is to:
• Plan
• Do
• Review
• Replan
• Do
• Review and so forth
With, of course, good communication underpinning all these activities.

Communication needs to be with the stakeholders, the project team, and the organisation in general, as well as customers, community, regulatory authorities etc. The importance of communication and the need for it to be regular, concise and targeted to the audience cannot be overestimated - and few guides on project management will fail to emphasise this point

A key, and frequently omitted or rushed stage, however, is project launch. Good project launch is an investment that will never be regretted and with a bit of planning does not need to be onerous. There are many reasons for omitting it – a propensity to action, the logistical challenge of getting it organised, an underestimate of its important – and one reason to including it: project launch improves the way your project works.

Key stages to project launch

Stage One: identify your key stakeholders, your project team, and other experts who will be critical to your project

Stage Two: arrange a project launch meeting. Ideally this will be a face to face but where this will add unacceptable cost or delay it can be run as a web and voice meeting.

Stage Three: plan the meeting agenda. This meeting should normally be given a half or full day (depending on the size and complexity of the project). The agenda can allow for varying attendance – e.g. stakeholders at beginning and end only. The topics that should be covered are:
• Sharing the structure of project and different roles
• Undertaking work breakdown and project phasing
• Definition of project plan with milestones, critical success factors
• Risks and potential mitigation
• Development of a communication plan
• Team building, skills mapping, agreeing working approaches
• Stakeholder analysis, identifying needs, plans for meeting the needs
• Action Planning and key next steps

Stage Four: meeting review, actions follow up

Stage Five: deliver your project!

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Related Forum Posts
Re: How To Stay Motivated In Your Business - Whether you think you can or think you can't, you are correct. Having the right mindset is critical to being a successful entrepreneur. Kicking the dead horse one more time:::: Write down your goals. And then READ THEM!! I find that most people don't write them down, and of those that do, hardly any read them later. When you are most motivated is usually in the beginning of your project, so write down your goals then. When feeling down, go back and read those goals, this will get you motivated and make you remember why you started your venture. .
Re: Hello to the forum - Hi Pete, You are welcome to this great forum. A client of mine is interested in pipeline construction project across Africa. When he is loooking for consultant to work on the project will you be interested? The project is taken off in the first quater of 2011
Books that should be written - [quote:1m0dcpd7]"The Idiots Guide To Sticking With One Thing At A Time and Not Doing Something New All The Time" [/quote:1m0dcpd7] I myself am a 'constructive' procrastinator... I don't know if I'm alone in this. I have about six or seven projects I'm working on at any given time. I get one project almost done... then my interest is piqued by another project and I work on that... I get burnt out and move to another...I know I do this so I have it arranged such that once I get bored or burnt out with one project, I can step right back into project 1 - or 2 or 3, and get that a little bit more done before moving on to something else. As long as you're organized and know where all your reference material/idea sheets are when you're ready to get back to work on each project, it should be fine. I also find that by stepping away from a project - I still work on it in the recesses of my mind so that when I go back to it - it's with some good ideas that I wouldn't have had if I'd continued on with it originally. Maybe I should write a book on how to Procrastinate Constructively... I've actually thought about doing that...because most people procrastinate, don't they...and very few are ever able to stop.
Re: What is Your Favorite Thing About Owning A Business? - We have a market research and competitiive intelligence firm and our needs vary from project to project. For me, owning my own business means that I get to choose exactly the people that I want for each individual project. In the 'corporate world', too often we get stuck with folks that others don't want, and they can take up SOOOOOO much of our time. Terry "Getting answers to tough marketing questions ..."
My first working day - Thank you very much for the comment!! Today was my first working day on the project. I'll add everyday how the project is going on the blog. I'm really tired. Tomorrow I'll got up at 7:00 AM to continue.


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