PRINCE2 Directing a Project
The directing a project process clarifies where the main authority for the project resides. The organisation has an overall interest in the project, and the project manager has a substantial delegated authority for day-to-day management.
However, the project board is the body charged with making sure that the project runs properly and delivers what it is supposed to, and it is the project board to whom the project manager is primarily accountable.
It is important that you are clear that the project belongs to the project board.
Directing a project is one of the smaller processes in terms of the activities involved, but do not let yourself be fooled, this is an important process!
Within the structure of PRINCE2, this process is particularly significant, because it covers decisions at key points within the project by punctuating the running of the other processes.
PRINCE2 directing a project activities
Make sure you are clear on how the activities are triggered as most activities within the directing a project process happen in response to something from the project manager.
As an example, the first activity is called “authorize initiation”, and is triggered when the project manager finalise is the project brief and submitted to the project board together with a “request to initiate a project” trigger.
PRINCE2 directing a project key points
The process of directing a project is quite small with just five activities so it is quite easy for you to miss its significance. The project board is a pivotal part of PRINCE2, and in the real world it is a common point a failure in using the PRINCE2 method.
It is important that you understand how the process functions as these act as a series of checks running throughout the project. These checks aligned with the management stage boundaries.
PRINCE2 uses the term “end stage assessments” for the end stage meetings of the project board to check the project. Outside of PRINCE2 these are often called “stage gates”.
The term “gate” is a good one within this context as it is a barrier you must stop that, but one which can then open to allow you through to the next area or stage.
Directing a project “give Ad-Hoc direction” process
This is a vitally important process and you must understand that ad hoc direction can be fired off by a number of different things and includes giving general advice to the project manager, not just for making decisions.
The purpose of the PRINCE2 project board
It is easy to lose focus on roles when thinking about particular people within a project. The word role is significant, as an individual’s job on a project may cover just part of a role, a single role or several roles.
Project board roles are all about managing the project, not about any aspect of doing it. The project board roles do not do anything on the project in terms of building or testing products. The individuals who hold the project board role may, or could perform other work activities within a project but they do not do so within their role as project board members.
The directing a project focus on decision-making
The overriding purpose of the directing a project process is about decision-making. If you encounter a question within the exam where the project board is involved with the project manager, then normally the project manager will be recommending something, but the board will be making a decision on it.
This is similar to the normal day to day management within an organization. A staff member may recommend something to the boss, but really can they insist on it as it is the boss who makes a decision which may or may not align with the staff member’s original recommendation.
This is similar in that the project manager may need to refer something to the project board who does so in the form of a recommendation on the course of action. The board, acting as “the boss” then makes a decision.
The board may agree with the project manager, or may take a different view and instruct the project manager to take a different course of action.
Directing a project activities and decisions
Authorize initiation
The decision is made by checking the project brief and deciding whether it looks promising enough to justify starting the project and planning it in more detail within the initiation stage
Authorize the project
The decision is made by looking at the PID and deciding whether to commit the delivery stages or stop the project at this point. If the PID is OK, then looking at the stage plan for the first delivery stage and if that is also a okay, giving the project manager permission to start that stage.
Authorize a stage or exception plan
The decision is made by checking the plan and authorizing the project manager to start the next stage. This is done at the end of the current plan to stage four authorizing a stage. Or this maybe done where a stage boundary has been forced by an exception situation that requires the stage to be replanned.
Give ad hoc direction
Decisions are made by giving advice and from receiving reports. This activity is partly about making decisions on things that are beyond the project managers delegated authority such as changes that are beyond the limit of the project managers change budget.
It is partly about receiving highlight reports and that part of the activity does not require any decision-making. It is also about giving guidance to the project manager when asked, and passing on inbound information from programme or corporate management.
Authorize project closure
The decision is made by checking that everything is complete and making the decision to close the project down.
So as you can see, of the five activities above, for a solely decision-making, and the fifth – give ad hoc direction – includes a significant elements of decision making.
Triggering of the directing a project process
Directing a project is largely a responses process, as the activities are mostly triggered by the project manager, but could be triggered by programme or corporate management. Sometimes the trigger may come from within the board, and so within the process of directing a project.
A summary of the activity triggers are:
Authorize initiation. The project manager submits the project brief
Authorize the project. The project manager submits the PID and the stage plan for the first delivery stage
Authorize a stage or exception plan. The project manager submits an end stage report for the work just completed together with the stage plan for the next stage or an exception plan for the rest of the current stage.
Give ad hoc direction. The project manager escalate an issue, or answer advice, or submits a highlight report, or programme or corporate management information arrives, or the project board itself triggers the process to give instructions to the project manager on some aspect of the project.
Authorize project closure. The project manager submits the end project report with a closure recommendation and related documentation.
This assessment is an important control within PRINCE2, and in particular when using the “authorize a stage or exception plan” actiivity within the “managing a stage boundary” process.
You need to be clear on what the assessments are and what an exception assessment is within the context of the activity “authorize a stage or exception plan”.
The two triggers for this activity reflect the two plans mentioned within the activity name. At the planned end of a stage, the project manager will produce a stage plan for the following stage. Together with an end stage report, this is given to the project board for the members to check the plan and approve it or to authorize work to start on the following stage. This is the first type of trigger.
The second trigger can happen during the stage and occurs if something goes significantly wrong, to the point that in order to recover from the problem, the rest of the present stage must now be run differently.
Clearly, if the stage is now going to be run differently, existing stage plan will not be of any use, so the project board tells the project manager to force a new stage boundary that was not originally planned.
In this case, the project manager produces a replacement plan called the exception plan, which like any plan at project or stage level, must be approved by the project board.
Because an end stage was forced, there must be an assessment, but because it is not at the planned end stage, the meeting is called an exception assessment rather than an end stage assessment.
The two assessments, one for he planned end stage, and one for a forced end stage because of the need for an exception plan, now clarify the title of the activity “approve a stage or exception plan”
Integrating PRINCE2 exception management
One of the fundamental PRINCE2 principles within the process of directing a project is that of “manage by exception”. In terms of the project board this means letting the project manager get on with things and standing back, unless, something goes significantly off track, and if it does, the project manager must go back to the board which will in step in to decide what to do next.
This “standing back” means that within a PRINCE2 project, the project board does not have any regular progress meetings. Be clear. Within PRINCE2, the project board does not hold traditional monthly progress meetings as they do not need to exist.
But much more than that, regular progress meetings are a violation of the PRINCE2 method. The project board will not meet until the end of the stage unless something goes significantly off track.
The term “significantly off track” means greater than the amount of leeway that the project board members have specified in terms of Tolerance.
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