The Project Plan

All projects, regardless of size and complexity, need a plan that describes the project progress from start to finish.

The key elements of the plan are tasks, resources, duration, timescale, phases, milestones and dependencies.

Tasks

Tasks are activities that need to be completed for the project to be successful. When defining tasks consider the following:

• Tasks should be explained simply in a few words. [Bad example – Speak to KC to arrange meeting where the team discusses the project in the Board room]. [Good example – Arrange kick-off meeting].
• Tasks should be granular. [Bad example – Produce contract]. [Good example - A series of tasks: Meeting with legal to agree contract ; Legal to draft contract ; Review contract with legal ; Final review of contract ; Publish contract]. 
• Tasks should be allocated to an individual who is responsible for delivery. [Bad example – Agree chart of accounts : Finance]. [Good example – Agree chart of accounts : Joe Bloggs].

Resources

Resources are the individuals undertaking the tasks on the project. It is important that the people assigned to the task:

• have the required time available to work on the project
• agree with the tasks and the timings

Duration and Timescale

Duration

Duration is the estimate of how long the task will take to complete. It is positioned on the plan on the date it is to be completed.

Timescale

The timescale over which the project will run. Most business projects take many weeks or months, and therefore the scale can be weeks.

It is also common to have a more detailed plan for the launch or go-live where the timescale is in days or even hour by hour.

Phases, Milestones and Dependencies

Phase: used to naturally group a number of activities for instance start-up, construction, test, etc.

Milestones: used to show a significant point in time. They are often used to manage the project to particular deliverables or at the end of a phase.

Dependencies: where there are important dependencies between tasks in the plan, these should be highlighted.

The project plan is a straightforward document that is the most visible evidence that the project is being managed and is under control.