Recognise when projects have failed

Global accountancy firm KPMG has said that, although IT project governance has generally improved over the past year, companies are having difficulty recognising when a project has actually failed, ZDNet Australia reports.

Egidio Zarrella, global partner in charge of information risk management at KPMG and co-author of the Global IT Management Survey 2005, told ZDNet Australia that even if a project comes in on time and on budget, if people don`t use the system - or find it is not what they needed - then companies need to recognise they have failed.

According to the report, 49% of respondents said they had experienced at least one project failure, which is a "modest" improvement from 57% last year. Zarrella says, however, that this improvement could be related to the actual definition of success being altered.

"If all you think is, `is it on time and on budget,` then you are in trouble. Organisations have come in on time and on budget, but nobody uses the new system because the scope (of the project) has been cut. You wouldn`t believe how many times that has happened," he adds.

He believes that one way companies could improve their governance of IT projects is by creating an enterprise project management office (EPMO) that directly reports to the board. The EPMO should be experienced and mature enough to recognise when certain projects are "going off the rails" and learn from any mistakes that are made.

Project management data - which is obtained from time-tracking information - is often an area that could be improved in many companies, writes Curt Finch, CEO, Journyx in an article on Accounting Software 411.

Recent studies have shown that cost reductions of 6,5% are common from improvements in tracking time from the project management area alone. This compares with improvements of about 5% for billing automation or 1% for payroll automation, the article states.

Time tracking data (payroll, billing, project management and strategy) can be used to improve project management in the areas of: costing, tracking, management and estimation improvement.

The article notes that most project time-tracking systems support some way of indicating what percentage of each project is complete. Combined with cost data, this can create an early warning system for projects that are going out of control.

The purpose of project management software is to provide an environment in which a group of people can work together on joint projects, Webpronews.com reports.

Most projects, according to the article, involve the development and implementation of new ideas, and these ideas have to be presented, evaluated and revised. The role of project management software is to help this collaborative effort along.

Collaboration happens at various levels and it is up to the project management software to facilitate all these levels.

Traditionally, coordination of this sort was done by the project manager. But project management software puts this job into the hands of individual team members. If it is working correctly, it gives each member of the team an accurate picture of how the project stands at any given moment.

Once a team member becomes familiar with the project management system, there is no reason not to be fully aware of developments, timelines and delivery dates, to submit assignments for approval in a timely manner and to make revisions as they are necessary.