Blog Post Image

Explain What Is Meant By The Term Project Governance

Paul Naybour Paul Naybour

Published: 17th January 2016

Explain what is meant by the
term Project Governance (10 Marks):-
Project Governance is the framework by which an organisation’s
projects are run.  It contains the
procedures, processes, responsibilities, policies and regulation that define the
establishment, management and control of projects, so that projects operate in
a pre-determined and controlled manner ensuring the Board of the organisation
have effective oversight.
Explain four effects there might be on an organisation’s
projects if governance is not implemented properly. (40 Marks):
1. If Governance is not implemented adequately Portfolio Sponsorship
may not be carried out effectively, resulting in lack of understanding of
whether a project forms part of the overall strategy, potentially wasting
valuable time, cost and resource on projects that should not be part of the
Portfolio, and the resources could be utilised on other projects that do
conform to the overall strategy.
2. If Project Direction of the organisation is not in place,
the deliverables on the project may not be adequate to meet the benefits.  For example if the business case does not state
the benefits clearly, then the products produced may not be appropriate, thus
the Users may not gain the suitable benefits, for example if an IT upgrade is implemented
to replace obsolescence , but the User interface of the system is not fit for purpose
then there is no benefit to the User
3. If the roles and responsibilities and performance
criteria for reporting for project managers and staff are not defined in the organisation’s
governance documentation, Disclosure and Reporting will not take place correctly,
and the correct information regarding issues and risks may not be communicated
in order for the organisation’s steering group to make correct decisions
regarding the projects, this may have adverse effects on the organisation such
as contributing to financial loss, to deal with surprise situations across many
projects.
4. If the Project Management Capability does not include
relevant stakeholders, this could result in lack of understanding and buy-in to
the project.  For example there may be
deliverables that will not be accepted by the Users, because the relevant
stakeholders were not included early on in the project lifecycle, for example
when developing new hardware the relevant stakeholders should be involved in
reviewing and agreeing the User and System requirements, before the preliminary
design starts