Embedded Files
Tools in your Toolbelt
Tools in your Toolbelt
Every project is unique. Not every tool will be needed, or needed in the same way. Get to know what will be most useful to you and your team.
Click any of the project artifacts at right to read more about it, see an example, and learn how to set it up for your project
Roles
Roles
Project Manager
Responsible for keeping the project on time, on budget, and within the scope of what was initiated by the Project Sponsor.
Project Sponsor
The governing team member or team lead who has initiated the need for this project. Held accountable for the success of the project. Responsible for providing resources and guidance to the core team.
Project Team
Responsible for execution of the project plan.
Project Stakeholders
Responsible for providing guidance on the project timeline, milestones, and performance measures. They may also be assigned to complete tasks by the Project Team, as needed.
Initiation
Initiation
Charter
Charter
This document formalizes the project. It should clearly, concisely, and correctly communicate expectations for what will be accomplished, why it's worthwhile, how success will be measured, and who is involved. It should also establish clear scope boundaries, progress checkpoints called milestones, and known risks.
How to use
Make a copy of the project charter template, and use the greyed text to guide completion of each section. Either the Project Manager or Project Sponsor will prepare the charter, and both should agree to its content before signing, thereby formally starting the project. It is best practice to involve other key stakeholders in the writing of the charter when they are expected to complete deliverables included in the charter.
SMART Goals Collection
SMART Goals Collection
Use to track your progress toward SMART goals set forth in the Project Charter. A SMART goal explicitly states what will be improved (Specific), the desired performance level of the intervention(s) (Measurable), is a feasible action to implement (Attainable), considers the impact to the audience(s) of the intervention(s) (Relevant), and is time bound (Timely).
Example - Between April 1, 2022 and June 30, 2022, the Leadership Team will test assigning one Enterprise Project Manager to each Q2 priority project to reduce the average number of days that projects are completed late from X to X.
How to use
Copy each of your SMART goals from the signed project charter to this sheet so that each has its own row. Use this table to ensure the team understands and is prepared to track each of the goals. This is a great tool for brainstorming with the team, and getting alignment.
Planning
Planning
Schedule
Schedule
The schedule is, at its core, a list of tasks with owners and due dates. We use a more robust schedule template that allows you to map dependencies--and therefore see how delivery dates are impacted by delays--and show the project milestones on a dashboard visible to the organization.
How to use
Start by adding your largest buckets of work under the Execution section. Then, break each down into smaller chunks of work that can be assigned to a single individual, and include start and end dates. The level of detail to which you break down work is up to you and your project team! Best practice is to only have ONE owner on each task, so there's a single point of contact and accountability.
Budget
Budget
Even if a project does not require the procurement of additional resources, there is a cost associated with doing the work. Meetings and individual tasks contribute to cost because they detract from day-to-day operational work. Tracking expected and actual time spent on a project can help the EPMO and functional teams to learn to better estimate work, as well.
How to use
Include estimated cost related to the purchase of equipment, additional licenses, or the expansion of a contract with an existing vendor (this may be an SOW).
Under execution, call out major meetings like requirements gathering or training. If your project involves creating a product, don't forget to include time for design, quality assurance testing and user acceptance testing (UAT).
Throughout the project, keep track of actual cost with receipts and time spent on the listed activities or deliverables.
Project Launch Dashboard
Project Launch Dashboard
Each project's dashboard should provide users accurate, timely, and concise information about its status.
How to use
Some changes are needed to tailor your project dashboard. See the steps below:
Add the project's name
Link the project charter and other relevant documentation or folders under "Related Files"
Update the Project Health indicator throughout the duration of the project
Best practice is to include a link to the dashboard in your weekly project status report, which is emailed to all project stakeholders.
RACI Matrix
RACI Matrix
Especially for projects with cross-functional stakeholders, this tool helps organize project participants by their level of involvement. R is for Responsible, and is the one assigned owner of a piece or work. A is for Accountable, and indicates the individual who is a decision maker and must ensure the piece of work gets done. C is for Consulted, and may include one or more subject matter experts, or people who contribute to the work in some way. I is for Informed, and includes one or more individuals who don't fall into the other categories and must be kept in-the-know.
How to use
Break the project work into workstreams (tactical teams who will collaborate to execute the work) or deliverables listed on each line, and work with the Project Sponsor and Project Team members to identify individuals most appropriate for each category.
Best practices:
Identify one individual for each of Responsible and Accountable to limit confusion around ownership.
Limit the number of people listed in Consulted to the minimum necessary to come to a decision AND ensure a holistic, cross-functional solution is implemented.
Monitoring & Controlling
Monitoring & Controlling
RAID Log
RAID Log
After the project schedule, this may be the most useful tool for your Project Team on a weekly basis. It empowers your team to identify risks early and not lose track of barriers that may be holding up progress against tasks. R is for Risk, A is for Action, I is for Issue and D is for Decision.
How to use
Use this sheet to capture identified Risks, outstanding Actions not otherwise documented on the schedule, unresolved Issues, and outstanding Decisions. Best practice is to review these on a weekly basis to assign an owner who can work on resolving theirs, check in on open RAIDs, and close any that have been resolved in the last week.
An item of any RAID type can also be identified as a parking lot item. For example, if your project is meant to deliver an SOP for a particular process, it may be identified somewhere along the way that the Sponsor wants to write an SOP for a subsequent process handled by another team. You may log this as a Decision point, resolve not to expand scope, and mark it as "Parking Lot".
Test Plan
Test Plan
One of the most important steps in the execution of a project is to test the deliverables. Thorough tests ensure the solution works as expected, and mitigates the need for rework.
How to use
Start by defining requirements, then the criteria that would be used to determine whether that requirement has been met. Using this website as an example, one functional requirement is as follows: users of this website must be able to access the Test Plan template from the Templates page. My acceptance criteria is that the button "Test Plan" on the Templates page should open a new tab in my browser to view the Test Plan template in Smartsheet.
Next, write detailed steps to complete your test, from the user's perspective. Finally, alongside a verifier, the tester will complete the test steps, indicate whether or not it was successful, and move on to the next test.
Best practices related to testing:
Set up test data and/or a test environment where this can be done without impacting active operations
Enlist a project stakeholder who is a real user of the process to complete the test
Page updated
Google Sites
Report abuse