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First, lay the foundation correctly and accurately
Its easy to take something for granted when you do it over and over again to the point where you just seem to be going through the motions. We've all seen this happen too often with respect to Project Charters. Since they are the earliest documents developed in a project life cycle, and since they are the official authorization for the project to begin, they can become something of a bottleneck. PMs need to finalize them and have them signed off by Sponsors. Sponsors need to make certain that correct information is supplied in sufficient detail to define the project. After all, this is the contract for the project!
What happens when this starts to take too long to develop and the projects don't begin as quickly as management would like?
You end up with Project Charters that are ineffective and useless documents because both the PM and the Sponsors accepted poorly defined Charters in order to get over the hump and start work on the project. In a rush to get started they likely have overlooked or given little thought to important questions about dependencies, constraints and assumptions.
Naturally, we recommend our Method123 Charter Template (download here), but simply having a great template isn't going to be sufficient if you don't have quality information going in.
To avoid the 'Charter-block' we recommend 3 strategies:
- Reduce the scope of the project by breaking it into phases. If the first phase is exploratory and thus causing difficluty is answering all the 'unknowns' then you probably need to complete this phase before scoping out the next phase.
- Introduce stage-gates for the project and require charter revisions/revists at the stage-gates so there is agreement about the charter.
- Review the Sponsor's role and the stakeholders. Sometimes the wrong person is tasked with being the sponsor and upon further consideration it becomes clear that someone else in the organization is better suited for the role.
By using a project charter template you will have a jump start on completing the task you have undertaken. The template is designed to assist you in the creation of this document so the final product will be formatted as expected.
The use of the project charter template will also make it possible for the project manager to complete this task with greater accuracy but in less time than if it was done by scratch. This is made possible by the template itself. By having the formatting and order already in place inside the template, the project manager only has to concentrate on the content of the project. This streamlines the entire process of completing the task at hand.
For most the inclusion of a project charter template is just the first of many templates that are available for the proper documentation of a project. With this processes being in a digital format, this template along with the others can be reused multiple times. This will bring consistency to your project charters and all the other documents that are created in this manner.
With consistency in the project charter template will come a better understanding by the users of what is necessary to prepare this type of document. In future uses, the project manager will know in advance what they need to assemble so they can just sit down and create and document their project charter. This time-saving mechanism will help the project manager not only complete this task in less time but with greater detail and accuracy so fewer if any changes will need to be made to it in the future.
Included in the use of the project charter template is that they contain a section that is set up for the creation of graphs and charts. This is generally a time-consuming part of every document that is now eliminated because the basic structure is already present. All a project manager has to do is fill in the data points.
By incorporating a project charter template into the required tasks of a project, you can save time, frustration and money in completing it. This allows you to move on to other required tasks in the project quicker so the project has an increased chance of becoming a success.
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