PROJECT WORK

• What management processes are most effective based on the organizational culture, complexity, and other project factors?
• How will knowledge be managed in the project to foster a collaborative working environment?
• What information should be collected throughout and at the end of the project? How will the information be collected and managed? What technology is available to develop, record, transmit, retrieve, track, and store information and artifacts?
• Will historical information and lessons learned be made available to future projects?
• Does the organization have a formal knowledge management repository that a project team is required to use, and is it readily accessible?

DELIVERY

• Does the organization have formal or informal requirements management systems?
• Does the organization have existing formal or informal validation and control-related policies, procedures, and guidelines?
• What quality policies and procedures exist in the organization? What quality tools, techniques, and templates are used in the organization?
• Are there any specific quality standards in the industry that need to be applied? Are there any specific governmental, legal, or regulatory constraints that need to be taken into consideration?
• Are there areas of the project with unstable requirements? If so, what is the best approach for addressing the unstable requirements?
• How does sustainability factor into the elements of project management or product development?

UNCERTAINTY

• What is the risk appetite and risk tolerance for this endeavor?
• How are threats and opportunities best identified and addressed within the selected development approach?
• How will the presence of project complexity, technological uncertainty, product novelty, cadence, or progress tracking impact the project?
• Does the project’s size in terms of budget, duration, scope, or project team size require a more detailed approach to risk management? Or is the project small enough to justify a simplified risk management process?
• Is a robust risk management approach demanded by high levels of innovation, new technology, commercial arrangements, interfaces, or other external dependencies? Or is the project simple enough that a reduced risk management process will suffice?
• How strategically important is the project? Is the level of risk increased for this project because it aims to produce breakthrough opportunities, addresses significant blocks to organizational performance, or involves major product innovation?

MEASUREMENT

• How is value measured?
• Are there measures for financial value and nonfinancial value?
• How will the project enable data capture and reporting related to benefits realization, both during the project and after the project is complete?
• What are the project status reporting requirements?

DIAGNOSTICS

Periodic reviews such as retrospectives or lessons learned are effective ways to determine if approaches are working well and if improvements can be made by tailoring. Project teams that do not use retrospectives can look to issues, threats, quality assurance statistics, and stakeholder feedback for signs that further tailoring or adaptation might be required or useful.

This section is intended as general guidance and does not address every possible situation that could surface within a project. Table 3-1 lists some common situations and suggested tailoring solutions for commonly encountered situations.

Table 3-1. Common Situations and Tailoring Suggestions