The post-implementation audit is an evaluation of the project's goals and activity achievement as measured against the project plan, budget, time deadlines, quality of deliverables, specifications, and client satisfaction. The log of the project activities serves as baseline data for this audit. The following six important questions should be answered:
The project was justified based on a goal to be achieved. That goal either was or wasn't achieved, and the reasons for this must be provided in the audit. This can be addressed from two different perspectives. The provider may have suggested a solution for which certain results were promised. Did that happen? Conversely, the requestor may have promised that if the provider would only provide, say, a new or improved system, then certain results would occur. Did that happen?
Recall from the scope triangle discussed in Chapter 1 that the constraints on a project are time, cost, and the client's specification, as well as resource availability and quality. Here you are concerned with whether the specification was met within the budgeted time and cost constraints.
It is possible that the answers to the first two questions are yes, but the answer to this question is no. How can that happen? Simple: the Conditions of Satisfaction (COS) changed, but no one was aware that they had. The project manager did not check with the client to see whether the needs had changed, or the client did not inform the project manager that such changes had occurred.
I remind you again that it is absolutely essential that the COS be reviewed at every major event in the life of the project, including changes in team membership, especially a new project manager, and changes in the sponsor. Reorganization of the company, acquisitions, and mergers are other reasons to recheck the COS.
The success criteria were the basis on which the business case for the project was built and were the primary reason why the project was approved. Did you realize that promised value? When the success criteria measure improvement in profit, market share, or other bottom-line parameters, you may not be able to answer this question until some time after the project is closed.
Companies that have or are developing a project management methodology will want to use completed projects to assess how well the methodology is working. Different parts of the methodology may work well for certain types of projects or in certain situations, and these should be noted in the audit. These lessons will be valuable in tweaking the methodology or simply noting how to apply the methodology when a given situation arises. This part of the audit might also consider how well the team used the methodology, which is related to, yet different from, how well the methodology worked.
The answers to these questions are helpful hints and suggestions for future project managers and teams. The experiences of past project teams are real “diamonds in the rough” — you will want to pass them on to future teams.
The post-implementation audit is seldom done, which is unfortunate because it has great value for all stakeholders. Some of the reasons for skipping the audit include the following:
Managers don't want to know — They reason that the project is done and what difference does it make whether things happened the way you said they would? It is time to move on.
Managers don't want to pay the cost — The pressures on the budget (both time and money) are such that managers would rather spend resources on the next project than on those already completed.
It's not a high priority — Other projects are waiting to have work done on them, and completed projects don't rate very high on the priority list.
There's too much other billable work to do — Post-implementation audits are not billable work, and people have billable work on other projects to do.
I can't stress enough the importance of the post-implementation audit, which contains so much valuable information that can be extracted and used in other projects. Organizations have such a difficult time deploying and improving their project management process and practice that it would be a shame to pass up the greatest source of information to help that effort. I won't mislead you, though – actually doing the post-implementation audit is difficult because of all the other tasks waiting for your attention, not the least of which is probably a project that is already behind schedule.
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