An organization that features a centralized project management office and requires all project managers to:

▪ Launch the project with the customer ▪ Provide high-level requirements documentation to the customer ▪ Outline solutions and estimates ▪ Formal project presentation to the technical committee

Before going any further, there are two things to know:

▪ In this company, project managers almost all projects are internal ▪ Technical committees are made up of internal managers

Technical committee and PM presentation the only purpose is to ensure that the project should be (because everything is internal, actually represents funds from one department to another department, and not the actual income, thus saving the cost), and to ensure that in the near future to phase out the technology, or is not supported, will not be used in long-term solutions.

So, in a sense, the technical committee is basically the “yes/no” decision point in the early stages of the project. Although this is early in the project, it’s a good time to ask:

▪ Is the problem worth solving? ▪ Is there a potential solution? ▪ Are we solving this problem the right way? ▪ Does this fit with the overall goals and mission of our company?

How do you decide whether to execute a project

Rationality and feasibility

In the above four questions, hidden in the rationality and feasibility of the issue of the discussion. Whether you serve an internal or external customer base, address these two issues first. Otherwise, you’re wasting time and money on problems that you shouldn’t or can’t solve.

Rationality, especially financial rationality, is difficult to assess in the requirements phase because not much is known about the project. Nonetheless, it is wise to try to assess whether you have a reason to continue with the project. You can do this by performing a simple cost-benefit analysis.

The benefit component is relatively easy to measure: it is the value of meeting demand. In many cases, it is simply a matter of calculating how much the problem of the day will cost. Estimating the cost of the solution is more difficult because you are not sure what to do or how to do it.

One approach you might want to consider is the reverse financial calculation. This way, you can determine the maximum amount you can spend on a solution. If any solution you come up with can’t be implemented for less than that amount of money, the project will end up being unsound — at least from a purely financial point of view.

The second question, feasibility, boils down to a basic question: Do you believe there is a solution? In other words, is the problem solvable? This step is called verification of feasibility. There can be a lot of subjectivity in this step and you should rely heavily on the judgment of the subject matter expert (SME).

Find the best solution

In reality, at this point, what you most realistically want to be sure is that the possibility of a solution is thought to exist. What you should do at this point, for good reason, is to avoid spending additional resources and money on a problem that has no reasonable solution.

Next, we’ll discuss how to determine the best solution for the project and the need to proceed. We’ll discuss how you can begin to review alternative solutions to project problems and determine the best solution to move forward.

Once you fully understand the need and determine that it is reasonable and feasible to meet the need, you are ready to determine the best way to meet the need. Although the word I use is “you,” it does take a lot of people to do this step right. If you are fortunate enough to be involved in this phase of the project, actively build a team that will work with you from now on.

Identify Alternatives

The process of determining the best way to meet project requirements begins with the generation of a set of potential solutions.

This process can be greatly enhanced by:

▪ Teamwork ▪ Appropriate inclusion of subject matter experts and stakeholders ▪ Use brainstorming techniques ▪ Limit further development to reasonable alternatives ▪ Choose the best option

Obviously, you can’t identify every idea through a process like brainstorming. After soliciting all reasonable alternative solutions, the project team needs to narrow the list down to those worthy of further development, investigation, and definition. You can reduce the list by comparing each alternative to a predetermined criterion. This is where the requirements document begins to add significant value.

The process of selecting the best solution begins by assessing how each alternative solution meets the most critical aspects of the project’s requirements, such as budget constraints or strategic adjustments. You may also want to use other requires-based considerations, such as the likelihood of success of the technology or the expected impact on the existing product.

This initial screening allows you to narrow down the number of possible alternatives to a manageable number — I’d recommend two to five. At this point, the selection process becomes more rigorous. Each potential alternative should be evaluated against two basic criteria: financial and non-financial.

Now, let’s use financial criteria, such as net present value and cost-benefit analysis, to try to find the best solution and learn more about using non-financial criteria.

Use financial criteria for project selection

Companies that use project selection and justification methods often rely on financial calculations as a comparison tool and as a basic barrier to management approval. Basic financial evaluation models, such as financial analysis, business case, project finance, or cost/benefit analysis, typically include a combination of these four basic indicators: net present value, internal rate of return, payback period, and cash gap.

Net Present Value (NPV) — Calculating the NPV of a project answers the question: How much money will the project make (or save)? It calculates the present value of all expected future cash flows of a project in dollars. This is similar to the concept of profit.

Internal Rate of Return (IRR) — Calculating the internal rate of return answers the question: How fast will the money be returned? This is a calculated percentage of the wealth that will be returned in the item. That’s roughly the effective rate of return on a savings account.

Payback Period — Calculating this metric (also known as turnaround time or break-even) answers the question: When will the initial investment (the amount spent on the project) be recoup through earnings? It is usually expressed in months or years.

Cash Gap — Calculating the cash gap (also known as maximum exposure) answers the question: What is the most we can put in at any given point in time? It’s expressed in dollars.

Use the help of project management software

Our project is the sum of all the decisions we’ve made — budget decisions, schedule decisions, scope decisions, requirements, team member choices. Therefore, during project planning and execution, it is important to have powerful tools that present a single version of the truth to the team.

8Manage PM project management software is such a solution. In this system, planning and execution are inseparable and updated synchronously in real time. A project has one and only one current plan, all responsibilities and implementation status are clear, and team members can share the latest progress of the project in real time.

8Manage provides an effective project application, evaluation and strategy management mechanism to ensure that each R & D project application is fully and rigorously evaluated through three aspects: ▪ Based on genuine market needs

In addition, 8Manage provides a real-time measurement mechanism to enable real-time tracking of all intermediate results against the target. The early selection of the project fully reflects the wisdom of a research and development project, and also forms the framework of project execution and management.

In terms of resource assessment, 8Manage PM makes all resource requirements and dependencies visible, helping project teams manage them in an organized way.

For risk monitoring, 8Manage can help you identify the probability of risk, the priority of risk management, and how to handle it. Real-time summary of all related issues and risks and their solutions, so as to manage all issues and risks in a unified and orderly way.

The 8Manage system provides full visibility into all of the work throughout the project and has the ability to generate periodic reports in an easily accessible manner that is very easy for every team member to use.