Challenge
Every client wants high quality results from the projects that he finances. The challenge often is to judge whether deliverables are matching the quality expectations – and to do so before a negative impact of missing quality manifests itself in time or budget overruns or dissatisfaction of users.
But sometimes it is too late already: The project is already in troubles and the client need to know what went wrong and what needs to be done to get it back on track.
In both scenarios the project team or, in the case of packaged software implementation, the vendor is certainly slightly biased towards potential shortcomings or failures during the project. The client itself often lacks the expertise and experience to judge on quality of deliverables or perform a comprehensive project review.
Solution
The obvious solution is to employ an external individual or team (depending on size) to review distinct deliverables or the entire project in order to receive an expert and unbiased view of the situation and recommendations on how to proceed.
Our Approach
Of course, we have studied all the applicable standards and methods, such as ISACA’s IT Governance Institute’s Cobit 5 framework, the UK Cabinet Office’s IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL), the Prince2 methodology and others.
However, every project is different. Therefore next to standards and methods we apply a great deal of project experience to judge deliverables and project progress against
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 | Industry best practices |
| Objectives of the deliverable, i.e. can the recipient effectively perform his work (e.g. technical design) based on this deliverable (in this example: functional design) |
| Available input to that deliverable, i.e. was there a chance from the beginning for better quality |
| Alternatives that might have been considered or were available |
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Based on the finding we will then establish recommendations on how to proceed from the current status, taking into account investments already made, resources and timelines available and early realisation of benefits.
Where appropriate, we will structure our recommendations into quick wins, medium-term measures and longer-term visions.
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