Project planning is an essential stage in the project lifecycle, ensuring all parties are clear on the scope of a project and expected deliverables. In this guide, we explore the vital components of project planning, examine its importance for professional services firms, and look at the benefits of engagement planning tools.
3. Essential project planning components
4. Why is project planning important?
5. What is the project lifecycle?
6. 3 key types of project planning
7. What are the 7 phases of project planning?
8. Project planning best practices
9. The benefits of using a project planning template
10. 5 tips to keep project performance on track
Project planning is an essential project management process, used to define goals, resources, budget, deliverables, timelines, and more. Strategic project planning is integral to ensuring efficient project execution and completion in the professional services sector. It should define:
There are other aspects to engagement planning, such as resource allocation, capacity planning, and budget forecasting, but in simple terms, it’s about outlining the scope and requirements of a project.
A project plan is a roadmap document that outlines key details of a project, and provides a framework for its delivery. A project plan will typically include:
There are key components that the project planning process must be centered around, regardless of the specific project. The essential components of planning a project are as follows:
The importance of thorough project planning cannot be underestimated. Every professional services project needs a clear roadmap, and that’s what the project plan provides. It defines responsibilities, ensures alignment across departments, and promotes collaboration. Project planning also plays a key role in identifying potential risks and challenges.
Engagement planning is typically the second stage of the project lifecycle, which comprises five key phases: initiation, planning, execution, monitoring and control, and closure. Every project should go through this cycle, and it can be a helpful way to break down the different steps required to ensure efficient project delivery.
The first stage of the engagement lifecycle is initiation, which is when the project’s purpose, scope, goals and objectives, and stakeholders are defined. The project manager will usually be required to compile a business case for the engagement, outlining how it aligns with overall strategy. This will be referred back to throughout the rest of the project cycle to ensure continued alignment.
Project planning is traditionally the second stage of the project lifecycle, and involves the creation of a detailed project roadmap. This will encompass:
The next stage of the engagement lifecycle is to execute the work required to deliver the project in line with the goals set during the initiation phase and the project plan. Resources will be engaged and coordinated, and deliverables produced.
The monitoring stage of the project lifecycle tends to run alongside the execution phase. It involves tracking and measuring performance, reporting on progress, and making any adjustments required to ensure continued alignment with the wider organizational strategy.
The final stage of the project lifecycle is closure or completion. This step kicks in when all work has been delivered, reporting is complete, and resources are released ready for their next engagement. During this phase, project managers will need to:
Engagement planning can take many forms, depending on the specifics of the project. Some of the different types of project planning include resource, people, and budget planning.
Resource planning is the act of identifying and allocating the resources necessary to deliver a project. Resources can include:
Resource planning helps ensure resources are allocated in the most efficient manner, ensuring optimal resource utilization. Accurate resource planning informs budgeting and supports decision making by providing a clear view into resource availability.
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People planning is the process of aligning people and skills with a specific task. Also referred to as ‘workforce planning’, this type of project planning puts talent at the center of resourcing decisions, enabling organizations to build an agile, adaptable workforce. It also provides people with the opportunity to upskill and work towards their career development goals.
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Budget planning primarily concerns finances, and involves forecasting the money required to deliver a project successfully. Budget planning typically begins with a project cost estimate, and calculates expected spend, including direct and indirect costs, in line with available budget. Detailed budget planning is vital for identifying potential areas of overspend, as well as efficiencies that can be introduced to ensure projects can be delivered on time and within budget.
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There are 7 key phases of engagement planning. The first step is to define scope, before setting goals, planning resources, and assessing risk. The 7 stages of project planning are as follows:
The process of defining project scope is also known as the ‘initiation’ phase. This is crucial for identifying a project’s purpose and objectives, and for setting boundaries for the tasks that will or will not be covered within its remit. Defining scope should be a collaborative process, engaging key stakeholders to ensure alignment and clarity from the start.
Clearly setting out project scope is important for preventing ‘scope creep’ further down the line, where extra requests may creep in, impacting the project delivery timeline.
SMART goals are Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound. At the beginning of the project planning process, make sure goals and objectives are clear so individual tasks can be planned with these in mind. All resources assigned to a project should be aware of its goals to ensure continued alignment.
A project’s goals should set out what needs to be achieved and by when, with milestones identified to track progress at key stages. SMART goals also assign a deadline to tasks, further helping to keep a project on track.
The next phase of project planning to support effective resource management is a work breakdown structure, sometimes referred to as a WBS. This involves breaking the project down into smaller, more manageable tasks, which can make exact requirements clearer. Estimate a timeline and cost for each individual sub-task to inform the overall project schedule.
All necessary resources then need to be identified, including budget. Resource managers are responsible for allocating these in line with overall goals and priorities, and regularly monitoring their usage to ensure continued efficiency and optimization to minimize waste.
Once the above elements have been considered, the project plan can be created, with dedicated software or project planning tools helping to automate many aspects of the process, saving valuable time. The plan must be shared with all relevant stakeholders for full visibility and transparency.
Evaluating potential risks is another important part of the engagement planning process. Risks can be identified by analyzing the project’s scope and assessing external factors that may impact delivery. Risks should be categorized according to their severity, and a mitigation strategy should be implemented to keep them to a minimum.
The final phase of project planning before work begins is to outline a communication plan to keep all stakeholders updated once execution is underway. Devise a communication schedule and identify preferred methods; ultimately, a communication plan should determine who needs to be informed of what, when, and how. This is essential for ensuring visibility and transparency throughout the project’s timeline.
Every professional services project plan will be unique, but there are some best practices to follow for each project to ensure efficient execution. These include:
Project planning templates can help professional services firms to standardize the process. With a template, you can save time and effort, freeing up resources to focus on other priorities. The many benefits of using a project planning template include:
Engagement planning is only one step in successful project delivery. Resource and project managers are responsible for keeping project performance on track throughout the entire project cycle. Monitor project performance by following these top tips:
1. Define metrics: ensure all work is measured against metrics clearly defined during the project initiation and planning process. Keep revisiting the original objectives and KPIs throughout engagement delivery to prevent the project veering too far from the overall goal
2. Continuous monitoring: the process of tracking project performance needs to be ongoing, continuing throughout the execution and monitoring stages of the engagement lifecycle, and following project completion to evaluate effectiveness
3. Regular check-ins: schedule regular progress update meetings or virtual check-ins to create a culture of open communication. This can help to identify any issues or potential deviations from the plan so adjustments can be made accordingly, before too much time or money is wasted
4. Facilitate collaboration: provide all teams with up-to-date insights into project progress to encourage a culture of transparency, accountability and collaboration. This level of visibility can encourage resources to take responsibility for keeping their work on track, ensuring everyone is working towards a common goal
5. Automate reporting: use automated reporting tools within your resource management software to keep track of progress and measure project performance. Receiving real-time insights into project execution or alerts when timelines are at risk allows for prompt adjustments and enhanced expectation management
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