Planning: a ‘big-deal’ in PRINCE2®
The Planning process’ abbreviation is PL and it has 7
sub-processes.
The activities in PL are the responsibility of the (B.5)
Project Manager, with the aid of (B.6) Team Managers and team members
and (B.8) Project Support staff under the watchful eyes of the (B.1)
Project Board or their delegated (B.7) Project Assurance
representatives. (Appendix B [and chapter14]
is where PRINCE2® describes the responsibilities of the roles involved in a
PRINCE2® project).
PL activities span choosing the tools and the estimating
techniques and the presentation formats for plans (done once for the project at
Designing a Plan (PL1) with input from the (B.1) Project Board who
should describe what they want to see for control).
Key
to planning in PRINCE2® is the technique called ‘Product Based Planning (PBP)’.
This technique is used wholly and only during Defining and Analysing Products
(PL2). In Identifying Activities and Dependencies (PL3) the
well-known activity based planning techniques such as critical path analysis are
carried out. PRINCE2® does not regard activity based planning as key. Estimating,
scheduling, risk assessment and final write-up of the plan’s content are
performed in PLs 4, 5, 6 and 7 respectively.
Sequence (soup?)
Designing a Plan (PL1) and Completing a Plan
(PL7) are definitely first and last. Defining and Analysing Products
(PL2), is probably largely done in series with Identifying Activities and
Dependencies (PL3). These two are then mostly followed by both Estimating
(PL4) and Scheduling (PL5) in parallel.
Analysing Risks (PL6) is a constant activity along
side all the PL sub-processes. It is wise if there is a final checking role for
PL6 after PL2 through PL5 have produced a risk aware plan and before PL7 adds
narrative to explain the plan’s content and context to those who will rely upon
it. Producing a risk aware plan is not practical if PL6 has not been a constant
process during PL1, 2 and 3 etc.
(Remember your aim on first reading is to just get the
lie-of-the land, not extract every last detail. For the details revisit this
section a second time.
Next
Initiation - IP & PL
