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Acquisition
Acquisition: Project topics: Project diagnostics: Project documentation

Project documentation

The basis project documentation is listed below.

Project Charter

The project charter should contain:

  • an overall description of the project, identifying its sponsor, owner and manager;
  • the purpose of the project;
  • the objectives of the project;
  • the success factors for the project;
  • the scope of the project, including items that are specifically within or beyond the scope of the project;
  • the deliverables;
  • the approach;
  • the initial schedule (which will be amended by subsequent project plans);
  • the resources required for the project;
  • the project team;
  • the project stakeholders;
  • any constraints; and
  • any assumptions.

Risk Management Plan

The risk management plan may be included as a section of the project charter. For large or complex projects it may form a separate document.

It should include:

  • the risks that have been identified;
  • the impacts of those risks;
  • the responses to be adopted for those risks;
  • the plan to implement those responses; and
  • any contingency plans.

Quality Management Plan

The quality management plan may be included as a section of the project charter. Alternatively, there may be a general quality management plan, applied to all projects.

The quality management plan should state:

  • how deliverables are accepted;
  • how control of tasks will be managed; and
  • how scheduled project diagnoses will be initiated.

Issues Register

The issues management process may be described in the project charter, or in an overall document covering all projects.

The issues register itself may be included in the project charter, although, due to its changeability, it is more usually set up as a separate document.

Raised and resolved issues should be reported in the project status reports.

Document Management

The management of documents may be described within the project charter or it may be established overall for all projects.

There are two kinds of document relevant to the project: those that are input to the project and those that are output from the project.

For documents that form input to the project, the document register should include the title of the document, its source, the date of receipt, its nature (such as "report" or "Word .doc"), and its disposal ("return to source", "file" or "destroy") and disposal date.

For documents produced by the project, the document tracking system should establish how documents are filed and distributed. The document register should include all:

  • documents subject to a sign off;
  • copies of deliverables;
  • correspondence;
  • meeting agendas and minutes;
  • status reports; and
  • contracts.

Significant events, such as the sign off of key documents, should be included in the project status reports.

Change Control

The process for managing changes to the project should be included in the project charter or in an overall change control policy.

The changes themselves should be documented in terms of:

  • change requests;
  • change request approvals;
  • adjustments to the project documentation, especially the project plan; and
  • change initiation.

New change requests and approved change requests should be reported in the project status reports.

Cost Management

The methods to be used for cost management should be included in the project charter or in an overall project cost management policy.

Current incurred costs and future projected costs should be reported in the project status reports.

Stakeholder Communication Plan

There may be a need for a stakeholder communication plan, which would normally be included in the project charter.

Status Reports

Status reports should be prepared by the project manager (or by a project administrator) on a regular basis. A common reporting period is weekly, although for some projects a longer period may be appropriate to management needs.

A status report should contain:

  • a statement of the project status, in terms of achievement, both to date and in the latest period;
  • a statement of the plans and activities for the next period;
  • a summary of effort and resource usage, both to date and in the last period;
  • a summary of costs, both to date and in the last period; and
  • a summary of the current unresolved issues and risks.


The opinions expressed are solely those of David Blakey.
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