Benefits Management
Yeah, but what does the software do?
Two things happened recently on the same day in the same organization.
The first was I received a copy of a post implementation review report that basically said “We don’t know if we got the benefits from this project as the KPIs and other benefit measures were largely vague, unmeasurable or irrelevant.” Overall, the conclusion was [...]
Critical Insights (1)
Our consulting company, Capability Management International, is 15 years old this year. So we start the year with 15 of our most critical insights.
“We do projects to realize the associated benefits”
Benefits realization is not peripheral or consequential to projects but central. Benefits realization should not, therefore, be ‘hoped for’ or ‘someone else’s responsibility’ but the [...]
Is ‘avoided loss’ a benefit?
“If we don’t do this project, we’ll lose market share/customers/opportunities and that’ll be worth $XXm in lost revenue/profit!”
I’ve seen a number of projects justified with ‘avoidance of loss’ cited as the major (sometimes only) benefit.
The argument can be quite genuine. If the Blackberry did not respond to the iPhone, it would potentially lose significant market [...]
Am I being unreasonable?
When recently reviewing a project that had a projected benefits value of $32m we found that the true available value was over $100m.
So, if the project delivered the $32m is this true success? Or, is it a failure for failing to realize the other $70+m?
One of our surprising findings when we conducted our worldwide research [...]
The essential THIRD dimension
Initially the focus was on successfully completing projects. “Successful” often meant ‘finish’ hopefully within sight of the original budget and timeframe. This was called “Doing projects right”.
Then the focus came onto selecting the right projects. “Right” often meant ‘financially positive’ with some cognisance of the risks involved. This was called “Doing the right projects”.
This is [...]