Situation
Terra Firma was engaged to conduct project management health checks of two in-flight projects. Both projects had experienced delays, causing concern about whether the expected business outcomes would be delivered in a timely manner.
Challenge
The environment was complex, with stakeholders having differing views on the projects’ viability and the need for a health check.
To further complicate matters, the health checks were conducted remotely due to the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns, making access to information, artefacts and stakeholders problematic.
Solution
Terra Firma was engaged to:
- Review the projects, including the core areas of business alignment, people and team, environment, tools, planning and reporting controls.
- Review the status of project artefacts against the department’s delivery methodology requirements.
Our Approach
Terra Firma:
- Interviewed key project stakeholders and vendors to gain insight into the project’s health and conducted a detailed assessment of project practice using Terra Firma’s pre-defined set of best-practice project delivery requirements.
- Conducted a “deep dive” review of a technically complex project involving the department’s first implementation of cloud-based infrastructure and a new integration platform.
- Reviewed the status of project artefacts against the department’s delivery methodology requirements.
- Interviewed key project stakeholders and vendors to gain insight into the project’s health.
- Conducted a detailed assessment of project practice using Terra Firma’s pre-defined set of best-practice project delivery requirements
Outcomes
Terra Firma successfully produced two reports summarising the findings of our thorough interviews and assessments, identifying potential improvements to support our client’s delivery. These detailed reports included recommendations that outlined project strengths, gaps, and opportunities for improvement.
The reports were well received by the Project Control Board, who commended them for being balanced, pragmatic and sensitive to the views of affected stakeholders. As a result of our consultants’ achievements, Terra Firma was engaged to conduct multi-year ongoing project assurance reviews.
