It is vital that we are constantly challenging ourselves to learn from experience when things go right, and perhaps even more importantly, when things go wrong.
Link to the report with the five themes and twenty four lessons is here.
Theme 1 – Accountability must be unambiguous:
- Ensure clarity of role and extent of autonomy
- Hold the Delivery organisation’s Board accountable for controlled Delivery
- Evolve Governance and personnel across the lifecycle stages
- Maintain a stable scope and operating environment
- Joint sponsorship requires careful design and operation
- Join up across Departments
Theme 2 – Behaviour matters more than process:
- Act decisively when in exception
- Invest in building relationships between leaders
- Use control gates to step back and consider status objectively
- Challenge the objectivity of delivery confidence assessments
- Recognise both the value and limitations of independent assurance
- Invest in preparing contingency plans for the most significant risks
- Identify, capture, share and apply lessons
Theme 3 – Control schedule and benefits as well as cost:
- Use an evidenced range rather than a single target date
- Set a realistic cost envelope
- Protect benefits
- Test value for money through benchmarking
- Increase focus on managing schedule
Theme 4 – Deal with systems integration risk:
- Ensure clear organisational accountability for systems integration
- Reduce systems integration risk by controlling complexity
- Protect the test phase diligently
Theme 5 – Enter service cautiously:
- Ensure clear accountability for the decision on whether to commission
- Manage the whole portfolio to protect other projects and service users
- Prepare to recover from disruption when new services are introduced
