For many people project management is mainly buerocratic overhead, for the majority of executives it is (still) a commodity. Actually the Project Manager’s work should obviously provide an added value to the project, and be it only that nothing important gets forgotten. For this we “educated” project managers have a bunch of tools and methods which we can scale and apply appropriately to the specific project situation.
Among the documents that to my opinion should not be missing in any project, not even in small ones, we have a resilient project order (Project Charter and Scope Description), a Change Management Process mandatory for all involved parties, and the Risk Management. All further components in the Project Management Plan may be included there in more or less formal and sophisticated shape.
How to incorporate this can be retrieved in the relevant professional literature, the grade of formalism needs to be determined right by the Project Manager according to the acceptance in the team and on executive level. It is important that the Project Order as well as the Project Management Plan is approved (countersigned) by all relevant stakeholders. Therefore it is recommendable for the PM to conduct an extensive stakeholder analysis right at the project start to not miss any important influencer or decider…
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