My greyhound ‘Champ’ lives by a simple motto,
“Go ahead and eat it; if it turns out that it isn’t food,
you can always barf it up in the living room.”
A lot of project teams live by the same motto when it comes to scope management. When they define their project objectives, they don’t place them under change control. As they begin to plan out the project, they see opportunities to tack on other tasks and objectives “as long as they are in the neighborhood.” The problem is that each little opportunistic change can have a profound impact on the budget and schedule, particularly if the project is already under way. More often than not, these extra requirements are indigestible and the project team eventually drives the project off schedule and budget. This, more than anything, is why most IT projects fail.
Project Server 2003 helps you address this by having the project team collaborate on scope, schedule, and requirements documents, and then place them under change control. If the requirements absolutely have to change, then there is a process to review the change and estimate its impact to the project schedule and budget. The schedule and budget are then modified in keeping with the scope change, and the project remains under control.
Keep in mind though that Project Server 2003 doesn’t manage your scope for you, it gives you the tools to use to effectively manage scope. You still have to have more discernment than Champ when it comes to decided what’s in, and what’s out of scope.