Managing IT Projects in Dynamic Environments: Key Strategies
It is widely known within the project management profession that failure rates increase with project size (Collyer, 2009), but the article goes to great lengths to inform readers as to the effect that dynamic environments can exert on this existing trend. The concept of scope control, while essential to managing projects of every variety, is especially pertinent when attempting to guide a project that is subject to a dynamic environment. In addition to the practice of segmentation described above, Collyer advocates a process known as controlled experimentation for project managers hoping to mitigate the risks of continually changing project parameters. According to Collyer's research, "organisations in environments with high levels of unknowns should benefit from experimentation, discovery and selection processes" (2009), and confirmation of this theory can be found whenever a major company develops multiple prototypes for prerelease testing, or when firms perform their due diligence using several independent auditors. By spreading resources equally among a number of segments, at least during the initial phases of the project schedule, competent managers can utilize controlled experimentation to quickly identify weaknesses, order improvements, and investing time and energy appropriately once feasibility has been evaluated.