/
What is a "Project"?

What is a "Project"?

Owned by Eric Puchalski
Jun 14, 2013

The point at which a body of work becomes a "project" and would begin to benefit from the application of a defined methodology is not always clearly defined. Some groups define a project simply as any task that is expected to consume more than a certain number of staff hours to complete. Others base the decision on budget while others rely on a simple decision by department managers. Irrespective of how the decision is made, all projects undertaken by OIT must:

  • Be defined as temporary with a clear beginning and end.
  • Not conflict with OIT strategy.
  • Address one or more strategic goals of the department for which the project is being implemented, UCI, or the UC system.
  • Be assigned to a single project manager to oversee project activities and ensure completion.
  • Meet defined goals and objectives within budget and time constraints.

When making the decision to initiate a project within OIT, the following work is not considered a project:

  • Tasks that require less than 80 staff hours to complete.
  • Customer support or troubleshooting production problems.
  • Bug fixes.
  • The maintenance phase of projects (after production roll out).
  • Non-project related administrative time.

However, this work may be converted to a project if OIT management determines that formal governance of the activities needs to be more closely managed or documented.

Other factors to consider when determining when a task becomes a project:

  • Work that involves high risk (e.g., "This task only requires about 20 hours of programming but if it fails then Admissions won’t be able to process enrollment applications").
  • Work that requires access to sensitive data (e.g., student data, PII, HIPPA, etc.). The controls built in to the SDLC will be required for the audit trail.
  • Work involving complicated interaction with units outside OIT (e.g., a system that needs to transfer data back and forth to the Police Department but only when a student is involved and the student financial records need to be updated).
  • High cost projects. This could include third-party systems that do not require extensive programming but the software acquisition and annual licensing costs are high.
  • High visibility tasks (the so-called "VIP projects"). These are tasks that are highly visible within the organization and require careful attention to process and governance.