Different themes in PRINCE2

These are the PRINCE2 themes:

• Business case

• Organization

• Quality

• Plans

• Risk

• Change

• Progress

What are themes?

Themes are aspects of project management that must be addressed continually throughout the life of a PRINCE2 project. It is essential that a project manager using PRINCE2 applies the seven PRINCE2 themes thoroughly. Each theme is applied in a specific way in PRINCE2 and all of the them work together in an integrated way. A project progress in each PRINCE2 process applies the themes in an appropriate way.

Business case:

Assess at how one idea is developed into a viable investment proposition. This theme also tells us our project manager to maintain its focus on the organization's objectives throughout a project. The business case is very much to the forefront in a PRINCE2 project.

Organization:

The program senior responsible owner (SRO) is the single individual with overall responsibility for ensuring their program will meet its objectives and deliver the projected benefits. It is likely that the program SRO will confirm the appointment of the project executive. The program manager is responsible for the setup and day to day management of the program and delivery of the program on behalf of the SRO. The business change manager is responsible for benefits definition and management throughout the program.

The program and project management team structures need to be integrated such that there are clear lines of responsibility from top to bottom i.e. everyone is accountable to someone.

• Duplication is avoided

• Reports and reviews are efficient

• The integration of roles may include:

• The program manager being the executive for one or more of the projects.

A business change manager from the program fulfilling the project role of senior user (or having input in the appointment of the senior user) for one or more of the projects or being the project executive for one or more of the projects. Project support being provided by the program. Or the program's design authority (if used) fulfilling the project role of change authority or project assurance for one or more of the projects.The choice of structure will depend on the scale and complexity of the program. Stakeholder analysis for the project may be performed by the program or the program may require the project to take a lead with certain stakeholder groups with which it has good engagement.

Quality:

A project's quality management strategy is derived from the program's quality management strategy. Quality assurance and quality control activities may be carried out by members of the program management team and the program's design may provide advice and guidance to the project manager on any quality methods to be used.

Plan:

Any specific standard that the project planners should work to will be described in the program monitoring and control strategy and when the project manager is planning the project they are gonna to need to make sure that they are using any program defined standards and tools.The program may have dedicated planners that can help the project manager to prepare and maintain the project plan the stage plans and the program dependency network will detail how each projects deliverables are being used by other projects within the program and that means that each of the project plans can have the relevant dependency is specified in it.

Risk:

The project's risk management strategy will be derived from the programs risk management strategy. This will include defining:

• A common set of risk categories.

• Risk scales for probability impact and proximity.

• Any risk evaluation techniques (such as expected monetary value).

• The project level risk tolerance.

• The mechanisms to escalate risks to the program level.

​​Change:

The project's configuration management strategy will be derived from the programs information management strategy and this defines how interfaces between projects should be maintained. The project's change control procedure will be derived from the program's issue resolution strategy and the project's change authority may include the programs design authority.

Progress:

The programs monitoring and control strategy may influence the formality, frequency and content of the projects reviews and reports, and any project management standards that are to be complied with. Project level time and cost tolerances will be defined by the program. The program may even define a set of standard management stages all projects within the program comply with. The number and length of management stages will be influenced by the program plan.

To Summarize:

• The Organizations theme describes about how work is allocated to managers with clear responsibilities and also how the roles and responsibilities within a PRINCE2 project team work together effectively.

• The Quality theme tells a cell an idea is developed into a definition of the quality attributes of the products to be delivered. And also how the project management theme ensures that those quality requirements actually are delivered.

• The Plan theme says at how plans are developed using PRINCE2 techniques and how PRINCE2 plans the focus for communication and control throughout the project.

• The Risk theme sets at how project manager handles the uncertainties in its plans and in the environment in which the project operates.

• The change theme says that project management assess an active on the need to change either as a result of changes to requirements or to issues that arise.

• The progress theme describes about how to decide whether to approve a plan and also how to monitor progress on what to do when things don't go according to plan.

Applying the themes in PRINCE2

In PRINCE2 all of the themes must be applied, but they should be tailored to the projects scale, nature and complexity. The tailoring can be "up" or "down". In the tailor up we put in more documentation and in tailor a down we use less gloss and formality.