Perform Integrated Change Control

The key focus of Integrated Change Control is to measure the impact of change on all project limitations. Changes to any part of the project may be requested during the course of the project, especially during the project executing and monitoring and control phase. It is not necessary to execute all changes. In the Perform Integrated Change Control, changes accepted or rejected basis their evaluation and impact.

Whenever a change is requested, it is advisable to identify the impact of the proposed change on project cost, quality, risks, resources, scope, and also on customer satisfaction.

There are two pre-requisites to measure the impact of change:

• A realistic project management plan to be used as a baseline
• A complete product and process scope (as applicable)

Since changes are inevitable, the project manager should work to prevent the root causes of changes whenever possible. Most cases indicate improper planning of the project results in change requests. Although changes can happen, they are not encouraged and the handling of possible changes must be planned, managed and controlled.

There can be anywhere between 18-25 questions from this topic in the exam. Hence, this is one of the most critical topics to understand.

To control changes to the project, the project manager should:

• Identify all requirements at the earliest

• Comprehensively identify all the risks related to the project

• Establish time and cost factors

• Establish Change Management Process

• Follow the change management process

• Have required templates in place to create change requests

• Identify clear roles and responsibilities amongst stakeholders to approve changes

• If a number of changes become disproportionate, reevaluate the business case

• Consider terminating a project (if required) if the number of changes is disproportionate

• Ensure only approved changes are added to the baselines

Changes can have two categories: the one that impacts the project management plan, baselines, policies and procedures, charter, contract, or statement of work and the one that does not impact any of this.

Change Control Board

Basis the level of authority of the project manager, he/she may be required to facilitate decisions about some changes, rather than actually making the decisions. Hence, the need for change control board exists. Review and analysis of change requests are done by the board. The board may either approve or reject a change request. Board can include multiple stakeholders including customers, experts, sponsors, functional managers, project manager, etc.

Process for Making Changes

It is extremely important to prevent the root cause that makes the changes happen. Managing changes comes later, the prior thing to do for a project manager is to eliminate the need for changes. The next step is to identify the change. A change originator could be the project manager, the sponsor, the team, the management, the customer or other stakeholders. The project manager can be proactive to identify changes from all these sources. If he is able to identify the changes early, it will decrease the impact of the changes. Identify the impact of the change is the third step. The fourth step is to Create a Change Request. The process of making a change should follow a change management plan. The next step (fifth) is to perform integrated change control. The Perform Integrated Change Control seeks an answer to the key question: How will the change affect the other project limitations? To resolve this, the first thing to be done is to Assess The Change. The next step is to Look for Options. The third is to check if the change is approved or rejected and the last point is to document the change in the change control system.

Close Project or Phase

Close Project or Phase finalizes all activities across all process groups to formally close-out the project or project phase.

A project manager must get a formal acceptance of the project. He should issue a final report that shows the project is successful. Issue the final lessons learned. Finally, index and archive all the project records.

A few steps to be done by the project manager while he is confirming closing the project include:

• Confirming that the work is completed as per the baseline

• Completing closure formalities

• Gaining final acceptance of the product

• Completing financial closure

• Completing product hand-off

• Soliciting feedback from the customer about the project

• Completing final performance reporting

• Indexing and archiving documents