Business Continuity Disaster Recovery Project Management OPM3 Risk Assessment Training

Business Continuity, like any other project, tends to grow in complexity and size over time. Often, this referred to as Scope Creep and is the result of people asking for new features from the project team and the project team including them in the project without considering the impact. Scope Creep can bog down your schedule, run costs through the roof, cause you to miss quality specifications, and make your clients (internal and external) hostile.

There are some effective ways to control Scope Creep. Hopefully, you have taken the basic steps at the beginning of your Business Continuity project and have a written Project Charter with a written Scope Statement that is signed by all involved parties. These become tools you can use to your advantage. Without telling your client "no", you can get the details of the proposed changes from them.

Have your project team evaluate what the impact of the proposed change would be to your Business Continuity project. Outline what the impacts would be in terms of time, cost, quality, and ability to successfully implement your Business Continuity plan. Once the client sees what it will cost, they often back off. Also remind them that the project sponsor has to approve the changes and everyone will have to sign off on the revised Scope Statement, deliverables, and deadlines (in addition to them funding the proposed changes).

You would be surprised at how quickly people back off of "necessary" changes once they are presented with a bill and the opportunity to defend what they propose.