Outcome profile
Project stakeholders tend to assess project success in terms of how well a project delivers expected project outcomes and benefits. However, traditionally, project success has been defined in terms of how well a project delivers project outputs, leaving project stakeholders to reconcile the reported delivery of outputs with the delivery of associated outcomes and benefits – which sometimes leads to misunderstandings about the actual success of a project.
Project stakeholders can overcome this outcomes/outputs dilemma, by using the Outcome Profile™ template to document project scope and success criteria in terms of expected project outcomes, benefits and outputs.
The Outcome Profile™ template developed by Kersti’s doctoral research is based on a combination of benefits management and project management principles and processes.
The template guides project stakeholders through the process of defining expected tangible and intangible outcomes, benefits and the outputs required to deliver them.
The ability of the Outcome Profile™ template to document both tangible and intangible outcomes is important for two main reasons. Firstly, because an organisation's competitive edge is due to its unique combination of tangibles and intangibles. Secondly, because intangible outcomes such as learning, leadership and relationships and their associated benefits are increasing in importance whilst remaining challenging to define, align and deliver.
Outcome Profiles™ are best defined as early as possible in the project lifecycle, as part of preparing a project business case, or at the stage of project kick-off. Alternatively, Outcome Profiles™ can be defined as part of the project review process, to help define a common definition of project success.
Contact Kersti to discuss how Kersti might help your organisation to use the Outcome ProfileTM to define/review project success in terms of outcomes, benefits and the outputs required to deliver them.
Kersti’s Outcome Profile™ related book chapter, Articles & Papers
