Governance of projects

The benefits of project governance

  • Ensures that the project mission is clearly framed during project initiation
  • Gives a clearer understanding of the impacts and benefits which the project will generate
  • Improves control over and evaluation of projects
  • Improves predictability of project outcomes
  • Clarifies key project roles and responsibilities (project board, steering group, sponsor and project manager)
  • Helps to set stakeholder expectations
  • Saves time and money by avoiding unnecessary rework
  • Provides an excellent start to planning
  • Ensures strategic alignment of projects
  • Improves risk management of projects

Programme and project governance at Oxford Brookes

Strategic alignment

All projects must either contribute to the University’s strategic objectives or be mandatory  e.g. to fulfil government regulations. A programme/project board (appropriate to level and complexity) will decide which projects concepts go forward into the full definition and implementation phases.

All investment activities should be subject to the governance process in that they require resources from the investment ‘pot’ and need to be resourced and financed adequately.

For mandatory projects, the decision is not whether to undertake the project but how to manage it in order to meet the required standard with minimum risk.

For discretionary projects, there needs to be more focus on the ‘go/no go’ decision and whether the project supports the University’s strategic objectives and whether the investment gives best value, given the other investment options available.

Projects originating from agreed Faculty and Directorate business planning rounds will receive a higher weighting with regard to prioritisation. Although it is acknowledged that some emergent projects may still take priority due to necessity.

Programme/Project Boards

The individual initiating a project concept will typically be the sponsor and they will guide the project through its concept phase potentially with the support of a project manager. See the four phases of project management.

To gain approval for a project, Oxford Brookes has established the following governance process.

  • At a university level: The Executive Board guided and supported by recommendations from specific project assurance groups.
  • At a local level: Faculty /Directorate Management Teams or OBIS for IT specific projects under £15K (in alignment with EU tendering requirements).           

Executive Board

The Executive Board fulfils the role of the Programme/Project Board where formal governance will be applied.  Whether the project will be required to go through the Brookes formal governance process will depend upon a few key qualifiers.

  • Will the project be pan university / cross-functional
  • Will the project require additional funding from central university funds. If they are ‘contingency items’ i.e. projects which require additional resources then they need to be raised to the executive board via the Director of Finance and Legal Services.   
  • IT related projects in excess of £15K (in alignment with EU tendering requirements).           

The Executives board’s remit will be to

  • assess the strategic alignment of potential projects against the University's key strategic objectives
  • approve, reject or recommend a re-submission of an initial Terms of Reference (on approval of a ToR the next step would be to submit a full business case.)
  • approve, reject or recommend a re-submission of a full project business case
  • on completion of a project to assess that project’s overall performance and realisation of benefits.

project management flowchart

 

Supported by relevant Programme/Project Assurance Groups

Programme/Project Assurance Groups are commissioned to provide scrutiny and support for  key projects during their project life cycle.

Programme/Project Assurance Groups can be established around key themes for example

  • The IT Programme Assurance Group relating to all IT specific projects
  • The NLTB Project Assurance Group relating to projects linked to the New Library Teaching Building.

The role of the programme/project assurance groups are

  • review and quality assure the initial terms of reference for concept ideas and append a recommendation report prior to submission to the Executive Board.
  • review and quality assure the subsequent business case submissions and append a recommendation report prior to submission to the Executive Board.
  • recommend project priorities to Executive Board
  • to judge whether constraints of time, budget and resources are reasonable
  • review and quality assure subsequent project plans and contingency plans
  • during the project life cycle identify significant deviations from the project plans and to raise this for the attention of EB
  • to ensure appropriate consultation, dissemination, evaluation and reporting arrangements  are in place.
  • To ensure appropriate handover arrangements are planned for at the end of the project together with the assessment of benefit realisation.

Specific Programme/Project Assurance groups will have additional roles and specifications.

Faculty/Directorate management team

Outside of the qualifiers for Executive Board all other projects will be considered at a local Faculty / Directorate management team level.  They will fulfil the role of project board and will adopt their own process of assessment, approval, monitoring and control.

Project Concept documentation

The Terms of Reference

A Terms of Reference (ToR) for a potential project will need to be completed to enable an initial strategic alignment test at the appropriate programme/project board level.

Those ToR which require submission to the Executive Board will in the first instance be reviewed and assessed through an appropriate Programme/Project Quality Assurance  Group who in turn will append a recommendation report prior to its onward submission to Executive Board.

The Executive Board will review the Terms of Reference together with the recommendation report for its strategic alignment test. The Board will make a yes, no or resubmit decision.

The business case

Following a successful strategic alignment test, a more detailed investigation will be undertaken to give structure and a business case will be required. This will consist of a high-level investigation into the key impacts, costs, benefits and risks of running the project.

Key project personnel (sponsor, project manager and team members i.e. subject matter experts) will need to be appointed by the project board to conduct the study

The Executive Board will review the business case together with the recommendation report for its strategic alignment test. The Board will make a yes, no or resubmit decision.

Concept approval and Initiated

Once initiation is complete, if project ‘go ahead’ is granted, the project board will decide whether a steering group needs to be established for day-to-day decision-making of the project. This will largely depend upon the scale, impacts and risk assessment. The roles of sponsor and project manager should also be confirmed, having been provisionally established in order to conduct the concept phase.

At this stage appropriate reporting points back to the main project board for the duration of the project will be established. These may be around the main project deliverables and benefits realisation.

As a minimum, the sponsor must report back to the main project board as part of the post project review.