organisational functions - Alpine-space.org

CHAPTER 6:
PROJECT STEERING AND INFORMATION SYSTEMS
After the organisational structure has been drawn up and a direction has been
chosen, procedures must be put in place to ensure the project stays on course.
Effective steering is needed to cope with any unforeseen situations or uncertainties
encountered along the way.
1. Why use a steering system?
• To monitor and meet the objectives that have been fixed
• To take into account unforeseen situations and uncertainties within the project
• To regularly audit the project
• To clearly show the status of the project and any current difficulties
• To circulate appropriate and ranked information about the status to the project
team
• To provide short-term confirmation of the action plan
• To organise and motivate the team around current priorities
In short, to ensure the right decisions are taken at the right time and by the right
people.
2. Steering by physical progression, steering by risks
In order to ensure a permanent balance between usable resources, qualitative
results and deadlines, the project managers must have a method, based on a
project outline, for steering collective and individual actions.
This method, which is based on measuring physical progress and on variance
analysis, must not be limited to the static identification of progress or delays;
it should provide a dynamic evaluation of the risks connected with the nearest
future key events at any time “t”.
The evaluation of the risk will measure qualitative, budgetary and deadline
aspects, as well as any legal, commercial, human, technological or political
impacts.
The particularity of event project management is the combination of elements
that are decided in advance with others that are integrated during the steering
phase (evolution of the context, income and expenditure). Projects are similar to
strategies in that they have to take into account what has been decided and what
actually happens.
Steering must use tools that model the 80% that is “structural” certainty, and
integrate the 20% of “circumstantial” uncertainty. This information should be
summarised using a simple, decision/action tool, such as a management chart.
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