Re-visioning and Management of Internal Custom Development Effort

Centric delivers best-practice project management to turn around a complex internal development effort that was facing termination.

The Business Need

Centric’s client, a leader in food service and facilities management, engaged their internal development team to build a custom software solution to support the needs of their asset management business unit. The complexity of the project exceeded the capabilities of their internal management structure and they, after four months of development, reached out to Centric for help.

Centric performed a quick analysis of the project’s current state and determined that several key management elements needed additional focus in order to secure the scope, timeline and budget of the effort. The team concluded that regrouping on requirements definition, establishing a formal change management process and implementing a new governance and communication plan would get the project back on a measurable track to success and improve overall morale, both internally and among third-party partners.

Centric’s High-Impact Approach

Centric introduced best-practice project management principles such as a scope statement, issues management program, risk management and a formal change control process, and then partnered with the client to fully explore and document the business requirements. In addition, a new governance structure and communication management plan were put in place. The team was reconstituted with participation from IT, the business and the third-party partner involved.

Results

Centric was able to build team cohesion through routine and well-understood project management methodologies. With scope properly documented and approved, a new project plan and revised timeline was put in place. The project went from near-cancellation to a notable success, which was lauded across the company as one of their most successful implementations ever.