I’ve been a project & program manager for years and one of the areas I find non project management professionals and some project management professionals have difficulty with is understanding and managing scope.

Some points to note below 

• Scope management is completely different to requirements management.

• Scope can be broken down into product and project scope, one looks at the capabilities and functionality of products, systems and services and the desired results, the other is the project work needed to achieve the former and the boundaries and parameters applied.

• Scope is one of the five dimensions of project management, the others being cost, time, risk and quality.

• Scope can be managed using documentation such as a Project Charter, Scope Statement, WBS (Work Breakdown Schedule) and Project schedules.

• Scope is a great way to manage the quality of the delivery whilst controlling the work and output.

• Scope baseline is the signed off version of the Scope Statement & WBS.

• Anything added to the deliverable after the scope baseline has been agreed is classified as scope creep and should be assessed against the agreed costs, timelines and quality of the delivery.

• Scope should never be unknown, scope status should always be ‘In Scope’ or ‘Out of Scope’ for project delivery.

• Methodologies used should not be an excuse to bypass scope, it is essential in all methodologies used.

• Scope decomposition – it’s important to breakdown scope into manageable deliverables. This can be done by using the scope statement and then the WBS which can break down scope into hierarchical levels, each with more low level detail. Another more agile way is to use user stories, put them into Epics and then break down further into features which are essentially a related set of requirements. A hybrid mix of the above approaches is a great way to manage and decompose scope but make sure the methodology used is tailored your delivery.

• Scope Management Plans are another great way to manage scope and any plan used should clearly state how scope is defined, developed, monitored, controlled and validated.

• If you decide to manage a project delivery without adequate scope management the chances of success are slim to none.

• From an audit perspective post project delivery scope management is a great way to show what the business was implementing and the boundaries and parameters for the delivery.

• All stakeholders need to be aware what scope is and the importance of it.

• No stakeholder should be unsure of the project and product scope, if they are then the project structure needs to be reviewed and improved upon.