How effective was your project delivery success rate in 2023?

Delivering IT projects can be a challenging process for most organisations. At the start of 2024 and despite uncertain times, organisations continue to invest in transforming their IT infrastructures to support their business objectives, so Empowered has collated the critical areas of impact that you should consider in your planning to help you deliver a successful year of IT programmes:

Scope creep: One of the most common challenges in delivering an IT project is scope creep. This occurs when the project’s scope expands beyond its original objectives, leading to delays and additional costs. Organisations must manage the scope carefully to ensure the project stays on track.

Resource allocation: Another challenge with IT projects is resource allocation. Organisations must ensure they have the necessary resources, including staff, equipment, and budget, to deliver the project successfully to avoid potential delays and cost overruns.

Communication: Communication is critical to the success of IT projects. Effective communication between the delivery team, stakeholders, and end-users is essential to ensure the project meets everyone’s needs. Poor communication can lead to misunderstandings, delays, and frustration.

Technical complexity: IT projects can be technically complex, so organisations must have sufficient technical expertise to deliver the project successfully. This may include hiring additional staff or outsourcing specific tasks to specialist partners.

Change management: Finally, change management is a critical challenge with IT projects. Organisations must manage change effectively to ensure the project’s benefits are realised without disrupting their day-to-day operations.

The Importance of the PoC Phases: The Proof of Concept (PoC) phase is crucial in developing any project. The PoC is a small-scale demonstration of the concept behind the project, which helps identify any potential issues that may arise and validate the project’s feasibility whilst ensuring that the project will meet the stakeholders’ requirements.

Undertaking a PoC can help reduce the risk of project failure by identifying any potential issues on a small scale before the project is fully deployed. It also helps to validate assumptions and hypotheses about the project ensuring that the project is based on solid foundations and improves the chances of success.

Moving from the PoC phase to delivery on a project can be a complex and challenging process. However, several key steps can help to ensure a smooth transition and successful delivery.

1. Firstly, ensuring that the PoC has been thoroughly tested and validated before moving to the delivery phase is essential. This includes testing for scalability, integration, performance, and any other relevant criteria.
2. Secondly, it is vital to establish clear project goals and timelines. This includes defining the scope of the project, the expected outcomes, and the key milestones and deadlines.
3. Thirdly, it is important to assemble a strong project team with the necessary skills and expertise to deliver the project successfully. This includes stakeholders, project managers, technical design authorities, delivery resources and partners.
4. Fourthly, it is crucial to establish clear communication channels and protocols within the project team and with external stakeholders. This includes regular status updates, progress reports, and issue resolution processes.
5. Finally, monitoring and managing the project closely throughout the delivery phase is essential, including tracking progress against milestones, identifying and addressing any issues or risks, and making necessary adjustments to the project plan.

“A successful transition from the POC phase to the project delivery requires careful planning, strong project management, effective communication, and close monitoring and management throughout the delivery phase. By addressing these challenges proactively, organisations can deliver a successful IT project that meets everyone’s needs.”

Empowered’s World Class Service Delivery

Empowered’s reputation has been built on its ability to consistently deliver its service outcomes, to complete customer satisfaction every time.

Our proven approach to delivering IT consultancy combines our experience working closely with customers to fully understand their objectives today and tomorrow, along with our ability to drive the outcome and deliver complex network and IT infrastructure projects on time and within budget.

In 2024, we are looking forward to supporting our partners in transforming their customer’s infrastructure and bringing our expertise to support their brand with successful delivery.

You can learn more about our international rollout project capabilities here: https://www.empowereduk.com/it-professional-services or contact our sales team at [email protected].