Project Milestones

Abstract

Some studies have come to the conclusion that there is correlation between project planning and project success. . In addition, according to the Project Management institute almost 40% of projects failures is due because of poor planning. Due to that fact it is very important that project managers use good planning methods because planning is one of their responsibilities. Project milestones is a project management tool that project managers find useful to identify important events in the life of the project. So, project milestones help project managers to track deadlines and critical dates, see potential bottlenecks and see how time and resources are allocated. By using project milestones, it can also give more visibility to stakeholders so they can see better how the project is going as well as the project teams will have a better overview of what they are responsible for. The focus in this article will be on explaining what project milestones are, how they can be used and how SMART goals can be used to make the project milestones more effective. In addition to that the article will discuss on how project milestones are applied as well as pinpointing advantages, disadvantages, and limitations of the tool.

Introduction

A project milestone is an event on a schedule that marks significant progress in a project. It might be the completion of a work package, a delivery stage or perhaps a management stage. By breaking the plan using milestones, the project manager will be able to get an early indication of problems related to the schedule, as well as a clearer view of the activities that are crucial to the timeline of the plan. Additionally, the milestones are useful because they have zero duration so they will not affect the schedule at all. Project milestones are usually defined in the planning phase of a project and are updated as the project develops. There is no right number of milestones or how much time there should be between them but if they are too many or too few, they lose their value. The project milestones should be fewer than the work packages or the deliverables but enough to measure if the plan is progressing as planned. Some people might suggest setting milestones around once a month to the plan. That can be a good guideline, but it is important to take professional experience into account. Some months could have a lot of activity while others can focus more on execution which leaves little left to set a milestone on. For the purpose of reporting it is useful to have at least one milestone for each reporting cycle. Having milestones part of your project gives an opportunity to celebrate when project milestones have been reached. It can be in the form of handshake, note or lunch to take an example. By doing that there will be a more positive relationship between the team and the project manager and more trust which leads to a productive project.