Everywhere one looks these days in public sector project procurement notices both in the UK and increasingly elsewhere, there is a requirement that the project development and delivery requires a PRINCE 2 experienced and qualified Project Manager.  For those more experienced Project Managers, particularly in Construction and Manufacturing, PRINCE 2 may something they have heard about but in practice may be a closed book.  So what is it about and where does it apply?

For those who still don’t know, PRINCE 2 ((PRojects IN Controlled Environments) is a generic methodology for project management and it provides a common language between participating organisations and suppliers to deliver what the end user needs efficiently, on time and within the parameters set by the project’s business case.

PRINCE was first developed by the Central Computer and Telecommunications Agency CCTA, now part of Office of Government Commerce OGC, in 1989, as a UK Government standard for IT project management but it has now been adopted in 150 countries for use for all kinds of projects in both the public and private sectors regardless of scale, type, organisation, geography or culture.

Given such provenance, one wonders how such a method has gained a following of over 20,000 organisations worldwide and with 20% of persons year on year gaining PRINCE 2 qualifications.   Certainly the UK government is not generally perceived to be a good procurer of major projects with endemic cost and time overruns.  One only has to look at the IT projects such as the NHS common database project, the Millennium Dome and the scandal of the Chinook Helicopter Software.  It is precisely because of their previous poor track record on project procurement that they decided to set down a common standard.  The fact that problems still occur with their procurement is therefore likely to be down to other causes and ones that are still not fully addressed - more of that later. 

On first reading, the language in the OGC textbooks appears to be somewhat convoluted with statements of seven Principles, seven Themes and seven Processes in the most general of terms.  It is therefore, hard not to form an overwhelming first impression of bureaucratic mumbo-jumbo.  If one persists however, it all becomes very familiar for project managers new to PRINCE 2 as being good practice they have been following (or aspiring to) for years.  The biggest changes to traditional project management practices are the stakeholder management, business focus with a robust project business case and thereafter managing the project through it’s stages constantly testing it against the agreed business case.    Such terms as the Project Products, Senior User & Senior Supplier are strange until one realises that PRINCE 2 can be applied equally well to small departmental change projects, the procurement of high-tech equipment or the multi-million pound capital works project.   Moreover, PRINCE 2 need not be any more complex than other methodologies; it’s the mindset of the stakeholders and project teams that is important.

So why don’t the government now get their procurement right and their projects delivered on time and within budget.  Clearly It’s not the methodology, with it’s world-wide acceptance as trusted best practice, that is wrong but rather the fact that it is an object lesson on how important it is not only to put a common project methodology in place in an organisation, but also for all the stakeholders to buy into it.   Meddling politicians and senior managers alike should note this latter point. 

As a final point, It is a pity that the PRINCE 2 methodology with its structured empowerment and decision-making, is perhaps becoming subverted by the civil service mentality for public sector projects with unnecessary complexity at the lower project value end.  The number of hoops to be jumped through by private sector suppliers is on the increase.   So the answer to the title question is that whilst PRINCE 2 is the best practice methodology; it’s the way that the methodology is being applied that is not universally leading to better project delivery.

 The author, Philip Norris is Principal Consultant and Managing Director of Norris Management Ltd.  In a long and varied career, Phil has been a Programme and Project Manager for high profile projects in the Construction and Transportation fields.  In recent years, he has provided much needed support as a management consultant to corporate and SME clients on the development of, the management of, team building and the employment of people in the workplace.