Project Vision - Keep it short

Okay so we've been moving for a whole week here and the most important bit has been knocked down to the two paragraphs and a bullet list that it needs to be. The project vision.

Now reading around some people seem to think that the vision should be a document that includes all the detail around the business case, outline plan and other elements. For me that is the kick-off document and its something that only has a life expectancy of about 3 weeks when everyone is on board and you are into the detail.

The vision for me is something very clear that says

• What we are going to achieve for the business
  
• How we will measure success
• What is important to delivery

Basically I do a "look back" exercise and imagine that the project has finished successfully and what is it that people are saying is brilliant about the project, I also think about what the focus of this is and what are the things we had to overcome.

So this short piece, less than 100 words, basically says to anyone inside or outside the project what we are going to do. It does so in terms of words that describe achievements as in "will deliver the business change and solutions required to drive a 10% increase in sales" and measures "this will be measured based on new transactions through the Gerald system".

So everyone knows on the project what our objectives are and its not long enough for someone to have an excuse to have ignored it, its also concise enough for the person funding it to agree that this is why they are putting up the cash and hold me accountable with clarity for delivering it.

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