Beware of Scope Creep

In project management, scope creep refers to the change in a project's scope after the project work has started. Typically, the scope expands by the addition of unapproved work to an already approved plan. As a result, the project will drift away from its original purpose, timeline, and budget.

These changes in scope often comes about from small, seemingly insignificant change requests that the project team accepts to keep the project stakeholders happy. Eventually, the change requests become numerous enough that they are significant or one of the requests turns out to require much more work than expected.?

Scope creep can come about from:

• Lack of proper identification of the work required to achieve project objectives.
• Failure in managing stakeholder expectations.
• Weak project management or poor change control processes
• Not involving the beneficiaries in the early stages of the project

When working on unapproved features of a product or service, the project team devotes more time to the unauthorized changes. The work to incorporate these changes must usually be done within the original time and budget estimates, leaving less time for approved parts of the scope. The result can mean that the approved scope of work doesn't get completed, and the deliverables are not what was agreed with the donor, or that time and cost overruns will occur to finish the authorized parts of the scope.

Tips to manage Scope Creep:

• Set project expectations with the stakeholders and get the buy-in from the beneficiaries.
• Decide and document the agreed project deliverables in the?Statement of Work (SOW) document and requirement areas that are NOT included.
• Make a flexible project plan, allowing beneficiaries and key stakeholders to participate in the design phase and incorporate their suggestions.
• Introduce a formal change management process that would allow stakeholders to define the requests for change in terms of the project constraints.
• Do an impact analysis and attach a cost and time for the new required changes.
• Only implement changes that have been approved by management, the donor, and the beneficiaries.

The change management plan defines how you record, track and act on change requests. Without it, you risk losing track of changes and stretching the project beyond the scope. Whenever someone suggests a change, it is reviewed, approved, or rejected, and if it is approved, then incorporated into the project plan.

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