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Top 15 Project Management Case Studies with Examples

Home Blog Project Management Top 15 Project Management Case Studies with Examples

Having worked for more than 9 years in the dynamic field of project management, I would strongly refer to real-world case studies as invaluable resources for both budding and experienced professionals. These case studies provide critical insights into the challenges and triumphs encountered in various industries, illustrating the application of project management principles in practical scenarios.   I have curated the case studies as a part of this article in such a way that it delves into a selection of compelling project management case studies, ranging from the healthcare sector to infrastructure and technology. Each case study is a testament to the strategic planning, adaptability, and innovative problem-solving skills necessary in today's fast-paced business environment. These narratives not only highlight past successes but also offer guidance for future projects, making them essential tools for anyone eager to excel in project management.

What is Case Study?

A case study refers to an in-depth examination of a specific case within the real-world context. It is a piece of content that sheds light on the challenges faced, solutions adopted, and the overall outcomes of a project. To understand project management case studies, it is important to first define what a project is . A project is a temporary endeavor with a defined beginning and end, aimed at achieving a specific goal or objective. Case studies are generally used by businesses during the proposal phase. However, they are also displayed on the websites of companies to provide prospects with a glance at the capabilities of the brands. It can even serve as an effective tool for lead generation. In simple words, case studies are stories that tell the target audience about the measures and strategies that the organization adopted to become successful.

What is Project Management Case Study?

A project management case study is a piece of content that highlights a project successfully managed by the organization. It showcases the challenges that the organization faced, the solutions adopted, and the final results. Keep reading in order to explore examples of successful project management case studies.

Top 15 Project Management Case Studies and Examples 

Are you looking for some examples of PMP case studies? If yes, here are some of the best examples you can explore. Let’s dive in!

1. Mavenlink Helps Improve Utilization Rates by 15% for BTM Global

The case study is all about how Mavenlink helped BTM Global Consulting to save hours of work and enhance utilization with resource management technology. BTM Global Consulting offers system development and integration services to diverse clients. The challenges that the company faced were that tools like Netsuite OpenAir and Excel spreadsheets were not able to meet the customization needs as the company grew. It impacted their overall productivity.

In order to overcome the challenge, the solution they adopted was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was that it increased the utilization of the company by 10% and enhanced project manager utilization by 15%. It also reduced resource allocation work from 4 hours to just 10 minutes.

2. Boncom Reduces Billing Rate Errors by 100% With Mavenlink

Boncom is an advertising agency that collaborates with different purpose driven brands to create goods worldwide. The challenge was that the company relied on several-point solutions for delivering client-facing projects. However, the solutions failed to offer the required operational functionality. An ideal solution for Boncom was to adopt Mavenlink. The result was that the billing rate error got reduced by 100%. Accurate forecasting became possible for Boncom, and the company could generate reports in much less time.

3. whyaye! Reaches 80% Billable Utilization with Mavenlink

whyaye is a digital transformation consultancy delivering IT transformation solutions to businesses operating in diverse sectors. The challenge was that whyaye used to manage resources and projects using tools such as emails, PowerPoint, and Microsoft Excel. However, with the growth of the company, they were not able to access project data or gain insights for effective management of the projects . The ultimate solution to this challenge was to make a switch to Mavenlink. The result was an increase in the utilization by 6%, doubling of new clients, tripling of the company size, and seamless support through business growth.

4. Metova Increases Billable Utilization by 10% With Mavenlink

If you are looking for a project planning case study, Metova can be the right example. Metova is a technology firm, a Gold Partner of Microsoft, and an advanced consulting partner of AWS. The challenge was that the company handled several projects at a time. However, its heavy dependence on tools like Google Sheets limited the growth capabilities of the organization. So, the company looked for a solution and switched to Mavenlink. The result was that it was able to increase its billable utilization by 10%, increase its portfolio visibility, and standardize its project management process.

5. Appetize Doubles Length of Forecasting Outlook with Mavenlink

Appetize is one of the leading cloud-based points of sale (POS), enterprise management, and digital ordering platform that is trusted by a number of businesses. The challenge of the company was that its legacy project tracking systems were not able to meet the growing needs of the company. They experienced growth and manual data analysis challenges. The solution they found was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was an increase in the forecast horizon to 12 weeks, support for effective companywide scaling, easy management of over 40 major projects, and Salesforce integration for project implementation.

6. RSM Improves Client Satisfaction and Global Business Processes with Mavenlink

RSM is a tax, audit, and consulting company that provides a wide array of professional services to clients in Canada and the United States. The challenge of the company was that its legacy system lacked the necessary features required to support their work- and time-intensive projects and delivered insights relating to the project trends. An ideal solution to this challenge was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was better to risk mitigation in tax compliance, improved client-team communication, templatized project creation, and better use of the KPIs and project status.

7. CORE Business Technologies Increases Billable Utilization by 35% with Mavenlink

CORE Business Technologies is a reputed single-source vendor self-service, in-person, and back-office processing to the clients. It offers SaaS-based payment solutions to clients. The challenge faced by the company was that its tools like spreadsheets, Zoho, and Microsoft Project led to a hectic work schedule owing to a huge number of disconnected systems. The solution to the challenge was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was the enhancement of team productivity by 50%, time entry compliance by 100%, and enhancement of the billable utilization rate by 35%.

8. Client Success: Health Catalyst Improves Business Processes and Increases Consistency in Project Delivery with Mavenlink

Health Catalyst is a company that delivers data and analytics services and technology to different healthcare organizations. The firm provides assistance to technicians and clinicians in the healthcare sector. The challenge of the company was that the tools like Intacct and spreadsheets that is used for project management were not able to provide the required data insights and clarity for better project management. It also limited effective resource management. The solution was to embrace Mavenlink. The result was better resource forecasting, enhanced interdepartmental communication, consistency in project delivery, and better resource data insights .

9. Client Success: Optimus SBR Improves Forecasting Horizon by 50% with Mavenlink

Optimus SBR is a leading professional service provider in North America. It offers the best results to companies operating in diverse sectors, including healthcare, energy, transportation, financial services, and more. The challenge was that legacy software tools that the firm used gave rise to project management issues. The company was not able to get a real-time revenue forecast or gain insights into its future financial performance. The solution that the company adopted was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was better data-driven hiring decisions, efficient delivery of remote work, and enhancement of the forecasting horizon by 50%.

10. Client Success: PlainJoe Studios Increases Projects Closing Within Budget by 50% With Mavenlink

PlainJoe Studios is an experimental design studio that focuses on digitally immersive and strategic storytelling. The company has a team of strategists, architects, and problem solvers to create value for the clients. The challenge of the company was that the manual processing of the company affected its ability to grow and manage the diverse project effectively. They lacked clarity about their project needs and profitability. The solution to deal with the challenge was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was an enhancement in the billing rates by 15%, better project closing within budget by 50%, better data insights for the success of different projects, and a faster shift to remote work.

11. Client Success: RPI Consultants Decreases Admin Time by 20% With Mavenlink

If you are looking for an example of one of the best software project management case studies, then RPI Consultants can be the ideal one. RPI Consultants offer expert project leadership and software consulting services for enterprise-level implementation of solutions and products. The challenge was that the task management solutions adopted by the company gave rise to a number of complications. It resulted in poor interdepartmental transparency and time-consuming data entry. The ultimate solution that the company embraced was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was a rise in the utilization rate by 5%, lowing of admin time by 20%, better forecasting and resource management, and a single source for gaining insights into the project data.

12. Client Success: CBI's PMO Increases Billable Utilization By 30% With Mavenlink

CBI is a company that is focused on protecting the reputations, data, and brands of its clients. The challenge that the company faced was that the solutions used were unable to meet the growing needs of the organization. The systems were outdated, data sharing was not possible, and time tracking was inconsistent. The solution to the challenge was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was better interdepartmental alignment, enhancement of time tracking to support business growth, an increase in the billable utilization rate by 30%, and detailed insights for a greater success of the projects.

13. Client Success: Butterfly Increases Billable Time by 20% with Mavenlink

Butterfly is a leading digital agency that provides digital strategy, website design and development services, and ongoing support to businesses across Australia. The challenge was that the different legacy systems used by the agency limited its capability of effective project management and reporting. The systems were time consuming and cumbersome. In order to deal with the challenge, the solution was to make a switch to Mavenlink. The result was the enhancement of billable time by 20%, fast reporting insights, enhancement of productive utilization by 16%, and better Jira integration.

14. Client Success: TeleTracking Increases Billable Utilization by 37% With Mavenlink

TeleTracking Technologies is a leading provider of patient flow automation solutions to various hospitals in the healthcare sector. The challenge of the company was that it used different systems such as Microsoft Excel, Sharepoint, MS Project, Jira, and Netsuite. The use of a variety of solutions created a number of challenges for the company. It had poor forecasting capability, an insufficient time tracking process, and unclear resource utilization. The solution was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was the enhancement of time tracking compliance by 100%, rise in hours to date by 18%, and enhancement of billable utilization by 37%.

15. Client Success: Taylors Improves Utilization Rates by 15% with Mavenlink

This is a perfect example of a construction project management case study. Taylor Development Strategists is a leading civil engineering and urban planning organization in Australia. The challenge that the company faced was that the systems that it used were not able to support the growth of the business. There were a lot of inefficiencies and limitations. The solution to the challenge was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was better global collaboration, an increase in the utilization rate by 15%, consistency of timesheet entry, and in-depth insights relating to utilization and project targets.

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Start Creating Your Project Management Case Study

Not that you have a detailed idea about project management case studies, it is time to prepare your own. When doing the project management case study exercise, make sure to focus on covering all the important elements. Clearly stating the challenges and the solutions adopted by the company is important. If you want to get better at project management, getting a PMP Certification can be beneficial.

Case Study Best Practices and Tips 

Want to prepare a project management case study? Here are some tips that can help. 

• Involve your clients in the preparation of the case study. 
• Make use of graphs and data. 
• Mix images, texts, graphs, and whitespace effectively.

Project Management Case Studies Examples

Hospital el pilar improves patient care with implementing disciplined agile.

If you are looking for an example of one of the best hospital related project management case studies, then Hospital El Pilar can be the ideal one. Hospital El Pilar is a private hospital in Guatemala City, Guatemala, that provides comprehensive care to patients in various medical specialties. The challenge was that the hospital’s application development team faced several obstacles in managing and delivering projects, such as unclear priorities, a lack of visibility, little interaction with users, and competing demands. The solution that the team adopted was to use Disciplined Agile® (DA™), a flexible and pragmatic approach to project management that optimizes the way of working (WoW). The result was improved project outcomes, increased user satisfaction, greater transparency, and more trust from stakeholders and customers.

British Columbia’s Ministry of Technology and Infrastructure (MoTI) gets its principal corridor for transportation up in 35 days

Reconnecting Roads After Massive Flooding (2022) is a case study of how the British Columbia Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure (MoTI) used a project management approach based on the PMBOK® Guide to restore critical routes after a catastrophic weather event. It is one of the examples of successful project management case studies you can look into. The challenge was that an atmospheric river caused severe flooding, landslides, and bridge collapses, cutting off the lower mainland from the rest of Canada2. The solution was to prioritize the reopening of Highway 5, the principal corridor for transportation of goods and people, by creating scopes, work breakdown structures, and schedules for each site3. The result was that Highway 5 was reopened to commercial traffic in 35 days, despite additional weather challenges and risks4. The construction project management case study we discussed demonstrated the benefits of flexibility, collaboration, and communication in emergency response.

Case Study Template 

To create a well-crafted and highly informative case study template in the realms of project management, you should start by providing a brief overview of the client's company, focusing on its industry, scale, and specific challenges. Follow with a detailed section on the challenge, emphasizing the unique aspects of the project and obstacles faced. Next, you might want to describe the solution implemented, detailing the strategies, methodologies, and tools used. Then, you would need to present the results, quantifying improvements and highlighting objectives achieved. Finally, please conclude the case study with a summary, encapsulating key takeaways and emphasizing the project's success and its implications for future endeavors. By following this structure, you can present a comprehensive yet concise analysis that is ideal for showcasing project management expertise and insights. You can also refer to the template for crafting a better case study on project management – Template for writing case studies.

By now, you must have gained a comprehensive knowledge of preparing a project management case study. This article elaborately explains the significance of real life project management case studies as vital tools for demonstrating a company's expertise in handling complex projects. These case studies, showcasing real-world scenarios, serve as compelling evidence of a firm's capability to navigate challenges and implement effective solutions, thereby boosting confidence in potential clients and partners. They are not only a reflection of past successes but also a lighthouse guiding future project endeavors in the discipline of project management within the fields of construction, pharmacy, technology and finance, highlighting the importance of strategic planning, innovation, and adaptability in project management. If you are aspiring to excel in this field, understanding these case studies is invaluable. However, you would also need to learn from project management failures case studies which would provide a roadmap to mastering the art of project management in today's dynamic business landscape.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) 

1. how do you write a project management case study.

In order to write a project management case study, keep everything brief but mention everything in detail. Make sure to write it with clarity and include graphs and images. 

2. Why is a case study important in project identification?

It is important to highlight the story of the success of your company and your clients.

3. What are case studies in project management?

A case study in project management is the success story of how effectively a company was able to handle a specific project of the client.

4. What should a project case study include?

A project study must include information about the client, how your company helped the client in resolving a problem, and the results.

5. Which are the best-case studies on project management?

The best-case studies on project management have been listed above. It includes BTM Global, Butterfly, Boncom, and more.

Kevin D.Davis

Kevin D. Davis is a seasoned and results-driven Program/Project Management Professional with a Master's Certificate in Advanced Project Management. With expertise in leading multi-million dollar projects, strategic planning, and sales operations, Kevin excels in maximizing solutions and building business cases. He possesses a deep understanding of methodologies such as PMBOK, Lean Six Sigma, and TQM to achieve business/technology alignment. With over 100 instructional training sessions and extensive experience as a PMP Exam Prep Instructor at KnowledgeHut, Kevin has a proven track record in project management training and consulting. His expertise has helped in driving successful project outcomes and fostering organizational growth.

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Top 20 Project Management Case Studies [With Examples]

Project management case study analyses showcase and compare real-life project management processes and systems scenarios. These studies shed light on the common challenges that project managers encounter on a daily basis. This helps project managers develop effective strategies, overcome obstacles, and achieve successful results. 

By leveraging project management case studies , organisations can optimise their operations by providing insights into the most effective approaches. With effective implementation of these case studies, strategies, and methodologies, ensuring successful project completion is achievable.

Criteria for Selection of Top 20 Case Studies

The top 20 case studies are selected based on significance, impact, challenges, project management strategies, and overall success. They provide diverse insights and lessons for project managers and organisations.

1. The Sydney Opera House Project

The Sydney Opera House Project is an iconic example of project management case studies as it faced multiple challenges during its construction phase. Despite facing leadership changes, budget overruns, and design failures, the project persevered and was completed in 1973, a decade later than planned. The Opera House stands as a symbol of perseverance and successful project management in the face of humankind.

2. The Airbus A380 Project

The Airbus A380 Project is a project management case study showcasing the challenges encountered during developing and producing the world’s largest commercial aircraft. The project experienced massive delays and impacted costs of more than $6 billion, with several issues arising from the manufacturing and delivery process, outsourcing, and project coordination. 

However, the Airbus A380 was successfully launched through carefully planned project management strategies, delivering a world-class aircraft that met customer expectations.

3. The Panama Canal Expansion Project 

The Panama Canal Expansion Project serves as a compelling case study, illustrating the management’s encounters in expanding the capacity of the Panama Canal. The project included multiple stakeholders, technological innovations, environmental concerns, and safety challenges. 

4. The Boston Central Artery/Tunnel Project

The Boston Central Artery/Tunnel Project serves as a project management case study of a large-scale underground tunnel construction project. It successfully addressed traffic congestion and was completed in 2007. The project was completed in 2007, with numerous hurdles delaying progress like complexity, technology failure, ballooning budgets, media scrutiny, etc.

5. The London 2012 Olympics Project

The London 2012 Olympics Project stands as a successful project management case study, showcasing the management of a large-scale international sporting event. This project involved the construction of a new sports infrastructure, event logistics and security concerns. The project was successfully accomplished, delivering a world-class event that captivated the audience.

6. The Hoover Dam Bypass Project

The Hoover Dam Bypass Project was a construction project in the United States of America that intended to alleviate traffic from the Hoover Dam by building a new bridge. Completed in 2010, the bridge spans across the Colorado River, connecting Arizona and Nevada and offers a safer and more efficient route for motorists.

7. The Golden Gate Bridge Seismic Retrofit Project

The Golden Gate Bridge Seismic Retrofit Project is a case study example constructed in San Francisco, California. Its objective was to enhance the bridge’s resilience against earthquakes and aftershocks. Completed in 2012, the project included the installation of shock absorbers and other seismic upgrades to ensure the bridge’s safety and functionality in the event of a major earthquake.

8. The Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge Project

The Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge Project is a massive case study that intends to connect Hong Kong, Zhuhai and Macau with a bridge-tunnel system of 55 kilometres. Completed in 2018, the project required massive funds, investments and innovative engineering solutions, providing a new transport link and boosting regional connectivity.

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9. The Panama Papers Investigation Project

The Panama Papers Investigation Project is a global case study of journalistic investigations into offshore tax havens. It involved leaked documents from Mossack Fonseca, a Panamanian law firm. Coordinated by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, the project resulted in major political and financial repercussions worldwide, garnering widespread media attention.

10. The Apple iPhone Development Project

The Apple iPhone Development Project started in 2004, aiming to create a groundbreaking mobile device. In 2007, the iPhone transformed the industry with its innovative touchscreen interface, sleek design, and advanced features. This project involved significant research, development, marketing, and supply chain management investments.

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11. The Ford Pinto Design and Launch Project

The Ford Pinto Design and Launch Project was a developmental project intended to create an affordable, fuel-efficient subcompact car. Launched in 1971, because of its fuel tank design, it became infamous for safety issues. The project was rigged for ethical and safety concerns, lawsuits, and recalls.

12. The Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill Response Project

The Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill Response Project was a response to the largest oil spill in US history, caused by an offshore drilling rig explosion in 2010. This crisis response project utilised a waterfall project management approach, where the project team followed a pattern of planning, executing, monitoring, and closing phases. 

13. The NASA Challenger Space Shuttle Disaster Project

  The NASA Challenger Disaster Project was a tragic space exploration mission in 1986, resulting in the loss of all seven crew members. Extensive investigations revealed design and safety flaws as the cause. This disaster prompted NASA to address decision-making processes and improve safety cultures.

14. The Three Gorges Dam Project

  The Three Gorges Dam Project was a large-scale infrastructure project developed in China that aimed to build the world’s largest hydroelectric dam on the Yangtze River. Completed in 2012, it encountered environmental, social, and engineering challenges. The dam currently offers power generation, flood control, and improved navigation, but it has also resulted in ecological and cultural consequences.

15. The Big Dig Project in Boston

The Big Dig Project was a transportation infrastructure project in Boston, Massachusetts, intended to replace an old elevated highway with a newer tunnel system. Completed in 2007, it serves as one of the most complex and costly construction endeavours in US history. Despite facing many delays, cost overruns and engineering challenges, the project successfully improved traffic flow and urban aesthetics but also resulted in accidents, lawsuits, and financial burdens.

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16. The Uber Disruptive Business Model Project

  The Uber Disruptive Business Model Project was a startup that introduced a new ride business model that disrupted the taxi-cab industry by connecting riders with drivers via a mobile app. Launched in 2010, this project required innovative technology, marketing and regulatory strategies and faced legal actions and ethical challenges related to labour, safety, and competition. Uber has since then dominated the market with its ride-sharing business plan.

17. The Netflix Original Content Development Project

The Netflix Original Content Development Project was an initiative created to launch its original content for its platform. This launch by the online streaming giant in 2012 was a huge success for the company. The project required huge investments in content creation, distribution and marketing and resulted in award-winning shows and films that redefined the entire entertainment industry’s business model.

18. The Tesla Electric Car Project

The Tesla Electric Car Project was a revolutionary project that aimed to compete for its electric vehicles with gasoline-powered vehicles. The project required a strong project management plan that incorporated innovation, sustainability, and stakeholder engagement, resulting in the successful launch of the Tesla Roadster in 2008 and subsequent models. Tesla has one-handedly revolutionised the entire automobile industry on its own. 

19. The Johnson & Johnson Tylenol Crisis Management Project:

The Johnson & Johnson Tylenol Crisis Management Project was a case study in crisis management in 1982. The project required quick and effective decision-making skills, stakeholder communication, and ethical leadership in response to the tampering of Tylenol capsules that led to deaths. 

20. The Airbnb Online Marketplace Platform Project  

The Airbnb Online Marketplace Platform Project was a startup that created an online platform which connected travellers with hosts offering short-term rental accommodations in flights. The project required innovative technology, user experience design and stakeholder management. Airbnb’s success has led to the disruption of the hospitality industry and inspired many other project case study examples of sharing economy platforms.

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Future developments in project management.

Future developments in project management include all the insights on the increased use of artificial intelligence, agile methodologies, hybrid project management approaches, and emphasis on sustainability and social responsibility, along with many more developing ideas that will address the evolving market innovations. 

Key Takeaways from the Case Studies

The project management case study examples illustrate real-life examples and the importance of project management in achieving project success. The cases show the use of innovative technologies, tools, techniques, stakeholder engagement, crisis management, and agile methodologies. 

Project Management also highlights the role of ethical leadership and social responsibility in project management. To learn more and more about case studies, upGrad, India’s leading education platform, has offered an Advanced General Management Program from IMT Ghaziabad that will equip you with in-demand management skills to keep up with the changing trends!

Keerthi Shivakumar

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Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Project Management is extensive planning, executing, monitoring and closing of a project before its deadline. Project management ensures accuracy and efficiency across all organs of a project, right from its inception to its completion.

Project Management case studies are real-life examples of projects to put an insight into all the tools, techniques and methodologies it provides.

The role of a project manager is to ensure that all day-to-day responsibilities are being met by the resources deployed in a certain project. They have the authority to manage as well as lead the functioning members as well.

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Project Management Examples: Success Stories Case Studies, and Examples

By Kate Eby | January 3, 2023

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The best real-world project management starts with meticulous planning and ends with achieving goals. Take charge of your next project with the techniques and tools that experts use to avoid failure and deliver stellar results.

In this article, learn about eight real-world project management examples , project success criteria , five famous project management failures , and how modern project management software supports success .

Successful Real-World Project Management Examples

Successful real-world project management examples have one thing in common: they support company strategy. Examples show how detailed research, planning, and organization of resources helped real-world project managers achieve a particular aim that moves the organization forward.

Successful project management examples reveal that, in order to reach the final goal, you must have and maintain a big-picture view. Other success factors include involving stakeholders, reviewing multiple frameworks and solutions, and keeping the lines of communication open.

Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital Case Study: Increased Outpatient Surgical Center Performance

Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital is a 357-bed not-for-profit community hospital and trauma center in Santa Clarita, California. Jay Arcilla, Director of the Performance Excellence Office, is charged with studying and adapting the functions and processes to increase the achievement of desired outcomes, better meet patients' needs, and assure quality. 

• Challenge: In every hospital, starting the day's first scheduled in-patient or out-patient surgery on time has a knock-on effect on subsequent surgery timelines. Meeting schedules can always be challenging. The pandemic created even more hurdles, from having the right supplies and equipment on hand to keeping up with documentation and ensuring the right personnel are available to cover every patient's needs. Arcilla focused on raising surgery on-time start times to 70 percent. 

• Work Sessions: A team work session helps frontline staff analyze the root cause and create a consensus-driven, interdisciplinary team.

•  Communication: Disseminating information and encouraging discussion for all stakeholder groups.
•  Accountability: The operating room executive leadership created and enforced an Outpatient Surgery Center First Case On-Time Start (OPSC FCOTS) Escalation Plan, holding all staff accountable for showing up to first cases on time.
• Takeaway: In complex, multi-layered project situations, there is often no single silver bullet. Instead, results manifest over time. In this case, within seven months, monthly performance went past the 70 percent target to 89 percent for April 2022.

Behr Process Corporation Case Study: Paving the Way for Road Show Marketing Achievement 

Behr is one of the largest purveyors of architectural paint and exterior wood care products in the United States and Canada. Lisa Kudukis, Director of Professional Products and Services for the Behr Process Corporation , oversees promotions, including a major road show.

• Challenge: Kudukis created the BehrPro Experience Tour to connect with U.S. contractors. The annual event employs five tour teams covering 75 markets and 500 Home Depot locations in 34 states. Initially, each manager used different tools and organizational tactics to run their activities. Supervising people and processes and collaborating to maximize efforts was challenging. The Behr marketing team needed a way to operate more efficiently and stay on task. 
• Solution: After an exhaustive review, Kudukis chose Smartsheet as the group's project management tool. Everyone on the team now uses a single, custom template. A master dashboard relays information about key initiatives and features a drill-down menu so anyone with access can check on small details.  
• Takeaway: For the team, it is a huge time and money saver since anyone can view the project status and provide assistance if necessary. It also helps the team identify new business development opportunities or obstacles to inform future promotions and projects.

Successful Software Project Examples

Software projects involve generating an overall plan, scheduling, allocating resources, executing, tracking, and delivering quality software and apps. These examples show that successful software projects deliver the product with the pre-agreed level of quality within the given time and cost. 

Software companies create, change or maintain valuable products. Software project management is one of the most complex and fastest-growing endeavors in business today.

Hyland Software: More Responsive Updates and Website Requests

Jacob Huston-Lowery manages web operations at Hyland Software , a content services platform and developer of Onbase, an enterprise content management (ECM) and process management software suite. Hyland cuts dozens of hours from the website request process while capturing data to drive ongoing improvement for its clients. Clients include insurance, manufacturing, higher education, and finance businesses that provide web-based services to their customers.

• Challenge: Providing efficiency and seamless services is paramount to maintaining Hyland's standards. Service requests from internal staff who noticed system issues, along with those on behalf of customers, created log jams and confusion. When Huston-Lowery came on board, there were five different contact forms, and some requesters were bypassing the process and sending emails. 
• Solution: Huston-Lowery turned to Smartsheet to find an easy-to-use solution for the critical challenges his team faced. Using project messaging and alerts within the app helped eliminate email delays. When users complete an online form with an alert for urgent projects, Smartsheet routes website requests to a sheet Huston-Lowery manages. As requests come in, all projects are prioritized, scheduled, and assigned to team members or third-party website management agencies.
• Takeaway: By replacing email trails with built-in alerts and update capabilities, the Smartsheet solution saves communication time and eliminates duplication. The ability to handle requests strategically helps the team implement a support program that runs 24 hours a day, 5 days a week – a process that was impossible before instituting the new project management process.

Examples of Successful IT Projects

Information technology (IT) projects ensure that software, devices, and systems work together to help people get things done. 

Managing IT projects and creating efficient IT project plans involve all aspects of planning, design, implementation, project management, and training.

Convergint: A Single System of Record Improves Processes and Customer Service

Jenn Hilber is the Business Architect, Operations for Convergint , the largest privately held security integrator in the United States. Convergint has more than 175 locations worldwide, providing a range of services, including installation and management of card readers and cameras, alarm systems, fire systems, building controls, and more.

•  Challenge: The company prides itself in creating an outstanding customer experience, but managing all the details seamlessly was difficult. Convergint relied on manual practices and printed playbooks, with no single unified process for most of its activities.
•  Solution: Convergint turned to Smartsheet to capture all of its data, best practices, and resources in a single place. As a result, teams can make strategic decisions and act on customer priorities with confidence knowing that they have the most current and accurate information at their fingertips.
• Takeaway: Convergint teams now enjoy better cross-team and global communication, a clearer insight into customers' needs and status, and greater accountability for internal processes. Customers also experience quicker turnaround time for requests.

Exoft: Shifting to Mixed Methodologies Rescue an IT Project Management Client Relationship

Bohuslava Zhyvko is Head of Marketing for Exoft , a software development services company located in Lviv, Ukraine. Exoft builds robust web and mobile solutions with a focus on increasing clients' efficiency and solving technology challenges. 

• Challenge: Zhyvko began a new assignment with an IT client previously managed by another project manager. Zhyvko learned the IT client didn't want to hear about Agile methodology or process at Exoft; he simply wanted to complete his project ASAP. 
• Solution: Zhyvko immediately requested a kick-off conference call. During the call, she discussed the goal and purpose of the project and clarified the main issues that were creating stress points. After the call, Zhyvko gathered the team and included Exoft's CTO. The weaknesses of the client's planning and reporting systems became apparent, and Zhyvko offered the solution: Agile, after all. The team used a mix of Scrum and Kanban to replace Waterfall , which wasn't the right approach for the nature and goals of the project. They divided the project's scope into milestones and sprints, then switched the look of the workboard in Jira. Zhyvko supplied the client with a process improvement proposal and SOW with all the features he wanted. Zhyvko explained how the project's formal change request procedure worked and shared the documentation, so the client could clearly understand the development process, which they accepted and signed.
• Takeaway: After three months, when two milestones were closed, the client was pleased with the deliveries and the Scrum working process. The project concluded after milestone 11 with a client who was pleased with the outcome. His startup is growing extremely fast, and the company and Zhyvko have an excellent relationship. Solid planning, reporting, and communication can turn around even the most complex project management challenge.

Examples of Successful Completed Business Projects

Efficiently reaching project objectives is a key element of project management success. Efficiency relates to how the project’s limited resources are managed to meet its goals while building good relationships with internal and external stakeholders.

Whirlpool: Regional Alignment for Smoother Operations

Thiago Zapparoli is a Senior Planning Engineer at Whirlpool Corporation . The global home appliance company relies on regional project managers to manage its extensive portfolio.

• Challenge: When you're responsible for managing a project portfolio of a global home appliance company — including approximately 400 individual projects across five worldwide regions — you need a comprehensive system to keep everything on track. That's why Zapparoli looked for a way to get project managers, leadership, and other stakeholders on the same page with the laundry and dryer portfolio he manages.
• Solution: Zapparoli knew he needed an effective and unique system for all project managers to aggregate the 400 projects that covered multiple regions around the globe. At a minimum, the project management system needed to identify responsibilities for each project and task; key performance indicators; and open, completed, and delayed tasks. Smartsheet offered an all-up view of an entire region, providing real-time visibility into the overall project status and numerous tasks. First deployed in Brazil, the holistic tracker transformed how the 10 project managers and cross-functional leaders in that region approach their daily work and stay in sync.
• Takeaway: After implementations in Brazil and the United States, Zapparoli’s Smartsheet trackers are used in all three remaining regions and assisted deployment in four other Whirlpool internal organizations. Project managers are engaged because they have control over projects. Cross-functional leaders are satisfied with the visibility, and senior leadership can now see how they can help.

Simplus: Improved Sales Process

Katherine Albiston is a Content Manager for Simplus , an Infosys company that provides a strategic, industry-focused digital transformation for customers in the Salesforce ecosystem. She shares how Simplus’ customer Ziehm Imaging needed to improve its sales process to garner maximum efficiency and profits, as well as the company’s solution for them.

• Challenge: Simplus customer Ziehm Imaging, Inc. was using a legacy configure, price, quote (CPQ) system process for defining new products or modifying bundles. As a result, it took up to a week to go to market. A Microsoft Excel-based process further complicated managing market-specific annual pricing updates, which required a manual price override to apply pricing for each segment. The manual work increased errors, eroded margins, and led to customer communications about pricing adjustments – not good for relationships. 
• Solution: Simplus simplified Ziehm's bundle configuration process and centralized compatibility management rules. It now uses a lookup-based rules setup for products that enforces business policies in real time as sales reps interact with the CPQ system. 
• Takeaway: Streamlining and installing coherent systems decreased Ziehm's quote creation time by 93 percent, troubleshooting time by 87 percent, and the time to add products by approximately 87 percent. The lesson is clear: A holistic approach to process improvement can reap impressive benefits.

designdough: A More Refined Recruitment Process

Molly Govus is the Marketing Manager of designdough , a full-service U.K. design firm. The company tightened its use of project and time management tools to run projects and realized it needed to do the same for managing internal projects.

• Challenge: designdough audited its recruitment process and discovered four key issues: Permanent and temporary staffing ebb and flow was always in flux depending on client project demands. There were no clear start-to-finish timescales, and they lacked transparency with staff regarding project timescales. Staff capacity related to assigned tasks was unclear. Finally, the firm lacked designated client communication points.  
• Solution: They started by planning and documenting every resource and task using a project management tool that provided visibility for all team members. They wanted to clarify the audit's issues and organize information and project processes around recruiting by implementing clearly delineated stages (Administration, Interview, Offer, Induction, and Confirmation). Now, they set start dates for each step and complete tasks before moving to the next stage. Additionally, they add relevant tags, such as meeting , to tasks so they can easily identify who is assigned the task assignment and dates attached to every job. 
• Takeaway: Thanks to a straightforward process and an efficient project management tool, the team met its recruitment project goals. They now encounter fewer bottlenecks and have an easier recruitment process that has improved staff and client satisfaction and relationships.

What Is the Measure of Project Success?

The measure of project success is meeting the initial criteria established by the internal or external client and the project team. Teams use these specs, milestones, and deliverables to evaluate a project after it closes. 

“Project managers are experts at helping people define problems,” notes J. Scott, CEO of 120VC and author of The Irreverent Guide to Project Management . “Data drives and measures success to control the outcome and move the project forward as aggressively as possible, leaving no time or money on the table.”

In its 2020 report, “Ahead of the Curve: Forging a Future Focused Culture,” the Project Management Institute (PMI) found that organizations that operated from mature ROI capabilities geared toward meeting strategic goals, working within predetermined budgets, delivered segments and the entire project on time with limited scope creep . High-maturity companies had 50 percent fewer project failures than low-maturity organizations.      

A success measurement framework includes:

• Buy-In: Worthy projects and outstanding ideas can fail if critical stakeholders aren't behind the effort. With buy-in, resources will be available, and you can move the project forward.
• Strategic Approach: One of the best ways to guarantee buy-in is to make a business case that shows how the project fits into overall company goals and will positively impact the organization’s future. According to an article on the six questions to ask before starting a big project in the Harvard Business Review, a good distribution of resources is 60 percent in support of the core business, 30 percent in the adjacent business area, and 10 percent unrelated to your core business.
• Meticulous Planning: Completing projects on budget and on schedule relies on thorough advanced planning. Professional planning includes defining the scope and objectives of the project and operating from an understanding of the resource and budget limitations that affect your project. 
• Continuous Monitoring: Once the project begins, it's essential to monitor all activities, resources, and expenditures almost constantly. You will likely find that you’ll need to make adjustments to some elements in every project. You will want to monitor the execution of tasks against milestones, keep an eye on quality, track whether you are on schedule, and verify money is spent according to plan. 
• Make Relationships a Priority: Stay in touch with clients, vendors, and internal team members to stay informed about project status and build relationships. Once the project concludes, check in with stakeholders to see what worked and what didn't so that you can apply winning strategies and tactics to subsequent projects.

Setting Success Metrics

For the best results, the only way to measure project failure or success is by collecting and tracking data from the first day until the project closes. "You can't manage what you don't measure" is Peter Drucker’s time-honored adage for setting project success metrics. 

Management consultant Drucker's gold standard in project management metrics is his specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time-bound goals framework, known as SMART . To start setting those strategic types of project metrics, the Performance Management Institute (PMI) suggests asking three questions to inform the metrics you will use to measure the success of your project .

 The key questions to help set metrics are the following:

• Why is the project needed? Understand the purpose or goal of the project or work.
• What are the success factors? Determine what critical success factors are mandatory for you to succeed and achieve the goal.
• What are the metrics? Identify how you will measure the fulfillment for each critical success factor for the project or program, and collect and share data.

Common Project Management Success Metrics

Metrics for on-target project management track productivity, assess resource utilization, monitor the scope of work changes, and measure quality. Assuring a low number of defects throughout the project and providing a quality deliverable at its end should be a metric for any project. 

Examples of crucial project metrics include the following:

• Resource Utilization: This metric assesses how individual team members or the project team spend their time against the total number of hours allocated for the project. Periodically checking time spent on the project can help assess how human energy is being used. For organizations that bill hours, this is an important metric to monitor and review at the end of a project.
• Schedule Variance: This metric helps project managers determine if projects are running according to the planned budget or ahead of it. A negative schedule variance means the project is behind schedule.
• Cost Performance: This metric measures efficiency. Divide the work performed or earned value by how much money it took to accomplish tasks. Accurate budget estimates rely on forecasting cost performance. 
• Cost Variance: This metric pinpoints how you are operating within a planned budget. The purpose is to see if you are running below or within budget. If cost variance is negative, the project is over budget. If it’s under budget, that means you are achieving budget and project success.
• Gross Margin: A strategically planned project aims to contribute to the company by increasing profits. The gross margin is the difference between the total income and total project spend. It’s best to establish the gross target margin before a project begins and measure it on an ongoing basis. Achieving or exceeding a gross margin is the primary mark of project management excellence.

With project metrics in place and the right tools to track that data, it is easier to crunch the numbers on previous projects to see what went right and what task ended up causing a significant delay.

What Skills and Tools Support Project Management Success?

You need various tools and skills to guide projects to the desired goal. Soft skills are people skills or emotional intelligence. Hard skills are specific to project managers and can be learned through formal training or on the job. 

The exact project management techniques and tools you need depend on your industry, company, and team preferences. The vital foundation for success is to create your project plan and lean into best practices that focus on organization, communication, and team leadership. "There are many methodologies project managers employ," says 120VC’s J. Scott. "Waterfall, Agile, Lean, and more – but the most important skill to have is leadership and a people-centric framework since it is people that get [expletive] done.”

Project management skills and tools to help you meet project management challenges – and win –  include the following:

• Soft Skills: Soft skills are interpersonal skills such as communication, flexibility, leadership, teamwork, and time management.
• Project Management Tools: Tools is another word for software. Purpose-built project management software supports teams in the planning, tracking, and managing of projects to meet stated goals on time and within budget. These also serve as a repository for data that will inform the post-project analysis.
• Project Management Methodologies and Frameworks: The Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK) Guide describes all the PM methodologies and techniques available to manage projects. Project managers choose frameworks such as Critical Chain Project Management, Lean, Scrum, and Waterfall for their projects.

Reasons Projects Fail and How Modern Project Software Supports Success

Projects fail for many reasons. Those include inadequate preparation, poor documentation and tracking, and poor communication. Modern project software can help solve those problems and support success. 

"Project management, particularly at the enterprise scale, is about getting to desired outcomes as efficiently as possible under any conditions," says 120VC's Scott. "You must be agile (with a lowercase a) to get things done to reach those outcomes." Modern software is the way forward.

“IT projects have an exceptionally high failure rate of 44 percent,” says Scott. “These projects fail due to a lack of alignment between business and project objectives. As software project failure statistics show, the lack of alignment of projects with the business objectives is why nearly half of the strategic initiatives fail.”

5 Famous Project Management Failures and How They Could Have Been Solved

Project management failures are part of most projects. The key is to learn from past failures and track projects closely to get back on track when things go awry. 

1. Citibank Interest Payment Failure Citibank intended to make a $7.8 million interest payment to creditors of its client Revlon. Instead, the company paid $900 million because of errors due to aging software. Citibank's employees set up a transaction as if they were paying off the entire loan to calculate the interest correctly, then check numerous boxes to deliver the majority of the sum to an internal Citibank account. Three different people signed off on this transaction, most of which wasn't due to creditors until 2023, but the Citibank employees didn’t check all the proper boxes. Creditors kept more than $500 million of the payment. A judge ruled that they didn't have to return the money because he said it was not believable that one of the largest and most sophisticated financial institutions on earth could make such a mistake. 

• Takeaway: The big lesson is to modernize your software and user interfaces, so employees can perform their duties in a streamlined, logical fashion. Remember: You might suffer less when you make mistakes if people aren't angry enough to take advantage of those errors.

2. J.C. Penney Rebrand Failure Ron Johnson, who has a successful branding track record, took over as J.C. Penney's CEO in 2011. Johnson's "cheap chic" rebranding for Target was enormously successful, as was his previous work with Apple to generate its outstanding and consistent brand experience. Defying expectations, Johnson's rebrand for Penney's was a dismal failure. His goal was to revitalize the chain by making "hip" changes. He wanted to shake things up at the company by doing away with sales and coupons, nixing some of the legacy merchandise, and modernizing the store’s physical layout. It failed miserably. Revenues dropped from an already low level, and after 17 months, Johnson was out.

• Takeaway: No matter how cool or innovative a new brand concept seems, robust market research is mandatory. J.C. Penney's poor financial state forced Johnson to act too quickly. As such, he failed to align the likes and dislikes of J.C. Penney's loyal existing customer base with new tactics. That's not to say the change involved in rebranding has to be totally at the mercy of your customers' extant preferences. When a brand has long-standing customer favorite factors such as discounts and coupons, it may be best to roll out changes slowly rather than all at once to acclimate existing customers to a new direction.

3. McDonald's Arch Deluxe Burger The fast food giant put an unprecedented $150 million into advertising for the Arch Deluxe Burger, only to discover its customers weren't interested in the sophisticated, ”gourmet” menu option. Mistakes include marketing to a new, disinterested Gen X demographic while neglecting the brand's core audience, overpricing the burger to cover the additional costs it took to create, and franchisee disinterest. 

• Takeaway: The message is to never ignore your buying base and pick the right metrics when you start and run a project. If McDonald's had a more accurate picture of what its customers wanted and conducted more testing with existing customers, the company could have saved its money, resources, and reputation. 

4. Dyson Electric Car James Dyson spent a small fortune – more than $600 million – on a seven-seat electric car with a 600-mile range. Then Dyson scrapped it before the prototype ever hit the road. Electric vehicles are costly, and the battery, battery management, electronics, and cooling system are much more expensive than an internal combustion engine. Tesla — hailed as a success by many — has burned through $19 billion of investor cash and is still not profitable. It turned out that each Dyson would have had to fetch roughly $183 million to break even. 

• Takeaway: The British government wants to ban sales of all fossil-fuel cars by 2035, so Dyson shifted its focus. The company continues to work on solid-state battery manufacturing. Solid-state batteries are the key to making electric vehicles functional and desirable. Highly efficient, as well as smaller and lighter than ion batteries, solid-state batteries generate less heat and are easier to recycle. Dyson says he could return to electric vehicle production when commercial and financial circumstances change.

5. Coca-Cola and New Coke The company tested New Coke with 200,000 consumers. Most people who tried it preferred New Coke over the traditional product. Based on that information, Coca-Cola launched New Coke in 1985. But the new product did not sell, and product loyalty and people’s old-fashioned habits got in the way. The cost to the company was $30 million in unsellable backstock and $4 million lost to development. New Coke remains one of the most famous failures in marketing history.

• Takeaway: While Coca-Cola researched the market, it missed the mark when assessing the power of brand loyalty. Understanding customers is imperative in product development. Ensure your information is comprehensive and those insights are realistic and accurate.

How Modern Project Management Software Cures Common Project Woes

Modern project management software provides real-time visibility into work conducted across projects, programs, and processes. Store, track, manage, and automatically report on all work, so you can save time and help your team focus on the work that matters most.

Take Charge of Your Next Project with Real-Time Work Management in Smartsheet

From simple task management and project planning to complex resource and portfolio management, Smartsheet helps you improve collaboration and increase work velocity -- empowering you to get more done. 

The Smartsheet platform makes it easy to plan, capture, manage, and report on work from anywhere, helping your team be more effective and get more done. Report on key metrics and get real-time visibility into work as it happens with roll-up reports, dashboards, and automated workflows built to keep your team connected and informed.

When teams have clarity into the work getting done, there’s no telling how much more they can accomplish in the same amount of time. Try Smartsheet for free, today.

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Project Management Study Case

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Introduction Project management is an essential discipline in today's business world, and understanding it through case studies can offer valuable insights. A case study is a detailed investigation of a specific project, allowing us to analyze its different aspects, such as planning, execution, and evaluation. It provides practical examples that aid in comprehending theoretical concepts and applying them effectively. In this article, we'll delve into this topic and offer tips and common error-prone cases to consider.

• Understanding a Project Management Case Study

Table of Contents

Importance of Studying Project Management Case Studies

Analyzing a project management case study, common mistakes in project management and how to avoid them, tips for studying project management case studies.

• A project management case study revolves around a real-life or hypothetical project. It describes the project's background, process, and outcome, providing the opportunity to evaluate its successes and shortcomings.
• The case study may describe various aspects of the project, such as its objectives, stakeholders, timeline, budget, risks, and results. The goal is to present a comprehensive picture of the project and its management.
• Case studies provide practical examples that enhance understanding. They can illustrate how project management theories and techniques are applied in real situations, thus supplementing textbook learning.
• Through case studies, students can learn from others' experiences. They can see how different project managers handled various challenges, what strategies worked, and what mistakes were made.
• To analyze a case study, start by reading it thoroughly to understand the project's context. Note the project's objectives, stakeholders, resources, constraints, and results.
• Identify the project management techniques used and assess their effectiveness. Consider whether different approaches could have led to better outcomes.
• Reflect on the lessons learned from the project. What can be applied to future projects? What mistakes should be avoided?
• Lack of clear objectives: A common mistake is not defining clear and measurable goals at the project's outset. To avoid this, ensure that project objectives are SMART – Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound.
• Poor communication: Miscommunication can lead to misunderstandings, conflicts, and project failures. To prevent this, establish clear communication channels and ensure regular updates among all stakeholders.
• Inadequate risk management: Many projects fail due to unforeseen problems. To mitigate this, conduct a thorough risk assessment at the project's beginning and devise appropriate risk management strategies.
• Take notes: While reading the case study, jot down key points. This will help you remember important details and make your analysis more effective.
• Discuss with peers: Case studies can be complex, and discussing them with others can provide new perspectives. Try to engage in group discussions or forums.
• Apply to real-world situations: Try to relate what you learn from the case study to real-life scenarios. This will help you understand the practical application of project management theories and techniques.
• Project Management

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Methodology

• What Is a Case Study? | Definition, Examples & Methods

What Is a Case Study? | Definition, Examples & Methods

Published on May 8, 2019 by Shona McCombes . Revised on November 20, 2023.

A case study is a detailed study of a specific subject, such as a person, group, place, event, organization, or phenomenon. Case studies are commonly used in social, educational, clinical, and business research.

A case study research design usually involves qualitative methods , but quantitative methods are sometimes also used. Case studies are good for describing , comparing, evaluating and understanding different aspects of a research problem .

Table of contents

When to do a case study, step 1: select a case, step 2: build a theoretical framework, step 3: collect your data, step 4: describe and analyze the case, other interesting articles.

A case study is an appropriate research design when you want to gain concrete, contextual, in-depth knowledge about a specific real-world subject. It allows you to explore the key characteristics, meanings, and implications of the case.

Case studies are often a good choice in a thesis or dissertation . They keep your project focused and manageable when you don’t have the time or resources to do large-scale research.

You might use just one complex case study where you explore a single subject in depth, or conduct multiple case studies to compare and illuminate different aspects of your research problem.

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Once you have developed your problem statement and research questions , you should be ready to choose the specific case that you want to focus on. A good case study should have the potential to:

• Provide new or unexpected insights into the subject
• Challenge or complicate existing assumptions and theories
• Propose practical courses of action to resolve a problem
• Open up new directions for future research

TipIf your research is more practical in nature and aims to simultaneously investigate an issue as you solve it, consider conducting action research instead.

Unlike quantitative or experimental research , a strong case study does not require a random or representative sample. In fact, case studies often deliberately focus on unusual, neglected, or outlying cases which may shed new light on the research problem.

Example of an outlying case studyIn the 1960s the town of Roseto, Pennsylvania was discovered to have extremely low rates of heart disease compared to the US average. It became an important case study for understanding previously neglected causes of heart disease.

However, you can also choose a more common or representative case to exemplify a particular category, experience or phenomenon.

Example of a representative case studyIn the 1920s, two sociologists used Muncie, Indiana as a case study of a typical American city that supposedly exemplified the changing culture of the US at the time.

While case studies focus more on concrete details than general theories, they should usually have some connection with theory in the field. This way the case study is not just an isolated description, but is integrated into existing knowledge about the topic. It might aim to:

• Exemplify a theory by showing how it explains the case under investigation
• Expand on a theory by uncovering new concepts and ideas that need to be incorporated
• Challenge a theory by exploring an outlier case that doesn’t fit with established assumptions

To ensure that your analysis of the case has a solid academic grounding, you should conduct a literature review of sources related to the topic and develop a theoretical framework . This means identifying key concepts and theories to guide your analysis and interpretation.

There are many different research methods you can use to collect data on your subject. Case studies tend to focus on qualitative data using methods such as interviews , observations , and analysis of primary and secondary sources (e.g., newspaper articles, photographs, official records). Sometimes a case study will also collect quantitative data.

Example of a mixed methods case studyFor a case study of a wind farm development in a rural area, you could collect quantitative data on employment rates and business revenue, collect qualitative data on local people’s perceptions and experiences, and analyze local and national media coverage of the development.

The aim is to gain as thorough an understanding as possible of the case and its context.

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In writing up the case study, you need to bring together all the relevant aspects to give as complete a picture as possible of the subject.

How you report your findings depends on the type of research you are doing. Some case studies are structured like a standard scientific paper or thesis , with separate sections or chapters for the methods , results and discussion .

Others are written in a more narrative style, aiming to explore the case from various angles and analyze its meanings and implications (for example, by using textual analysis or discourse analysis ).

In all cases, though, make sure to give contextual details about the case, connect it back to the literature and theory, and discuss how it fits into wider patterns or debates.

If you want to know more about statistics , methodology , or research bias , make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples.

• Normal distribution
• Degrees of freedom
• Null hypothesis
• Discourse analysis
• Control groups
• Mixed methods research
• Non-probability sampling
• Quantitative research
• Ecological validity

Research bias

• Rosenthal effect
• Implicit bias
• Cognitive bias
• Selection bias
• Negativity bias
• Status quo bias

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Case Studies

Learn about the people behind the projects, the projects they deliver and the organisations raising the bar of project professionalism. We recognise what people can achieve through project management, and have been celebrating excellence in the profession for over 20 years.

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What is Project Management? Definition, Types & Examples

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Project Management is the application of specific knowledge, skills, methodologies, and techniques aimed at achieving specific and measurable project goals, including, ultimately, successful project completion. It differs from general “management” because project management relates directly to the goals and time-bound objectives achieved within the scope of a project itself, on a limited timeline, rather than an ongoing one.

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What is a Project?

A project is a temporary, time-bound sequence of tasks that aim to achieve a particular goal. Projects bring together the talents of multiple team members in order to deliver a tangible result or outcome over a predetermined span of time. Often, projects involve the work of multiple individuals, across numerous areas of expertise, requiring an upfront investment in time and resources. 

What is a Project Manager?

Project managers take ownership over the entirety of the project lifecycle from start to finish, from directing team efforts to navigating day-to-day challenges, implementing project management strategies, and more. Ultimately, they are responsible for the successful competition of the project and the distribution of key deliverables and project outcomes. 

Responsibilities of a Project Manager

Project managers are responsible for a wide range of project-related duties, including but not limited to:

• Establishing and managing the project timeline 
• Assigning project tasks and delegating responsibilities to team members
• Communicating with key stakeholders
• Executing each phase of the project
• Facilitating team adaptation of project management aids and tools (such as project management software, and Gantt charts)
• Monitoring the project budget and project scope, preventing cost or scope overruns
• Troubleshoot and mitigate potential roadblocks and issues 
• Establishing set meeting schedules and facilitating team discussions
• Monitoring ongoing project progress
• Concluding the project lifecycle with relevant end-of-project responsibilities, including facilitating project reviews, and turning over deliverables

Essential Skills of a Project Manager

Project managers handle a wide variety of project-related responsibilities and duties, and understandably, need to wield a broad and flexible skillset. Some of the essential skills a project manager should possess include the following: 

Examples of Project Management

In order to better conceptualize what project management is, it’s helpful to understand how project management plays out in real-life applications. Here are a few examples of how project management is used across various industries every day: 

Example One: Project Management in Construction

In 2005, BAA Airports Ltd. was presented with an enormous task: remodeling Terminal 1 within Heathrow Airport, the busiest international airport in the world while keeping the terminal open to the 20 million annual travelers that pass through the airport. The project was extremely complex, and made even more challenging by a strict deadline and significant public health concerns, given the construction project was taking place within an active terminal. 

Throughout the project lifecycle, David Buisson, PMP, and the project manager in charge of the Heathrow renovation project, encountered many unexpected obstacles, including asbestos in the ceiling and inconsistencies with the floor level. Buisson and his team were able to properly navigate project challenges, operational risk, and communication management with key stakeholders. They successfully delivered the project on time and on budget—without any major mishaps—utilizing the PMBOK Guide from the Project Management Institute, the standard guide for project management professionals.

The 2005 renovation of Heathrow Airport Terminal 1 is widely considered one of the most successful case studies in construction project management to date. 

Example Two: Project Management in Healthcare

During the Covid-19 pandemic, pharmaceutical and biotechnology company, AstraZeneca partnered with the University of Oxford to address the international need for a vaccine. The research partners at Oxford University had begun showing promising research around an early vaccine option. Paired with AstraZeneca’s manufacturing capabilities and global supply chain experience, it was a no-brainer for the two entities to pair up to address the pandemic. 

However, the partnership would face numerous challenges throughout the project lifecycle, including, most notably, a highly unpredictable and rapidly evolving public health crisis. Adaptability had to be the name of the game, and the structured guidelines of project management provided a baseline for the team to work from. Ultimately, the project was an overwhelming success, with over 1 billion doses of the vaccine delivered to over 170 countries.

Example Three: Project Management in Aerospace Technology

The Mars Pathfinder Mission began in 1996 as a result of budget cuts within NASA, shifting the organization’s focus to projects that could be completed “faster, better, and cheaper.” The goal was to spend less than $150 million dollars on the project in total and implement it within 36 months. Based on the initial goals established by NASA, just getting the spacecraft to Mars and landing it in one piece would have been a success. 

Instead, by the time the project reached completion in September 1997, the Mars Pathfinder returned 2.3 billion bits of information, including more than 16,500 images from the lander and 550 images from the rover, as well as more than 15 chemical analyses of rocks and soil and extensive data on winds and other weather taking place on Mars. Ultimately, the project was such an exemplary example of project management at work that it won the Project Management Institute’s coveted ‘‘Project of the Year Award’’ for 1998. 

Phases of Project Management 

Check out the video below for an in-depth walkthrough of the five phases of the project management lifecycle. 

• Project Initiation

The project initiation phase focuses on establishing a high-level vision for the project while securing approvals from sanctioning stakeholders. This phase is not meant to dive into excessive detail, but rather to get the ball rolling and get the team thinking about what is to come. 

• Project Planning

During the project planning phase, teams build upon the vision established in the initiation phase in much more detail. First, teams must answer a few essential questions surrounding what the project will aim to accomplish, how the project will be carried out, when it will begin, on what timeline, and how project success will be measured. Once those initial questions have been answered, teams can dive into building out project infrastructure, covering essential topics such as:

• Project scope
• Deliverables
• Key stakeholders
• Goals and milestones
• Resources needed (internally and externally)
• Project timeline
• Potential risks or roadblocks
• Dependencies
• End of project outcomes
• Project Execution

The project execution phase is the starring act of the project, and where most of the deliverables come from. During this phase, the project manager(s) coach and guide the team to present essential project deliverables while keeping stakeholders in the loop and monitoring progress against key milestones and KPIs. Throughout the project execution phase, project management systems, such as project management software, can make life easier by keeping track of deadlines and deliverables, serving as a platform for team member collaboration, and more. 

• Project Monitoring 

During the monitoring phase, the project manager(s) keep tabs on the progress of the project overall and the status of the team. Whether teams are on track and delivering stellar results or struggling with roadblocks and challenges, the project manager can help eliminate stressors, solve problems, and communicate updates with key stakeholders.

• Project Closure

The closing phase of the project lifecycle is a time for wrapping up project activities, delivering project deliverables and outcomes, and reflecting on the wins and losses of the project overall. Communication is key within this final phase, where team members have an opportunity to reflect and celebrate. 

Download Our FREE Project Lifecycle Guide

Read more: 5 phases of project management life cycle you need to know, project management methodologies & frameworks.

Project management methodologies establish a guiding set of rules and principles that teams can implement in order to achieve greater efficiency while maximizing positive project outcomes. Each methodology approaches project management through a slightly different lens, providing teams with a specific set of repeatable steps to follow throughout the project lifecycle. Methodologies are rigid and cannot be used in combination with other methodologies.

Project management frameworks can exist within methodologies, providing a more focused view of how a methodologies guidelines can be applied and implemented. While the structure and rules follow the teachings of the methodology, frameworks can color in detail how and when those rules are applied in a project setting. 

Project Management Methodologies Agile

Agile project management focuses on an iterative and highly flexible approach to project management that focuses on delivering the project in pieces throughout the project lifecycle, rather than all at once at the project’s conclusion. In Agile project management, teams have more flexibility to adapt to challenges and redirections than in more structured methodologies, such as Waterfall.

Best for: 

• Software development teams
• Teams dealing with high levels of uncertainty
• Teams who are creating prototypes that need multiple levels of edits and changes
• Teams working closely with external parties and stakeholders

Waterfall project management is a traditional approach to project management that involves rigid, sequential project phases. In the waterfall model, each phase of the project must be fully completed before the next phase can begin, and project deliverables are turned over only at the conclusion of the project.

• Projects with a well-defined goal
• Projects with concrete timelines
• Teams who need to define rigid project requirements early on

Project Management Frameworks

Scrum project management, as the name suggests, is inspired by the camaraderie and teamwork of a Rugby team within the Agile methodology. Led by a Scrum master, Scrum teams are encouraged to learn through their experiences, self-organize as they problem-solve, and progress throughout the project lifecycle. 

• Smaller teams tackling numerous unknowns and ever-changing variables

The Kanban framework is a subset of the Agile methodology that emphasizes continuous improvement and flexible task management. In the Kanban framework, teams utilize Kanban boards, vertical boards that separate individual task cards into categories based on their status in the project lifecycle (for example: “not started,” “in progress,” and “completed”). 

• Teams who are new to project management and looking for a simple, organized framework
• Projects with numerous individual tasks and assignments
• Teams who need quick access to a high-level view of task overviews and completion status

Critical Path Method (CPM)

Critical Path Method is a project management framework within the Waterfall methodology that identifies critical and non-critical tasks, prioritizing them based on their importance—eliminating bottlenecks and roadblocks. The CPM method emphasizes the importance of calling out relationships between tasks and task dependencies. 

• Teams managing large, complex projects
• Projects that require a large number of tasks with subtasks and dependencies
• Teams who want to maximize efficiency and prevent roadblocks from the start of the project (especially for projects that have a high likelihood of complication) 

PRojects IN Controlled Environments, or PRINCE2, is a framework within the Waterfall project management methodology that emphasizes organization and control. Frequently used in the UK and internationally, The PRINCE2 model breaks down projects into smaller, more manageable chunks in order to manage risk and resources while clearly defining team roles and responsibilities. 

• Teams who have less experience in project management (PRINCE2 follows clearly defined, easy-to-understand steps)
• Teams who need more clarity around specific role-based responsibilities
• Compartmentalizing project steps and actions

Project Management Tools

Project management software.

Project Management Software helps teams organize all project essentials in one place, while streamlining and simplifying the project management process overall. At every phase of the project lifecycle, project management software supports teams’ ability to assign tasks, manage deadlines, view task dependencies, track team progress against goals, access data insights, and much more. 

Example of a list-style project view in project management software. Source: monday.com, accessed September 2023. 

Read more: 10 Best Project Management Software for 2023

Project management charts , gantt charts.

Gantt charts are one of the most common planning tools in project management. In a timeline-inspired format, Gantt charts highlight tasks against the project timeline, task dependencies, and designated assignees. Gantt charts are useful for teams who want to visualize projects at a high-level view while avoiding resource overload. 

Best for: Visualizing project timelines and task dependencies

Example of a simple Gantt chart. Source: TeamGantt, accessed September 2023. 

Burn-Up/Burn-Down Charts

Burn-up and burn-down charts visually represent how project tasks have been completed across a predetermined timeframe. This type of chart is popular with Scrum teams for tracking work across sprints, as it can easily reveal the total scope of work against items that have been completed or left unfinished. 

Best for: Tracking project progress

Example of a burn down chart. Source: Teamwork, accessed September 2023.

Read more: Best Project Planning Software & Tools

Collaboration tools.

Slack is a communication-focused collaboration software that enables teams to communicate asynchronously through messaging, audio calling, and video conferencing. While many project management software offerings include collaboration features, Slack is a faster solution for teams who need to communicate efficiently as project updates come up.

Example of Slack’s chat functionality, complete with a mobile app option. Source: Slack, accessed September 2023. 

Miro is a collaborative mind-mapping software that can help teams brainstorm throughout the project lifecycle in real-time. The application functions as a virtual whiteboard for teams to map ideas, add digital sticky notes, and plan out timelines.

Example of Miro’s team brainstorming features. Source: Miro, accessed September 2023. 

Read more: Best Collaboration Software & Tools in 2023

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Project management provides structure and accountability to the project process while providing ongoing support to your team by way of a project manager. Here are just a few of the top benefits of project management: 

Project Management Keeps Projects on Track

According to data from Wellingtone, only 43% of projects are finished on time and within budget, and only 29% are on time. Project management structures a plan for teams to stay on time and budget ahead of time, so projects are more likely to go as planned. 

Eliminate Scope Creep

Scope creep occurs when project requirements and frame of work expand over time—and it’s one of the most significant threats to project success, with the Project Management Institute reporting that half of all projects experience scope creep. Projects that adhere to best practices in project management are more likely to stay focused on the initial objectives of the project and, ultimately, experience success. 

Enhanced Resource Management

Project management involves planning and accountability—and that can make resource management much easier. During the initial phases of project planning, teams clearly outline team roles and responsibilities while monitoring individual workloads as work progresses, ensuring that resources are allocated appropriately.

Team Coaching and Coordination

Project management efforts are traditionally led by a project manager, or at the very least, a dedicated team member who oversees team efforts while providing support throughout the project lifecycle. Having a dedicated individual who can monitor project progress, troubleshoot problems, and promote team accountability can help the project process move much more smoothly. 

While every organization’s approach to project management is different, taking stock of your goals can help guide your next move. Take time to reflect on the projects your team has completed previously. What went well? What could have been improved? 

If you don’t have the budget to hire a dedicated project manager, implementing smaller steps, such as taking advantage of a project management software solution, can help your team make big strides toward a strong project management strategy. 

Most teams will require a toolbox of project management aids, rather than a single solution by itself. In order to determine which tools are the best fit for your team, testing is key. A majority of project management software solutions offer free trials and plans, making it easy to test out a variety of options. Other tools, such as charts, planning aids, and mind maps, are free tools that can easily be tested and explored. 

Interested in learning more? Check out our FREE guide on how to choose project management software. 

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Project Management Case Study

A project management case study is a piece of information that showcases a project that the company effectively handled. It describes the organization's issues, the remedies used, and the end outcomes.

 This article offers an overview of a Case Study in Project Management. A project is a collection of coherent activities that are arranged in an ordered fashion, with a great deal of in-depth research and planning to reach the desired outcomes. Simply said, a project contributes to the creation of something distinctive. A project must be well managed in order to be successfully performed. The management and his team, who start a project, develop a procedure that is free of all needless obstacles and can accomplish its objectives within the allotted time frame. This process is known as the project life cycle. Project management employs information, skills, tools, and procedures to design project operations to fulfil the needs of the project.

What is a case study?

A case study is an in-depth investigation of a particular instance in its actual surroundings. It is a piece of information that illuminates the obstacles encountered, the solutions used, and the overall results of a project. Typically, companies use case studies throughout the proposal process. However, they are also posted on company websites to offer prospective with an overview of the brands' capabilities. It may also function as an excellent lead creation tool. In basic terms, case studies are narratives that inform the intended audience about the effective measures and tactics used by an organisation.

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A study of agile adoption was performed on a project to update an old corporate data warehouse. On this project, the team members were working together for the first time. Scrum was used to introduce Agile throughout the project. This case study's data was gathered from three sources: recorded, transcribed, and analysed talks.

Components of a Successful Project case study

By doing a project case study, you may explore a specific project or system in depth. Its purpose is to identify the key challenges of the project and evaluate the acquired material.   Listed below are the primary components that your research must include to be successful.

Identifying the issue for your case study is essential. It is not advisable  to attempt to fit all the concerns you have compiled into a single page when creating this sort of document. Instead, you might consider the primary issue of the topic you're researching. You might begin by questioning various project stakeholders. Thus, you may get a clarification of the actual issue.

The fundamental objective of doing a case study is to provide a solution. It might be a product that your team or a sponsor produces. However, you must be mindful of how you convey your point. You should prioritise offering a genuine solution above promoting the sponsor's goods. For instance, you may provide more authentic possibilities from which customers can choose. In this approach, you will give them the idea that you are trustworthy and upfront with the case study resolution you are proposing.

The last components of your case study should be the consequences and advantages of the product you will be recommending. You may add information such as cost and time savings, loss avoidance, productivity improvement, revenue growth, return on investment (ROI) indicators, and reduction of noncompliance risk.

Case Study Results in Project Management

All of the results were met with mixed emotions. Participants' primary concern was that the scrum approach lacked forethought. Everyone complimented the collaborative and dynamic qualities of the process.

Negative Response

The Big Picture and the Failure to Plan: The majority of participants did not value the lack of an overview. Despite having a case study, the project lacked sufficient planning and execution. Thus, the project's end product was not being determined. The scrum method lacked a project vision and, as a result, lacked a project plan. It was considered that the larger picture was already understood, hence its definition was unnecessary. Despite the existence of a backlog, the scrum method was too comprehensive. Defining the objectives and the overall picture was more crucial than diving immediately into the detailed procedure.

According to the participants, the documentation process was disregarded throughout the scrum process; as a result, the process was disorganised and its needs were not fulfilled. Due to the large number of team interactions, requirements might arise at any moment. In order to circumvent this constraint, team members had to interact by email or orally.

Positive Response

However, a few components of the procedure were praised by the participants.

Team Spirit: During this procedure, members engaged often with one another, which contributed to the development of team spirit. This procedure fostered the character of generosity. The method made the team very dynamic, and all members' perspectives were considered.

Lessons Learned :

The following modifications should be made to make the Agile process more efficient:

• The Agile methodology should be well prepared.
• As a straight change is exceedingly dangerous, agility must be implemented in stages.
• Prior to deciding on a plan, the large picture should be carefully described.
• The Agile implementation must be continuously improved via feedback.

Whether or whether a process is suited for the adoption of the Agile approach must be determined beforehand. Several criteria must be addressed and recognised throughout this examination.

Cultural Fit: The application of the Agile methodology is determined by an organization's culture. Agile is not a panacea; firms with the right culture may achieve success and desired goals to a certain degree, but not entirely. If Agile is inappropriate, it becomes a culture shift rather than an adaptation.

Mature Project Execution: Is your crew punctual with deliveries? Delivery on time is not just a method, but also a culture. Changing the procedure does not ensure consistent delivery each time a product is manufactured. When all interdependent processes are adjusted and enhanced, the process is profitable overall.

Expectations: As the framework sets out just the principles and not the advantages, Agile process expectations should be explicitly articulated. All stakeholders must be contacted and required to participate in the Agile implementation process. This facilitates unanimity on pertinent problems.

Distributed Ambience: Agile implementation requires many partnerships and implementations; thus, if a team is geographically dispersed, its implementation will be challenging. Thus, a dispersed environment makes Agile implementation difficult.

 Project management is a difficult process that involves certain knowledge and abilities; thus, not everyone can become a project manager . There are now courses and programmes designed to educate individuals on the topic of project management. People are gaining tactics for planning and scheduling, as well as abilities for working with groups, organising, motivating, and managing their behaviours. Due to the fact that every project has a certain degree of risk, project managers must be able to anticipate potential hazards and rapidly devise solutions to diverse challenges. This is what makes the project management process: the capacity to execute that lies somewhere between experience and talent, knowledge and intuition, skills and random efforts to complete a task.

 Therefore, if you want a successful career in leadership positions, you need to get started right away. There are several online certificates and courses that can facilitate your travel. You may visit StarAgile to learn about the PMP certification and training that will allow you to grasp the roles and obligations as well as the required skills of project leaders and help you master the ability to write a project report . Then, you will be able to begin your career and ascend to the position of top team leader in huge businesses. This PMP training course will be a great step in your career and you can start your career on a great note and get a pool of opportunities for your bright career.

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How to write a case study — examples, templates, and tools

It’s a marketer’s job to communicate the effectiveness of a product or service to potential and current customers to convince them to buy and keep business moving. One of the best methods for doing this is to share success stories that are relatable to prospects and customers based on their pain points, experiences, and overall needs.

That’s where case studies come in. Case studies are an essential part of a content marketing plan. These in-depth stories of customer experiences are some of the most effective at demonstrating the value of a product or service. Yet many marketers don’t use them, whether because of their regimented formats or the process of customer involvement and approval.

A case study is a powerful tool for showcasing your hard work and the success your customer achieved. But writing a great case study can be difficult if you’ve never done it before or if it’s been a while. This guide will show you how to write an effective case study and provide real-world examples and templates that will keep readers engaged and support your business.

In this article, you’ll learn:

What is a case study?

How to write a case study, case study templates, case study examples, case study tools.

A case study is the detailed story of a customer’s experience with a product or service that demonstrates their success and often includes measurable outcomes. Case studies are used in a range of fields and for various reasons, from business to academic research. They’re especially impactful in marketing as brands work to convince and convert consumers with relatable, real-world stories of actual customer experiences.

The best case studies tell the story of a customer’s success, including the steps they took, the results they achieved, and the support they received from a brand along the way. To write a great case study, you need to:

• Celebrate the customer and make them — not a product or service — the star of the story.
• Craft the story with specific audiences or target segments in mind so that the story of one customer will be viewed as relatable and actionable for another customer.
• Write copy that is easy to read and engaging so that readers will gain the insights and messages intended.
• Follow a standardized format that includes all of the essentials a potential customer would find interesting and useful.
• Support all of the claims for success made in the story with data in the forms of hard numbers and customer statements.

Case studies are a type of review but more in depth, aiming to show — rather than just tell — the positive experiences that customers have with a brand. Notably, 89% of consumers read reviews before deciding to buy, and 79% view case study content as part of their purchasing process. When it comes to B2B sales, 52% of buyers rank case studies as an important part of their evaluation process.

Telling a brand story through the experience of a tried-and-true customer matters. The story is relatable to potential new customers as they imagine themselves in the shoes of the company or individual featured in the case study. Showcasing previous customers can help new ones see themselves engaging with your brand in the ways that are most meaningful to them.

Besides sharing the perspective of another customer, case studies stand out from other content marketing forms because they are based on evidence. Whether pulling from client testimonials or data-driven results, case studies tend to have more impact on new business because the story contains information that is both objective (data) and subjective (customer experience) — and the brand doesn’t sound too self-promotional.

Case studies are unique in that there’s a fairly standardized format for telling a customer’s story. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t room for creativity. It’s all about making sure that teams are clear on the goals for the case study — along with strategies for supporting content and channels — and understanding how the story fits within the framework of the company’s overall marketing goals.

Here are the basic steps to writing a good case study.

1. Identify your goal

Start by defining exactly who your case study will be designed to help. Case studies are about specific instances where a company works with a customer to achieve a goal. Identify which customers are likely to have these goals, as well as other needs the story should cover to appeal to them.

The answer is often found in one of the buyer personas that have been constructed as part of your larger marketing strategy. This can include anything from new leads generated by the marketing team to long-term customers that are being pressed for cross-sell opportunities. In all of these cases, demonstrating value through a relatable customer success story can be part of the solution to conversion.

2. Choose your client or subject

Who you highlight matters. Case studies tie brands together that might otherwise not cross paths. A writer will want to ensure that the highlighted customer aligns with their own company’s brand identity and offerings. Look for a customer with positive name recognition who has had great success with a product or service and is willing to be an advocate.

The client should also match up with the identified target audience. Whichever company or individual is selected should be a reflection of other potential customers who can see themselves in similar circumstances, having the same problems and possible solutions.

Some of the most compelling case studies feature customers who:

• Switch from one product or service to another while naming competitors that missed the mark.
• Experience measurable results that are relatable to others in a specific industry.
• Represent well-known brands and recognizable names that are likely to compel action.
• Advocate for a product or service as a champion and are well-versed in its advantages.

Whoever or whatever customer is selected, marketers must ensure they have the permission of the company involved before getting started. Some brands have strict review and approval procedures for any official marketing or promotional materials that include their name. Acquiring those approvals in advance will prevent any miscommunication or wasted effort if there is an issue with their legal or compliance teams.

3. Conduct research and compile data

Substantiating the claims made in a case study — either by the marketing team or customers themselves — adds validity to the story. To do this, include data and feedback from the client that defines what success looks like. This can be anything from demonstrating return on investment (ROI) to a specific metric the customer was striving to improve. Case studies should prove how an outcome was achieved and show tangible results that indicate to the customer that your solution is the right one.

This step could also include customer interviews. Make sure that the people being interviewed are key stakeholders in the purchase decision or deployment and use of the product or service that is being highlighted. Content writers should work off a set list of questions prepared in advance. It can be helpful to share these with the interviewees beforehand so they have time to consider and craft their responses. One of the best interview tactics to keep in mind is to ask questions where yes and no are not natural answers. This way, your subject will provide more open-ended responses that produce more meaningful content.

4. Choose the right format

There are a number of different ways to format a case study. Depending on what you hope to achieve, one style will be better than another. However, there are some common elements to include, such as:

• An engaging headline
• A subject and customer introduction
• The unique challenge or challenges the customer faced
• The solution the customer used to solve the problem
• The results achieved
• Data and statistics to back up claims of success
• A strong call to action (CTA) to engage with the vendor

It’s also important to note that while case studies are traditionally written as stories, they don’t have to be in a written format. Some companies choose to get more creative with their case studies and produce multimedia content, depending on their audience and objectives. Case study formats can include traditional print stories, interactive web or social content, data-heavy infographics, professionally shot videos, podcasts, and more.

5. Write your case study

We’ll go into more detail later about how exactly to write a case study, including templates and examples. Generally speaking, though, there are a few things to keep in mind when writing your case study.

• Be clear and concise. Readers want to get to the point of the story quickly and easily, and they’ll be looking to see themselves reflected in the story right from the start.
• Provide a big picture. Always make sure to explain who the client is, their goals, and how they achieved success in a short introduction to engage the reader.
• Construct a clear narrative. Stick to the story from the perspective of the customer and what they needed to solve instead of just listing product features or benefits.
• Leverage graphics. Incorporating infographics, charts, and sidebars can be a more engaging and eye-catching way to share key statistics and data in readable ways.
• Offer the right amount of detail. Most case studies are one or two pages with clear sections that a reader can skim to find the information most important to them.
• Include data to support claims. Show real results — both facts and figures and customer quotes — to demonstrate credibility and prove the solution works.

6. Promote your story

Marketers have a number of options for distribution of a freshly minted case study. Many brands choose to publish case studies on their website and post them on social media. This can help support SEO and organic content strategies while also boosting company credibility and trust as visitors see that other businesses have used the product or service.

Marketers are always looking for quality content they can use for lead generation. Consider offering a case study as gated content behind a form on a landing page or as an offer in an email message. One great way to do this is to summarize the content and tease the full story available for download after the user takes an action.

Sales teams can also leverage case studies, so be sure they are aware that the assets exist once they’re published. Especially when it comes to larger B2B sales, companies often ask for examples of similar customer challenges that have been solved.

Now that you’ve learned a bit about case studies and what they should include, you may be wondering how to start creating great customer story content. Here are a couple of templates you can use to structure your case study.

Template 1 — Challenge-solution-result format

• Start with an engaging title. This should be fewer than 70 characters long for SEO best practices. One of the best ways to approach the title is to include the customer’s name and a hint at the challenge they overcame in the end.
• Create an introduction. Lead with an explanation as to who the customer is, the need they had, and the opportunity they found with a specific product or solution. Writers can also suggest the success the customer experienced with the solution they chose.
• Present the challenge. This should be several paragraphs long and explain the problem the customer faced and the issues they were trying to solve. Details should tie into the company’s products and services naturally. This section needs to be the most relatable to the reader so they can picture themselves in a similar situation.
• Share the solution. Explain which product or service offered was the ideal fit for the customer and why. Feel free to delve into their experience setting up, purchasing, and onboarding the solution.
• Explain the results. Demonstrate the impact of the solution they chose by backing up their positive experience with data. Fill in with customer quotes and tangible, measurable results that show the effect of their choice.
• Ask for action. Include a CTA at the end of the case study that invites readers to reach out for more information, try a demo, or learn more — to nurture them further in the marketing pipeline. What you ask of the reader should tie directly into the goals that were established for the case study in the first place.

Template 2 — Data-driven format

• Start with an engaging title. Be sure to include a statistic or data point in the first 70 characters. Again, it’s best to include the customer’s name as part of the title.
• Create an overview. Share the customer’s background and a short version of the challenge they faced. Present the reason a particular product or service was chosen, and feel free to include quotes from the customer about their selection process.
• Present data point 1. Isolate the first metric that the customer used to define success and explain how the product or solution helped to achieve this goal. Provide data points and quotes to substantiate the claim that success was achieved.
• Present data point 2. Isolate the second metric that the customer used to define success and explain what the product or solution did to achieve this goal. Provide data points and quotes to substantiate the claim that success was achieved.
• Present data point 3. Isolate the final metric that the customer used to define success and explain what the product or solution did to achieve this goal. Provide data points and quotes to substantiate the claim that success was achieved.
• Summarize the results. Reiterate the fact that the customer was able to achieve success thanks to a specific product or service. Include quotes and statements that reflect customer satisfaction and suggest they plan to continue using the solution.
• Ask for action. Include a CTA at the end of the case study that asks readers to reach out for more information, try a demo, or learn more — to further nurture them in the marketing pipeline. Again, remember that this is where marketers can look to convert their content into action with the customer.

While templates are helpful, seeing a case study in action can also be a great way to learn. Here are some examples of how Adobe customers have experienced success.

Juniper Networks

One example is the Adobe and Juniper Networks case study , which puts the reader in the customer’s shoes. The beginning of the story quickly orients the reader so that they know exactly who the article is about and what they were trying to achieve. Solutions are outlined in a way that shows Adobe Experience Manager is the best choice and a natural fit for the customer. Along the way, quotes from the client are incorporated to help add validity to the statements. The results in the case study are conveyed with clear evidence of scale and volume using tangible data.

The story of Lenovo’s journey with Adobe is one that spans years of planning, implementation, and rollout. The Lenovo case study does a great job of consolidating all of this into a relatable journey that other enterprise organizations can see themselves taking, despite the project size. This case study also features descriptive headers and compelling visual elements that engage the reader and strengthen the content.

Tata Consulting

When it comes to using data to show customer results, this case study does an excellent job of conveying details and numbers in an easy-to-digest manner. Bullet points at the start break up the content while also helping the reader understand exactly what the case study will be about. Tata Consulting used Adobe to deliver elevated, engaging content experiences for a large telecommunications client of its own — an objective that’s relatable for a lot of companies.

Case studies are a vital tool for any marketing team as they enable you to demonstrate the value of your company’s products and services to others. They help marketers do their job and add credibility to a brand trying to promote its solutions by using the experiences and stories of real customers.

When you’re ready to get started with a case study:

• Think about a few goals you’d like to accomplish with your content.
• Make a list of successful clients that would be strong candidates for a case study.
• Reach out to the client to get their approval and conduct an interview.
• Gather the data to present an engaging and effective customer story.

Adobe can help

There are several Adobe products that can help you craft compelling case studies. Adobe Experience Platform helps you collect data and deliver great customer experiences across every channel. Once you’ve created your case studies, Experience Platform will help you deliver the right information to the right customer at the right time for maximum impact.

To learn more, watch the Adobe Experience Platform story .

Keep in mind that the best case studies are backed by data. That’s where Adobe Real-Time Customer Data Platform and Adobe Analytics come into play. With Real-Time CDP, you can gather the data you need to build a great case study and target specific customers to deliver the content to the right audience at the perfect moment.

Watch the Real-Time CDP overview video to learn more.

Finally, Adobe Analytics turns real-time data into real-time insights. It helps your business collect and synthesize data from multiple platforms to make more informed decisions and create the best case study possible.

Request a demo to learn more about Adobe Analytics.

https://business.adobe.com/blog/perspectives/b2b-ecommerce-10-case-studies-inspire-you

https://business.adobe.com/blog/basics/business-case

https://business.adobe.com/blog/basics/what-is-real-time-analytics

Top 10 Project Management Case Studies with Examples!

Real cases are the concrete material for those who want to go into professions. The ten real-world project management case studies with examples look into successful project management strategies and emphasize the need for proper planning, communication, and problem solutions. They show us different sectors of the economy, from technology, construction, health, and many others. The case studies will help you develop a deeper knowledge of how project management tools are implemented in different situations. It doesn’t matter whether you are a project manager or aim to get certified as a PMP ; the case studies will be instrumental in that. Through this analysis, high project management significance is demonstrated and the strategies as well as means of achieving project success become clearer.

Brief Overview of Project Management

Process management involves scheduling, execution, and completion of tasks in a planned and interconnected way to achieve desired goals in a timely. Practical application: utilizing knowledge, resources, and processes to achieve project objectives efficiently. Moreover, project management aims to deliver customized outcomes within specified constraints like scope, time, cost, quality, and risk.

Lastly, the matter fact that effective project management needs good leadership skills, excellent communication, risk management, and the ability to change according to the circumstances becomes vital. Therefore, various project management methodologies , such as Agile, Scrum, and Waterfall, provide frameworks for guiding through their project life cycles.

Top 10 Project Management Case Studies and Examples

The following are the summaries of ten project management case studies and examples that highlight various aspects of successful project execution and lessons learned:

Case Study 1: The Sydney Opera House

The renowned Sydney Opera House is one of the world’s iconic symbols for architecture. This particular place is situated in Sydney, Australia. The project took off in the middle of the 1950s to produce a world-class entertainment facility towering the city skyline. The competition for the structure design was won by the Danish architect, Jørn Utzon with him becoming the lead of the building team, and the construction commenced immediately the following year.

Also, the design of the Opera House returns its shell-like constructions that are quite problematic both esthetic and engineering. It intended to produce a space that would be home to a diverse range of performing arts activities and become a symbol of Sydney, achieving this goal through a combination of its function and transformative design.

Subsequently, the Sydney Opera House case study is regarded as an important source of experience for project managers and they continue to underline the necessity of developing a holistic approach that involves leading practicians, highly efficient teamwork, and powerful project governance to be able to manage this kind of project successfully.

Case Study 2: NASA’s Mars Rover Mission

NASA farms the Mars Rover mission to discover and gain insight into the surface of the planet. Within these tracked roving vehicles are two-wheeled Sojourner, Spirit, Opportunity, and Curiosity alongside the most recent one Perseverance. All rovers had these instruments on board for Martian surface analysis, looking for traces of space biology, and studying the core history of the planets.

In addition, the program involves all-encompassing planning, impeccable calculations, and sophisticated technology to deliver impeccable results. For the discovery of the Moon’s geological dynamics, each rover was a testament to space exploration as well as robotics in scientific investigations.

Astronauts aboard Mars Rover involve the use of effective project management , risk identification, and adaptability, which are the keys to space exploration. This is another example of how such missions provide a learning and also development opportunity for future space exploration endeavors.

Case Study 3: The London Olympics 2012

Its aim was an uncomplicated worship of the Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games which accepted athletes and spectators from the whole world as the participants. These world-changing constructions revolutionized and greatly influenced the everyday life of Londoners, shaping their way of life significantly.

Nevertheless, the London Olympics set a legacy beyond the lasting success of the event. Furthermore, authorities converted and repurposed the infrastructure surrounding Olympic Park for public use, stimulating urban regeneration efforts. The project management best practices for event planning are centered around environmental conservation measures, economic impact, and community intervention.

Case Study 4: Apple’s iPhone Development

Apple inc.; making the iPhone is the epitome of complex product development. There was no such thing as the iPhone in 2007, just a phone that was much more than that magical device that incorporated a phone, iPod, and internet communication appliance into a single thing. 

Designing a quality product involves integrating high-tech hardware, software, intuitive user interfaces, and various technologies seamlessly.

Apple’s iPhone exemplifies agile innovation, quality-speed balance, and lasting market impact, driving unparalleled business success.

Case Study 5: The Panama Canal Expansion

The 2016 announcement of the Panama Canal Extension addressed the need for accommodating larger vessels amid global seaborne trade growth. The first canal built, finished in 1914, could not have been a passageway for the size and capacity of these days’ ships. Additionally, the extension project targeted these inadequacies and intended to uplift the channel’s performance in terms of time-saving and upgrading the global shipping sector.

To conclude, the Panama Canal is an excellent example of how much infrastructure developments are needed as the world is rapidly changing. The project that stands behind the success of global collaboration and project risk management became the vehicle of a plan that influenced the way of doing international trade, and the Panamanian economy.

Case Study 6: The London Crossrail Project

The Crossrail London project, also called the Elizabeth Line, improves transportation connections in London through extensive rail network construction. The main goal is to design a straight east-west railway, spanning key city districts and neighboring territories.

Moreover, the London Crossrail line confronting the delays and overflows of funds, at last, created a disruptive shift in London public transport. In that respect, the positive results and public benefits show the role of major projects that focus on green transit infrastructure in creating urban connectivity and driving ecological and social development.

Case Study 7: The Big Dig – Boston Central Artery/Tunnel Project

The Big Dig, of the Boston, Massachusetts, Central Artery/Tunnel Project was this outstanding public works effort. The project aimed to enhance urban transportation by replacing the Central Artery with tunnels, bridges, and interchanges to expedite traffic.

The project required innovative engineering to tackle tunnel construction, soil conditions, and water management challenges. Moreover, effective public and political expectations management was critical, necessitating extensive public engagement, transparent communication, and collaboration across government entities.

Despite facing delays and cost overruns, completing the Big Dig in 2007 marked a transformative moment for Boston. The project achieved its goals of improving traffic, revitalizing urban areas, and driving economic growth through new developments. Therefore, the success of the Big Dig serves as a case study in adaptive project management, overcoming technical complexities, and achieving positive urban and economic outcomes in large-scale infrastructure projects.

Case Study 8: The Hoover Dam

Planners began the Hoover Dam project in 1936, aiming to meet water and electricity needs in the southwestern USA. Additionally, technologically innovative, the dam featured an arch-gravity design and introduced advanced concrete construction methods. Engineers overcame desert conditions using continuous pouring and refrigeration to counter high temperatures during construction.

Moreover, the Hoover Dam’s enduring impact includes water supply management by creating Lake Mead, one of the largest U.S. reservoirs. The power plant at Hoover Dam generates electricity for the regional grid, serving as a reliable and ongoing energy source. The dam has gained significance beyond its strict utilitarian role. The dam symbolizes America’s resilience and cleverness, drawing millions of visitors to appreciate its cultural, historical, and engineering significance.

Case Study 9: The Airbus A380 Project

The Airbus A380 holds this exceptional record and thereby symbolizes a development breakthrough in the aviation industry in 2007 respectively. The designers created the twin-deck, wide-body aircraft for maximum capacity and comfort, making it ideal for long-distance travel.

Also, it serves the global collaboration in aerospace engineering evidenced by the contributions of different countries as the project was taken as a whole.  Moreover, the Airbus A380 project portrays the complexities of global collaboration, overcoming technical difficulties, and embedding oneself in the competition of the aerospace industry as well. The A380’s impact on aviation underscores lessons in adaptation and environmental consciousness for shaping tomorrow’s airline transportation.

Case Study 10: The Hubble Space Telescope Repair Mission

The HST Mission repaired the telescope’s optical issues, unleashing its full astronomical potential and overcoming initial obstacles. Starting in 1990, Hubble had a manufacturing problem in one of the primary mirrors, which caused blurred images. As a consequence of that day, NASA carried out the first mission of servicing (STS-61) in 1993. Astronauts conducted a complex EVA to install WFPC-2 optics on Space Shuttle Endeavour, addressing Hubble’s optical issues.

However, this repair mission showcased the collaborative efforts of NASA and astronauts, emphasizing meticulous training, communication, and problem-solving skills. The success of the mission marked a turning point for Hubble, transforming it into a premier astronomical observatory. Subsequent servicing missions further upgraded instruments, extending Hubble’s lifespan and contributing to groundbreaking scientific discoveries. 

These top 10 project management scenarios showcase real-world industry challenges in action. Thus, from the dissertation of the given cases, you can be more capable of leading your projects appropriately. Would you like to elevate your expertise? Join our project management course package now, which covers everything from detailed instructions to hands-on experience.

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How to Build and Implement a Project Strategy

Every project is different. While they all have a timeframe and end with a deliverable, they require unique methodologies and steps to reach their goals. Project strategy is the plan that defines a project, which is why project management strategy is so important.

To better manage projects, one must clearly understand project strategy, who’s responsible for it in the organization and the steps to create a project strategy. We’ll go over that and link to free project management templates that can help you in this process.

What Is Project Strategy?

Project strategy is made up of your plan and the tools that are used to complete the project. This should align with the larger goals and objectives of the organization. The project strategy works to meet the organization’s mission, but its goals are specific to the individual project it’s directing.

Once you have a basic project strategy, it can be reused for multiple projects by tweaking it to fit the new goals. That’s because whatever that future project might be it will still have to align with the organization’s long-term goals and the project strategy has already done this. However, organizations use project strategy for more complicated strategic projects rather than operational projects.

The importance of a project strategy is simple: it helps deliver projects on time, within budget and aligned with larger strategic goals. It also streamlines project planning, which increases efficiency as you work on new projects and don’t have to start at square one. Project strategy is also useful in sharing the details of a project plan with stakeholders.

To effectively plan and manage your project strategy, you’ll need a Gantt chart. ProjectManager is award-winning project and portfolio management software with robust Gantt charts that give managers transparency into how the project progresses in real time and the resources it needs to achieve its goals.

Beyond organizing tasks and adding milestones, resources and costs, users can link all four types of task dependencies to avoid costly delays. Use the filter to easily identify the critical path and set a baseline to track planned versus actual progress and costs. Get started with ProjectManager today for free.

Strategic Projects vs. Operational Projects

As noted, a strategic project isn’t the same as an operational project. Strategic projects can be anything that helps deliver the organization’s strategic goals. For example, creating a website or mobile app to sell products online, marketing to promote new stores or building a facility to increase production.

Organizations need operational projects, on the other hand, for daily functions. These operational projects aren’t necessarily aligned with the organization’s strategic planning goals but are needed to keep the organization running. Some examples of operational projects are routine maintenance, training programs and upgrades to the IT infrastructure.

Who’s Responsible for Creating the Organization’s Project Strategy?

The creation process for an organization’s project strategy is in the hands of leadership and management. These are people who have interest or input on the organization’s future direction. Whoever is in charge of the organization will be involved in the project strategy, such as an owner, CEO or managing director. The following professionals will handle the actual creation of the project strategy.

• Project Management Office (PMO): A PMO is responsible for defining and maintaining the standards for an organization’s project management. They can be an internal department or an external group or an agency. They help with prioritizing projects, providing governance guidelines and ensure that projects are beneficial to the organization by aligning with larger strategic goals.
• Project Manager: This is a professional responsible for leading the project, making its schedule and budget as well as leading and managing the project team. The project manager is responsible for delivering the project on time and within budget while meeting quality standards. They’ll help align the project with the organization’s strategic goals.
• Program Manager: If the project strategy involves multiple related projects, they’re called a program and managed by a program manager . This is a more strategic position than a project manager as they’re responsible for overseeing the delivery or project strategy across multiple projects without directly managing each project.
• Portfolio Manager: If multiple projects aren’t related as in a program, it’s a portfolio. A portfolio manager is responsible for delivering them. Just as with a program manager, they oversee multiple projects to ensure that they’re all delivered successfully while also meeting the project strategy of the organization.

How to Create a Project Strategy

An organization must conceive a project strategy before identifying projects that will help achieve its long-term goals. Leadership and stakeholders should follow the steps listed below as it’s the process by which a viable project strategy can be made.

1. Define the Purpose of Your Project

The first step is knowing the underlying reason for the project you plan on initiating. One must know the why of the project: why are we doing this? The more precise and compelling your definition of the project’s purpose, the more likely it will be planned and delivered successfully.

2. Make Sure The Project Aligns With the Organization’s Strategic Plan

Once you have the purpose of the project clearly defined, look at your organization’s strategic plan . If the project’s goals are aligned with the organization’s long-term goals, then the project can move forward. If not, then you’ll need to reexamine the project. If it can’t be made to fit into the larger strategy of the organization, then you’ll have to pass.

3. Set Project Goals & Success Criteria

If the goals align with the project strategy of the organization, then you can move forward. The next step is to clearly define those goals. You’ll want to make sure that they’re SMART goals, which means they should be specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time-based. At the same time, determine the success criteria for the project such as scope, budget, timeline, goals, deliverables, etc.

4. Define Your Project Scope

Identify all the work that must be completed to deliver a successful project. That’s the project scope. When defining project scope you should also identify what’s out of scope so everyone is clear on what needs to be done and what’s not necessary to the project. This sets boundaries on the project and defines its goals, deadlines and deliverables to help hit your goals.

5. Estimate Resources

Resources are the people, equipment and materials you need to complete the project. To ensure you have what you need when you need it and those costs align with your budget, estimate the resources necessary to complete the project. This will inform your schedule and budget.

6. Create a Project Budget

The project budget will determine the resources, which is the estimated costs of the project. By creating a budget, the project manager can forecast the project costs. This includes resources and how long you’ll need them.

7. Make a Project Timeline

The project timeline is a visual representation of the schedule, showing the start and end dates of the entire project and mapping the various tasks on that timeline. It also breaks the larger project down into phases, milestones and tasks, which makes it easier to manage.

8. Choose a Project Management Methodology

There are many ways to manage projects. You can use a traditional project management methodology , such as waterfall, which clearly defines the sequence of project phases, where one starts after the one before has ended. There are also agile practices, which are more iterative and collaborative with cross-functional teams. That’s only two of many sets of tools and guidelines that organize projects for greater efficiency and performance.

9. Assemble a Team

Your team will be the ones who execute the project. Selecting those team members with the right skills and experience is important, but it also helps flesh out the project’s organizational structure. The strategic goals should also be at the forefront of the project manager’s mind; the team should be chosen because they fit the bill for what’s needed to deliver the project and achieve its goals.

10. Establish Project Tracking Methods

Once the project is in motion and tasks are being worked on, the project manager needs a method to monitor and track the team’s progress and performance. The project manager will look at the project plan and compare it to the actual progress and costs to see if they’re the same. If not, then the project could be off track and adjustments to the scope, time or cost can get it back on track.

Project Management Templates That Help You Make a Project Strategy

ProjectManager isn’t only a powerful tool, but our site is an online hub for free project management templates that can help you with each phase of your project. Our free templates for Excel and Word also address various industries that run projects, such as construction, manufacturing, professional services, event planning and IT. Here are a few free templates that are related to project strategy.

Project Plan Template

A project strategy needs a project plan. Our free project plan template for Word helps you figure out everything you need from the project scope to the schedule and the budget.

Project Budget Template

To forecast an accurate budget, use our free project budget template for Excel. It lays out tasks and subtasks and their associated labor, materials and miscellaneous costs and even has columns to track the actual costs versus the budget.

Project Timeline Template

Our free project timeline template for Excel is made up of two parts. On the left is a spreadsheet for tasks and their duration. On the right is a visual timeline that populates as you fill in the left side of the template.

How ProjectManager Helps You Build Your Project Strategy

Templates are fine, but they fall short of project management software. Templates are static documents that need to be manually updated, which isn’t efficient. They’re not even good for collaboration. ProjectManager is award-winning project and portfolio management software that helps you build and execute your project strategy. Managers plan on robust Gantt charts or our sheet view, while teams can work on multiple project views, such as the visual workflow of a kanban board or task lists. You can keep stakeholders updated with the calendar view.

Track Project Costs, Time and Progress

A project strategy can’t be achieved without closely monitoring your projects. You can get a high-level overview of a project’s progress and performance anytime you want by toggling over to our real-time dashboard. Here, you’ll see KPIs such as project cost, time and progress displayed in easy-to-read graphs and charts.

There’s even a portfolio dashboard for tracking multiple projects. For more detail, use our customizable reports, such as status, portfolio, timesheet, workload, variance and more. All can be filtered to show only what you want to see and then shared with stakeholders to keep them updated.

Allocate Resources Across Projects

When you onboard teams, our software lets you set their availability, including PTO, vacation and global holidays for remote workers. This makes it easy to assign resources to tasks. As you allocate resources , use our color-coded workload chart. There, you can see at a glance who’s overallocated and balance the team’s workload from the chart. This keeps the team working at capacity and productively achieving project strategy goals.

Related Strategic Content

There’s more to project strategy and strategic planning than we could write about here. If you’re interested in going deeper, our site is full of free content, videos and templates to explore. Here are a handful of links that will take you to more articles, templates and guides on business strategy.

• Strategic Project Management: Planning Strategic Projects
• How to Create a Strategic Roadmap for Your Organization
• Strategic Planning in Business
• Strategic Plan Template for Word (Free Download)
• A Quick Guide to Strategic Initiatives

ProjectManager is online project and portfolio management software that connects teams in the office, out in the field and anywhere else they’re working. They can share files, comment at the task level and stay updated with email and in-app notifications. Join teams at Avis, Nestle and Siemens who are using our software to deliver successful projects. Get started with ProjectManager today for free.

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How to Actually Execute Change at a Company

• Tom Hunsaker

Four factors that will determine the success — or failure — of your initiative.

The author analyzed project teams across 257 firms to identify why only 60% of planned value is typically realized in change initiatives, focusing on four key factors: effective initial communication (“ACE the Memo”), ensuring resource accessibility and autonomy (“Master the Means”), employing mechanisms to align actions with goals (“Amplify with Mechanisms”), and strategic measurement to influence future outcomes (“Measure to Account”). These factors emphasize the importance of clear, credible, and emotionally resonant messaging, the necessity for teams to have the right resources and freedom, the use of mechanisms to increase transparency and precision, and the role of measurement in adapting and improving execution. This comprehensive approach underscores the significance of execution in turning the potential of an idea into realized value.

As important as it is to make great change decisions, equally important is to consider what happens after the decision to act is made. It is well documented that on average just 60% of planned value is realized . To what can be attributed the “lost” 40%?

• TH Tom Hunsaker is clinical professor of strategic leadership and former associate dean of innovation at ASU’s Thunderbird School of Global Management and advisor to senior leaders ranging from the Fortune 500 to rapid-growth private enterprises.

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Creative project management: a guide for project managers.

Sarah Burner

ClickUp Contributor

March 15, 2024

As the head of a creative team, you know chaos and creativity go hand in hand. You have several projects running at once, each one with a tight deadline, while juggling multiple tools and collaborating across departments.

Fortunately, controlled chaos is at your fingertips with creative project management. This framework offers processes to get your creative projects from ideation to production—without ruining the organic and innovative aspects of the design process. 👩🏽‍🎨

We’ll cover what creative project management is and highlight the key differences from traditional project management. You’ll learn about our favorite creative project management tools and the benefits of implementing them, plus a case study for inspiration.

• What is Creative Project Management?

The Difference Between Creative Project Management and Traditional Project Management

Adapt the main elements of creative project management, set achievable and measurable goals, build flexible plans designed to meet goals.

• Creative Project Manager’s Responsibilities

Creative signoff

Creative project management tools and software, benefits of creative project management, challenges in creative project management, case study: examples of creative project management.

• 1. What are the 3 crucial keys to creative project management?

2. What is creativity in project management?

3. what are the 3 important things in project management.

What is Creative Project Management ?

Creative project management is a structured process for planning , managing, and monitoring projects from ideation to delivery. Designed for creative teams, this framework handles everything from setting objectives, identifying key stakeholders, and streamlining workflows for all team members. 💪 

Creative project management processes aim to reduce chaos and minimize the risk of issues—like scope creep, distractions, and resource constraints—delaying the project. This framework also provides a structure that guides day-to-day tasks and the entire project timeline. 

Because creative project management oversees a project from start to finish, the exact framework will vary from team to team. Most management systems generally have tools to track deliverables and milestones, standard operating procedures (SOPs) for handling creative assets, and a structured decision-making hierarchy.

Traditional project management is a rigid process that closely controls how work moves through the pipeline to create deliverables. On the other hand, creative project management is more flexible in promoting organic ideation. 👩‍💻

One clear example is manager reviews of work. For traditional project management, the review process focuses on whether the job was completed. On creative projects, reviewing tends to be more involved and hands-on.

For instance, a creative project manager annotates video projects and adds markups to design files. They may do in-depth reviews of coding for clarity and effectiveness or add feedback for revisions in content briefs .  

Another critical difference is creative project managers build space in projects and processes for creative techniques . Instead of assigning a set time for a task, the manager may provide a time range. This allows creatives to develop the best possible idea without the pressure of deadlines.

Components of Creative Project Management

There are several components to creative project management, like the management of the client and the in-house team. Plus, there’s planning and time management to keep a project on schedule. Here, you’ll learn more about the critical components of creative project management. 🛠️

Project management has three main components: scope, cost, and time. Each element has a significant impact on project outcomes. This is especially relevant when discussing creative teams where management takes a less rigid approach. 

Here’s how these three main elements relate to creative project management:

• Scope: Creative project scope tends to be more flexible. While the primary goal may be creating a website, that means different things to different people. A client may want two landing pages, an online store, and a complete blog. Laying out the scope of the project prevents miscommunication and sets clear expectations
• Cost: Creative deliverables vary, and so do costs. As a manager, it’s essential to sit down and think through the costs related to the project. Build processes for addressing oversights or overreach with a project and how much it costs your team
• Time: With more flexibility comes more risks when scheduling and allocating work time. For creative teams, build flexible task timeframes into your larger project timeline. This allows space for creativity but still keeps the project on track

Goal setting is vital in all projects, but especially creative ones.

These goals need to be set early with input from all key stakeholders. That includes managers on your team as well as the client. It needs to be communicated clearly to the team working on the project. Regularly check that goals and all tasks relate directly to achieving the main objective.

Planning is a crucial task for creative project managers. Not only will you assign tasks to team members, but you’ll also need to ensure all work is broken down correctly to achieve the primary goal. 

One way to do this is to use project management software. These tools speed up your processes and build better task pipelines. They automate busy work and create visual dashboards to plan the project from start to finish, all while allowing flexibility in deadlines and time allocation.

Another option if you’re working on creative developer projects is to use the systems development life cycle (SDLC), a conceptual planning model that addresses the design, development, testing, deployment, and maintenance of a system or product. 

Creative Project Manager ‘s Responsibilities

Creative project managers have a unique position within organizations and agencies. You guide processes, track the project’s progress, and foster a creative environment that encourages your team to develop great ideas. 💡

While planning the project timeline, you also build collaboration, create transparent processes, and schedule brainstorming sessions where team members can ideate.

As a result, teams are expected to provide deliverables on time, but how they get there is a more creative, flexible, and adaptable approach. 

Here are the key responsibilities and skills required for a creative project manager:

• Managing clients : Creative project managers don’t just manage team members. You also have to manage client expectations and communications at every stage of the project
• Onboarding: Whether it’s hiring freelancers with design certifications or a new team member with extensive coding knowledge, creative project managers need to onboard employees. That typically involves adding them to the project management software, connecting them with human resources, and finalizing contracts
• Problem-solving and conflict resolution: A key responsibility is ensuring nothing delays or derails the project. That means handling internal team conflicts as well as developing creative solutions to issues in the supply chain or allocating resources
• Reporting and reviewing: Creative project managers play an active role in reviewing mock-ups and drafts while also reporting regular updates to the client
• Progress tracking: Tracking progress from initiation to execution is key. That involves staying on top of each team member’s progress as well as the entire project process as a whole

Process and Lifecycle of Creative Project Management

The creative project management framework adapts as projects progress from brainstorming to wireframing and final delivery. 

Here are the four stages of the creative project management lifecycle and what to expect at each step. 🎨

All creative projects begin with an initiation phase. Think graphic designers creating imagery for advertising campaigns, copywriters writing branding content for a script, or web designers building a website from scratch. It’s all about laying the foundation for a successful project.

Early on, the team will create a project charter, with buy-in from stakeholders, and list the goals and objectives of the project. You’ll define the scope of the project, including expectations and deliverables. 

Cover these items to create an effective project scope:

• Deliverables : These are the items the client expects to receive at the end of the project, like a website wireframe, digital media files, or a product
• Project timeline : As a manager, you know how important a timeline is for a project’s success. Create an expected timeline to keep everyone on track
• Milestones : These are key events that should not be missed. Early on, set milestones—like a V1 product or staged website—to highlight important events in the project scope
• Reporting and communication plans: Along the way you’ll need to keep the client updated on the project’s progress. Create a framework for reporting practices and create communication plans to provide feedback from initiation to completion 
• Budget: Create a detailed breakdown of the project budget and expected costs. Include language for handling additional work not discussed in the project scope

The planning stage involves taking the project scope and breaking it into workflows and tasks for each team member. At this stage, start planning the creative process and streamline workflows using creative project management software like ClickUp. The software offers various views, including Kanban boards, Gantt charts, and Calendars to build the project timeline.

With design project management tools, set goals and milestones and start planning your roadmap to success. Consider the capacity of your team members and break down tasks based on skill sets. Decide who will be accountable for what parts of the project and consider whether you need to hire freelancers or additional team members.

This is all about task management, team collaboration, and getting stuff done. Prioritize tasks, resolve bottlenecks as they arise, and celebrate small wins.

Make this stage easier by using time-tracking tools and regular check-ins so team members stay up-to-date and on track with the project timeline and any issues. Offer time management support by readjusting workflows and schedules if a task takes longer than expected.

Track progress by updating task statuses as work gets completed. Use dashboards and board views to segment work in progress, under review, or coming up. Get real-time project progress with notifications and monitor the creative workflow to ensure nothing falls through the cracks. 

You did it! The project’s done, and it’s time to deliver it to the client. At this stage, it’s essential to review the completed work and ensure all deliverables have been met. Next, you’ll send the project items to the client for review.

If all is good, go ahead and celebrate a successful creative project. Sometimes, you may need to make a few revisions or minor changes before closing out the project.

To make your life easier, there are several creative project management tools and software to streamline everything from ideation to workflows and reporting.

ClickUp’s project management software provides an all-in-one platform for your creative team’s needs. ✅

Use the built-in ClickUp AI features to generate product ideas, brainstorm creative designs, or grab summary notes from your discussions with the team. Quickly plan and prioritize your initiatives by setting goals and building workflows all in the same space. 

ClickUp makes team collaboration more accessible than ever. Use ClickUp Docs to store creative project SOPs and hop into the Chat feature to share instant updates with relevant team members.

ClickUp for Creative Agencies brings your design processes into one space. Use Whiteboards to generate ideas on a creative canvas and instantly assign tasks based on those ideas. Proofing is painless thanks to in-app markup and feedback features. Use permissions to add guests (like the client) to the project and allow them to see the items that matter to them and nothing more.

Make your creative process more fun and engaging with access to more than 1,000 templates. There are even planning templates like ClickUp’s Creative Project Plan Template to save you time when drafting procedures.

The Benefits and Challenges of Creative Project Management

If you’re ready to take on creative project management, there are several benefits and challenges. Here we’ll cover the top reasons for implementing processes and procedures to streamline your creative projects and address these challenges. 🙌

While creative project management takes time, you’ll find several benefits by implementing a successful framework.

Here are some of the top benefits of creative project management:

• Streamlined workflows: With software and a little planning, you can automate creative work for the project team, instantly assigning tasks and ensuring everyone knows who’s responsible for what work
• Clearer project goals : Established processes make it easier for the team to understand the project goals—and what’s expected of them
• Agile processes: Creative management processes offer a flexible work environment where creative people develop their best ideas without feeling burdened by processes
• Better resource management : Planning the creative process means you’ll have better control over asset management and can create decision-making processes to ensure resources are used appropriately

The benefits are clear, but there are also some pitfalls to be wary of. Naturally, these challenges may affect the success of your project and a client’s satisfaction. Creative project management faces challenges due to your internal team and their needs.

Common obstacles in creative project management include:

• Project scope changes: Creative projects are unpredictable, and clients may want more as the project develops. Project creep—where more work is required than initially planned—impacts your budget and ability to meet expectations. Indicate how additional work outside the project scope will be handled when drafting the contract with the client to avoid this
• Miscommunication: With multiple team members working on different things, it’s easy for things to fall through the cracks or for miscommunications to occur—like failing to provide updates or request changes from the right person. Establish communication plans and build systems of accountability so team members know who to contact
• Work environments that are too rigid: Creative projects need flexibility to thrive, but many processes also require some rigidity. The key here is finding a balance between freedom of creativity and setting expectations and guidelines
• Not setting clear expectations: A client must be happy with the deliverable. If you didn’t clearly state what the client will receive during the initiation stage, you may have issues when it’s time for them to sign off on the work. Set achievable and realistic deliverables and regularly communicate with the client to avoid this problem

Want to know how creative teams use ClickUp to manage all kinds of projects? Look at how Trinetix leveraged the features of ClickUp to scale its creative efforts in this breakdown of the case study . 🏆

Trinetix is an information technology company helping top-of-the-line clients through mobile app development, design, and intelligent automation. 

However, inefficient processes kept the team from doing their best work and scaling the company’s offerings. There was confusion in their onboarding system; they were juggling multiple tools that didn’t work well together, and they were wasting time dealing with these obstacles. 

Their main goal was to find a tool that did it all. That’s why they chose ClickUp to streamline and simplify their creative processes. Now, Trinetix uses ClickUp as an all-in-one solution to create visual plans for team member career paths, automate workflows, simplify hand-offs, and centralize essential company documents. 

Use ClickUp to Support Your Creative Team

Creative project management involves creating processes and procedures that let your team develop the most innovative ideas. From initiation and planning to execution and client signoff, these processes guide every aspect of your team’s efforts.

Sign up for ClickUp and start building a better creative project management framework. With tools like task automation, dashboards, and documentation hubs, it’s easier than ever to get the team aligned and supported to deliver great results. ✨

Common FAQs

1. what are the 3 crucial keys to creative project management .

Three crucial keys to creative project management are setting measurable goals, planning and assigning tasks to relevant team members, and using tools to track progress.

Creativity helps project managers resolve complex problems, develop unique solutions to bottlenecks, and develop innovative ideas that better serve clients. 

Three essential things in project management are planning, goal setting, and tracking. A project manager must plan the project’s scope, including deliverables and goals. They must also map out workflows and assign tasks while tracking progress at every project stage.

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A generative AI reset: Rewiring to turn potential into value in 2024

It’s time for a generative AI (gen AI) reset. The initial enthusiasm and flurry of activity in 2023 is giving way to second thoughts and recalibrations as companies realize that capturing gen AI’s enormous potential value is harder than expected .

With 2024 shaping up to be the year for gen AI to prove its value, companies should keep in mind the hard lessons learned with digital and AI transformations: competitive advantage comes from building organizational and technological capabilities to broadly innovate, deploy, and improve solutions at scale—in effect, rewiring the business  for distributed digital and AI innovation.

About QuantumBlack, AI by McKinsey

QuantumBlack, McKinsey’s AI arm, helps companies transform using the power of technology, technical expertise, and industry experts. With thousands of practitioners at QuantumBlack (data engineers, data scientists, product managers, designers, and software engineers) and McKinsey (industry and domain experts), we are working to solve the world’s most important AI challenges. QuantumBlack Labs is our center of technology development and client innovation, which has been driving cutting-edge advancements and developments in AI through locations across the globe.

Companies looking to score early wins with gen AI should move quickly. But those hoping that gen AI offers a shortcut past the tough—and necessary—organizational surgery are likely to meet with disappointing results. Launching pilots is (relatively) easy; getting pilots to scale and create meaningful value is hard because they require a broad set of changes to the way work actually gets done.

Let’s briefly look at what this has meant for one Pacific region telecommunications company. The company hired a chief data and AI officer with a mandate to “enable the organization to create value with data and AI.” The chief data and AI officer worked with the business to develop the strategic vision and implement the road map for the use cases. After a scan of domains (that is, customer journeys or functions) and use case opportunities across the enterprise, leadership prioritized the home-servicing/maintenance domain to pilot and then scale as part of a larger sequencing of initiatives. They targeted, in particular, the development of a gen AI tool to help dispatchers and service operators better predict the types of calls and parts needed when servicing homes.

Leadership put in place cross-functional product teams with shared objectives and incentives to build the gen AI tool. As part of an effort to upskill the entire enterprise to better work with data and gen AI tools, they also set up a data and AI academy, which the dispatchers and service operators enrolled in as part of their training. To provide the technology and data underpinnings for gen AI, the chief data and AI officer also selected a large language model (LLM) and cloud provider that could meet the needs of the domain as well as serve other parts of the enterprise. The chief data and AI officer also oversaw the implementation of a data architecture so that the clean and reliable data (including service histories and inventory databases) needed to build the gen AI tool could be delivered quickly and responsibly.

Creating value beyond the hype

Let’s deliver on the promise of technology from strategy to scale.

Our book Rewired: The McKinsey Guide to Outcompeting in the Age of Digital and AI (Wiley, June 2023) provides a detailed manual on the six capabilities needed to deliver the kind of broad change that harnesses digital and AI technology. In this article, we will explore how to extend each of those capabilities to implement a successful gen AI program at scale. While recognizing that these are still early days and that there is much more to learn, our experience has shown that breaking open the gen AI opportunity requires companies to rewire how they work in the following ways.

Figure out where gen AI copilots can give you a real competitive advantage

The broad excitement around gen AI and its relative ease of use has led to a burst of experimentation across organizations. Most of these initiatives, however, won’t generate a competitive advantage. One bank, for example, bought tens of thousands of GitHub Copilot licenses, but since it didn’t have a clear sense of how to work with the technology, progress was slow. Another unfocused effort we often see is when companies move to incorporate gen AI into their customer service capabilities. Customer service is a commodity capability, not part of the core business, for most companies. While gen AI might help with productivity in such cases, it won’t create a competitive advantage.

To create competitive advantage, companies should first understand the difference between being a “taker” (a user of available tools, often via APIs and subscription services), a “shaper” (an integrator of available models with proprietary data), and a “maker” (a builder of LLMs). For now, the maker approach is too expensive for most companies, so the sweet spot for businesses is implementing a taker model for productivity improvements while building shaper applications for competitive advantage.

Much of gen AI’s near-term value is closely tied to its ability to help people do their current jobs better. In this way, gen AI tools act as copilots that work side by side with an employee, creating an initial block of code that a developer can adapt, for example, or drafting a requisition order for a new part that a maintenance worker in the field can review and submit (see sidebar “Copilot examples across three generative AI archetypes”). This means companies should be focusing on where copilot technology can have the biggest impact on their priority programs.

Copilot examples across three generative AI archetypes

• “Taker” copilots help real estate customers sift through property options and find the most promising one, write code for a developer, and summarize investor transcripts.
• “Shaper” copilots provide recommendations to sales reps for upselling customers by connecting generative AI tools to customer relationship management systems, financial systems, and customer behavior histories; create virtual assistants to personalize treatments for patients; and recommend solutions for maintenance workers based on historical data.
• “Maker” copilots are foundation models that lab scientists at pharmaceutical companies can use to find and test new and better drugs more quickly.

Some industrial companies, for example, have identified maintenance as a critical domain for their business. Reviewing maintenance reports and spending time with workers on the front lines can help determine where a gen AI copilot could make a big difference, such as in identifying issues with equipment failures quickly and early on. A gen AI copilot can also help identify root causes of truck breakdowns and recommend resolutions much more quickly than usual, as well as act as an ongoing source for best practices or standard operating procedures.

The challenge with copilots is figuring out how to generate revenue from increased productivity. In the case of customer service centers, for example, companies can stop recruiting new agents and use attrition to potentially achieve real financial gains. Defining the plans for how to generate revenue from the increased productivity up front, therefore, is crucial to capturing the value.

Upskill the talent you have but be clear about the gen-AI-specific skills you need

By now, most companies have a decent understanding of the technical gen AI skills they need, such as model fine-tuning, vector database administration, prompt engineering, and context engineering. In many cases, these are skills that you can train your existing workforce to develop. Those with existing AI and machine learning (ML) capabilities have a strong head start. Data engineers, for example, can learn multimodal processing and vector database management, MLOps (ML operations) engineers can extend their skills to LLMOps (LLM operations), and data scientists can develop prompt engineering, bias detection, and fine-tuning skills.

A sample of new generative AI skills needed

The following are examples of new skills needed for the successful deployment of generative AI tools:

• data scientist:
• prompt engineering
• in-context learning
• bias detection
• pattern identification
• reinforcement learning from human feedback
• hyperparameter/large language model fine-tuning; transfer learning
• data engineer:
• data wrangling and data warehousing
• data pipeline construction
• multimodal processing
• vector database management

The learning process can take two to three months to get to a decent level of competence because of the complexities in learning what various LLMs can and can’t do and how best to use them. The coders need to gain experience building software, testing, and validating answers, for example. It took one financial-services company three months to train its best data scientists to a high level of competence. While courses and documentation are available—many LLM providers have boot camps for developers—we have found that the most effective way to build capabilities at scale is through apprenticeship, training people to then train others, and building communities of practitioners. Rotating experts through teams to train others, scheduling regular sessions for people to share learnings, and hosting biweekly documentation review sessions are practices that have proven successful in building communities of practitioners (see sidebar “A sample of new generative AI skills needed”).

It’s important to bear in mind that successful gen AI skills are about more than coding proficiency. Our experience in developing our own gen AI platform, Lilli , showed us that the best gen AI technical talent has design skills to uncover where to focus solutions, contextual understanding to ensure the most relevant and high-quality answers are generated, collaboration skills to work well with knowledge experts (to test and validate answers and develop an appropriate curation approach), strong forensic skills to figure out causes of breakdowns (is the issue the data, the interpretation of the user’s intent, the quality of metadata on embeddings, or something else?), and anticipation skills to conceive of and plan for possible outcomes and to put the right kind of tracking into their code. A pure coder who doesn’t intrinsically have these skills may not be as useful a team member.

While current upskilling is largely based on a “learn on the job” approach, we see a rapid market emerging for people who have learned these skills over the past year. That skill growth is moving quickly. GitHub reported that developers were working on gen AI projects “in big numbers,” and that 65,000 public gen AI projects were created on its platform in 2023—a jump of almost 250 percent over the previous year. If your company is just starting its gen AI journey, you could consider hiring two or three senior engineers who have built a gen AI shaper product for their companies. This could greatly accelerate your efforts.

Form a centralized team to establish standards that enable responsible scaling

To ensure that all parts of the business can scale gen AI capabilities, centralizing competencies is a natural first move. The critical focus for this central team will be to develop and put in place protocols and standards to support scale, ensuring that teams can access models while also minimizing risk and containing costs. The team’s work could include, for example, procuring models and prescribing ways to access them, developing standards for data readiness, setting up approved prompt libraries, and allocating resources.

While developing Lilli, our team had its mind on scale when it created an open plug-in architecture and setting standards for how APIs should function and be built.  They developed standardized tooling and infrastructure where teams could securely experiment and access a GPT LLM , a gateway with preapproved APIs that teams could access, and a self-serve developer portal. Our goal is that this approach, over time, can help shift “Lilli as a product” (that a handful of teams use to build specific solutions) to “Lilli as a platform” (that teams across the enterprise can access to build other products).

For teams developing gen AI solutions, squad composition will be similar to AI teams but with data engineers and data scientists with gen AI experience and more contributors from risk management, compliance, and legal functions. The general idea of staffing squads with resources that are federated from the different expertise areas will not change, but the skill composition of a gen-AI-intensive squad will.

Set up the technology architecture to scale

Building a gen AI model is often relatively straightforward, but making it fully operational at scale is a different matter entirely. We’ve seen engineers build a basic chatbot in a week, but releasing a stable, accurate, and compliant version that scales can take four months. That’s why, our experience shows, the actual model costs may be less than 10 to 15 percent of the total costs of the solution.

Building for scale doesn’t mean building a new technology architecture. But it does mean focusing on a few core decisions that simplify and speed up processes without breaking the bank. Three such decisions stand out:

• Focus on reusing your technology. Reusing code can increase the development speed of gen AI use cases by 30 to 50 percent. One good approach is simply creating a source for approved tools, code, and components. A financial-services company, for example, created a library of production-grade tools, which had been approved by both the security and legal teams, and made them available in a library for teams to use. More important is taking the time to identify and build those capabilities that are common across the most priority use cases. The same financial-services company, for example, identified three components that could be reused for more than 100 identified use cases. By building those first, they were able to generate a significant portion of the code base for all the identified use cases—essentially giving every application a big head start.
• Focus the architecture on enabling efficient connections between gen AI models and internal systems. For gen AI models to work effectively in the shaper archetype, they need access to a business’s data and applications. Advances in integration and orchestration frameworks have significantly reduced the effort required to make those connections. But laying out what those integrations are and how to enable them is critical to ensure these models work efficiently and to avoid the complexity that creates technical debt  (the “tax” a company pays in terms of time and resources needed to redress existing technology issues). Chief information officers and chief technology officers can define reference architectures and integration standards for their organizations. Key elements should include a model hub, which contains trained and approved models that can be provisioned on demand; standard APIs that act as bridges connecting gen AI models to applications or data; and context management and caching, which speed up processing by providing models with relevant information from enterprise data sources.
• Build up your testing and quality assurance capabilities. Our own experience building Lilli taught us to prioritize testing over development. Our team invested in not only developing testing protocols for each stage of development but also aligning the entire team so that, for example, it was clear who specifically needed to sign off on each stage of the process. This slowed down initial development but sped up the overall delivery pace and quality by cutting back on errors and the time needed to fix mistakes.

Ensure data quality and focus on unstructured data to fuel your models

The ability of a business to generate and scale value from gen AI models will depend on how well it takes advantage of its own data. As with technology, targeted upgrades to existing data architecture  are needed to maximize the future strategic benefits of gen AI:

• Be targeted in ramping up your data quality and data augmentation efforts. While data quality has always been an important issue, the scale and scope of data that gen AI models can use—especially unstructured data—has made this issue much more consequential. For this reason, it’s critical to get the data foundations right, from clarifying decision rights to defining clear data processes to establishing taxonomies so models can access the data they need. The companies that do this well tie their data quality and augmentation efforts to the specific AI/gen AI application and use case—you don’t need this data foundation to extend to every corner of the enterprise. This could mean, for example, developing a new data repository for all equipment specifications and reported issues to better support maintenance copilot applications.
• Understand what value is locked into your unstructured data. Most organizations have traditionally focused their data efforts on structured data (values that can be organized in tables, such as prices and features). But the real value from LLMs comes from their ability to work with unstructured data (for example, PowerPoint slides, videos, and text). Companies can map out which unstructured data sources are most valuable and establish metadata tagging standards so models can process the data and teams can find what they need (tagging is particularly important to help companies remove data from models as well, if necessary). Be creative in thinking about data opportunities. Some companies, for example, are interviewing senior employees as they retire and feeding that captured institutional knowledge into an LLM to help improve their copilot performance.
• Optimize to lower costs at scale. There is often as much as a tenfold difference between what companies pay for data and what they could be paying if they optimized their data infrastructure and underlying costs. This issue often stems from companies scaling their proofs of concept without optimizing their data approach. Two costs generally stand out. One is storage costs arising from companies uploading terabytes of data into the cloud and wanting that data available 24/7. In practice, companies rarely need more than 10 percent of their data to have that level of availability, and accessing the rest over a 24- or 48-hour period is a much cheaper option. The other costs relate to computation with models that require on-call access to thousands of processors to run. This is especially the case when companies are building their own models (the maker archetype) but also when they are using pretrained models and running them with their own data and use cases (the shaper archetype). Companies could take a close look at how they can optimize computation costs on cloud platforms—for instance, putting some models in a queue to run when processors aren’t being used (such as when Americans go to bed and consumption of computing services like Netflix decreases) is a much cheaper option.

Build trust and reusability to drive adoption and scale

Because many people have concerns about gen AI, the bar on explaining how these tools work is much higher than for most solutions. People who use the tools want to know how they work, not just what they do. So it’s important to invest extra time and money to build trust by ensuring model accuracy and making it easy to check answers.

One insurance company, for example, created a gen AI tool to help manage claims. As part of the tool, it listed all the guardrails that had been put in place, and for each answer provided a link to the sentence or page of the relevant policy documents. The company also used an LLM to generate many variations of the same question to ensure answer consistency. These steps, among others, were critical to helping end users build trust in the tool.

Part of the training for maintenance teams using a gen AI tool should be to help them understand the limitations of models and how best to get the right answers. That includes teaching workers strategies to get to the best answer as fast as possible by starting with broad questions then narrowing them down. This provides the model with more context, and it also helps remove any bias of the people who might think they know the answer already. Having model interfaces that look and feel the same as existing tools also helps users feel less pressured to learn something new each time a new application is introduced.

Getting to scale means that businesses will need to stop building one-off solutions that are hard to use for other similar use cases. One global energy and materials company, for example, has established ease of reuse as a key requirement for all gen AI models, and has found in early iterations that 50 to 60 percent of its components can be reused. This means setting standards for developing gen AI assets (for example, prompts and context) that can be easily reused for other cases.

While many of the risk issues relating to gen AI are evolutions of discussions that were already brewing—for instance, data privacy, security, bias risk, job displacement, and intellectual property protection—gen AI has greatly expanded that risk landscape. Just 21 percent of companies reporting AI adoption say they have established policies governing employees’ use of gen AI technologies.

Similarly, a set of tests for AI/gen AI solutions should be established to demonstrate that data privacy, debiasing, and intellectual property protection are respected. Some organizations, in fact, are proposing to release models accompanied with documentation that details their performance characteristics. Documenting your decisions and rationales can be particularly helpful in conversations with regulators.

In some ways, this article is premature—so much is changing that we’ll likely have a profoundly different understanding of gen AI and its capabilities in a year’s time. But the core truths of finding value and driving change will still apply. How well companies have learned those lessons may largely determine how successful they’ll be in capturing that value.

The authors wish to thank Michael Chui, Juan Couto, Ben Ellencweig, Josh Gartner, Bryce Hall, Holger Harreis, Phil Hudelson, Suzana Iacob, Sid Kamath, Neerav Kingsland, Kitti Lakner, Robert Levin, Matej Macak, Lapo Mori, Alex Peluffo, Aldo Rosales, Erik Roth, Abdul Wahab Shaikh, and Stephen Xu for their contributions to this article.

This article was edited by Barr Seitz, an editorial director in the New York office.

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What Is Project Risk Management?

Updated: March 11, 2024

Published: February 12, 2023

Growing your business by launching products or taking on new clients can be exciting, but it can also be risky . Growth involves expansion into higher workloads, and it often requires stepping into new territories. 

You can’t eliminate risk from your business. But you can take steps to better understand and manage the risks associated with new business undertakings. 

Known as project risk management, adequately planning for and mitigating risks that may arise from new proposals will set your company up for long-term success.  

Definition of project risk management

Project risk management is the process of identifying, anticipating, mitigating, preventing, and responding to potential risk events that may occur during a project. Project risk refers to anything in the project that doesn’t go as planned.

One key thing to note about project risk management is that it’s not all about prevention. Instead, it’s about acknowledging that things don’t always go as planned and preparing risk mitigation strategies.

Risk vs. issues in project management

Business projects can have risks and issues . While the two terms may sound interchangeable, they’re not. 

The key difference between a risk and an issue is timing. A risk is a potential event that could happen in the future. In contrast, an issue has already happened. 

Analyzing projects for potential risks at the beginning can help you prevent them from becoming issues. 

You can be better prepared for issues when you include risk management in your project plan. Since you’ve anticipated the problem, you can craft your plan of action ahead of time and respond more quickly. 

Types of project risk management

There are several ways to approach risk management depending on the lens that you look through. Here are the most common approaches to managing various types of business risk .

Financial risk management

In financial risk management , you analyze and plan for budget risks. These risks include rising project costs, a lower-than-expected budget, or low revenue.

External risk management

In external risk management, you analyze and plan for external events that could affect the project. Examples include new regulations, emergencies, weather events, supply chain issues, and market events.

Performance risk management

In performance risk management, you identify and plan for events that can affect performance. These events could include poorly defined KPIs, outdated research, scope creep , missed deadlines, and underperforming employees .

Schedule risk management

In schedule risk management, you identify and plan for risk events that can affect the timeline of the entire project. These risks include certain tasks taking longer than expected, waiting on deliverables, supply-side delays, and shortened deadlines.

Operational risk management

In operational risk management, you analyze and plan for risks that come from organizational operations. Examples include personnel changes, technology changes, and company restructuring.

Examples of project risk management 

People tend to associate the word “risk” with a negative impact. But in project risk management, the term applies to anything that doesn’t go as planned. In other words, it also includes events that can positively affect your project.

Positive risk examples in project management

Positive risk refers to unplanned events that benefit your project. For example, you could complete the project early, spend less than expected, or acquire more customers than projected. 

At this point, you might wonder, “If positive risk benefits my business, why do I have to manage it?”

A positive risk management strategy lets you capitalize on unexpected benefits. For example, say you launch a new ad campaign and expect it to increase traffic to your online store by 20%. Instead, it goes viral and generates a traffic boost of 200%. 

While this is a great result, your website needs to be able to handle the spike in traffic. Using positive risk management, you can plan ahead to ensure a great user experience if your website gets an unprecedented amount of visits.

Negative risk examples in project management 

On the other hand, negative risk means that the unplanned event has a detrimental effect on your project. For example, you could go past your deadline, surpass your budget, or have a supplier shut down in the middle of the project.

The goals of negative risk management are to avoid the risks you can and contain the impact of risks that turn into issues.

For instance, say you identified supplier loss as a possible risk. To manage this risk, you could work with multiple suppliers from the beginning. Or you could have a backup ready in case a supplier shuts down or encounters delays.

Project risk management planning: Seven steps

1. identify possible risk events.

The first step in the planning process is to identify possible risk events before the project starts. This is sometimes referred to as conducting a “premortem.” 

Ryan Renteria, executive coach and founder of Stretch Five, explains that teams should “imagine a future where the project has failed and ask, ‘What are the most likely reasons it failed?’”

For best results, create a meeting environment where people feel rewarded for speaking up about concerns. You want your subject-matter experts to feel comfortable giving honest opinions.

Kristin Chester, founder and creative director of luxury magazine Marquet Media , recommends that you look at your internal dynamics and consider how your strengths and weaknesses may affect a project.

Specifically, you want to consider the impact of risk events on your timeline, budget , deliverable quality, and end results.

2. Prepare risk analysis and contingency plans

After the brainstorming session, it’s time for risk assessment. Determine the likelihood of each risk event happening, the estimated impact size, and a potential response plan. 

Information from past projects can help your team predict risk probability and impact.

Remember that you don’t need to act on response plans immediately. They’re contingencies in case the risk event happens.

3. Prioritize the risk

At this point, you can use your risk analysis to prioritize the risks you identified. 

The priority level of a risk helps you decide how many resources you’ll put toward a response should the event occur. 

This helps you set priorities while looking at the big picture. This way, you can understand which risks deserve more attention and which you can reasonably tolerate.

4. Assign a risk owner

Before the project begins, you want to assign a risk owner to each risk. This person monitors the risk , communicates concerns with the team, and implements the response plan if the risk occurs. 

Travis Lindemoen, managing director of staffing firm nexus IT group, recommends that you choose the “person on the project team who is best equipped to manage and keep an eye on a given risk.”

For instance, someone on your development team might be most appropriate to deal with a risk involving website bandwidth or performance.

Assigning owners ahead of time means risk monitoring is less likely to fall through the cracks. Also, you’ll have a better chance of successfully implementing a risk response plan .

5. Monitor risks and communicate project tracking

Once the project has begun, risk owners should monitor their assigned risk events. They can inform other project team members if a risk appears on the horizon. 

For example, someone tracking a project timeline may alert the team if they have missed intermediate milestones. 

Open communication with project stakeholders (including clients) can help you manage expectations and even avoid miscommunication-related risks. 

Carl Jensen, management consultant and founder of Compare Banks, recommends that project managers “leverage regular conferencing with customers so you can incorporate feedback as you go instead of having to redo work later.”

6. Respond to risk events

It’s not always possible to eliminate risk, even when you take the time to plan. If risk events occur, you’ll need to implement your contingency plans. 

Risk owners should communicate the details of a risk event to key stakeholders. Then, owners should follow the appropriate plan and continue monitoring the risk. In some cases, the ability to respond quickly can reduce the impact of a risk event.

7. Assess your risk management plan

After the project life cycle is complete, you have a lot of information that can help you understand the effectiveness of your risk management plan. 

Ask yourself questions like:

• Did we predict all the risks that occurred?
• How accurate was our risk analysis in terms of the likelihood and severity of the impact?
• Did our risk monitoring let us avoid or limit a risk?
• How well did we implement response plans?
• Did our response plans limit the impact?
• How can we improve our project risk management processes?

Much of project risk management relies on projections, assumptions, and subjective analyses. In other words, it depends on imperfect data. But you can improve your project management skills by looking back to see what you’ve done well and where you can improve.

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