“Measure the result not the activity.” This could be also viewed as managing the relationship with a broad set of goals. The project plan will invariably be altered, so constantly re-assessing the details can slow project development. There is a balance between maintaining the project momentum and effectively documenting changes in project tasks and scope.

Our experience has indicated that a certain pre-requisite to undertaking a successful software build is developing a positive energy and work-flow around the project beginning from the preliminary discussions. Experience has also shown that successful project management is about relationship building and expectations management as well as detailed but not overly onerous documentation.

When building a new application, structured meetings early in the planning process allow the stakeholders to not only formulate the design principles but establish working relationships with all stakeholders including most importantly, the key system users. These relationship “bridges”are a vital project success pre-requisite. After any system goes “live”, when the meetings are no longer necessary, established lines of communication are vital so that the system users feel comfortable relaying important information regarding functionality issues to the developer. A lack of up-front communication can lead to what we call the “Black Box”development paradigm, where users may have insufficient input into the upfront design so that system improvements after implementation are problematic.