If you’re studying for the project management professional exam, you probably know there’s a lot to learn. When it comes to project scope management, the concept of work packages is a key topic to learn. Work packages are important when preparing the Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) for any project.
What is Work Package?
A work package is the smallest unit of a Work Breakdown Structure. When preparing a Work Breakdown Structure using the decomposition technique, deliverables are generally broken down into smaller, more manageable chunks of work.
This process of deconstruction continues until the deliverables are small enough to be considered work packages. Each of these packages should be small enough to help the Project Manager estimate the duration and the cost. Work packages can be scheduled, cost estimated, monitored, and controlled.
What Is Included in a Work Package?
Every project management dataset has an array of smaller pieces associated with it called work packages.
A Budget
A budget is required to account for how much money was allotted to this package. Tracking prices and ensuring the project isn't over budget is necessary too.
Deadlines
This will give the project manager a point of reference to measure how the work is progressing.
Risks
You need to identify risks and formulate a risk management plan to avert the problems before they start. You also need to monitor progress, so you can stop any potential problems before they get out of hand.
Task Priority
By structuring your work according to the work breakdown structure, you can set the priorities for every task, informing teams of the specifics of their tasks and making clear where they need to focus. On the one hand, stakeholders need to know about all the details, but on the other hand, they also need to be up to date on the overall progression of a project.
Characteristics of a Work Package
When an individual completes a work package, he or she may generally share a common set of characteristics. For example, these might include the type of work that is performed, and whether that type of work is done on a marketing, programming, or other skill set.
Certainly, you need to figure out what tasks you are going to execute in this work package, when they will take place, and how much time they will take. Resources may also be necessary to accomplish these tasks; some may be technological or material-based.
Every project must have a team leader assigned to it, as well as stakeholders that are deeply invested in that particular project. It's your responsibility to get their contact information and keep them up to date with the progress of the work.
Why are Work Packages Important?
By breaking a project down into work packages, the development of Work Breakdown Structures becomes easier—and project managers will have a finer level of control over assignments.
Other benefits include:
- Work packages allow for simultaneous work to be done on different components of a project in parallel by multiple teams. Each team follows the tasks defined for the work package and completes them by the specified deadline.
- Once the teams have finished their individual work packages, the entire project comes together with seamless integration. Completion of a work package is most often overseen by a specific person: a manager, supervisor, a team lead, or a designated team member.
- Even though costs are estimated at an activity level, these cost estimates are aggregated to the work package level, where they are measured, managed, and controlled.
- For each work package, we can determine the direct labor costs, the direct costs for material, equipment, travel, contractual services, and other non-personal resources, as well as the indirect costs associated with each of these work packages.
The individual costs of all the work packages are then aggregated to arrive at the authorized cost baseline or the authorized budget for the project.
5 Essential Tips for Work Packages in Project Management
Here are some project management tips to help with work assignments
- To make a Work Breakdown Structure, do not neglect to bring your team into the process. Your team is at the front of the work. They're your best resource when making sure your project has the necessary time and budget and when evaluating potential risks.
- Two excellent benefits of a work package system are it can provide an accurate time and cost estimate, while also making it easier to see which portions of the project are a greater percentage of the whole.
- It is advisable to assign one person to handle each job and report to the project manager. This will ensure accountability and manage workloads more effectively.
- On every WBS work package should be something that only that work package will produce, and the work package should not be repeated elsewhere.
- Limit your project so that it is doable within a short period of time; that is, not more than two weeks at the most. You want to execute the campaign at the same time as your reporting schedule.
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Measuring Work Package Performance With Earned Value Management
The performance of a work package can be measured by the earned value management measurement technique, a commonly used performance measurement metric. It integrates project scope, cost, and schedule measures to help the project management team assess and measure project performance and progress. It calls for the preparation of an integrated baseline against which the performance of the work packages can be measured for the duration of the project.
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Earned Value Measurement develops and monitors three key dimensions for each work package.
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Planned Value: Planned value is the authorized budget allocated to the work to be accomplished for the work package.
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Earned Value: Earned value is the value of work performed expressed in terms of the approved budget assigned to the work package.
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Actual Cost: Actual cost is the total cost actually incurred and recorded in accomplishing work performed for a work package.
Variances from the approved baseline are also monitored.
Measuring Work Package Performance – Other Metrics
Cost Variance
It is a measure of schedule performance on a project. It is the difference between the earned value and the actual costs. The relation to determining Cost Variance is: CV = EV – AC
Performance indices are also useful for determining project status.
Cost Performance Index
The cost performance index (CPI) is a measure of the value of work completed compared to the actual cost or progress made on the project.
Relation: CPI = EV / AC
These CV and CPI values for work packages are documented and communicated to stakeholders.
Schedule performance of the project can be measured at the level of a work package
Variances in schedule can be measured for every work package.
Schedule Variance
This is a measure of schedule performance on a project. It is equal to the earned value minus the planned value. Relation: SV = EV – PV
Schedule performance indices can also be determined for every work package.
Schedule Performance Index
The schedule performance index is a measure of achieved progress relative to planned progress on a project.
Relation: SPI = EV / PV
These SV and SPI values for each work package are documented and communicated to stakeholders.
Work packages allow team members to have a clear understanding of their roles and responsibilities with organization charts and other aids. Various formats exist to document team member roles and responsibilities. Most of these formats fall under three types: hierarchical, matrix-based, and text-based.
For instance, the responsibility assignment matrix (RAM) is a matrix-based chart which is used to illustrate the relationship between work packages or activities and project team members. On larger projects, a higher-level RAM can be used to define what a project team group or unit is responsible for within each work package. Also, a lower level RAM can be used within the group to designate roles, responsibilities, and level of authority for specific activities.
Risks can be managed at the level of work packages in a Work breakdown structure.
The work breakdown structure is a critical input to identifying risks as it facilitates an understanding of potential risks at both micro and macro levels. Risks can be identified and subsequently tracked at the level of work packages.
How to Prepare a Work Package - Guidelines
When breaking a WBS down to the level of work packages, the WBS nodes could be decomposed to extremely granular levels, wasting time and actually making the project difficult to understand, manage, and change. There are many things to be considered when deciding how far to decompose the WBS or how best to create a work package, but a few important factors to consider are:
- Work Packages should be small enough to be estimated for time and cost.
- The project manager and the project team should be satisfied that the current level of detail at the work package level provides enough information to proceed with subsequent activities.
- Work packages should be small enough to be assigned to a single person or a group who can be held accountable for results.
- Although this may differ from project to project, most project managers concur that the 8/80 rule can be applied to measure a work package. This rule says that no work package should be less than 8 hours and greater than 80 hours.
- Work packages can lie at different levels in the WBS hierarchy. Project managers should not artificially force their WBS into a structure where all the work packages lie at the same level in the WBS hierarchy. This results in problems as the project progresses, like forced detail -where you could have monitored and controlled specific parts of the work at a higher level- or not enough scrutiny where you really need it.
For an in-depth look at Work Packages, Project Scope Management, and more, check out our accredited PMP certification course. If you start your career as a project manager, then check out Simplilearn’s popular Post Graduate Program in Project Management. PMP is a registered trademark of the Project Management Institute, Inc.
