Gold plating software project management

Agile methods are the method of choice to solve that problem and several others. The concept of gold plating on projects usually refers to the process or concept of adding functionality beyond what is covered by the. Team members may add extra functions to prove their ability. Next time they will expect you to deliver more than agreed upon in the scope statement, and not doing so will make the client unhappy. Following are a few causes of gold plating in order to prove his abilities to the project manager, a team member may add extra features to the products. Gold plating is also considered a bad project management practice for different project management best practices and methodologies such as project management body of knowledge pmbok and prince2. Gold plating project management part 1 project smart. Gold plating can increase the cost and risk and delay the schedule. Scope creep in project management refers to the unauthorized changes to the scope of a project, that occur after the project scope has been baseline andor approved. My experience is mostly in software development projects. In other ways, its similar to the kind of overkill that people perform when they use topoftheline products unnecessarily. This is particularly easy in software, where the team want to add a extra function because they have extra time, or they think it will be cool. Most of the times we try to complete existing project software development and implementation and. Scope creep and gold plating in project management pm.

Gold plating involves adding additional but unrequested features during a project because the team thinks it will result in a better product. A project manager may add extra functions to earn credit. Gold plating in project management refers to the practice, where the project team works in enhancing the product features or functionality, which was not part of the project scope. How to avoid gold plating in project management quora. One of the primary reasons for gold plating is, one or more project team members or the project manager himself wanted to display their abilities in the work to the customer or senior management. Scope creep and gold plating terms refer to the modifications done in the scope of the project. This is particularly easy in software, where the team want to add a extra function because they have extr. A guide to the project management body of knowledge pmbok. Gold plating is common in software projects, and is usually done by team members either on an individual or a collaborative basis, most of the times without the knowledge of the project manager.

Developers sometimes make the mistake of gold plating trying to impress important clients particularly if the developers or project managers are less experienced. Gold plating is what we call it when the project team does work on the product to add features that the requirements didnt call for, and that the stakeholder and customer didnt ask for and dont need. Sometimes it is performed to divert attention from defects. One of the primary reasons for gold plating is, one or more project team members or the project manager himself wanted to display their abilities in the work to the. In this case, gold plating means the addition of any feature not considered in the original scope plan pmbok or product description prince2 at any point of the project.

Its typical manifestation is the addition of new product features or functionalities without considering the impact to the other project constraints such as time, cost, resources. In software development projects, gold plating is very common because team members want to show their abilities to their managers. Neither of these two ideas is a perfect analogy for software gold plating. Scope creep and gold plating in project management pm study. Goldplating in project management is the act of giving the customer more than what he originally asked for. Gold plating may sound pleasing, but it is bad for the project. Scope creep and gold plating in project management. Scope statement, project documents, and work breakdown structure wbs give sufficient information about the project deliverables. In time management, gold plating is the phenomenon of working on a project or task past the point of diminishing returns. Gold plating is the practice of making changes to a project that are outside of the original agreedupon scope. Therefore, managing scope creep and gold plating is key for effective project scope management.