Hi,

many times I heard talking about big and small Projects. Many companies have different procedures for them. Of course procedures are lightweight for small Projects, and heavy for big ones. But, I am not going to talk about different procedures. I will talk about how recognize those Projects.

Almost every company which make differences among big and small project make it by the:

• Budget – or how much will it cost?
• Time – or how much will it last?
• Resources – how many people are going to work on it?

And, for example, decision is:

• If the Project is under $100.000 it will be considered as small, otherwise it will be considered as big
• If the Project is under 3 months it will be considered as small, otherwise it will be considered as big
• If the Project is going to be done under 10 people it will be considered as small, otherwise it will be considered as big

And, frankly, I do not agree with that. YES project can be measured with those parameters, but think about this: RISKS. From my point of view Project is big if it is risky. Let me explain that theory. Let’s say that you are going to upgrade 10 computers to the latest version of operating system. And you need 2 hours per computer. And you are going to be payed $500 per computer. And you need only two persons to do that. So, this is cheap, short, and not people demanding project. According to parameters mentioned above, it should be consider as small. BUT! What if those computers serves as as front end computers in the bank? What if mayor application is running on those computers. And, finally, if this application won’t work, you will get extremely angry customers. In other word, what if this upgrade project is risky? And it is, no matter of budget, time and resources. See where am i pointing at?

On the other hand, if you sold ERP system to company which is subsidiary of another Company. And it follows all processes and procedures as the main company. So, new ERP system is, more or less copy – paste Project. BUT, since we are talking about ERP, and licenses are expensive, we are talking, for example, about $500.000 budgeted Project. Is it big? Well, not exactly.

So risks, risks, risks, are always the primary measure when you think about your Project as big or small.

To be short, and jump in the conclusion at once. If your project is risky, no matter how small your budget, timeline, and resources demands are you should consider it as big!

Regards,

Nenad