Fast Forward – Process Summary
The Fast Forward Process consists of 6 process stages that have synergies and alignment with the outcome based GDPM approach to project management. With this model there is an additional stage which is process stage 3 - Organising, this is a key area dealing with people who deliver, the human factors and the inevitable resistance to change; if not addressed this will often be a major contributor to project failure. More traditional methodologies have 5 stages.
We have focused on the 3 high level themes: Capability, Benefits and Lessons supported by the 6 stages:
Delivering Capability - The fundamental outcome of a project is delivery and implementation of the capability as defined by the Sponsor(s).
Realise Benefits - This is an area that is often ill defined or not defined at all, dangerous assumptions are often made that delivering capability will automatically realise a benefit. It is at this stage where we need to apply strategies and tactics to embed the change and adopt controlling mechanisms to sustain the change, track and realise the benefit as defined by the Sponsor(s). This is about the transition to Business As Usual (BAU) driven by the organisational managers and if required designated Change Managers.
Learn Lessons - This is a classic area of Project management that just doesn’t get done! In this area we need to formally close the project having handed over the capability to Business As Usual (BAU). Benefits realised to date accounted for to include review and confirmation of continued benefits tracking. We need to appraise the project team and review how well the project performed and what could we learn to help us this team and others in the future.