Effective Project Governance: Principles, Issues, and Recommendations

This report delves into the critical aspects of project governance, emphasizing the application of corporate governance principles to project management. It highlights the significance of well-defined roles, responsibilities, and performance criteria within project governance, along with the board's overall responsibility. The report addresses potential issues such as mismatches between governance and project culture, the impact of deadlines, dynamics, ethics, and processes on project outcomes. A checklist is provided to ensure compliance with good project governance practices. Recommendations include clear project planning, sponsor involvement, and transparent reporting mechanisms. The report concludes that effective project management necessitates proper planning, adherence to established principles, and proactive project manager oversight to achieve project success while mitigating risks and staying within budget.

Running head: PROJECT GOVERNANCE
PROJECT GOVERNANCE
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
Principles....................................................................................................................................3
Issues..........................................................................................................................................4
Checklist.....................................................................................................................................5
Recommendation........................................................................................................................5
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................6
References..................................................................................................................................7

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Introduction
The term governance can be related to a set of regulations, policies, function,
responsibility and procedures that define the management, establishment and control the
aspects of program, projects and portfolios. The concept of a good governance in recent times
is increasing in demand taking into consideration the government, regulators and the
shareholders (Muller 2017). The main factor, which should be very important in this scenario,
is the success of the project and the means of getting to the level of success without any type
of risk associated with the process keeping in mind the overall budget.
The focus point of the report would be to put emphasis on the principles from the area
of the corporate governance that can be applied to the concept of project management. On the
other hand, the issues, which can be faced in order to address the sector of ensuring good
project government, is also taken into consideration. Checklist is also provided which provide
a basic guideline relating to the plan of governance.
Principles
The principle, which can be applied to the concept of the project management
scenario taking into consideration the area of corporate governance, are as follows:
Principles 1
The roles, performance and the responsibility criteria for the project management
governance are clearly defined and understood.
Principles 2
The board of the project has the overall responsibility relating to the governance of
the project.

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Principles 3
A supportive and a coherent relation is directly demonstrated between the project
portfolio and the overall strategy of the business (Loch, Mähring and Sommer 2017).
Principles 4
Agreement which is government disciplined supported by appropriate control and
methods that are applied to the overall working life span of the project.
Principles 5
All the projects have been plan and approved containing the authority points at which
the case of the business is approved and reviewed. Decision made at the point of
authorization are communicated and recorded.
Principles 6
The business case project is supported by realistic and relevant information that a base
which is realistic for the concept of making appropriate authorization decision.
Principles 7
The organization fosters an improvement culture and of frank discloser of information
relating to the project.
Principles 8
There are well-defined criteria relating to the report status of the project and for the
risk escalation and the direct issues to the level of the organization.
Principles 9

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The member of the delegated authorities have sufficient amount of representation,
authority, competence and resources, which can help them, make a decision, which is
appropriate.
Principles 10
The stakeholders of the project are engaged into a level that is commensurate with the
importance towards the organization and in the way, which fosters the trust.
Issues
It can be stated here that most of the project fail due to mismatch between the
governance and the project culture. Some of the issue in this aspect are stated below:
 Deadline: the project deadline can affect the overall outcome of the project drastically
were the project manager usually take some steps. They should have a clear-cut idea
about the deadline of the project. The project manager should be involved in the overall
activity so that the project can reach the outcome. The project manager should have a
clear-cut idea on when to push the team members. It should be aimed that a project
should be delivered within the predefined deadline so that it would not hamper the overall
working of the project and the stakeholders as well as the client would be satisfied with
the service they receive.
 Dynamics: A project culture, which is negative in framework, can directly setback the
effort of a good project governance (Too, Le and Yap 2017). In most of the scenario, it
can be seen that the employees are not motivated so much instead of having an
environment and resources to work with.
 Ethics: It can be stated that it is very much difficult to stare the ethics of a team but
visualization can be done if wanted. The project ethics should be aligned with the pre –

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fixed ethics of the organization. The conforming and the compliance with the standards of
ethics can be considered as a key factor in a god governance of a project.
 Processes: A good project governance can directly mean that the process, which are
related to the project, are stated and the working is checked. In ideal situation, it should
be that a fresher in any of the organization should get a chance to interact with the
superiors do that they can get the necessary help from them (Loch, Mähring and Sommer
2017).
Checklist
Description Yes No
Is the scope of the project
clear
Is the funding of the project
approved
Have the stakeholders of
project been identified
Has the sponsors of the
project been identified
Is there any risk factor
associated with the project
Is the project approval
process being identified
properly

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Is the resources and the
budget of the project been
identified (Too, Le and Yap
2017)
The above is a checklist for ensuring compliance with a good project governance.
Each of the description has to be identified and marked according to yes and no accordingly.
Recommendation
Recommendation 1
The project should have a clear plan: The plan of the project should be one of the
most important sectors, which should be taken care of. Most of the project fail due to the
factor that they did not have a clear-cut idea or any sort of planning involved in the overall
working of the project. In many situation a project can face different types of risk factors
associated with it, there should always be a backup plan, which should be implemented
during the situation (Too, Le and Yap 2017).
Recommendation 2
The project should have a Sponsor: The sponsors of the project is a sector were the
overall funding of the project would be available. In many situation, it can be stated that
project fail due to lack of fund so in any situation the sponsors play a vital role in this aspect
(Müller and Martinsuo 2015).
Recommendation 3

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The project should have clear reporting: Clearly defined reporting can be stated very
much important this is due to factor that it can be stated as a driver, which would be helping
the project to reach the success level. The report can be of different types such as budget
report, project report etc. (Loch, Mähring and Sommer 2017).
Conclusion
The report can be concluded on a note that a project management process should
always have a proper planning involved. The planning should be in the field of finance to
working to execution of the overall project. The principles which are stated above in the
report play a very dominating role in the overall working of the project and can be applied to
any type of project management scenario. The project manager can be considered as a person
who should have the overall control of the project and the project manager should take into
consideration whether the project is working according to the principles, which are stated.
There are different types of approach which can lead a project to success but the main factor
which can be stated here is that the implementation of the process which is done and the
means by which the success of the project can be obtained.

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References
Ahola, T., Ruuska, I., Artto, K. and Kujala, J., 2014. What is project governance and what are
its origins?. International Journal of Project Management, 32(8), pp.1321-1332.
Bekker, M.C., 2015. Project Governance–the definition and leadership dilemma. Procedia-
Social and Behavioral Sciences, 194, pp.33-43.
Joslin, R. and Müller, R., 2015. Relationships between a project management methodology
and project success in different project governance contexts. International Journal of Project
Management, 33(6), pp.1377-1392.
Lappi, T. and Aaltonen, K., 2017. Project governance in public sector agile software projects.
International Journal of Managing Projects in Business, 10(2), pp.263-294.
Loch, C., Mähring, M. and Sommer, S., 2017. Supervising projects you don’t (fully)
understand: Lessons for effective project governance by steering committees. California
Management Review, 59(2), pp.45-67.
Müller, R. and Martinsuo, M., 2015. The impact of relational norms on information
technology project success and its moderation through project governance. International
Journal of Managing Projects in Business, 8(1), pp.154-176.
Muller, R., 2017. Project governance. Routledge.
Oakes, G., 2016. Project reviews, assurance and governance. Gower.
Too, E., Le, T. and Yap, W., 2017. Front-end planning-The role of project governance and its
impact on scope change management. International Journal of Technology, 8(6), pp.1124-
1133.

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Too, E.G. and Weaver, P., 2014. The management of project management: A conceptual
framework for project governance. International Journal of Project Management, 32(8),
pp.1382-1394.