You are working as a project manager for a small IT consulting firm and have been asked to create a plan for reviewing and auditing completed projects in order to gauge their success

What factors will you use to measure the success of a project? What questions would you ask in order to understand why a project succeeded or failed?

Student answers will vary but should include an understanding of the main project variables: scope, time, cost, quality, and risk. A sample answer is:
The factors I would use are:
• Cost: What was the original budget and final budget?
• Time: What was the original schedule and final schedule?
• Quality: Did the project meet the requirements outlined in the project plan?
• Scope: Did the scope of the project change?
Questions I would ask to understand the success or failure of the project would be:
• What technical difficulties were experienced and which could have been foreseen?
• What risks did the project entail?
• What events led to the scope changing?
• What difficulties occurred that were a consequence of personal, employee-oriented problems?
• What difficulties occurred that were a consequence of environmental, organizational, or managerial challenges?
• What do project team members consider as the primary challenges?
• What do clients or stakeholders consider as the primary challenges?