Why A Business Case Is Necessary For Your PRINCE2 Project

Introduction

How do you make sure your leaders spot the value in your product? How do you do this early on, and provide a way for everyone to visualize your product even before the project starts?

You need to understand the importance of making a strong business case for your product in order to achieve all of the above.

When you write a great business case for your product, it becomes easier to understand what your project is all about, just at the outset.

How to exactly do all of this, is what we are going to see in this blogpost.

Key takeaways:

• How to be communicative about your product.
• How to add to the appeal and interest surrounding your product.
• How to increase confidence in your project.
• How business cases work for PRINCE2 Agile projects as well.
• What courses to choose if you are interested in helping to visualize your product even when it is not created.

Raising the communicative bar :

A product is what you put into it. And what is put into it affects the final form of the product.

It is important to communicate this early on, so as to make the leaders comfortable with your product.

More importantly, this can be tied into a business case.

A business case written with the final form of the product in mind can go a long way in putting out the crux of the product across various layers of the organization.

Suppose you are a product manager and have a project going.

You are creating a product.

You have plans to simultaneously start creating a digital identity for the product.

You put this down in a business case. The business leaders understand from your business case, that in the present scenario, it is wise to have a digital presence that is easily accessible to customers.

They strike a partnership with a social media company, a third party supplier, who helps you with creating the digital identity that your product warrants.

This business case has helped you build your product the way you want it.

Lets recap what we have seen :

• It is important to be communicative about your product, which is in turn formed by what is put into the product.
• A good way to start is by writing a great business case.
• A solid business case will communicate the stuff your product is made up of. It communicates the crux of your product across various organizational layers.

Strategic communication helps gain a solid standing

Having a fantastic business case helps communicate the form and shape of your product.

After all, you are going to put a everything, the absolute world, into your product. And that will affect the way your product is going to come across to people.

Hence fixing that into your business case helps your product reach across to strategic leadership, just as it is.

Not only that, leaders will perceive the confidence you have in your product.

A good business case will help them see what you are ready to put into the product, and they begin to eye your your product with an interest as to how it would turn out.

This sense of interest increases the appeal of your product.

I'll refer to the same example that we saw before. You are a project manager with an active project.

You are creating a product. Not only that, you are creating a digital identity for the product.

Your business case helped you gain third party support for the digital identity of the product.

Due to the social media package that the supplier company has for you, it becomes easy to get your digital product out at a faster rate and lower cost. It as well, becomes easier to increase visibility into what went into the making of the product, because you could focus more on the costs of the materials, with the savings you made on the digital side.

You update your business case to reflect this.

Lets recap!

• A product is what you put into it.
• This affects the form and shape of the product.
• A strong business case helps you convey the form that the product takes, across to various people in leadership positions.
• It raises the interest these people would take, in your product.
• This raises the overall appeal for your product and ensures sustained effect of your project.

Ensuring continued investment and support

After all, a product becomes what you put into it.

We saw that this affects the form and shape of the product.

A valid business case increases visibility into what is put into a product, hence it informs leadership of what the product is going to be like, even before work on the product has started.

When that happens, senior leadership know what it is going to take to create the product and that you as a project manager are going to make it a reality.

They now know that the project is going to see completion after the effort being put into it.

This assures them that it is safe to invest in and provide continual support for, your project.

We'll yet again continue with the same example. You are the project manager with an active project.

You are now creating a digital identity for your product by engaging the help of a third party, who have a social media package for you.

After that happened, you updated the business case.

In doing that, you have been transparent with your leadership of what it has cost you to create the product and how much of a value bundle your product is .

Because of the success of the digital identity of your product, you have been able to spread the enthusiasm for your product.

This is noted by the senior leaders and they have extended all the whole-heartedsupport for the project, saying that whatever you need to complete the project will be available to you.

Lets recap!

• The shape and form of your product should be continuously conveyed to the various people affected by your project. Especially your leaders
• A strong business case helps raise the appeal of your product by doing just that.
• When your product appeals to leaders, it means it is going to find support.
• That makes it a safe bet for investors and senior management who look at your project from an investment perspective.

PRINCE2 methodologies have been the driving force behind projects for a very long time. These have been adjusted to reflect changing project requirements, like shorter and quicker development spans, not very unlike those characteristic of Agile Software Development.

However, whatever may be the case of a project, some things will never change.

Your project will always involve the creation of a product. It will always involve putting something into a product.

This will affect the form and shape of a product. The shape and form of a product are innate properties of that product.

A business case always communicates the final form your product is going to take, from the start of the project. If the product is going to take a different form, the business case will be suitably updated.

This hold true for both PRINCE2 and PRINCE2 Agile projects.

Both kinds are after all projects.

They would lead to the creation of products.

A business case is meant for the product created.

It communicates the efforts and materials being put into a product, and hence raises the overall interest in the product.

That is why, both PRINCE2 and PRINCE2 Agile kinds of projects need a business case to enhance the visualization of the product being created.

Lets recap!

• We looked at a primary difference between PRINCE2 and PRINCE2 Agile.
• The latter comes from new software development techniques.
• A valid business case is necessary for the product.
• We looked at an example that focused on products, and not on the methodologies.
• The project in case could have been PRINCE2 or PRINCE2 Agile.
• Creation of products is universal in both cases, and a strong business case is meant to cater to products.
• Hence, a fortified business case is universal for both PRINCE2 and PRINCE2 Agile.

Knowlathon has been for long, a provider of PRINCE2 trainings.

Not only do you attend a training, but also you can validate your skills by sitting a certification exam. You then get a PRINCE 2 certificate.

We have several options for you: the PRINCE2 Foundation, PRINCE2 Practitioner, and also a blended course:PRINCE2 Foundation and Practitioner. If you just want to know the basic tenets of PRINCE2, you may opt for the PRINCE2 Foundation.

If you want to lead projects actively, you may take the PRINCE2 Practitioner course.

Save yourself the time by doing a three day blended PRINCE2 course.

Newer ways of software development led to Agile practices being widely popular. Given how immensely popular Agile is when resources are strained during times like these, PRINCE2 Agile was written for those who want to speed up development and creation of products.

Now, for you, we have the PRINCE2 Agile route.

Consisting of the same course types as PRINCE2, we must say our three day PRINCE2 Agile Foundation and Practitioner course is well sought after.