Planning and Defining the Design-Build Procurement Process - Design-Build for Water and Wastewater Projects - page 91

the project team to strive for success. It should have broad significance to motivate and
stimulate the project team.
Creating the mission statement helps focus the team on what is to be accomplished.
Owners should consider including completion of the DB project in the mission statement,
because it is the desired result. A mission statement cannot be created, however, unless
the team understands the project's scope.
The following is a hypothetical, representative mission statement for a major capital
program:
While keeping our commitments to project stakeholders, we effec-
tively leverage our talent and experience to safely place the project
in full and efficient operation by April 2016. We always manage the
project to deliver best value to our customers within the approved
budget. We will intentionally transfer experience gained to optimize
the enterprise's capital program management and conduct of our core
business.
A mission statement is the first part of generating team alignment because it requires
agreement among those who develop it.
Gaining alignment. Gaining agreement among stakeholders about the goals for the
project at the beginning of project plan development is critical to the successful completion
of a DB project. Project team alignment begins with the collaborative development of the
mission statement. Alignment of other key stakeholders can then be achieved through
additional collaboration.
In the alignment phase of the chartering process, the team that developed the mis-
sion statement brainstorms and then agrees on a list of declarative statements, or critical
success factors (CSFs), that describe the critical actions that the project team must take to
assure project success. There are usually four to eight CSFs, and they support the project
mission statement.
Each CSF must be for a single issue. The list of CSFs usually includes strategic and
tactical items. Each of the CSFs must be necessary to achieve the project's mission, and
collectively they should be sufficient to assure that the project team achieves the project's
mission. Because a personal commitment is sought from all members of the project deliv-
ery team, CSFs are usually written as simple declarative statements that begin with “we
must” or “we shall.”
The list in Table 8-1 contains a hypothetical list of CSFs that can be developed to sup-
port the project mission statement shown previously.
Chartering outcomes are sometimes posted in the project workspace for regular ref-
erence by project staff. Chartering language is often used in the introductory sections of
project documents such as progress reports, technical reports, procurement notices, and
other important project documentation. Owners who prepare mission statements with
supporting CSFs often use them to guide future project delivery work.
Deploying the plan. Once the mission statement and CSFs are ready, it is up to senior
managers to deploy the people, processes, and tools to move the project forward. This
step requires that organizational responsibilities, authorities, and communication
protocols be well defined and understood by the entire project delivery team. A roles and
responsibilities matrix is then used to designate authority and identify accountabilities.