A proven process for project management

A Co-Innovation project proposal will be developed out of a company Strategy on a Page (SOAP), a road map for the overall Co-Innovation Program developed jointly by your company and MLA. The SOAP will likely include several projects covering innovations in multiple areas of the company.

A project proposal, once approved, acts as a charter for each project and should cover:

• The Business Case – the problem to be solved, justification and benefits, aligned to both the company and MLA strategy.
• Feasibility – how the project can be achieved within budget, technical and operational constraints. (This may be covered in an up-front feasibility project.)
• Vision – the expected impact and why it is important.
• Specific goals and objectives – how the project will solve the problem.
• Stakeholders – the partners, collaborators and users and how they will benefit and be involved in the project.
• Deliverables – the specific and tangible outcomes at different stages of the project.
• Timeline – the milestones and time frame commitments.
• Resources required – the budget, time and people needed to complete the project.
• Challenges – and how they will be resolved.

Once the proposal has been accepted, the next stage is to develop a plan. This may be done with the project team or before the team is established. Because of the nature of the project and the need to work across divisions and functions, you should ensure that your plan has input from team members and is sufficiently flexible to respond to challenges, new ideas and developments as they occur.