Joseph Phillips, PMP: Planning the Project

During the initiating process you and the project customer created requirements that defined the basic ideas of the project. This document is elaborated upon, and the project scope is now created. In addition to the preliminary project scope statement, you’ll use the project charter, historical information if you’ve done projects like this one before, and approved change requests that may have trickled in. (Here’s an example of how you won’t have many change requests affecting the project scope early in the project, but as the project moves through its execution change requests can become more common.)

Technically there are two scopes when it comes to project management:

1. Product scope – This is all of the resources and work required to create the product scope and the ancillary deliverables of the project. This the labor, plans, blueprints, documents, and effort to create the vision the project customer possess.

The product scope and the project scope support one another. If the project team is doing work outside of the project scope then the customer is not going to get the product scope that she envisioned. If the customer doesn’t know what the product scope is then the project manager and the project going to have a tough time creating the project scope. These two scopes support one another. The project scope statement is identified by completing a product scope analysis, since it reveals what the project must create.

Real World Note: Often the product scope is already designed before the project manager and the project team get started on the project. The product scope is concerned with the features and functions of the project deliverable, while the project scope is concerned with the work to create the project deliverables.