The History of PRINCE2™
By Duncan Haughey
It's true to say that the public sector has hardly covered itself in glory with their ability to deliver projects on time and within budget. PROMPTII, PRINCE and subsequently PRINCE2™ were all introduced to address the common causes of project failure.
PROMPTII (1975)
Project Resource Organisation Management and Planning Techniques
A project management method developed by Simpact Systems Ltd and adopted in 1979 by the Central Computing and Telecommunications Agency (CCTA) in response to an outcry that computer projects were over-running on time estimated for completion and initial budgets as set in the feasibility study. Factors of double, treble and even ten-times were experienced. PROMPTII was an attempt to set down guidelines for the stage flow through a computer project as follows:
- Feasibility Study - to determine whether the project should be done/can be done/will work if it is done
- Initial Stage - where the project organisation is set up
- Specification Stage - in which the user specification was detailed
- Design Stage - where the logical and from this the physical design of the computer system was designed in detail
- Development Stage - The system is built and tested
- Installation Stage - The user accepts (hopefully) a working system
- Operation Stage - when the system is tuned for the work in hand
This lead onto the development of PRINCE.
PRINCE (1989)
PRojects IN Controlled Environments
Produced in 1989 by the Central Computing and Telecommunications Agency (CCTA) a government agency for the development and implementation of IS/IT projects.
The main features are:
- A defined management structure
- A system of plans for resourcing and technical issues
- A set of control procedures
- A focus on products - deliverables to the customer and project deliverables for the management of the project
A feature in the original PRINCE methodology not seen in other methodologies was the concept of "assuring progress" from three separate but linked perspectives.
- Business Assurance Co-ordinator known as the BAC whose function is to monitor that the project is in line with the business mission of the company, and to report back at progress meetings. This assures that the project stays in the best interests of the company and other work in other projects.
- Technical Assurance Co-ordinator (TAC) who monitors the technical aspects of the project and assures that it does not get into technical difficulties.
- User Assurance Co-ordinator (UAC) who represents the eventual user. Notice that this is done all through the project and not left (as in days gone by) to the last minute after software has been developed and hardware purchased.
However, the PRINCE methodology developed a reputation as being too unwieldy, too rigid and applicable only to large projects, leading to a revision in 1996.
PRINCE2™ (1996)
PRojects IN Controlled Environments 2
An upgrade to PRINCE was deemed to be in order and the development was contracted out but assured by (virtual) committee spread among 150 European organisations. The BAC, TAC and UAC were removed in the official version. Most companies who adopt a PRINCE approach to project management adapt the methodology to their commercial environment and use those parts of PRINCE that work for them. This is quite acceptable as the puritanical days of sticking rigidly to a method are seen now as undesirable and unnecessary.
Originally developed for IT projects to minimise cost and time over-runs, now in a second revision has been made more generic for any projects in controlled environments.
In 2005 PRINCE2™ was updated in consultation with the international user community.
