1. Project Life cycles
BTEC National

2. Project Life cycles
A project is broken down into stages in a number of different ways. How you break it down is called a project life cycle. We will look at one way of breaking a project down. There are other ways that are just as valid

3. Define and produce a specification
This stage is about finding out what the customer wants. It may include recording what the users do now, what the customer wants to happen once the new system is in place and any performance needs. The four main activities are:
Interview the customer
Analyse the customer’s requirements
Produce a specification
Produce a business case
The end result or deliverable of this phase are usually:
A specification saying what the new system must do, buit not how it will be done
A business case for going ahead with the new system, giving potential costs and benefits

4. Plan and design
The plan for the design stage turns the customer’s requirements into a potential computer-based solution. The design stage often has these five major activities:
Produce an overall design
Design an input system
Design an output system
Design a processing system
Produce design documentation
Alternatively, the plan for design may be based on the proposed system’s functions – for example, create, update, delete and display. It could also be based on the system’s users – for example, sales, marketing and finance.

5. Collect information
Your plan for a project needs to include a process for you to collect information on how the project is going from others who are working on the project. You will need to review and summarise that information and present it to stakeholders in your project

6. Implementation The implementation stage includes: Build the project
Test that the produce meets the need
Provide documentation and possibly training
Hand the project over to the customer

7. Complete and review
Completion involves the customer and the users using your product. It includes identifying the actual benefits and costs of building and running the product. It also includes a final project review, where the stakeholders review how well you did in managing the project and product delivery.

8. Test your knowledge!
What are the 4 main activities of defining and producing a specification?
What are the 5 main activities of planning and designing?
What are the 4 main activities of implementation?