Professional Documents
Culture Documents
PROJECT 1
Ravi Gudemalla
[Institutional Affiliation(s)]
Author Note
Abstract
The Standish CHAOS report has been a basis to identify the factors affecting the success of a
project. The first report concluded that the iron triangle – scope, time and budget were responsible
for a successful project. This idea has changed over time and has resulted in the introduction of
various other factors that affect the success of a project like the approach, size/complexity of the
project, the team skillset, customer feedback and much more. This paper explains about the factors,
according to the author, that also influence the success of the project apart from the iron triangle
"All success is rooted in either luck or failure. If you begin with luck, you learn nothing
but arrogance. However, if you begin with failure and learn to evaluate it, you also learn to succeed.
Failure begets knowledge. Out of knowledge you gain wisdom, and it is with wisdom that you can
According to the Standish CHAOS report, 1995, a successful project is the result of proper
scope, time and budget management. After evaluating various companies in different scenarios,
the report stated that the three (scope, time, budget) are the pillars of a successful project also
The Standish CHAOS report has been published every year since its first edition and each
year has provided different conclusions based on its studies. Over the years, the CHAOS report
found out that the iron triangle is not sufficient to improve the success of a project, and a project
must delve deeper into other aspects to improve its success rate. According to me, the iron triangle
responsible for a successful project to scope, time and budget eradicates the impact of various
other factors such as the human skill factor, the size of the project, the approach used, customer
“We found that both satisfaction and value are greater when the features and functions
delivered are much less than originally specified and only meet obvious needs.” -
The 2015 Standish CHAOS report took into consideration the customer feedback besides
the iron triangle by viewing the product through a customer’s perspective. The results showed that
the success of a project dropped by 7% when considering customer feedback. This implies that to
Standish CHAOS Report and Factors affecting a successful project 4
improve the success of a project, the customer’s review must be given much more importance to
enhance the success rate of a software project. These results incline with my thoughts about the
Apart from the customer’s perspective, I believe that the approach and the size of the
project are also instrumental in deciding the success of a project. Through my experience and my
knowledge in this subject, I have studied and applied both the approaches of managing a project –
the waterfall approach and the agile approach. According to theory, the waterfall approach is a
preplanned, rigid and irreversible process, which can only be reviewed in the SDLC (Software
Development Life Cycle). On the other hand, the agile approach is highly flexible, and has a give
and take approach, which means, the reviews given by the customers and the QA team are a
significant part of the agile approach to project management. My experiences in the field of
Software Project Management has proven it to me that the agile approach has a much higher
success rate to a project. The CHAOS report of 2015 has proven that the agile approach has higher
success rates compared to the waterfall approach. According to Shane Hastie and Stephane
Wojewoda, “With the take up of agile development methods over recent years it was possible to
compare project outcomes between agile and traditional waterfall projects. Across all project sizes
agile approaches resulted in more successful projects and less outright failures.” This was the
conclusion the obtained from the results of the 2015 CHAOS report.
Not just the approach, but the size of the project also plays a key role in the success of the
project. A small project has few factors that affect a project and are of a manageable magnitude.
This give more control to the team responsible for the project, hence improving the success of the
project. A large project has huge investments but have a low return value compared to multiple
small projects. Inferring from the CHAOS report, for large projects, the agile approach is close to
Standish CHAOS Report and Factors affecting a successful project 5
6 times better than the waterfall approach. Thus, it is better to have small projects with the agile
approach. According to Jennifer Lynch, the advantage of having the agile approach to a small
project is that, the project fails earlier and can be restarted faster. This in turn reduces the
Finally, I believe that investing in the human factor of a project has a huge effect on the
success of the project. “Moving investments from PM tools and other worthless activities should
improve success and value rates. Everyone is looking for a quick fix, but investing in people takes
time, but offers a much bigger payout in the end.”, according to Jennifer Lynch regarding the skills
of the project team. Investing in the skills of the personnel, as stated by Jennifer can be a slow
process, but has huge benefits over time regarding the success of the projects.
Apart from the skills of the team, emotional maturity, that is, soft skills also play a role in
a successful project. Communication skills amongst team members is crucial while taking
decisions about a project, especially in an agile approach. This is because, the agile approach is a
high paced and flexible method, thus a lot of innovative ideas and suggestions keep bouncing
around the team. Thus, communication and soft skills are crucial for a successful project.
Therefore, I believe that the old-fashioned iron triangle is not enough for the success of a
project. A successful project depends on various factors as mentioned above. Apart from what I
have mentioned, there are various other factors that [play a crucial role, such as executive support
– financial and emotional, project optimization – time and budget, skilled resources – labor and
technology and many more. To identify the perfect method for a guaranteed success of a project is
not possible, but the above factors can highly increase the success of a project and eradicate
outright failures.
Standish CHAOS Report and Factors affecting a successful project 6
References