Tim Grassley

Using Ben Aston’s Statement of Work as a guide, I created the following document to formalize project requirements and deliverables.

Aston notes that a statement of work “is one of the best and worst weapons in a project manager’s arsenal of tools.” These documents take a lot of work to produce, and even small errors can have massive implications. But on the upside, it clarifies expectations and agreed upon procedures to organize the manner a client and development team can work together.

In short, it says what is in the project and what is not. In the case of the ProBuffs project, it was a way to formalize our team’s goals and gave the project momentum.

The ProBuffs project is exciting for the opportunity to reconcile four units’ desires to improve undergraduates’ experiences at CU Boulder. The challenge has been in the actual work of synthesis. This document made a strategy concrete, which meant we needed to begin delivering our user studies and wireframes to make our deadlines.

We decided on a three phase approach that began by researching the validity of the project requirements against user preferences. We plan to collate these into a report that will inform our first prototypes.

This excerpt of a much longer timeline provides a snapshot of deliverables the executive team members can present to their own stakeholders. The advantage of a condensed, printable timeline has been to broaden buy-in from unit staff members whom we expect to also use the end product.

More is to come on this project, but the statement of work proved a critical step in moving the project forward.

Lily Board
Assistant Dean for Student Success

Kathy Noonan
Director of Engagement

Cori Shaff
Associate Director, Career Services

Eryn Elder
Assistant Director, Academic Coaching

Tim Grassley
Project Manager, Content Manager

Alex Steele
Graphic Designer

Clint Talbott
Assistant Dean for Communications

Mindy Hurd
Assistant Director, Career Services