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Changes mainly fall into three categories (Gray & Larson, 2008):

a) Scope changes: These are changes in design or additions normally suggested by customers that would add new features to the existing product.

b) Occurrence of predicted risk events, resulting in implementation of contingency plans. This might have an effect on the baseline costs as well as schedules.

c) Implementing changes suggested by team members in order to improve the product.

In the case of outside contracts, scope changes and occurrence of predicted risk events needs to be properly addressed, in order to ensure that resultant consequences of the change are handled effectively and do not have any negative impact on the continuance of the project. Effective change controls systems must be in place to identify proposed changes, review and approve changes. The change control system also needs to communicate changes, adjust schedule and budget as well as track all the changes that are to be implemented.

The following suggestions could help ensure adequate change control on projects that involve outside contracts (Schwalbe, 2008):

a) Any change made to any part of the project needs to be reviewed, documented and approved in the same way as the original part of the plan was approved. Apart from this, the evaluation of any change should also include an impact analysis of the change. This would take into account the effect of the change on the scope, time, and cost of services being provided by the outside contractor. A baseline to analyze and understand the changes could also be useful in this case.

b) All changes need to be documented in writing, which would be quite helpful in resolving any disputes with the outside contractor at a later stage. Several other tools and techniques including a formal contract change control system, claims administration and records management systems will help designing an effective change control system for the organization.

Changes