2.60 The Department's initiatives to match its project management expertise to the requirements of individual projects should help minimise the risk of projects drifting away from plan. In responding quickly to meet additional demand for project management skills, it has increased its reliance on contractors until staff can be recruited on a permanent basis.
Recommendation 7 | In view of the significant growth in workload, the Department should keep its in-house project management skills base under review to minimise the risk of over-dependence on bought-in resources. |
2.61 To make effective use of resources ordered from EDS under the contract, project managers need to understand how variations in the timing of requirements impact on what the Department has to pay, and that failure to report surplus requirements risks the Department incurring nugatory expenditure. The Department has identified this as a risk and plans to issue guidance on the subject.
Recommendation 8 | To minimise the risk of nugatory expenditure, the Department should ensure that its guidance provides project managers with sufficient information about the contract pricing mechanism and the impact of changes in requirements. In particular, managers should understand how changes in EDS productivity and in the volume and timing of resource requirements may affect costs. |