Project Initiation, Chartering, and Stakeholder Identification
Initiation is where the exam checks whether you know what authorizes a project, what belongs in the charter, and how stakeholders get identified and analyzed before planning begins. Scenarios often hinge on a missing charter element or a stakeholder identified too late.
Core rules
- The business case justifies the investment; the benefits management plan defines how benefits are measured and sustained. The charter formally authorizes the project and the project manager.
- Charter contents: purpose, measurable objectives and success criteria, high-level requirements and description with boundaries, overall risks, milestone schedule, preapproved financial resources, key stakeholder list, approval requirements, assigned PM, sponsor authority.
- The charter is high-level and does not contain the detailed scope baseline, schedule, or budget; it is the reference against which later baselines are judged.
- Stakeholder identification inputs: charter, business documents, agreements, enterprise environmental factors, organizational process assets. The register records identification, assessment (power, interest, influence, impact), and classification; the engagement plan states current and desired engagement levels.
- Initiation precedes planning; the kickoff happens after the charter and after the team is assembled enough to plan.
Worked example
A sponsor signs a charter whose objectives read 'improve customer satisfaction' and lists no success criteria, no milestone schedule, and no preapproved budget. Six months later the steering committee cannot decide whether to continue. The fix belongs at initiation: restate objectives measurably (for example, raise first-call resolution from 62% to 80% within two quarters of go-live), name the approval thresholds, and record the sponsor's financial authority. The charter is not a detailed plan, but it must be testable.
Traps
Using the charter as the scope baseline. Letting the sponsor alone own stakeholder identification. Listing names without analysis. Confusing the engagement plan with the register. Assigning the PM only after planning has begun.