Before you undertake your project, you need to describe the tasks you will be completing. This is often the hardest part of the project. One way to think about the tasks is to think of them in different phases.

Phase 1 – represents tasks associated with understanding the scope of the project. Typically this phase consists of

• Conversations with stakeholders involved with the project
• Refinement of the requirements for the eventual solution

Phase 2 – represents data collection. This includes the identification of data you will need, the collection of this data, and the analysis of the data.

Phase 3 – represents the development of various approaches for solving the problem. This phase includes the development of appropriate design model(s) and the use of these models to test different possible solutions.

Phase 4 – represents the selection of a set of recommendations to be presented. Inherent in this phase is development of a comparison of different solutions.

Phase 5 – represents the preparation of a final report and the presentation of the report to those who will decide on the recommendations.

Phase 6 – (Optional) represents the implementation of the solution that is accepted. This phase may not be in all projects.

Not every project will have all of these phases, but most will. You will find this to be a useful template to follow when you just don’t know how to start.