Every project needs artifacts. These documents can give you valuable insight into how your project is progressing as well as tangible proof that you are meeting your goals. But what exactly are project management artifacts, why do we need them, and what is the best way to develop them?
What are Project Management Artifacts?Â
Project Management Artifacts are items or documents that provide “evidence of the progress, goals, and results of a project.” These artifacts can include reports, diagrams, charts, photos, videos, or anything else that provides a record of or details about the project’s progress.Â
Since artifacts tend to hold a pretty broad definition, it may be even more pertinent to consider what isn’t an artifact. Artifacts are not outputs or deliverables. Meaning, project artifacts relate to managing the project, not the thing you are creating as the output (materials/events) of the project.
In other words, artifacts “are not the project’s final deliverables. Instead, they are the stepping stones to its completion. They are the evidence of the work done, the decisions made, and the strategies implemented throughout the project.”
Why Project Management Artifacts?
Artifacts are important because they give project managers an organized and comprehensive way to track project objectives and progress. They also provide project managers and team members alike with reference points that allow them to make necessary changes. Without artifacts, it would be difficult to keep the project on track and deliver it in a coordinated fashion. Â
Types of Project Management Artifacts
As you may have guessed, there are many different types of artifacts, but they generally fall under one of these categories:
Strategy
These artifacts relate to a project initiation or initial stages. These types of artifacts define project elements like scope, resources, schedules and responsibilities. Typical strategy artifacts include project proposals, project charters, vision statements and road maps.
Communication Plan
Communications plans are artifacts that relate to effective communication tactics and strategies. A communication plan artifact may include documents that establish ways to communicate issues, meetings, document reviews, and more.
Logs and Registers
These artifacts are those that teams and project managers evaluate and update daily. This can include risk registers, assumption logs, backlogs and stakeholder registers.
General Plans
Project managers typically develop general plan artifacts to measure project progress and efficiency. General plans can be one document or several with both visual elements and text. According to Indeed, you may find general plans related to logistics, quality, releases, scope management, iteration and tests while working on a project.
Reports
Report artifacts cover reports with topics like the risks, quality, and status of a project.Â
Hierarchy Charts
Another type of project management artifact is a hierarchy chart. Hierarchy charts typically describe the relationships between different parts of a project in a detailed hierarchical structure. These charts can include breakdowns of work processes, organization, products, etc.Â
Visual Information
This type of artifact includes anything that constitutes a non-traditional, visual representation of project processes. For example, images, flow charts, dashboards, and velocity charts.
Baselines
Budgets, milestone schedules, scope baselines, and performance baselines are all examples of baseline artifacts.Â
Agreements and Contracts
Any type of legally binding document can be included in this category. “Fixed price contracts, time and materials contracts and cost reimbursement contract” are a few examples of contract artifacts.Â
*Anything that provides you with a sense of your project’s progress could be considered an artifact. Â
The Benefits of Project Management Artifacts
Project management artifacts are more than paperwork and records, they are an integral part of any project. In fact, artifacts provide a variety of benefits to the project including:
Better Communication
Artifacts can help team members communicate clearly as they provide access to “unified understanding of project goals, progress, and challenges.”
Informed Decision-Making
Likewise, artifacts can help your team and stakeholders make better decisions – as they provide critical data that you can use to make informed, evidence-driven decisions.Â
Transparency
In the process of creating artifacts you’ll record team member’s actions, decisions, and changes. This provides transparency about who is responsible for what decision.Â
Better Alignment
Because you will continually refer to original documentation to maintain your artifacts, they can help ensure the project stays aligned with its original goals.Â
Execution
Artifacts like detailed plans and schedules keep your project on track and help team members execute it effectively and efficiently.Â
Reference for Future Projects
All of the insights gathered in your artifacts will certainly help future projects. They can be used to prevent mistakes as well as build on established best practices.
How to Create Project Management Artifacts
Identify Need
The first step in creating your artifacts is to identify whether there is a need for the artifact. Make sure that your artifact has a clear purpose in your project and determine whether another document/diagram already covers this purpose. If there are no other documents that address the need, proceed with creating the artifact.Â
Gather Resources
The next step in creating your project management artifact is to gather all necessary information and resources needed to create it. Depending on the artifact, this could be data, images, research, etc.Â
Develop Your Artifacts
Once you have all of that, you’ll be able to develop your artifacts. Project management software like Primavera P6, Word, and Excel is often necessary to quickly create and manage most artifacts. Many of these tools offer templates so you can quickly develop your vital artifacts.
Best Practices in Creating and Maintaining Project Artifacts
Establish Responsibility
You should establish who will create and manage each artifact. This will clear any confusion and clarify each team member’s role.
Ensure Quality and Consistency
You should apply quality control measures to each artifact to ensure that they align with the needs of the project. It can be helpful to establish these measures before you even make your first artifact. Additionally, keeping language, formatting and other details consistent can help keep your artifacts clear and concise.Â
Collaborate and Review
Creating opportunities for team members to collaborate and provide feedback about your artifacts in an important step in maintaining them. Scheduling regular meetings with your team and stakeholders where they can voice their opinions is a great way to do so.
Track Changes
As the project evolves and changes, so too will your artifacts. Be sure to keep track of these changes to your artifacts. This can help you see how the project has progressed as well as give your the opportunity to refer back to the original artifact when deciding how to proceed with the project.Â
Use Automation
Using automated tools can help you track these changes accurately and automatically.
Archive Your Article
When the project is over, don’t just throw away your artifacts, archive them for future reference. Artifacts can provide key insights for future projects.Â
Artifacts are an Integral Part of Project Management
Project management artifacts are an integral part of project management. They provide both a record of the project progress and give team members an organized and comprehensive view of the project’s journey. Artifacts are more than just documents, they are tools for communication, decision-making, and overall project effectiveness.
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