Dividing a project into stages makes it possible to lead it in the best possible direction. Through this organization into stages, the total workload of a project is divided into smaller components, thus making it easier to monitor. The following paragraphs describe a staging model that has been useful in practice. It includes eight stages:
Stage 1 : Initial Stage
Stage 2 : Identification Stage
Stage 3 : Critical Analysis Stage
Stage 4 : Structuring Stage
Stage 5 : Project Development Stage
Stage 6 : Execution Stage
Stage 7 : Maintenance Stage
Stage 8 : Ongoing Management Stage
Stage Four
Structuring Stage
The list of requirements that is developed in the Identification Stage can be used to make structuring design choices. In the Structuring Stage, one or more structuring designs are developed, with which the project result can apparently be achieved.
Depending on the subject of the project, the products of the Structuring Stage can include dioramas, sketches, flow charts, site trees, HTML screen designs, prototypes, photo impressions and UML schemas. The project supervisors use these structuring designs to choose the definitive structuring design that will be produced in the project. This is followed by the Project Development Stage. As in the Identification Stage, once the structuring design has been chosen, it cannot be changed in a later stage of the project.
In a young, very informal company, the structuring design department was run by an artist. The term structuring design department was not accurate in this case; it was more a group of designers who were working together.
In addition, everyone was much too busy, including the head of the department.
One project involved producing a number of structuring designs, which were quite important to the success of the project. A young designer on the project team created the structuring designs. Although the head of the structuring design department had ultimate responsibility for the structuring designs, he never attended the meetings of the project team when the structuring designs were to be discussed.
The project leader always invited him, and sent him e-mails containing his young colleagues sketches, but the e-mails remained unanswered.
The project leader and the young designer erroneously assumed that the department head had approved the structuring designs. The Execution Stage began. When the project was nearly finished, the result was presented to the department head, who became furious and demanded that it be completely redone. The budget, however, was almost exhausted.