An outline of the Project Development Plan is available.

The purpose of the Project Development Plan is to define and establish the management strategy for achieving the goals of the project.

The project development plan is used to:

• Guide project execution.
• Document project planning assumptions.
• Document project planning decisions regarding alternatives chosen.
• Facilitate communication among stakeholders.
• Define key management reviews as to content, extent, and timing.
• Provide a baseline for progress measurement and project control.

The Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge describes the role and content of a project development plan in the following terms:

Project plan. The project plan is a formal, approved document used to manage and control project execution. It should be distributed as defined in the communications management plan (eg., management of the performing organization may require broad coverage with little detail, while a contractor may require complete details on a single subject). In some application areas, the term integrated project plan is used to refer to this document.

A clear distinction should be made between the project plan and the project performance measurement baselines. The project plan is a document or collection of documents that should be expected to change over time as more information becomes available about the project. The performance measurement baselines represent a management control that will generally change only intermittently and then generally only in response to an approved scope change.

There are many ways to organise and present the project plan, but it commonly includes all of the following (these items are described in more detail elsewhere):

• Project charter.
• A description of the project management approach or strategy (a summary of the individual management plans from the other knowledge areas).
• Scope statement, which includes the project deliverables and the project objectives.
• Work breakdown structure (WBS) to the level at which control will be exercised.
• Cost estimates, scheduled start dates, and responsibility assignments to the level of the WBS at which control will be exercised.
• Performance measurement baselines for schedule and cost.
• Major milestones and target dates for each.
• Key or required staff.
• Key risks, including constraints and assumptions, and planned responses for each.
• Subsidiary management plans, including scope management plan, schedule management plan, etc.
• Open issues and pending decisions.

This material should be organised as needed to facilitate its use during project plan execution.

A detailed outline and template for the Project Development Plan is provided, based on the Australian Standard AS 4071 (IEEE 1058.1): Standard for Software Project Management Plans. It has been expanded to include issues of Configuration Management and Verification & Validation, rather than using separate plans for these areas. A complete Plan based on this outline would be expected to be ten to twelve pages in length, together with a detailed project schedule and some appendices.