Search

People: Core Literacy, Experience and Culture

Corporate boards have moved away from an emphasis on stakeholder representation to skills-based composition. Project boards should also look past stakeholder representation to consider the skills and capabilities that members contribute. Board members should include external members, and be chosen for their authority, expertise, experience, status and connection ⁽¹¹⁾, focusing on people who:

Are authorised to represent the interests of the area they represent;
Can provide necessary resources; and
Are committed to the project outcomes ⁽¹⁰^,²⁸⁾.

Project boards rarely have the time or luxury to be able to develop complete knowledge of all aspects of any project. Some literacies can readily be taught, helping board members know what to look for and the questions to ask. Project board training can help rapidly develop core literacies ⁽¹¹^,²¹⁾. Other board member capabilities are developed through years of experience. We differentiate between SROs’ and board members’ digital project literacies (Table 4), the collective experience the board should contain (Table 5), and the culture, attitude and behaviours that needs to be established for a digital project board to be effective (Table 6).

Core Literacy

Table 4: Foundational literacy all project board members should have
Capability	Description
Benefits and outcomes	Understanding of benefits management processes, and the relationship between outputs and outcomes, benefits and value ⁽²³^,⁴⁰⁾
Communication in the context of change	Understanding the importance of a project narrative, creating a culture of transparency, stakeholder identification, constructive conflict and feedback loops ⁽²⁰⁾
Project management foundations	Understanding of key project management concepts, giving the board the ability to question aspects of the project lifecycle, critical path, earned value, burn rate and baselines ⁽⁵^,¹⁵^,²³⁾

Core Experience

The expertise needed on the Board should be guided by key areas of risk, both enterprise and project delivery.

Table 5: Common expertise requirements for Digital Project Boards
Skills	Description
Business expertise	Understanding of the business, impacts and change required for end users, allowing the board to maintain sight of the business logic of the project ⁽⁵^,¹⁵^,²³⁾
Operations expertise	Understanding of the operational environment to ensure the solution is integrated, maintainable and sustainable within the existing IT applications portfolio ⁽²⁹⁾
Digital project management expertise	Understanding of digital projects, their lifecycle, risks, ideally with experience in a similar type of project (e.g. AI, SAAS, risk tier)
Interpersonal skills and social capital	Strong networks and relationships that support negotiation, decision-making, issue resolution, stakeholder management, effective communication and resourcing ⁽⁵^,²⁸⁾
Digital, data and cyber expertise	Depending on the project type and stage, deep technical expertise may be required
Legal and policy	Depending on the project type and stage, regulatory and policy expertise may be required
Procurement and contract management	Depending on the project type and stage, expertise in procurement and contract management may be necessary
Independence	Balancing the need for vested interests, ensuring there is someone who can view the project and its progress objectively and independently
Supplier expertise	Depending on the project, experience and knowledge of the product, implementation approach and supply chain
Interdependencies	Knowledge of areas the project has interdependencies with, for example, resourcing, systems integration
Employee/customer experience	Expertise in ensuring a solution is well suited to the needs of the users of project deliverables
Change management expertise	Experts in communicating and designing organisational change, reducing resistance and increasing uptake of change
Financial expertise	Depending on the complexity, size, risk and procurement strategy of the project

Culture, Attitude and Behaviours

Table 6: Attitudes and behaviours required on project boards
Culture	Description
Skin in the game	Members should have a genuine interest, commitment and ownership of the project's success ⁽²⁸⁾
Psychological safety	Boards need to foster a no-blame environment where people feel safe with constructive conflict, raising ideas and escalating issues ⁽²³^,⁴¹⁾
"Can do" agency	Board membership is not a passive role. Members should take action to ensure they have the right information to support decisions and proactively identify strategies that enhance project success ⁽²³⁾
Time commitment	Board members often underestimate the time involved. Members must ensure they are suitably informed, attending meetings and prepared to support decision-making ⁽¹¹^,²³^,⁴²⁾
Courage	Courage to stop a project, escalate risks or reset the project if the project does not have sufficient business justification and/or delivery confidence is low ⁽¹^,²⁵⁾
Attendance	Continuity in core board membership facilitates historically informed decision-making. Use of deputies or proxies should be avoided as it signals a lack of commitment, dilutes accountability and can delay decision-making ⁽¹¹⁾. Members should not attend just to report to others ⁽²⁸⁾
Decision expediency	Boards need to make decisions escalated to them in a timely manner, possibly despite incomplete information. Decisions should be clear and prioritise action⁽²³^,⁴³⁾
Value-focused	Boards should suspend self-interest and operate from a position of what is best for the organisation and project, optimising value from the project investment
Empowering	The project board can make the decisions it needs to so that the project is empowered to deliver
Humility	Openness to learning and adaptation – seeking robust advice from independent advisors and project assurance, seeking out lessons learned from similar projects, listening to user and reference groups, acting on recommendations ⁽¹^,⁴⁴⁾

Information flow: Reporting and Communications

Project reporting

Project Board meetings should be regular, scheduled and aligned as much as practical to the organisation’s financial reporting cycles, so that the project manager can give timely information on project progress and costs, and to escalate issues beyond their delegation. Most digital project boards meet on a monthly basis and at key decision points, but the frequency of meetings should be adapted to project pace and risk ⁽¹¹⁾, with the possibility of a higher meeting frequency, for example, when the project is close to go-live or release.

The content of board meetings is often influenced by the project manager, supported by key topics in project reports. To keep the board focused on decision-making, reports should focus on exceptions to planned progress, changes to scope, risks and relationships ⁽¹¹⁾. The agenda and supporting project reports will need to adapt to maintain a focus on the critical decisions needed to progress the project ⁽²³^,⁴³⁾.

Production of reports for the board divert resources from other project activities. The SRO needs to balance information requests from the board to the project team, with the effort needed to produce them. There is also a tension in the timeliness of information for project reporting. Where possible, board meetings should be scheduled to minimise the lag between report data and the meeting. The board should regularly reflect on whether all sections of project reports play a role in the decisions the board makes. Removing redundant sections of reports can make it easier to focus on key information and reduce a project reporting burden. Focus for reports should be on exceptions, earned value, and differences between planned and actual progress.

Co-design with users
Involve users throughout the Service Design and Delivery Process to make sure their perspectives, needs and feedback are incorporated into the final service. Encourage shared ownership by co-designing accompanying artifacts, such as tutorials and guides, using language that is meaningful for all.

Consider cohort specific digital inclusion requirements (outlined below)
Tailor your digital service to meet the specific needs of users to promote inclusion and make sure support is provided at the appropriate level. Consider how you will apply the following cohort specific requirements when designing and delivering digital services.

The board maintain responsibility for obtaining the information they need to govern project progress and may need to work with the project manager to ensure they obtain necessary information, moving past a passive information-consumption attitude. Technical jargon should be avoided in reporting in favour of language that allows the board to make trade-off judgements on the business logic and strategic alignment of the project. Board members may have to actively seek outside information if they are to be suitably informed, for example by attending regular project meetings ⁽²³^,⁴³⁾, engaging directly with users and operational mechanisms (e.g. walking the shop floor), or conducting informal discussions with stakeholders.

Supporting project documentation

The following table lists some of the common documentation used to support project board formation and decision making. Governance tips from an SRO are also included later in this document.

Project Artefacts and Core Elements
Artefacts	Core elements
Project Board Terms of Reference (ToR)	The ToR should clearly articulate the scope of the board's remit, authority of the board and its positioning with corporate governance forums and other project governance mechanisms. It should clearly define board roles, potentially including a RACI matrix (responsible, accountable, consulted, informed). The ToR needs to place strongly restrictive conditions on board members use of delegates or proxies. Escalation processes and criteria for exception reporting should be included. These should detail the specific delegated time, cost, quality, or scope change limits that the project manager is delegated to approve, and which must be escalated for board approval.
Business Case	It specifies why the project is required, its objectives, intended benefits, and solution strategy. It specifies the parameters within which the project operates (e.g. time, budget, scope), which provide the baseline against which project delivery performance can be measured.
Benefits Realisation Plan (BRP)	A BRP outlines how the benefits of an investment will be achieved and measured. Its purpose is to ensure an investment delivers its intended value. The BRP describes the context, structure, and approach to the realisation of planned benefits and is typically developed alongside the business case (at least to initial draft level) to ensure there is a clear plan for the realisation of benefits outlined in the business case. See the DTA's Benefits Management Policy and Toolkit for more information.
Benefits Map	A benefit map links the key project benefits and enabling changes on which benefits realisation depends to an organisation's strategic objectives. Benefit mapping and the resulting Benefits Map, is an iterative process which should be revisited multiple times during the investment. This will ensure that unintended consequences and disbenefits are accurately factored into the investment planning process and that the investment remains on track to realise intended benefits. See the DTA's Benefits Management Policy and Toolkit for more information.
Stakeholder Impact Assessment	A Stakeholder Impact Assessment identifies who is affected by the project and evaluates the nature of the impact. It assesses relative power of each stakeholder, their interests and readiness for change. The assessment can be utilised to inform engagement strategies and risk mitigation plans.
Project Board Papers	Project board papers are produced by the project manager, focusing on decision-making and exception reporting. They are designed to support decisions escalated to the board. They should make clear recommendations, clearly noting the action required (e.g. note or approval). They should be distributed to the board at least 3 days in advance ^[³^-^DTA^]. Standardising reporting across an agency is recommended to help board members can easily consume information ^[¹⁴^,^SRO^].
Assurance Plan	Agencies are required to plan for assurance by applying the Key Principles for Good Assurance and meeting minimum assurance requirements applicable to the tier of the investment. The Assurance Plan is agreed with the DTA and submitted to Cabinet for approval as part of the proposed investment. The Assurance Plan should be regularly reviewed by the board, at least as often as the relevant tier requires. This is key to ensuring the plan continues to be fit-for-purpose. See the Assurance Framework for Digital and ICT Investments for more information.

Guidance for Senior Responsible Officials

Assurance Research Series 02

Tools for Digital Project Governance Boards

Project governance is "part art, part science", which can be facilitated by following principles to guide the design of digital project governance boards. This research has revealed and collated common challenges faced by digital project governance boards and some recommendations to resolve them. These are organised by the challenges in composing digital project boards (Table 7), and challenges with scope and performance (Table 8).

Common challenges: With recommendations to navigate them

We group challenges by the three pillars of project board composition: Structure, People and Information flows. We close this section out addressing when a project's performance or feasibility is at risk.

Structure

Challenge	Description	Recommendations to Resolve
Structural misalignment	Existing organisational structure does not align with the structure needed to support the digital project. For example, in digital health transformations it can be useful to get input from surgeons across health services, but there is not necessarily an organisational mechanism in place for that to happen.	Integrate informal mechanisms and proactive management by key individuals to enable practical governance (beyond the formal structures and meetings).
Cross-agency or complex stakeholder environment	Keeping board numbers low can be challenging with large, complex stakeholder groups with vested interests in the outcomes. Governance is sometimes conflated with communication and stakeholder engagement.	Maintain a manageable board size (for example, eight members) and bring in external parties as required ⁽²³⁾. Establish separate mechanisms and forums for this purpose, so that the governance board can focus on its primary purpose of decision-making ⁽¹⁹⁾. Clearly define roles and responsibilities and formalise in project artefacts. Establish an inter-agency forum to assist with inter-agency collaboration and stakeholder cohesion.
Convoluted or rigid governance structures	Too many layers and governance forums can dilute the project board's accountability, obfuscate escalation pathways, and slow down decision-making. Governance has remained static and hasn't evolved to the project's changing maturity or life cycle stage.	Redesign the governance structures to minimise the number of levels while maintaining appropriate separation for effective and minimum viable governance ⁽⁴⁷⁾. Ensure each forum has a distinct role with clear roles and responsibilities.
Insufficient capacity	SRO or board members unable to devote sufficient time to role due to overcommitment.	As part of onboarding, proactively communicate expected time commitments and meeting cadence. Integrate this into board members' formal role descriptions and ToR ⁽⁴⁵⁾. Utilise targeted board workplans and agendas to sharpen board meetings to focus on decision points versus information sharing. Revise project structures to consolidate into a smaller number of committees and boards if SRO and members have a number of boards within the same portfolio.

People

People-related challenges and recommendations
Challenge	Description	Recommendations to Resolve
SRO experience	The SRO does not have the experience in digital projects to confidently guide the project.	Utilise targeted coaching, mentoring and training to foster and build foundational SRO competencies ⁽⁴⁸⁾. Consider establishing an independent advisor or assurance (the DTA's portfolio assurance team can advise you on this). "Two in a box ⁽³²^,³³⁾". See role of the CIO
Board skills and capability	The collective capabilities and skills of the board do not align with the project's objectives and desired outcomes.	Apply Skills Matrix to guide appointments. Ensure balance of technical, delivery, implementation and governance skills. Appoint independent members who can provide neutral advice, ask critical questions, and contribute to the board's effectiveness. Onboarding process. See above. Cross-pollination – peer SROs attending each other's board meetings ^[¹^-^SRO^].
Agile Literacy Gap	Board members do not fully understand agile project methodologies and associated governance requirements.	Targeted agile training and education with a focus on core principles, iterative nature, and differences to waterfall methodology. Integrate agile principles into the operation of the board (increased cadence of shorter meetings, use of simple visual tools for board tasks/decisions, retrospectives etc.). Consider the value of Agile certification for board members. Appointment of Board members with Agile delivery experience. Inclusion of agile delivery experience in board skills matrix.
Over-reliance on third parties	Substantive reliance or over reliance on third parties. Vendors or Project Manager filling the vacuum of organisation capability.	Clearly define the third party or vendor's role (for example, as non-voting members or SMEs). Involve vendors in specific technical or delivery sub-groups, reporting to the board. Scale vendor or third party involvement in line with project lifecycle and critical phases. Limit vendor inclusion to agenda items aligned with their scope of work.
Commitment	Board members consistently delegating attendance. Not reading papers or just showing up between other commitments ⁽²³⁾. Distracted in meetings. Lack of understanding of roles.	Report meeting attendance (similar to corporate board reporting). Establish formal protocols to minimise use of proxies or delegates (for example, require chair or secretariat approval for a proxy for members, CEO review and approval for chair) ⁽¹¹^,²⁸⁾. Clarify ToR and documented roles and responsibilities.
Dominant or silent members	Members driving a particular agenda: Seeking to influence board decision-making or focus, to pursue a particular matter of personal or functional importance at the expense of what is best for the project or organisation ⁽²⁸⁾. Inability to get a balanced input from all members ⁽¹⁹⁾.	Clear articulation of business outcomes and values. Explicit and regular re-examination of operational deliverables and performance measures defined in the business case and detailed scoping documentation ⁽²³⁾.
Toxic behaviour	Adversarial behaviour, "hand grenades," fractured and dysfunctional relationships ⁽¹⁹⁾, an environment that is not psychologically safe ⁽²³⁾ or is used as an opportunity for blame smearing ⁽²⁸⁾. Conflicts are avoided and not addressed ⁽²³⁾.	Build a culture of openness. Articulate conflicts with an aim of producing a stable and workable compromise ⁽²³⁾.

Information Flows

Information flow challenges and recommendations
Challenge	Description	Recommendations to Resolve
Information supporting decision-making	Lag between report content and meeting ⁽²³⁾. "Watermelon" reporting - green one month, red the next. Packs too long, too short, or not representing information in a way that is useful for board decision-making.	Establish and communicate Project Board Work Plan. Leverage or reuse baseline reporting standards and templates. Focus on decision-making not information dissemination ⁽¹⁹⁾, emphasising risks, issues, exceptions, escalated matters. Communicate the board's reporting needs to the project manager. Take an active, not a passive, approach to sourcing required information ⁽²³⁾. Areas to address: Agendas are risk and decision-focused Maintaining group decision and action registers Focus on what is left to do what has not been done

Project Performance and Feasibility

Project performance and feasibility challenges and recommendations
Challenge	Description	Recommendations to Resolve
Benefits definition and oversight	Project benefits are not adequately defined and/or regularly monitored.	Establish performance metrics to enable measurement of expected savings or benefits ⁽⁴⁹⁾. One model that can be used is the five-case business model ⁽⁵⁰⁾, a structured approach for developing and evaluating business cases on five dimensions: Strategic, Economic, Commercial, Financial and Management. Ensure project benefits are adequately documented and discussed during planning stages. Regularly revisit original benefits vs actual benefits through the Project Board work plan, against project lifecycle.
Benefits difficult to attribute to the project in isolation	Project is either one of many initiatives to achieve a broader benefit, is the enabler for other projects to achieve direct benefits, and/or the majority of benefits will be realised well after (even decades after) the project has finished.	Establish structures around the project to maximise the chance of delivery of these benefits ⁽⁵⁰⁾. Ensure the benefits plans articulate when the benefits are likely to be realised, and ensure there are mechanisms (and resources) to continue to monitor and maximise benefits until that time ⁽⁵⁰⁾. "Gold standard" is to have an independent evaluation comparing what was promised against what was delivered ⁽⁵⁰⁾.
Optimism Bias	An overly optimistic view as to what can be realistically achieved with the scope of a project, groupthink, lack of curiosity.	Regular reporting on project progress, requirements and benefits. Independent Board Member or Critical Friend. Integrate demonstrations of product across work plan to validate reported project progress. Continually question: Are we aligned on the vision? Who is owning the benefit realisation? Are we getting good value for this investment? With all change requests: What are the implications for benefits and impact? Are we minimising negative impact on our users? Is the case for change still feasible and achievable?
The project is built on flawed foundations	Flawed foundations can include: The project is based on implementing a particular solution, rather than solving a particular problem, and hasn't properly assessed alternative options ⁽⁵⁰⁾. The project was under-estimated, for example, didn't account for whole-of-life costing, or did not adequately consider the impact of decommissioning activities ⁽⁴⁹⁾.	Request an independent assurance review to assess foundational issues and risks. Request recommendations for corrective action. Revisit and revise the business case with a view to adjusting to reflect actualities. Temporarily pause the project whilst engaging with delivery partners, users etc. to reconfirm the problem to be solved.
Ineffective decision-making	Decision-making is: poorly informed not timely doesn't consider impact on benefits re-prosecuted	Ensure board members have appropriate delegation to make decisions. Articulate the project "burn rate" (cost per day) to understand impact of slow decision-making. Ensure change request forms articulate impact on benefits. Revisit cadence and duration of Project Board meetings. Ensure those with a contributing interest are in the room but avoid placing stakeholders on the board if their role is more appropriately handled separately ⁽²⁸⁾. Schedule time to engage board directly with the project (for example, attending project meetings) to build deeper understanding of risks and issues ⁽²³⁾.
Informal decision-making	Core decisions made outside governance forums. Board meetings are seen as ceremonial, not challenging assumptions ⁽²³⁾.	Clarify and reiterate escalation processes. Ensure that the project governance aligns and can co-exist with other organisational or financial governance processes ⁽²⁸⁾. Formalise delegation between the project, board and broader organisational governance.

Source: Assurance Research Series 02 | DTA | UQ

Your responsibilities

To successfully meet this criterion, you need to:

follow guidance on critical and emerging technologies
maintain interoperability in the face of new technology
track adoption of new technology.

Self-Assessment Tool

This self-assessment tool is designed to help you reflect on the effectiveness of your digital project governance board. You can complete it on your own, or use it as a group exercise with your board members – either as an open process or subject to confidentiality. It can be undertaken at any time—such as when establishing a new board, at regular intervals throughout the project lifecycle, or following significant changes to the project or board composition. Periodic use of this tool helps track progress, identify strengths and areas for improvement, and support a culture of continuous improvement in governance.

Staff guidance on public generative AI

Guidance for understanding how to safely and responsibly engage with public generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools

Agency guidance on public generative AI

Guidance for Australian Government agencies on managing access to public generative AI tools for personnel working with government information – including employees, contractors and consultants.