When do I stop breaking down products?

One of the most difficult aspects of creating a product breakdown structure is knowing when to stop decomposing products. This is helped by having a good understanding of how the products will eventually be developed in an overall list of activities.

The product breakdown should continue until it is possible to identify the activities and estimate the effort, cost and duration to carry out the work to create or acquire the product.

Some people continue to breakdown products until the effort is between 1 to 10 days to complete a product. This provides both good visibility and tracking of product completions. See how products relate to the work.

The composition section of the product description is also a good guide to the breakdown. A well written composition section can help identify the next level of product breakdown. If the specification and understanding of this section is good, the product may not need to be broken down further. For example, if the product description can be given to any member of the team and they estimate and can complete the work in a consistent way, then the product does not need to be broken down further. See the product description

Where a product description is replicated many times in the project, the a breakdown of these products may not be necessary. In these cases, the activity descriptions for the work may provide the unique elements where this product will be produced. For example, a system rollout to a number of departments may have one product description that describes the outcome for a department and identifies a procedure to follow. Activities that may use an appropriate procedure can then be included in the plan that capture the work, for example:

System A Rolled-out (A Product)

Roll-out System A to Department A (An Activity)

Roll-out System A to Department B (An Activity)

Roll-out System A to Department C (An Activity)

Another danger of continued breakdown is over documenting the set of product descriptions. The derivation element of the product description can also provide a pointer to a specification of the product. This may also provide a way to stop breaking down the product. Too many products may create a loss of focus or a maintenance problem with the various diagrams.

Chapter 22 (PRINCE2™ 2005 Manual) also provides an example of how Project Level products have been broken down into Stage Specific products. When a stage plan is prepared, additional detail might be necessary for managing the stage. If possible, these stage products should be differentiated from the Project level products included in the project plan. See the Fully Operational Product or the Conference examples distributed with ChangeAide.

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