What is a Sequence Plan?

Sequence Plan – planning and documentation of the project procedure

A Sequence Plan documents the planned course of the project. The DIN 69901-5:2009-1 “Project management – Project management systems – Part 5: Concepts ” does not define the sequence plan as a schedule, but as an overview of the processes and decision points or milestones, which are arranged taking factual, logical and scheduling aspects into account. It is important that the sequence plan also considers the project goal, the boundary conditions and the planned results.

Elements of the sequence plan (sometimes also named flow chart or operating plan) are actions, events, and the mutual relationships between them.

There are organizations that define sequence plans based on processes (process flow charts), which are then used for concrete project flow charts. For example, a process flow chart could define general phases such as project preparation, project execution, and project completion, which is then used as the basis for concretising the project flow chart. Common examples of sequence plans are

• precedence diagrams and
• Gantt charts.

Recommendations for the creation of a sequence plan

In conventional project management, the creation of a sequence plan is an important planning task. The following recommendations are given:

• Plan the project realistically and together with the project participants.
• Define objectives, if necessary subdivided into mandatory, desired and optional goals.
• Divide the project into phases such as preparation, implementation, delivery and project completion and define corresponding milestones.
• Agree on the persons responsible for individual work packages and use buffers.
• Check, adjust and update the sequence plan on a regular basis.

In addition to using sequence plans in project management, any form of agenda – tabular, formal, graphical, or freehand – describes a sequence.

Impulse to discuss:

It seems that the term sequence plan is used relatively rarely in companies. Is this possibly a sign that the definition of the term is too unclear?

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