Work breakdown structures (WBS) are very useful to help us plan and control projects. Basically, they provide a convenient way to describe the work that needs to be done within a project. They are complete, in the sense that once everything has been done at WBS, the project can be said to be complete. Therefore, anything that is not on the WBS is considered out of reach.
Work breakdown structures look a lot like a family tree – they’re simply a hierarchy showing the subdivision of components that need to be done to deliver the project. The goal of WBS in the context of a project is to start at the top level and break down enough until we can plan the project; we don’t want to go into too much detail.
There are 4 different methods to organize a WBS:
- Method 1 – Deliverables: Here we start with the main deliverable at the top level of the WBS hierarchy and break it down from there.
- Method 2 – Subprojects carried out outside the team: at the top level we have the project as before, but below we have all the projects executed by subcontractors.
- Method 3 – Phases: we have the name of the project at the top level, but below we list all the phases of the project.
- Method 4 – Combination: This is when we use a combination of methods 1, 2 and 3 described above.
The real advantage of work breakdown structures is that they allow us to break down and understand complex deliverables, whether they are objects or projects. To do this, use one of the methods described above.
