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Achieving strategic benefits from project

investments: Appoint a project owner
Jack R. Meredith a,*, Ofer Zwikael b

a
Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem, NC 27109, U.S.A.
b
College of Business & Economics, Australian National University, Acton, Canberra,
ACT 2601, Australia

KEYWORDS Abstract Even though we have gotten better at meeting the iron triangle of cost,
Project management; time, and scope, many projects still do not achieve the strategic
Organizational change; benefitsdespecially those that are nonmonetaryddesired in most contemporary
Project manager; projects. Given that no one is specifically accountable for delivering these benefits,
Project success; it should be no surprise that these projects are largely unsuccessful. We consider
Project owner; multiple possible candidates for this role of accountabilitydthe CEO, the project
Project lifecycle manager, the sponsor, and the program managerdand find none of them accept-
management able, thereby necessitating the formalization of a new role: a project owner. The
project owner would be accountable for delivering the strategic benefits desired
from each project. In this article, we describe the responsibilities of the project
owner at each phase of the project, the sources for candidates to fulfill this role,
and the training needed for project owners to find success. We conclude with a case
study of an organization that has taken this route and discuss the advantages and
challenges that resulted from its strategic organizational change initiative.
ª 2019 Kelley School of Business, Indiana University. Published by Elsevier Inc. All
rights reserved.

1. Better project management success
without the benefits
Although today’s projects are much better
managed than in the past and generally deliver the
intended tactical outputs, delivering the strategic
objectives intended to support the organization’s
* Corresponding author
E-mail addresses: meredijr@wfu.edu (J.R. Meredith), ofer.
zwikael@anu.edu.au (O. Zwikael)
strategy is still a challenge (Krotov, 2015). The Los
Angeles Metro Red Line was completed 8 months
ahead of schedule, within budget, and on scope
and quality. Nevertheless, as Shenhar and Holzman
(2017, p. 35) reported: “While expecting to see
one million passengers during the first year of
operation, the actual number was less than
60,000.” The project failed to deliver the strategic
objectives for the local government, which
included enhanced use of public transportation
and reduced traffic flow on main roads. The

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bushor.2019.09.007
0007-6813/ª 2019 Kelley School of Business, Indiana University. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
2 J.R. Meredith, O. Zwikael
remaining phases of the Metro Line were dropped a
few years later.
The Project Management Institute’s 2018 Pulse
of the Profession report (Parsi, 2018) noted that
since 2013, there has been a 27% decrease in the
amount of money wasted due to weak project
performance. The same report also concluded that
organizations that undervalue project manage-
ment as a strategic competency for implementing
their strategy found 45% of their projects failed,
thereby indicating they “still haven’t grasped the
strategic role of project management” (Parsi,
2018, p. 67). In a separate study of 1,000 com-
panies by Bain & Co., only 12% of organizational
transformation initiatives were successful
(Rockwood, 2018).
Failing to achieve strategic objectives from
project investments is a continuing problem ac-
cording to many researchers (e.g., Bradley, 2010;
Breese, 2012; Coombs, 2015; Serra & Kunc,
2015). As recently as 2016, the Project Manage-
ment Institute (PMI) reported that 83% of organi-
zations they surveyed were immature when it
came to realizing intended benefitsdboth mone-
tary and nonmonetarydfrom their projects (PMI,
2016). Examples of nonmonetary project benefits
include increased staff morale and reduced
customer complaints. It appears that many orga-
nizations simply do not recognize, much less
measure, their degree of success in achieving their
projects’ benefits. Common reasons include the
challenges in measuring some benefits and lack of
supportive planning and tracking tools. However,
both literature and practice show that the most
critical factor is lack of personal accountability for
realizing project benefits within the organization;
this latter point is emphasized by Musawir, Serra,
Zwikael, and Ali (2017, p. 1668), who found that
“the single point of accountability in the organi-
zation is a strong predictor of project success.”
An organization’s CEO or another senior execu-
tive might be held accountable for benefits reali-
zation in strategic projects by the board but close
involvement by senior executives in the portfolio
of strategic projects is unrealistic. It would be
impractical for a C-suite execute to keep track of
the details of each project. In addition, they are
usually not equipped with the project expertise
needed to monitor a variety of different strategic
projects. Thus, the responsibility of project
benefit realization must be delegated to another
individual within the organization.
Instead of individual accountability, the PMI
(2019, p. 4) argued that benefits management “is
a shared responsibility among portfolio, program,
and project managers, benefit owners,
organization owners, executive sponsors, and
other senior leaders.” Realizing the importance of
individual accountability in management, multiple
organizations and people recognized the impor-
tance of individual accountability for benefits
realization. This has resulted in multiple terms to
describe this required and delegated project po-
sition. In the U.K., the Office of Government
Commerce (2009) referred to this role as the
project executive. Krane, Olsson, and Rolstadås
(2012) referred to two types of project represen-
tatives as the strategic manager and the super
project manager. The U.K. Infrastructure and
Projects Authority (UK Infrastructure and Projects
Authority, 2017) termed this person the senior
responsible owner. Zwikael and Meredith (2018)
employed the term project owner, which we use
in this article, as a compromise among all the
various terms to indicate both ownership of the
processdrather than only responsibilitydand the
focus on a particular project. Zwikael and
Meredith (2018, p. 485) defined the project
owner as “the senior manager who is held
accountable by the funder for realizing the busi-
ness case. The project owner acts on behalf of the
funder throughout the project, seeking to ensure
that their interests are being served.”
The responsibilities of a project owner for any
particular strategic-level project represent a
major effort and, thus, every such simultaneous
project should have a different project owner. As a
result, in Section 2 we address the following
question: Why not assign this task to the seemingly
obvious candidate, the project manager?
2. The role of the project manager
There has been substantial progress in completing
tactical projects according to the iron triangle,
also known as the triple constraint (Meredith,
Shafer, & Mantel, 2018, p. 2), of due date, cost,
and scope (i.e., to specification). Given this suc-
cess, it seems that as successful projects become
more strategic, the project manager would be the
natural person to entrust with achieving those
objectives. However, this temptation is highly
misleading because many such projects involve
organizational change rife with concomitant issues
of cultural changes, educational programs,
employee resistance, technological change, polit-
ical disruptions, training on new systems, and so
on. Good project managers are experts at pro-
ducing specified outputs such as bridges and soft-
ware on time and for the anticipated cost. But to
saddle them with behavioral issuesdtraining
Achieving strategic benefits from project investments
users, satisfying customers, shifting employee re-
sponsibilities, handling office political squabbles,
reasoning with external stakeholders such as angry
local residents, and achieving the board’s strategic
plansdis beyond their pay grade.
Look at Ford as an example. The project man-
ager in charge of Ford’s development of the sec-
ond generation of the Taurus completed the
project on time, to scope, and with efficiency.
However, the project was considered a commer-
cial failure due to low sales and an insufficient
return on investment (Shenhar & Dvir, 2007).
Project managers are skilled experts in achieving
specified technical outputs. That is plenty of re-
sponsibility: let project managers fill their role and
let the project owner tackle the super strategic
part of being a super project manager.
There are other notable explanations for why
the project manager is the wrong person to be
handed the responsibilities and accountability of
the project owner:
 Many projects are conducted by an outside
supplier or contractor whose job is to deliver the
outputs as specified in the contract and hence
are inappropriate agents for implementing a
strategy in which the outputs deliver the antic-
ipated benefits. This is true even in those situ-
ations for which the contractor is also
responsible for training employees in the use of
the output (e.g., machinery, software).
 Like an outside contractor, a project manager
typically has an operational mindset, trading off
one of the three efficiency constraints against
the others rather than making trade-offs be-
tween the iron triangle and strategic goals.
 The project manager position typically
is terminated after delivery of the
outputsdwhether being led by an external
contractor or internal managerdand hence is
unavailable for the tasks of implementing the
outputs in a way that achieves the desired
benefits.
 The project manager is typically appointed after
the project has been approved by senior man-
agement, making them unaware of the strategic
trade-offs and discussions along the way to the
final approved project and, thus, would be un-
informed about achieving the organization’s
desired strategic goals.
There has been much written recently about the
need for project managers to learn how to become
3
change agents in order to get their projects
implemented and the need for these managers to
get involved in the strategy discussions of their
organization to become better informed (e.g.,
Lappe & Spang, 2014; Mir & Pinnington, 2014;
Rockwood, 2018). However, except in rare cir-
cumstances, this is fanciful advice because such
tasks and activities are simply beyond the typical
project manager’s ability. For this reason,
contemporary approaches to force benefit reali-
zation on project managers (e.g., through benefit
targets in the project contract and the expecta-
tion that project managers will remain involved in
the operations environment following output de-
livery) are ineffective.
So, if not a senior executive and not the project
manager, who should be delegated for the role of
project owner? To help answer this question, we
explore the role of the project owner in more
detail.
3. Who should lead benefits realization?
This section describes the role, accountability, and
responsibilities of the project owner. It also in-
cludes some information about good candidates
for this role and what types of training may be
needed.
3.1. Definition of the required role and its
accountability
The general role of the project owner is conveyed
by the descriptions from various authors:
 “The individual responsible for ensuring that a
project or program of change meets its objec-
tives and delivers the projected benefits”
(Office of Government Commerce, 2009, p. 218,
312).
 “The project owner role comprises both the
responsibility for the funding of the project and
a primary interest in receiving the benefits from
it” (Krane et al., 2012, p. 54).
 “The owner of the business case” (Morris, 2013,
p. 146). Also, “generally external to the project
and has responsibility for defining the expected
benefits from the project” (Morris, 2013, p.
265).
 “The senior line manager who acts on behalf of
the funder [the one who authorizes funds for the
4 J.R. Meredith, O. Zwikael

project] throughout the project” (Zwikael & due to impediments in the time, cost, scale, or
Meredith, 2018, p. 485). objectives of the project. Following this, the
project owner then recommends a project man-
To help visualize this position in an organization,
ager, either internal or external, for the project.
Figure 1 illustrates the relationships involved in
After receiving approval for the modified business
initiating, executing, and implementing a stand-
case and if the project is internal, a senior-level
alone project. When a project is part of a previ-
sponsor may be appointed to the project and will
ously approved program, there will be slight
be responsible for obtaining resources and
differences. The champion of the project idea
providing political cover for the project. If an
brings it to the attention of the organization at
external contractor is engaged, then that organi-
which point a business case is constructed with
zation will appoint its own sponsor.
input from the champion, the funder (e.g., CEO,
After a project manager is appointed, a project
board), and a senior-level manager experienced in
team is assembled and a project plan is drawn up
such projects: the project owner. At some point,
for approval by the steering committee. During this
the funder approves a revised business case, a
period, the project owner works closely with the
steering committee is appointed for the project,
project manager, the steering committee, and the
and execution becomes the responsibility of the
external stakeholders and begins communication
project owner.
with the eventual users of the project outputs in
The project owner then contacts all stake-
order to determine their needs (e.g., training) for
holders, both internal and external, with interests
accepting and using the outputs. As the project plan
in the project. After communicating with all
is implemented, changes will invariably occur in the
stakeholders, the project owner may find it
desired benefits fromdor even the need fordthe
necessary to modify or terminate the business case
project, the views of the external stakeholders, the

Figure 1. The role of the project owner

Achieving strategic benefits from project investments
project plan, and the expectations and needs of the
users, all of which must be addressed by the project
owner and, once again, incorporated into another
revision of the business case.
This process continues until the outputs are
ready and delivered to the users, who by now will
have been trained and are looking forward to the
coming changes both technical and organizational.
This stage of the project is, in many cases, the
most crucial because if the users do not fully
accept and continue to use the outputs, then the
benefits expected from the project will simply not
materialize. The project owner must continue
monitoring changes until the realization of the
continuing benefits has been verified; at that time,
responsibilities can be handed over to the ongoing
functional department. In cases such as collabo-
rative projects (Kaplan & Haenlein, 2014), users
are actively involved during the entire project,
and project implementation may be easier.
It is also important to highlight how the model
described in Figure 1 is different from some
alternative approaches. For example, A Guide to
the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMI,
2017) focused on the role of project managers and
their responsibility to deliver outputs, with sup-
port from an executive sponsor and the project
team. However, the project model presented in
Figure 1 illustrates that these activities and
players involved in output delivery (in the bottom
half of the chart) represent only one part of the
project model. Therefore, managers must make
decisions that support the realization of the pro-
ject’s business case and its intended benefits
rather than focusing only on the delivery of out-
puts according to the iron triangle. This approach
of integrating project decision making into the
long-term operations enhancement strategy is
captured, for example, in the DevOps (i.e.,
development and operations) process being used
in software development.
Another dissimilarity with the PMI model is its
argument that the program manager should be
responsible for benefits realization, ignoring the
fact that not all projects are part of a program
(Zwikael & Meredith, 2018), nor is this perspective
always practiced. As a result, the model presented
in Figure 1 has a dedicated project owner
appointed by the client organization for each
project, all with different long-term commitments
than that of the program manager who typically
represents the delivery organization.
Furthermore, the model in Figure 1 also pro-
vides an extension to Agile methodology, which
defines a product owner as the person responsible
for achieving business value for the project
5
(SCRUMstudy, 2016). A product owner has one or
more of the following characteristics:
 A software development team member;
 Might be a subcontractor;
 Supposed to act as a customer proxy; and
 Typically not in the client organization.
While this role is important, it cannot replace the
real voice of the customer, which is voiced by the
project owner.
Given the substantial communication, coordi-
nation, and extensive effort involved in being the
project owner for a strategic project, it should be
clear that this is a job with demanding re-
quirements. In fact, acting as the delegated agent
of the CEO or board means not only being
responsible but also being accountable for the
results, implying that there are serious sanctions
for not accomplishing the invariably modified
business case and the organizational benefits ex-
pected. Figure 2 compares the roles of the project
owner with those of the project manager (Zwikael,
Meredith, & Smyrk, 2019).
3.2. Not the role of the sponsor or program
manager
From the description of the role of the project
owner in the previous section, one might conclude
that the sponsor ordif this project is a part of a
programdthe program manager should be
appointed as the project owner. However, the
sponsor is typically a senior executive with many
other duties in support of the project team to
attend to within the business unit. Moreover, if the
project is an external one, the contractor’s
sponsor cannot be responsible for the long-term
strategic benefits of their customer. Therefore,
the sponsor is a senior manager who supports the
project team (e.g., the IT staff) with resources and
political support in developing the project output
(e.g., an information system).
A program manager has multiple projects to
oversee and cannot devote enough time to the
effort required as a project owner for one indi-
vidual project in their program. Hence, the project
owner needs to be internal to the organization and
familiar with its executives and senior managers,
culture, strategy, policies, and approach to proj-
ect management. It is also useful and appropriate
that the same benefits the project owner targets
to achieve through a project are strongly aligned
6 J.R. Meredith, O. Zwikael
Figure 2. Role comparison of the project owner and the project manager
with their own key performance indicators as a
functional manager.
3.3. Responsibilities during the four major
project phases
The responsibilities of the project owner are
detailed here in terms of four chronological proj-
ect phases:
1. Initiation up to the approval of the business
case;
2. Project planning for output development;
3. Execution, monitoring, and controlling of the
project plan; and
4. Closing and benefits realization for securing a
permanent and sustainable change.
These phases are based on those suggested by PMI
(2017); we combined execution with its monitoring
and controlling phase and extended its short
closing phase into benefits realization.
3.3.1. Initiation
The responsibilities of the project owner in this
front-end phase (Martini, Massa, & Testa, 2014)
are to help develop the business case with input
from the major stakeholders in the project,
including the champion and the CEO. Clearly, the
business case must be aligned with the organiza-
tion’s strategic plan and specify the major pa-
rameters of the project: costs, time, outputs
(e.g., software), the users, the risks, and, most
importantly, the expected benefits that support
the strategy. The target benefits should be
specific, measurable in some manner, attainable
for the organization, and reflect the vision of all
key stakeholders. To facilitate attainment of the
desired benefits, it is useful to establish baseline
benefit measurements before the project is
launched in order to compare with the after-
project results.
3.3.2. Planning
In this phase, a variety of different activities needs
to be addressed. A steering committee for the
project needs to be formed with the project owner
acting as either a member or head of the com-
mittee. A decision also needs to be made about
whether the project outputs will be provided by an
internal team or an external contractor, and then
either a project manager appointed or contractor
selected. If the project is to be an internal one,
then a sponsor also needs to be appointed for the
project. Once the project has a manager, the
manager needs to assemble a project team and
develop a project plan with the advice and direc-
tion of the project owner. This plan will then be
presented by the project owner to the steering
committee for approval. After approval, the
intended users of the outputs need to be identified
by the project owner and initial contact made.
3.3.3. Execution, monitoring, and controlling
The project owner’s responsibilities in this phase
are mainly to support the project team. They
include:
 Executing the project plan;
 Monitoring project progress;
 Controlling the project environment;
Achieving strategic benefits from project investments
 Helping provide resources;
 Addressing problems that arise;
 Making timely decisions about project trade-offs
with the project manager, especially if there are
external changes to the business case regarding
the project; and
 Helping motivate and support the project man-
ager and team.
Another responsibility is continuing communication
with and management of the most influential
stakeholders whose views of the project can change
abruptly or from phase to phase. The project owner
will also have to update the business case regularly
as changes arise, inform the CEO or board about
progress, and keep the steering committee updated
about changes and issues in the project.
But as the nature of the outputs becomes better
defined, the project owner also must start inter-
acting with the users in terms of providing edu-
cation, training, coaching, and, most importantly,
motivating and encouraging them. Organizational
changes could be required, and these need to be
communicated as early as appropriate to all
affected parties. Finally, the project owner
always needs to be alert for potential risks to the
projectdespecially to the benefitsdfrom all
quarters. After execution is complete, the project
manager will write the project plan closeout
report for approval by the project owner.
3.3.4. Closure and benefits realization
In this phase, the project outputs are delivered to
the users, organizational changes initiated, and
extensive help provided to the users to facilitate
attainment of the intended benefits. This is when
the metrics developed to measure the benefits are
monitored. Typically, when a change is initiated in
an organization, efficiency will drop, then level
off, and finally start moving back up again. If the
change was a good one, results will exceed the
previous level and may even achieve all the tar-
geted benefits but it may take longer than ex-
pected. Once the measured benefits reach around
80% of what was expected, handoff to the func-
tional department can occur, although further
monitoring by the department is desirable to avoid
backsliding.
At this point, closeout workshops may be con-
ducted and a business case closeout report pre-
pared by the project owner for the steering
committee and CEO or board. It is worth noting
that there are at least three or four recognized
7
measures of a successful project, including (Turner
& Xue, 2018):
 Project management success: Whether the
outputs were delivered successfully in terms of
scope, time, and cost;
 Project ownership success: Whether the full
benefits were achieved according to the busi-
ness case; and
 Project investment success: Although the busi-
ness case may not have been fully achieved, the
investment was still a worthwhile expenditure in
the eyes of the organization (Musawir et al.,
2017).
Figure 3 summarizes the different roles of the
project owner and the project manager during
each of the four project phases.
3.4. Selecting and training the project
owner
Two sets of senior managers are good candidates
for the role of project owner. One set is the group
of senior managers in or related to the functional
area that is the target for change or improvement
or, alternatively, the area in which the primary
users of the project’s outputs reside. This could,
for example, be in a department or agency of the
organization and thus the department head or the
administrator of that or an allied area would be a
good candidate. At a higher level, the project may
involve an entire plant and so a plant supervisor
would be an appropriate candidate. These man-
agers/administrators may have already had some
experience with projects in their area and/or were
perhaps in charge of some at an earlier time in
their career, which would be valuable experience
for a project owner.
A second set of senior managers is the group of
project managers that have extensive experience
with implementing projects successfully in their
organization, and especially those that have
demonstrated the important soft skills needed for
managing important stakeholders. In organizations
that have multiple programs with projects, the
program managers would be good candidates also.
It would be particularly helpful if the candidate
had some experience in the functional area of
focus for the project.
It would be expected that an organization just
beginning this process of using project owners
would find it difficult to find a perfect match be-
tween the need for a project owner for a
8 J.R. Meredith, O. Zwikael
Figure 3. Role comparison of the project owner and the project manager by project phase
particular project and the available candidates, in
which case some training will be needed. Func-
tional managers may, for example, need additional
training in overseeing a project manager, main-
taining focus on a business case, making trade-offs
between project time-cost-scope goals and bene-
fits, and other such matters. However, they will
probably be more attuned to the difficulties of
organizational change and how to motivate users
to employ new methods or technologies.
In the case of experienced project managers,
they may need more training regarding business
cases and intended benefits, working with senior
stakeholders such as executives and steering
committees, and how to handle organizational
change and motivate users. These candidates may
have problems regarding oversight of the project
managers if they focus too strongly on the project
execution phase and micromanaging its time-cost-
scope trade-offs.
4. Case example: Successful
implementation of the project owner
role
This case study (Zwikael et al., 2019) summarizes
the experience of an unlisted Australian public-
sector mapping agency (PSMA) with shares held
by both the federal and local governments. This
company is now known for the sophisticated ben-
efits management of its various projects resulting
from implementing a comprehensive initiative to
make one persondthe project ownerdresponsible
for obtaining the benefits from each project. The
implementation project was initiated when a
project review indicated that since no one in the
firm was officially accountable for obtaining the
benefits of any project, the job defaulted to the
CEO and project manager. However, the CEO did
not have the time to monitor and guide all the
projects, so project managers typically made
trade-off decisions in favor of the iron triangle of
cost, time, or scope at the expense of future
benefits, which were rarely achieved. As a result,
the CEO approved an initiative with the
goal todaccording to the executives
interviewedd“enhance the performance of future
PSMA projects” and “gain certainty on the orga-
nizational ability to deliver” PSMA’s projects
successfully.
Case study data was collected over the entire
duration of the project owner role implementation
and included internal status reports, role de-
scriptions, business cases, and project closeout
reports. In addition, observations were made, in-
terviews with senior executives and managers
were conducted, and three surveys of all the firm’s
Achieving strategic benefits from project investments
employees were conducted over the course of the
implementation.
It was determined that, in general, project
owner candidates should be either functional or
operational executives (i.e., from management’s
second tier). The project owner role was to be
responsible for constructing the business case,
working with the project manager to construct the
project plan, guiding the project manager
throughout the lifetime of the project, maintain-
ing project team morale, chairing the project’s
steering committee (a new committee), and
keeping the committee and CEO updated on proj-
ect progress via periodic briefings. In addition, the
project owner was to maintain regular contact
with key stakeholders, giving them status updates
and hearing their thoughts and views about the
ongoing project. Given all these responsibilities, it
was deemed necessary to grant the project owner
the authority to provide resources to their projects
as needed. The result of the creation of this new
role was a major burden reduction for not only the
CEO but also other senior executives such as
project sponsors who had been trying to give
appropriate advice to their project managers. As
the project progressed, the project owner helped
guide the project manager as the inevitable
changes from both above and below impacted the
project. Given these responsibilities, the project
owner was also given the authority to acquire the
resources required by the project team (usually
the task of the sponsor). An executive interviewed
noted that if there was a good relationship and a
shared view of the tasks to be done by the project
owner and the manager, the projects were more
successful. At the end of project execution and
after the outputs were delivered, the project
manager prepared a project plan closeout report.
After the implementation phase when benefits
realization was largely complete, the project
owner filed a business case closeout report.
As a result of this initiative, it was found that
staff were more satisfied with their involvement in
projects, more aware of project success rates, and
more confident in PSMA’s ability to execute pro-
jects successfully. In addition, key stakeholders, as
well as staff, were more aware of the status of
projects in the organization. The conclusion was
that by appointing project owners, clarity about
roles and decision-making processes was signifi-
cantly enhanced. One executive noted that if the
candidate is clear about the project owner role, it
can work well.
In terms of lessons learned, it became clear to
PSMA with this initiative that the role does not
come naturally to all individuals and that project
9
owner candidates need to understand what the
role entails and may need to develop some new
skills. To help not only the project owner but also
project managers, functional executives and
managers, and staff, the firm realized that devel-
opment and training workshops needed to be
scheduled on a regular basis. These would cover
topics such as:
 How project benefits are derived;
 What project governance entails;
 Why benefit accountability is needed;
 How project manager responsibilities differ
from those of the project owner; and
 How the roles of the key players affect the
project throughout its lifetime.
Organizations have generally found that additional
training is needed for new managerial roles such as
this. For the role of project owner, workshops on
additional topics like the business case and its
continued use throughout the project, the impor-
tance of training and guidance for the intended
users, the realities of handling constant change in
a project, and the various roles involved in a
strategic versus operational projects could also
prove valuable.
5. Summary
Although we have gotten better at delivering
project outputs according to the iron triangle
of cost, time, and scope, we are still falling
short of delivering the strategic nonmonetary
benefits, often intangible, which were usually
the reason for undertaking the project in the
first place. When we realize that we have a
project manager whose responsibility is to
deliver the project’s outputs according to the
iron triangle but cannot be responsible for
delivering the strategic benefits, it becomes
clear that we need someone else to take on
this accountability. Because the CEO and
other senior executives do not have the
timedand possibly also the skillsdfor this task,
we conclude that we need to delegate this
role, and its accountability, to another trained
managerda person we call the project owner.
This project owner is accountable for delivering
the benefits desired as described in the business
case, which continues to evolve throughout the
life of the project. The responsibilities of the
10
position are extensive but occur most heavily at
the initiation phase of the project and the benefits
realization phase (i.e., before and after the actual
work on developing the project’s outputs occurs).
Some responsibilities of the project owner exist
throughout every phase of the projectdin all de-
cisions to act on behalf of the funder who autho-
rizes the project and to regularly update the CEO,
the steering committee, and the key stakeholders
regarding progress on the project and any signifi-
cant changes. The project owner is responsible for
two reports over the project’s lifecycle:
 A project plan closeout report written by the
project manager and approved by the project
owner following the execution phase of the
project; and
 A business case closeout report written by the
project owner and approved by the project
funder or CEO after benefits realization and
handover of the project results to the functional
department manager.
The project owner’s responsibilities during the
initiation phase of the project are primarily to help
build the business case for the project in concert
with the key stakeholdersdboth internal and
possibly externaldand to obtain a baseline mea-
sure of the benefits the project is directed at
obtaining or improving. During the planning phase
following project approval, the project owner will
need to determine if the project outputs will be
created by an external or internal team and, if the
latter, who the project manager should be. The
project owner should also make initial contact
with the intended users of the output at this time
and help the project manager draft the official
project plan.
During the execution phase of the project, the
project owner will monitor project progress, help
provide resources as needed, check for risks to the
project, update the business case, and help guide
the project manager with trade-offs as changes
due to reality and the business strategy alter the
project plan. In this phase, the project owner
needs to start preparing the workshops, training,
and education users will require for the transition.
Finally, in the benefits realization phase, the
project owner is focused on delivering the benefits
according to the updated business case. This will
involve working with the users of the project
output, providing the training and other resources
they will need, helping make any required orga-
nizational changes, measuring the benefits as the
users acclimate to the new environment, handing
J.R. Meredith, O. Zwikael
over the project to the functional area once the
benefits are assured, and writing up a business
case closeout report for the organization’s
records.
Good candidates for the project owner role can
be drawn from senior managers in the functional
area of the organization (e.g., department heads)
especially if they also have some project man-
agement experience. Another source for the role is
those project managers that have demonstrated
the soft skills needed for the project owner role,
especially if they have had some experience in the
functional area of the project. Nevertheless, it is
expected that training will inevitably be needed in
a few specific areas:
 How to write and monitor a business case;
 The role of the project owner versus that of the
project manager and how the two should work
together;
 How to handle constant changes in the business
case without getting frustrated;
 How to make trade-offs between the project
iron triangle and expected benefits;
 How to motivate, coach, and train users of the
project; and
 How to implement organizational change.
Clearly, this role is a major challenge, and it is
surprising that any projects are ever successful
when no one has specifically taken on this role.
With an understanding of the importance of this
position in every project that intends to achieve
strategic benefits, we should be more successful in
the future.
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