Lessons · Project management · the work breakdown structure
The work breakdown structure: the whole job, cut into pieces you can hand to someone
The WBS breaks the final deliverable into smaller deliverables, level by level, until each piece is small enough to estimate, assign and finish.
Hone is a place to practise a career, one idea a day. This is one of its lessons, written out in full and free to read without an account.
What it is for
Asked for the budget of the office move, you cannot price the move. You can price packing 40 desks, moving the server rack, fitting 40 network points. The WBS is what turns one unpriceable job into fifty priceable ones, and it is the first thing a real estimate is built on.
How to think about it
Start with the result at the top. Ask what it is made of, and write those as the next level. Keep asking until each piece is a deliverable someone could hand you and you could check. Nouns, not verbs: things, not activities.
Worked example
1 Office moveThe result. Level one is the whole project.
1.1 Packed office. 1.2 New building ready. 1.3 Moved equipment. 1.4 Staff workingWhat the result is made of. Four deliverables; nothing else counts.
1.2.1 Network points installed. 1.2.2 Desks assembled. 1.2.3 Server room fitted1.2 broken down. Each is a thing you can look at and say done or not done.
1.2.1: 40 points, 2 electricians, 3 days, $6,400Small enough to estimate. This is a work package, and the estimating starts here.
Your turn
Write the rule for what goes in a WBS box.
A WBS element is a , not an activity.
Solve one, graded on the server
The trap
Writing the WBS as a to-do list of verbs. Call the movers is an activity, and activities belong in the schedule. The WBS holds the things that must exist at the end, so nothing is forgotten when the activities are planned.