Institute for Healthcare Improvement
Boston,
Massachusetts,
USA
The Project Planning Form is a useful tool to help teams think systematically about their improvement project, including a listing of the changes that the team is testing, all of the
Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) cycles for each change, the person responsible for each test of change, and the timeframe for each test. The form allows a team to see at a glance the overall of the project.
Background
Used in many of the Institute for Healthcare Improvement’s collaborative projects, the Project Planning Form has been used by hundreds of health care organizations.
Directions
The planning form should be used at the beginning of a project to initiate planning. Begin by thinking about the drivers on which the team will focus. Identify an interim (for example, 90-day) goal for each driver, and the process measure that you are using to track progress on that driver. Then list the changes that you will undertake for each driver. Assign responsibility for each task, and estimate the time needed for testing, implementation and spread. Be sure to consider how you will gather the data needed to evaluate each test of change. As the project continues, update the Project Planning Form regularly.