In this article, I will cover the very beginning of the development of your project: how to develop your idea and to turn it into a project.
THE IDEA
The first step is to define as precisely as possible your idea. To help you, you can answer these short questions:
1) WHAT? What is the topic of your idea? What is its aim?
2) WHY? Why did you have this idea? What are the causes and effects?
3) WHO? Who will be the beneficiaries of
your idea? Who would be the stakeholders and who would be a partner?
4) WHERE? Where would the project take place?
5) WHEN? How long would your project last? When would you like to start and what would be the deadline?
FROM THE IDEA TO THE PROJECT
To develop your idea into a project, you need to identify the needs and how your project will address these.
Various tools are available to help you with this step. Among those you have:
- the root cause analysis: to identify the causes and effects of the issues that inspired you;
- the state of the art analysis: to identify the situation before your project starts;
- the SWOT analysis: to identify the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of your project;
- the logical frame: to identify the general objective, the specific ones and the actions of your project.