Contact us:
KCIT
Chinook Building
401 Fifth Ave.
Seattle, WA 98104

Phone: 206-263-7997
Fax: 206-296-6511

Project Review Board

Overview:

The Project Review Board (PRB) oversees King County's Information Technology (KCIT) projects. The project oversight focuses on promoting project success and protecting the county's investments in IT projects. The PRB was established by Ordinance #14155 in July 2001. It is chaired by the County Chief Information Officer and includes the Budget Director, the Assistant County Executive, and the Director of the Department of Executive Services. The PRB reviews project status, plans and progress and approves the release of funding so that projects can continue to completion. It advises projects on risks to scope, schedule, budget and provides assistance and support for successful completions.

All new and in-progress IT projects are asked to participate in Project Review Board oversight and are responsible for providing regular monthly status reports.
The PRB service includes:

Focusing oversight on promoting project success. There are three major focus areas of the Project Review Board project oversight that promote project success.

  • Risks Evaluation. The project reviews are targeted specifically on identification of project risks and recommendations to project teams for moving forward in a way to mitigate the risks and promote project success.
  • Quality Assurance.  If there are indications that a project may be experiencing significant risks to their scope, schedule and budget, PRB/CIO can recommend conducting quality review of the project.  The objective of quality review is to provide recommendations for corrective actions and bringing the project back on track. Such reviews may be conducted internally, or with hired consulting resources.
  • Outreach to Projects. Another important oversight focus is to identify projects that may need help and offer them assistance by involving PRB/CIO. The CIO has been instrumental in promoting this approach in multiple ways: Adding additional technical resources to projects lacking specific expertise; Joining project Steering Committees; Involving CIO subject matter experts to advise projects on specific project management or technical areas; Discussions with vendors; Encouraging and inviting projects to bring issues and problems forward and ask for help in resolving them.

Maintaining transparency of PRB actions and decisions. All project materials provided for PRB reviews for funding releases and briefings, monthly status reports, PRB decisions and actions are available on the King County Intranet and SharePoint Sites. With the availability of the SharePoint environment for countywide use, the projects teams now can post their materials themselves, without PRB staff and web publisher’s involvement. That has contributed to further efficiencies without compromising transparency of PRB oversight.

Increasing IT project management skills. Streamlining of Project Review Board processes has been, in great extent, enabled by a parallel effort to establish a coordinated Project Management Center of Excellence (PMO). The PMO role includes providing: Functional support for the county's IT project managers; Project management tools, disciplines, training; Practical support for project management; Standards for communications, methods; and ensuring quality through best practices. It further creates a community of practitioners for shared assistance and knowledge exchange.

The major values the PMO focuses on are: Enhancing project performance and results; Improving resource coordination; and Increase delivery of business benefits.The efforts to increase IT project management skills, adopt countywide project management methodology and standard IT project delivery methods contribute to shifting the oversight from compliance with PRB processes to promoting the project success.

Related information:

Contact information:

IT Governance Manager: Zlata Kauzlaric, zlata.kauzlaric@kingcounty.gov