Application Area Knowledge, Standards and Regulations

Application areas are categories of projects that have common elements significant in such projects, but are not needed or present in all projects. Application areas are usually defined in terms of:

• Functional departments and supporting disciplines, such as legal, production and inventory management, marketing, logistics, and personnel
• Technical elements, such as software development or engineering, and sometimes a specific kind of engineering, such as water and sanitation engineering or construction engineering
• Management specializations, such as government contracting, community development, and new product development
• Industry groups, such as automotive, chemical, agriculture, and financial services.

Each application area generally has a set of accepted standards and practices, often codified in regulations. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) differentiates between standards and regulations as follows:

• A standard is a document established by consensus and approved by a recognized body that provides, for common and repeated use, rules, guidelines or characteristics for activities or their results, aimed at the achievement of the optimum degree of order in a given context. Some examples of standards are computer disk sizes and the thermal stability specifications of hydraulic fluids.
• A regulation is a government-imposed requirement, which specifies product, process or service characteristics, including the applicable administrative provisions, with which compliance is mandatory. Building codes are an example of regulations.

There is an overlap in the concepts of standards and regulations that cause confusion. For example:

• Standards often begin as guidelines that describe a preferred approach and later, with widespread adoption, become generally accepted as if they were regulations
• Different organizational levels can mandate compliance, such as when a government agency, the management of the performing organization, or the project management team establishes specific policies and procedures.

Reference: A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK ® Guide)

Standards, Regulations, and Project Quality Planning

Rules are everywhere. People are bombarded by rules in the form of standards and regulations. Do you know the difference between the two?

Quality planning requires you to be familiar with the standards and regulations that affect your project. For many projects, these are well known and your planning will reflect them. The difference between standards and regulations is explained below.

• Standards. Although standards are approved by a recognized body, compliance with them is not mandatory. They are documents of rules, guidelines, or characteristics for projects, and will shape a project's product.
• Regulations. These documents outline the products, processes, or service characteristics of a project. Compliance to regulations is mandatory.

Standards and regulations are inputs to quality planning that can have a great effect on projects. As a project manager or member of a project team, you need to be certain your quality system is "up to code."

As with most things in life, rules are not always clear cut. There's a definite "gray area" between standards and regulations. A standard will sometimes begin as a guideline and then become a regulation. This happens when a standard becomes well-known and is widely used.

Another example of the "gray area" between standards and regulations is when each one is authorized at different levels. For example, the government requires pilots to have a national-level license for flying. At a company level, however, a pilot may be required to have a national-level pilot's license, 1,000 hours of flying time, 600 hours multi-engine flight experience, and 150 hours of night flying time.

Standards can help companies meet their quality goals. The International Organization for Standardization is an establishment that helps companies accomplish this with the ISO 9000 series. Companies that use the ISO 9000 standards follow documented procedures for the work they perform. It does not guarantee organizations will always produce good products. Instead, the ISO 9000 standards act as a tool for helping organizations meet quality goals and confirm they have a set of quality standards in place.

In summary, standards and regulations are important inputs to quality planning. Following them helps ensure that a project product is of good quality and meets stakeholder requirements.