Capability template for project and delivery
Project scope baseline
A project manager turns an approved brief into a draft scope baseline: the deliverables, what is excluded, the acceptance criteria for each deliverable, the constraints and the open questions for the sponsor. Nothing implied counts as scope until the sponsor says so.
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The outcome
The project manager and the sponsor sit down with one page that is clear enough to disagree with. Every deliverable the brief names is listed once, with the tests a person can run to say it is accepted and the role that accepts it. What is out of scope is written down beside what is in. The limits on the project, such as budget, dates, people and platform, are listed with where each came from.
The part that earns its keep is the questions. Wherever a conversation, a note or the sponsor's own expectation reaches past the brief, the draft does not quietly add it and does not quietly drop it. It becomes a question with the facts beside it, and it stays a question until the sponsor answers. The same holds for a vague test such as "easy to use": the draft quotes the words and asks what would be accepted instead.
The project manager and the sponsor agree scope and acceptance before the baseline is set. The draft prints its sign-off lines empty, and the AI assistant never fills them in.
Who starts the work, and when
The project manager runs it once the brief is approved and before planning the delivery in detail. It suits any project that has a brief, a sponsor and more than one deliverable: a system change, an office move, a new service, a client implementation run by your own team. The project manager reads the draft first, settles what they can, and takes the rest to the sponsor.
It writes a first baseline only. Changes to scope after the baseline is agreed belong to the project's change control. Until then it can be run again if the brief is reissued; the sponsor's answers to the questions are recorded by the project manager and agreed in the baseline, not fed back in.
What they supply
- The approved brief, pasted or attached, with its approval date.
- Discovery notes, if any: what was learned in conversations after the brief was written.
- Constraints, if any: budget, dates, people who are away, platform limits, rules the project must follow.
- The sponsor's expectations, if any, in the sponsor's own words.
- A working deliverable list, if the project already has one, as a spreadsheet export with the columns ID, Deliverable, Source and Status.
- Settings: the project name, the sponsor's role, the project manager's role and the date.
What comes out
A draft in a fixed order: a status line that says "draft, not baselined" and counts the questions that block baselining; the deliverables, each with its acceptance criteria and who accepts it; the exclusions; the constraints; the open questions for the sponsor; anything set aside because it is not scope; and an empty sign-off block for the project manager and the sponsor. Empty sections say so in a few words, so the reader knows nothing was left out.
It is an internal working document. It is not a client statement of work and it is not a contract, and it does not become one when it is signed off.
An invented example
Illustrative example with invented data. The firm, its people, the vendor, the project and every date and figure below are invented. The firm is an invented 60-person professional services firm putting a client document portal in place. The sponsor is the managing partner and the project manager is the operations manager; people are named by role only, and the vendor is called Vendor A. First come the four inputs the operations manager supplied, in full, then the draft the capability returned. No working deliverable list existed, so none was supplied.
The inputs
1. Settings
Project: Client document portal
Sponsor: Managing partner
Project manager: Operations manager
Date: Thursday 12 November 2026
2. The approved brief
CLIENT DOCUMENT PORTAL: PROJECT BRIEF (approved Monday 2 November 2026)
Why: Clients send documents by email and ask us where their work stands.
Staff spend too much time chasing documents. One place for both fixes this.
What the project delivers:
1. A client portal on Vendor A's platform where each client can upload
documents and see a status for each of their open engagements.
2. The open-engagement folders (140 today) moved from the shared drive
into the portal.
3. A one-page guide for clients on how to use the portal.
4. Training for the 35 staff who work with clients.
Not in this project: integration with the billing system; a mobile app.
Targets: go-live on Monday 1 March 2027. Total budget $48,000.
Success: clients find it easy to use, and document-chasing emails drop
significantly.
3. Discovery notes and constraints
DISCOVERY NOTES, Monday 9 November 2026 (operations manager with two team leads)
- Team leads want clients to be able to send messages to staff inside the portal.
- Closed engagements from the last three years, about 600 folders, must stay
searchable by staff. Nobody has decided where they will live.
- Vendor A's standard plan includes 50 staff seats. The firm has 60 staff.
CONSTRAINTS (operations manager, Tuesday 10 November 2026)
- The $48,000 budget includes the first year of Vendor A's fees, quoted at $18,000.
- The operations manager is away from Monday 21 December 2026 to Monday 4 January 2027.
- No staff training can be held from Monday 18 to Friday 22 January 2027 (firm retreat).
4. The sponsor's expectations
From a conversation with the managing partner, Tuesday 10 November 2026:
- "Clients should be able to pay their invoices there too."
- "Leave the shared drive alone for now."
- "Send me a one-paragraph progress note every Friday."
The draft the capability returned
SCOPE BASELINE (DRAFT): Client document portal
For: Managing partner (sponsor) and Operations manager (project manager). Prepared Thursday 12 November 2026 from: the project brief (approved Monday 2 November 2026), discovery notes (Monday 9 November 2026), constraints (Tuesday 10 November 2026), the sponsor's expectations (Tuesday 10 November 2026), no working deliverable list supplied.
Status: draft, not baselined. Open questions: 10, of which 8 block baselining.
Purpose, from the brief: "Clients send documents by email and ask us where their work stands. Staff spend too much time chasing documents."
Deliverables: 4
D1 Client portal on Vendor A's platform. Source: brief, item 1.
What it is: a portal where each client can upload documents and see a status for each of their open engagements.
Accepted when: (1) a client can upload a document in the portal; (2) a client can see a status for each of their open engagements; (3) the brief's "easy to use" has no test yet (question 6).
Accepted by: not stated (question 5).
D2 Open-engagement folders moved into the portal. Source: brief, item 2.
What it is: the open-engagement folders, 140 today, moved from the shared drive into the portal.
Accepted when: (1) every open-engagement folder is in the portal; 140 is today's count and the date the count is fixed is not stated (question 7); (2) what is to be done about the shared-drive folders is not decided (question 1).
Accepted by: not stated (question 5).
D3 One-page guide for clients. Source: brief, item 3.
What it is: a guide on how to use the portal.
Accepted when: (1) the guide fits on one page. No other check is stated in any source.
Accepted by: not stated (question 5).
D4 Training for the staff who work with clients. Source: brief, item 4.
What it is: training for 35 staff.
Accepted when: (1) 35 staff have been trained; what counts as trained is not stated (question 8).
Accepted by: not stated (question 5).
Excluded: 3
X1 Integration with the billing system. Source: brief, "Not in this project".
X2 A mobile app. Source: brief, "Not in this project".
X3 The shared drive left alone for now. Source: sponsor, "Leave the shared drive alone for now". Not in the brief (question 10).
Constraints: 6
K1 Budget: $48,000 in total. Source: brief; the constraints note says it includes the first year of Vendor A's fees.
K2 Budget: Vendor A's fees, $18,000 for the first year, as quoted. Source: constraints. Left for all other work: $30,000 ($48,000 - $18,000).
K3 Date: go-live on Monday 1 March 2027. Source: brief.
K4 Platform: Vendor A. Source: brief names Vendor A; discovery notes say its standard plan includes 50 staff seats. The firm has 60 staff, of whom 35 work with clients (question 9).
K5 People: the operations manager is away from Monday 21 December 2026 to Monday 4 January 2027. Source: constraints.
K6 Date: no staff training can be held from Monday 18 to Friday 22 January 2027 (firm retreat). Source: constraints.
Open questions for the sponsor: 10
1. Blocking, conflict. The brief says the open-engagement folders are "moved from the shared drive into the portal" (D2). The sponsor said "Leave the shared drive alone for now" (X3). What is to be done about the shared-drive folders, given both statements? Affects: D2, X3.
2. Blocking, implied deliverable. The sponsor said "Clients should be able to pay their invoices there too." The brief lists no payment feature and excludes "integration with the billing system" (X1). Is invoice payment in the portal a deliverable or excluded? Affects: D1, X1.
3. Blocking, implied deliverable. The team leads want clients to be able to send messages to staff inside the portal. The brief does not list messaging. Is messaging a deliverable, or is it excluded? Affects: D1.
4. Blocking, implied deliverable. About 600 closed-engagement folders from the last three years must stay searchable by staff, and nobody has decided where they will live. The brief covers open engagements only. Is making them searchable a deliverable, or is it excluded? Affects: D2.
5. Blocking, no acceptor. No source says who accepts D1, D2, D3 or D4. Which role accepts each? Affects: D1, D2, D3, D4.
6. Blocking, vague criterion. The brief's success line says "clients find it easy to use" and gives no test. What would the sponsor accept as showing it? Affects: D1.
7. Blocking, unfixed figure. The brief counts 140 open-engagement folders "today". On which date, or by what rule, is the count fixed? Affects: D2.
8. Blocking, vague criterion. D4 covers 35 staff, and no source says what counts as trained. What shows that a person is trained? Affects: D4.
9. Not blocking, constraint check. Vendor A's standard plan includes 50 staff seats. The 35 staff who work with clients fit within 50; all 60 staff would not. Which staff need a seat? Affects: K4.
10. Not blocking, unconfirmed exclusion. X3 comes from the sponsor's conversation, not from the brief. The words "for now" give no end date. Does the sponsor confirm it as an exclusion? Affects: X3.
Set aside, not scope: 2
- "Send me a one-paragraph progress note every Friday." Source: sponsor. A reporting request, not a deliverable; noted for the project manager.
- "document-chasing emails drop significantly" (the second half of the brief's success line). Source: brief. A result to look for after go-live, not a deliverable; "significantly" states no number.
Sign-off (to be completed by people, after the questions are answered)
Operations manager: ____________ Date: ________
Managing partner: ____________ Date: ________
Internal working document for Client document portal, not a client statement of work or a contract. Nothing has been sent, filed, changed or baselined.
What to notice
The brief names four deliverables, and the draft lists exactly those four. Three further things reached the project outside the brief: payment of invoices, messaging and the closed folders. None became a deliverable and none was dropped; each is a question. The sponsor's remark about the shared drive pulls against the brief, so both statements are printed together as a conflict and the remark is also listed as an exclusion marked as not from the brief. The remark about invoice payment is not the same as the brief's exclusion of billing-system integration, so it is a question about an implied deliverable that quotes the exclusion beside it. The $30,000 left after the vendor's fees is the only sum, and it is shown with its working; the seat comparison in question 9 sets 35 and 60 against 50 and adds no figure of its own.
Where it fits
- Project and delivery, where the first piece of work after approval is agreeing what the project will and will not deliver.
- Professional services, where internal projects and client implementations both start from a short brief.
- Software and technology, where "done" for each deliverable is argued about most.
- Engineering firms, where an internal system or process change has to be scoped between project deadlines.
- Construction, for the office-side and yard-side projects a contractor runs for itself.
- Established businesses, where the sponsor has little time and needs one page to react to.
- Growth & scaling, when the company begins running several projects at once and briefs get looser.
It sits before Pilot acceptance-test preparation, which sets up the tests for an AI pilot, and before Project status report, which reports against the plan once it exists. Decision log keeps the sponsor's answers to the open questions.
What has to change for your company
Decide who counts as the sponsor and who may accept a deliverable; the draft asks, and your answer becomes the default. List the words your company treats as too vague to test, and add them to the draft's list. Choose the form your constraints take, for example whether a budget is one figure or split by phase. Decide which questions you will let the project manager settle alone and which always go to the sponsor. It runs in ChatGPT, Claude, Copilot or Gemini from the documents and notes you supply; it needs no connection to your project software.
What has been checked
Fully Powered AI wrote this capability template from its own published map of the work, with no third-party text. It was editorially reviewed on 10 November 2026. It was tried once on its invented example on 10 November 2026 in Claude, and the record is published with it. The run showed the same four deliverables, the same two exclusions from the brief and the same $30,000 working; it differed on the blocking count (9 against the example's 8) and on how the shared-drive and invoice-payment remarks were classified. The edits made after that run, to the instructions on those points, to the wording of a few rules and to the example, have not been run again. It has not yet been tested in a client environment. It has not yet been tested as a packaged version in ChatGPT, Claude, Copilot or Gemini.
Testing in your environment means running it on the brief of a project you finished and remember well, then checking the draft against what the team and the sponsor argued about later: the deliverable nobody listed, the exclusion nobody wrote down, the acceptance test that was never agreed. The project manager checks every line against the sources before the draft goes to the sponsor. Pilot acceptance-test preparation sets up cases like these.
The full capability template
Everything above is the outline. The complete capability template is the working version: the roles, the inputs, the procedure, the exceptions and stop conditions, the output format, the reviewer checklist, the acceptance tests, the instructions for an AI assistant and what to customize for your company. It comes with a download and the link to its folder in Fully Powered’s public repository.
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Next step
Put this capability to work for your team: on your plan, or built with you in a sprint.
Build this in a sprint
In a sprint, Fully Powered adapts this capability template to your rules, proves it on your own work and puts it in the hands of the roles that own it.
Two ways to begin: