BACKGROUND OF THE WBS CONCEPT

The WBS is not a new concept in project management. In 1961, a sample WBS was included in an article published within General Electric Corporation that explained the importance of a WBS in developing effective management control systems.

The program evaluation and review technique (PERT) and WBS concepts spread widely and swiftly once their efficacy was recognized in their use on the Polaris Submarine Program and other similar large multidiscipline and multicontractor systems. These management tools and their application, as developed between 1958 and 1965, are the basis for most of the project management body of knowledge in use today.

Current DoD Requirements

The Department of Defense (DoD) has been a major user of the WBS since its conceptualization. DoD has developed a standard for the use of the WBS to ensure commonality in certain types of projects and to use as a template.

DoD has a required standard for a WBS usage that is addressed in MIL-STD-881C, The Standard Practice Work Breakdown Structures for Defense Materiel Items. This is the most recent version of the standard, which dates back to 1968 and is “based on the cooperative efforts of the military services with assistance from industrial associations.” Updates to the standard specifically address advances in technology and modifications of the acquisition process and incorporate new materiel items, developmental concepts, and approaches. The Department of Energy (DOE) also has a Work Breakdown Structure Handbook that “… provides suggested guidance and best practices on the development of product-oriented Work Breakdown Structures (WBS) that should be used by all projects within DOE to organize and subdivide total project work scope.”

The DoD standard (and the DOE handbook for project managers) presents instructions for effectively preparing, understanding, and presenting a WBS. It is intended to provide the framework for DoD program managers to define their programs’ WBSs and also provides direction to DoD contractors in their application and extension of a contract WBS. Section 1 provides general instructions and defines and describes the WBS. Section 2 provides instructions on how to develop a government program WBS. Section 3 provides contractor instructions for developing and implementing a contract WBS, and Section 4 addresses implementation of the CWBS. Section 5 provides a series of notes on various WBS issues. Other government agencies have similar documents, most of which are based on the DoD model.

Private-Sector Standards for the WBS

The lead in monitoring and documenting project management practices transitioned from the public to the private sector with the reductions in the space program, the end of the Cold War, and the rapid growth of the Project Management Institute (PMI).

PMI, a professional association of more than 600,000 members, through its conferences, chapter meetings, monthly magazine, and quarterly journal, provides a forum for discussion of the growth and development of project management practices. In August 1987, PMI published the landmark document, The Project Management Body of Knowledge. That document was revised and republished in 1996 as A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (the PMBOK® Guide). It has been updated frequently, and the fifth edition was published in early 2013. The PMBOK® Guide reflects the experience gained in project management since the seminal work of DoD, NASA, other government organizations, and the aerospace industry in the 1960s. In addition to the standard PMBOK® Guide, a DoD version was published in 2003, and a government version was published in 2006. A construction version is based on the 2000 PMBOK® Guide. (These are all available at www.pmi.org.)

In addition to the discussion of the WBS in the PMBOK® Guide, PMI has published the Practice Standard for Work Breakdown Structures, Second Edition, which is intended to be more universal in application than the comparable DoD Handbook.