Before any project starts, all project stakeholders must agree on the balance between these three elements and rate which of the three is the most important and which is the least important. No project can have quality, cost, and schedule be equally important.

What is the most important element to your project: quality, schedule, or cost? Almost every LIMS project stakeholder answers immediately that quality is the most important element. Stakeholders think "What message does it send to the project team when quality is not the most important?" The reality is that some projects are not driven primarily by quality. Some are driven by cost that cannot be exceeded. Some are driven by a fixed schedule that cannot be missed and the end quality is not as important as the deadline. This is just the way some projects are. The highest quality LIMS that doesn't go into production because it is never done is useless. Whatever the drivers, the point is that before the project starts, each element is ranked and that ranking ought to drive the execution of the project plan.

Yet, so many project managers forget the delicate balance in the heat of the plan execution and emphasize a part of the project that shouldn't be emphasized. When project change is introduced, the top priority is sacrificed for a lesser priority many times. For example, many projects will stretch to meet a tight deadline and let quality suffer in a pinch, even when the project priorities list quality as number 1. Project staffers will recognize this as being wrong. It is easy for those in the trenches to recognize when the correct priorities are being sacrificed for a short-term goal.

Things which matter most should never be at the mercy of things which matter least.
~ Johann Von Goethe