It seems so innocent at first. A simple customer request to add an item here, a brilliant idea to expand a service there, and before you know it, your project scope has outgrown the resources/time allowed and your team is over-stretched. Scope creep happens when either
▪️the parameters of the project were not well-defined from the outset
▪️there’s pressure either internally from the team or externally from customers to rush to win the contract or get a product to the market
▪️poor communication between parties
▪️lack of initial product versatility
▪️Management promises the sun and the moon, and then breaks the backs of the subject matter experts to deliver at impossible time frames.
By working on unapproved features of a product, a project team devotes time to the unauthorized changes thus impacting original time, and budget estimates and, leaving less time for approved activities parts of the scope.
This leads to approved features being rushed or not completed and the end product is not what was chartered.