Planning: subsidiary plans for quality, risk, communication, transition and release

The project management plan is not one document but a collection: the baselines for scope, schedule and cost plus subsidiary plans that describe how each area will be managed. On a small project they may be a page each; on a large one they may be substantial. Writing them forces the team to think through how the project will run before problems arise, and it gives new team members and auditors a single place to see how decisions are made. Like the baselines, the plan is approved and then updated through change control.