4.4 Applying Principles in Context
Key Takeaways
- All seven PRINCE2 principles are mandatory and interdependent; a breach of one usually undermines others.
- Analysis-level questions require recognising which principle a described action breaches, not just reciting the principle.
- Common breach symptoms map to specific principles: cancelled stage boundaries breach manage by stages; building before agreeing quality criteria breaches focus on products; continuing without funding breaches continued business justification.
- Principles cannot be traded off against one another — applying six does not excuse omitting the seventh.
Principles Are Mandatory and Interdependent
The seven PRINCE2 principles are mandatory: every project claiming to use PRINCE2 must apply all seven. They are also interdependent — a decision that breaches one usually undermines others. Analysis-level (Bloom's Level 4) exam questions test your ability to look at a described action and identify which principle is breached, and often which secondary principles are weakened as a consequence.
The seven principles
- Continued business justification — a project exists only while its Business Case remains viable.
- Learn from experience — lessons are sought, recorded, and acted on throughout.
- Define roles and responsibilities — everyone knows who does what and who decides what.
- Manage by stages — the project is controlled through accountable management stages.
- Manage by exception — authority is delegated with tolerances; escalation happens on breach.
- Focus on products — the project delivers outputs with agreed quality, not activity.
- Tailor to suit the project — the method is scaled to context, never applied verbatim.
Principle → breach symptom table
| Breach symptom (what you observe) | Principle breached |
|---|---|
| Project continues after the Business Case is no longer viable | Continued business justification |
| Lessons from a previous project are ignored or never recorded | Learn from experience |
| No one knows who has authority to approve changes | Define roles and responsibilities |
| Stage boundaries skipped or combined without board authority | Manage by stages |
| PM silently absorbs a stage tolerance breach instead of reporting it | Manage by exception |
| Team builds before quality criteria are agreed | Focus on products |
| Board removes all controls and calls it tailoring | Tailor to suit the project |
Worked scenario analyses
Scenario A — cancelled stage boundary review. The Project Manager cancels the stage boundary review to save time and moves straight into the next stage.
- Primary breach: Manage by stages. The stage boundary is where the Project Board reviews the completed stage, checks the Business Case, and authorises the next stage. Skipping it removes board control between stages.
- Secondary breach: Continued business justification is weakened because the Business Case is not re-checked at the boundary; Manage by exception is weakened because stage tolerance performance is not formally reported.
Scenario B — building before agreeing quality criteria. The team starts building the product before the Product Description's quality criteria are agreed, to hit an early milestone.
- Primary breach: Focus on products. Quality criteria must be agreed before development so done is defined.
- Secondary breach: Manage by exception is weakened because without quality criteria there is no quality tolerance to monitor; Learn from experience is weakened if this rework pattern was seen before and not acted on.
Scenario C — continuing after sponsor withdraws funding. The Project Board continues the project after the main sponsor withdraws funding, hoping a new sponsor will appear.
- Primary breach: Continued business justification. Without funding and an active sponsor, the Business Case is not viable.
- Secondary breach: Define roles and responsibilities is breached because the Executive role is unfilled; Manage by stages is weakened because the board authorising the next stage without a viable Business Case defeats the stage gate's purpose.
Scenario D — PM absorbs the tolerance breach. The Project Manager forecasts that the stage will exceed its cost tolerance but does not raise an Exception Report, hoping to recover by stage end.
- Primary breach: Manage by exception. A forecast breach must trigger an Exception Report to the level above.
- Secondary breach: Manage by stages is weakened because the board cannot make an informed stage decision without the exception information.
Why you cannot trade off principles
A common distractor in exam questions is a justification such as 'we skipped the stage boundary because the project is small, so tailoring applies.' This conflates tailoring with abandoning controls. Tailoring scales the form of the stage boundary; it does not remove the board's authority to authorise the next stage. The principles do not offset each other — applying six does not excuse omitting the seventh.
Approach for analysis questions
- Read the scenario for the action taken, not the intention stated.
- Identify which control or expectation the action removes or weakens.
- Map that to the principle whose purpose is undermined.
- Check for secondary breaches — a single action often weakens two or three principles.
- Reject distractors that confuse tailoring with abandonment, or activity with output.
A Project Manager cancels the stage boundary review to save time and begins the next stage without Project Board authorisation. Which principle is PRIMARILY breached?
The Project Board continues a project after the main sponsor withdraws funding and no replacement funder is confirmed. Which principle is primarily breached, and which secondary principle is also weakened?
A team begins building a product before its quality criteria are agreed, to meet an early milestone. Which principle is primarily breached, and what is the likely consequence?