What is the differences between golden plating and scope creep? How do you avoid them?

1. Scope Creep Gold Plating
Scope creep is also known as
requirement creep, which refers to the
uncontrolled changes in the project’s or
product’s scope.
Scope creep happens in the project for
following reasons:
 Due to interference from the client.
 Due to an incomplete scope
statement.
 Due to a poor change control system.
 Due to miss-communication among
the team members.
 Due to reasons external to
organizations; e.g. market conditions,
regulatory requirements, or
technological advancements.
Gold plating means intentionally adding
extra features or functions to the products
which were not included in the scope
statement.
Usually gold plating is performed by
either the project team or the project
manager with no additional cost to the
client. Gold plating is done with good
intentions and most of the time is
appreciated by the clients;
Gold plating is very common in software
programming and is done by team
members to show their abilities, or by the
project manager to the make client
happy.
Following are a few causes of gold
plating:
 Team member may add extra
functions to prove his abilities to the
project manager.
 Project manager may add extra
functions to earn credit from the client
or the top management.
 Sometimes it is performed to divert
the attention of the client from the
defects in the product.

2. Scope Creep Gold Plating
Scope creep is considered bad for the
project health and it must be avoided in
all cases. Here, you make some changes
without any proper review, and in later
stages it may create many problems. And
then you will have to implement many
other changes just to cover up the
changes made in earlier stages.
Gold plating sounds good to everyone, it
is bad for the project team and the project
manager in the long run. Gold plating
increases the input cost (though, in many
cases it does not appear to be high),
increases the risk, and the expectation of
the customer is elevated. If you do
another project for the same customer, he
would again expect you to deliver a
product with extra features. And if you do
not do so he will be dissatisfied.
Consequences of scope creep may
include delayed schedule and cost
overrun. If you do not control the scope
creep, then you may have problems with
successfully completing your project, or in
severe cases it may be terminated.
How to Avoid the Scope Creep
Scope creep is not something that
couldn’t be avoided. Of course it can be.
You can avoid scope creep by following
below given guidelines.
 Never allow changes without proper
review and approval.
 Establish a communication channel
between client and you. Don’t let
them talk directly to your project team
members.
 Prepare a solid and complete scope
statement.
 Establish a robust change control
system.
 Establish and encourage good
communication among the team
members.
 Keep proper checks on the project’s
progress.