ISO/IEC/IEEE 16326:2009 provides normative content specifications for project management plans covering software projects, and software-intensive system projects. It also provides detailed discussion and advice on applying a set of project processes that are common to both the software and system life cycle as covered by ISO/I EC 12207:2008 (IEEE Std 12207-2008) and ISO/IEC 15288:2008 (IEEE Std 152882008), respectively. The discussion and advice are intended to aid in the preparation of the normative content of project management plans. ISO/IEC/IEEE 16326:2009 is the result of the harmonization of ISO/IEC TR 16326:1999 and IEEE Std 1058-1998.

This International Standard is intended to aid project managers in managing to successful conclusion those projects concerned with software-intensive systems and software products. This International Standard specifies the required content of the project management plan (PMP). This International Standard also quotes the extracted purpose and outcome statements from the project processes of ISO/IEC 12207:2008 (IEEE Std 12207-2008) and ISO/IEC 15288:2008 (IEEE Std 15288-2008), and adds detailed guidance for managing projects that use these processes for software products and software-intensive systems.