work breakdown structure (WBS)

Work Breakdown Structure. The US Department of Defence first documented the WBS discipline in US Department of Defence Instruction 7000.2 Performance Measurement for Selected Acquisitions [12]. The official definition is:

"A WBS is a product oriented family tree division of hardware, software, services and other work tasks which organises, defines and graphically displays the product to be produced, as well as the work to be accomplished to achieve the specified product."

See also: WBS concept