Introduction
The fundamental and most basic definition of project management is about the people getting their things done. The organizational definition of project management is a bit different. In organizations it is the methods, skills, experience processes and knowledge to achieve the objectives related to a certain project. In organizations, projects are carried out to achieve outputs and benefits via planned objectives. A successful project is one which is completed in the allotted scale of time and budget, this is done through proper management of the project. There are few principal components of project management, which are to be followed in order for the project to be a success, such as, defining the reason that why project is being carried out, defining the quality of the output, resource usage, time of completion, mitigating the investment by preparing a business case and most importantly development and implementation of the project management plan. Project manager plays a key role in this. A project manager requires a certain set of skills to carry on with the project and his skills, knowledge and leadership defines if a project is going to be successful or not. Project managers usually gain knowledge by working on various projects, by working on a great number of projects they improve their skills and after achieving a certain set of skills they are promoted to the post of project management (Purdy,2012).
Importance of project management in business world
The role of project manager is to lead a project from its planning stage to completion (Harbour, 2010). Project management is a vastly growing field which is used by the businesses of both small and large sizes. As the top leadership and executive are responsible for handling and managing the organization, it is important for them to use project managers who can look after the company’s projects from the conceptual stage to completion stage. Understanding the use of proper , effective and efficient project management techniques helps the business to enhance and to carry out large scale projects. While business is an ongoing process, a project is a short term business enterprise which requires experience and expertise and utilizes communications, planning and budgeting to reach its completion. For an organization or business to grow it has to lay special emphasis on the importance of project management. Appointing a right project manager for a right project is the key to success. A right project manager is the one who has right project management skills. As many businesses and organizations work on large scale projects which means dealing with human resources, budgets and supply constraints, it is important for them to know the importance of project management and the skills and knowledge associated with it. By realizing importance of project management businesses and organization can complete their projects in a proper timely way by utilizing the resources, time and budget effectively. Due to this vast importance of project management businesses and organizations focus more on project management and spend more on improving the skills and techniques of project managers.
As an employee of an engineering firm and part of their team working on an environmental sustainability project, the organization laid special emphasis on providing us with a skillful project manager. The project was generation of electricity from water turbines. The project manager used his project management skills to build up a skillful team which can work on the project from the conceptual design to the completion of the project. As a result of this the project was completed on time by utilizing the resources available carefully and the budget was also minimal. The project manger used to hold team meetings on a regular basis to ensure that the project was carried on successfully without any problems.
Project life cycle management and benefits of the project
Management to organization
Proper project management offers many benefits and serves everyone involved in these processes which are the project manager, client, stakeholders and the team working on the project. The proper use of project management helps the organization apart from the client, manager and the team, and the process of project management is beneficial for the organization. If an organization carries out a project without implementing project management process the project often ends up in a chaos. The main purpose of the project management is to provide organizations with a structure which is reliable, common and can be used every time (repeatable), and it is not specific for a particular business or corporate department. In fact, it should be used by all the departments of an organization (Thom, 2011). If no project management process is followed in the organization, then the organization tends to fail in its projects in many ways and this can have a negative impact on the organization’s image. A proper project management process ensures that everything is documented well regarding the project, risk plan assessment is done, project goals are stated, project requirements are stated, communication plan is implemented along with the project plan and stakeholder analysis is done. A proper project management process ensures benefits for the organization. When the project management is done right, it offers benefits to everyone associated with it, but most importantly it benefits the organization more than anyone. Here are some benefits which an organization could gain from a proper project management process such as, efficiency of the services delivered by the organization improves, enhanced customer satisfaction when the project is completed on time and under budget, development and growth of the organization, opportunities to expand the business increases for the organization, brings better flexibility in an organization, increases the risk assessing capabilities of the organization and increases the quality of the organizational services (Picariello, 2014). The reputation of an organization depends upon their consistency and effectiveness in managing projects. The organization is said to be successful if it handles the projects more effectively by completing them on time, saving cost and effort, with proactive scope management, resolving problems in a timely way, improving the work environment and building high quality products.
The one shared goal of the project team and project manager is to carry out their work to meet all the required objectives of the project. There are several stages of project phases such as, initiation phase, planning phase, implementation phase and closing phase (Watt, 2012).
Initiation Phase
This is the beginning stage of the project, where all the goals, objectives and needs of the projects are identified for the business. A proper case study is conducted with all the possible solutions. When a recommended solution is approved the project is initiated and the project manager and the project workforce is formed which starts to work on project by doing project planning as the next step.
Project Planning
In this phase the approved solution to the project is further discussed in detail to achieve the required objectives of the project. In planning process certain responsibilities are allotted to the team members, the requirement of the resources is analyzed, the time scope of the project is scheduled, the cost and budget expenses are assessed and tasks associated with the project are divided into departmental forms. The project planning phase determines the success or failure of the project on its completion. After this planning phase finishes the project implementation or execution phase begins.
Project implementation
In this phase of the project the plan of the project is put into action and work on the project begins. The key feature of this phase is the communication. Project manager plays a key role in this phase. He has the responsibilities of monitoring everything related to the project such as, to make sure that these tasks given out to the team members are carried out properly, information is distributed through team meetings, ongoing alterations and changes are made in the project and the clients and the stakeholders are informed about every step taken in the project. Hence the most key part of this phase in communication and information sharing, which ensures the successful completion of the project. After the execution phase of the project comes the closing phase of the project.
Closing Phase
In this phase the resultant output of the project is handed over to the client, the documentation regarding the project is handed over to the organization, resources used are disclosed and the contracts of the suppliers are terminated.
For our project regarding the generation of electricity from water turbines the project management process was done using the project life cycle. The project objectives were defined, output deliverables from the project were also shared with the stakeholders, time span of the project completion was stated and the positivity’s of the project were also stated. Proper planning on the project then took place such as, what resources are to be used, what will be the total expense of the project and the teams were divided in departments with each department given its own responsibilities. In the execution part of the project the project manager played a key and important role. He held regular meetings with the clients and the team members to make sure that the project was carried out successfully.
Concepts of planning and importance
Of research in project planning
The project initiation phase is important and it lays the foundation of the success of the project. Project planning is the most critical and important phase as it determines the success of failure of an ongoing project. Factors which could lead to a project failure are lacking in the communication process, not engaging with the stakeholders, and lacking in responsibilities and rolls. So for the success of any project all these factors are considered before executing the project. Project planning is important in ways as it improves the relationship between the stakeholders and the organization, emphasizes on communication to avoid any misunderstandings, it also emphasizes on the resources to be used and the budget and time span for its completion (Griffith, 2010). Critical thinking and research in the project planning lays down the foundation for a successful project plan to be implemented. In project planning special emphasis is laid on the research path. In the research part of the project planning the team does a thorough research about deliverables and the impact of the project. Research is carried out to see what resources can be used to carry on the project, and that the use of resources should not harm the environment or safety of the public. Research on the project planning part is carried out by a skillful workforce, which widens its research perspective to analyze the need of a certain project. Research in project planning helps assess risks and mapping benefits. Research is carried out to ensure that the outcome of the project is not harmful to the environment or the safety of the people.
During our work on the generation of energy from the water turbines a thorough research was done by a team of skillful engineers to ensure that the resources used in the project are properly utilized. Usage of resources in any energy related project is the most complex part. The organizations have to make sure that they use resources accordingly without wasting them. Also in our project planning process many rules were developed to make use of resources and budget more environmentally sustainable.
Importance of leadership in project organization
Leadership in an organization plays an important role in the project to be successful. For a project to be successful manager has to make sure that the team works effectively and efficiently and possess the right skills. For a project to be successful the leadership mainly focuses on vision, innovation, risk, opportunity, motivation, challenges, development and democratic. During the project execution the leadership and management is usually dependent on the life cycle of the project and the type of project. For large scale projects in which outputs are constrained by the time frame, expenses and market analysis their success can only be achieved through smart and effective leadership (Radhika, 2012). An innovative, flexible and sharing leadership brings the success to any project. Also the leadership is also responsible for the team building and motivation of the workforce so that all the members in a team can work together and play their part in the success of the project. During the planning of the project the leadership is also responsible to lead the team and the stakeholders and defines the needs of the project, also the leader plays an essential role in change management. A good leader anticipates the change and addresses it accordingly. A good leader leads by example and encourages the team members to cope with the change and utilize it to their own advantage.
Project Team Building
When the project is in initiation process the project manager is responsible for making team of skillful workforce to achieve the desired goals and objectives of the project. A skillful and knowledgeable team leads to the success of the project. If a good, efficient, effective and skillful team is prepared to work on the project then the outcome deliverable objective would be achieved rather easily. A leader requires a certain competencies and skills to form up great organizations and teams (Liopis, 2012). For an organization to grow and enhance in future they should know how to build long lasting teams. For this to happen a leader needs to know the art of people and how to maneuver hundreds and thousands of people in an organization.
There are various methods of building a team usually STAR (Strength, Teamwork, Alignment and Results) model is used to build efficient and effective teams. A leader is responsible for picking up those employees who possess certain skills and knowledge to carry out a project. He should find out each individual’s strengths and how these strengths can contribute in achieving the objective of the project. Teamwork also plays a vital role as a team building technique. Time should be provided to the members of the team to get to know each other’s strengths. Expectations of results from a team are very high by the team leader. Teams with clear goals set achieve their objectives more efficiently.
Work Breakdown Structure
One of the key project deliverables is a work breakdown structure which organizes and breaks the work into more convenient sections. It is a decomposition of the work for the project team so that they can have a view of how to proceed with each and every step of the project for it to be a success. The project team is responsible for identifying the work and then breaking it down into sections which are further broken down into sub deliverables. Every section defines how the work on that particular section is going to be carried out, the sub deliverables in the sections are the steps which are to be followed in a proper order to complete each section, by doing this the project is going to complete on time and most importantly it is going to be carried out in a coordinated way. The use of work break down structure is important for the project in many ways. It organizes the project work, identifies costs and budgets performance, allocates the time scope for each section, shows the progress of the project sections, if changes are to be made it helps in deciding that which section or sub deliverable needs to be changed for the improvement in the project and most importantly identifies issues or problem in project organization.
Importance of Project Management Software
The project management software helps the project team from the initiation to the completion of the project and also allows the workforce to give their inputs at different levels of the project that is being carried out. The main objective of the project management software is to handle all the complexities of the large scale projects and make it simpler and easier to use for the team. The use of project management software depends upon many ongoing factors of the project. The main use of the software is to solve the complexities of the project, deal with any change or wrong thing in the project, multitask on various projects at the same time, cost and budget evaluation, dealing with uncertainties, scheduling meetings and evaluating and detailing resources. There are various project management software’s available. For applying for a corporate jobs these days the use of these software’s is important to get a healthy job in an organization. Companies usually buy these software’s and train their employees on how to utilize these software’s.
Conclusion
The importance of project management in any large scale or small scale organization should be promoted more in order to achieve the desired results from a project accordingly. The objective of this assignment was to highlight on the importance of project management for an organization. The paper concludes that project management in any organization enhances and grooms the image of the organization. The leadership plays an important role in developing a team and providing them with a manager who can handle pressure and work cooperatively with everyone. Also the research concludes that for any project to be successful the it has to follow a certain steps in order to make sure that everything regarding the project goes smoothly without any issue. Team building and breaking down the work of projects into groups also plays a important role to achieve the deliverables of the project. Various project management softwares can be used to train the employees on how to be a part of an effective project team.
References
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