Project management undergoes various phases that span across initiating, planning, implementing, controlling and winding up the work of a team to attain specific goals and meet precise success criteria. Project management is a developing field used progressively by enterprises of all sizes. As company executives and entrepreneurs’ are faced with the daily responsibilities of handling an organization’s operations, it is vital to use dedicated project managers to superintend projects from conception to completion. Effective project management techniques assists organizations perform large-scale projects within the stipulated time frame, with minimal interference, and on the agreed budget.
Project management based organizations provide the human focus because they try to focus on the goals and outcomes instead of working to meet deadlines. This on the other hand is a more logic and inspiring structure for competent people. Moreover, since project management depends so much on a good communication structure, the discipline emphasizes the importance of focusing on the certainty of working with people’s successes and mistakes, bad and good days, and the conflicts involved.
Project management seamlessly combines the two essentials of an organization. First and foremost, is to be flexible to changing situations and second is to be organized, structured, and predictable. Noble project managers spend a great deal of time ensuring that each person understands what their responsibilities are and at what time their requirements are due. Project management based organizations are capable of adapting much more easily than other business entities because the entire teams can shift jointly to accommodate changes.
One of the essential notions of project management is harmonizing the three requirements of time, cost, and quality. However, these three factors are always in conflict and it is difficult to achieve them at once. A project could be delayed due to unavoidable circumstances or the quality anticipated may need more money than was originally budgeted for. A good project manager should ensure that he balances the three factors and generate the most efficient outcome possible.
Project management has a life cycle that entails four faces: the planning phase, the closure phase, execution phase, and initiation phase. Each project life cycle is explained below along with the responsibilities needed for its completion. Engaged jointly, these phases characterize the channel a project sequences from inception to completion thus explaining the life cycle of a project.
In the initiation phase, a project’s need or objective is identified. It could be a business opportunity or problem. A suitable response is acknowledged with suggested viable solutions. Viability study is often piloted to examine whether the options dealt with the objectives of the project and recommended conclusive solutions are determined. After the suggested solution is established, a project commences and a project manager is appointed.
The planning phase refers to where a project solution is ultimately developed in fine detail and the project’s objective planned. Here, the team categorizes the work at hand. Resources and tasks are pinpointed in conjunction with a strategy to facilitate their production. A project design is thus generated outlining the timeframes, dependencies, activities, and tasks. The project manager then harmonizes the formulation of the project by making available equipment and cost estimates on materials and labor. The budget then oversees and controls cost outflows during project implementation.
The third phase is implementation where project plan activity begins and the project’s work performed. During implementation, communication and maintaining control is vital. Progress is unceasingly monitored and adjustments created to be recorded as modifications of the initial plan. In this phase, employees are executing tasks with continuous information improvement being recounted through consistent team meetings. This information is then used by the manager in maintaining control by comparing the project plan with progress reports in gauging performance of project activities, thereby making corrections. The first strategy should be bringing the project back on track and if challenging, disparities should be recorded from the initial course of action, documentation, and alterations to the plan documented. In this phase, key stakeholders and sponsors ought to be updated on the status of the project in decided format and frequency of communication. Moreover, the plan should be revised and published occasionally.
The closing phase is the final stage and entails making available the ultimate deliverables to a customer, passing on project documentation to the enterprise, releasing project reserves and communicating termination of the project to stakeholders and terminating supplier contracts. The final step is to perform acquired lessons studies and scrutinize what went well and what did not.
Project organization describes the human infrastructure of a project. This task is intended to outline the project organization chart, the relationship of the project team and their roles. The organizational structure evidently identifies responsibilities and roles of each position, enhancing the present role definitions where they are required to cover all responsibilities outlined. The project organization technique used in this stage offers a standard set of responsibilities and roles which could be modified for a particular project. In a competitive business setting, effective leadership is a vital requirement for achieving organizational goals. For this to happen, clear direction, motivation, and inspiration must be provided by leaders and give a clear direction to their team. Sponsorship on the hand needs the same strength of focus and importance of status.
Team building is basically a project affiliated process that develops and builds shared goals, accountability, and commitment among team members. Every project manager has to encounter challenges when operating with a team. To eliminate the many challenges and setbacks that affect team productivity, the project manager should consider the following five techniques for organizing and unifying the teams .
One should set up a project organization with clearly defined roles where every team player should know the role they play on the team, how the role fits and what happens if they don’t comply. Depending on the functional discipline, you may employ customary or standard roles on your project. If a particular project requires a unique role then ensure you create it and if vice versa eliminate it.
Eliminate public fights and finger pointing in discussions as they lead the team a step backwards from project completion. For this to take place there must be a few rules in place in order to maintain civility. For example problems should be allowed to become personal and in decision making everyone must back it up as a team.
Holding team members liable for delivery since everyone must understand that the team is not only accountable to the project manager but also to each other. Thus, it is vital for each team member to understand what everyone else is undertaking to ensure that the team member understands where he/she fits into those standpoints of the project. Missing or meeting deliverables and deadlines should be taken as a team issue and should be revealed to the whole team. Each team member should feel accountable for their needs and work to feel the discomfort of failure other than the joy of success.
Celebrate as a team such as the key milestones to keep up morale and momentum going. Overseeing a project from inception to completion is a really hard work and team members could be discouraged in times of setbacks and roadblocks thus celebration should be considered but in moderation.
Work breakdown structure visually describes hierarchical decomposition of work a project team can basically comprehend. Creating a work break down structure entails team effort which is a result of the perspectives and inputs for a project . One helpful technique is to start up a brain storming session with several departments which are involved in the project. The Project teams may utilize low technology equipment such as note cards or white boards in identifying the major deliverables, specific work packages, and sub deliverables. However, it does not translate in to electronic format and it is not applicable with distributed teams. There are quite a number of tools that support work break down structures and brainstorming. MatchWare- MindView is an undemanding package which supports the work break down structures . The major importance of the package is the simplicity of translating the work breakdown structures. The project manager can assign duration estimates and budget by brainstorming the scope of the project in a mapping tool. These tools in turn could be exported to Microsoft excel for additional analysis and planning.
References:
Westland, J. (2007). The project management lifecycle: A complete step-by-step methodology for initiating, planning, executing and closing a project successfully. London [etc.: Kogan Page.
Project Management Institute. (2004). A guide to the project management body of knowledge (PMBOK guide). Newtown Square, Pa: Project Management Institute.
Frontiera, J., & Leidl, D. (2012). Team turnarounds: A playbook for transforming underperforming teams. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, a Wiley imprint.
Norman, E. S., Brotherton, S. A., & Fried, R. T. (2008). Work breakdown structures: The foundation for project management excellence. Hoboken, N.J: John Wiley & Sons.
