Trends in Project Management

Other than to focus on organizational process improvements, there are other trends in business and project management that a first-time project manager is likely to encounter. Some of these trends are:

Managing vendors—With the increased outsourcing of non-core activities, more projects leverage one or more vendors (suppliers) to get work done.

Facilitating a selection process—To determine which vendors you will partner with to get work done, a selection and evaluation process is normally conducted.

Change agent—Because most projects represent a “change” to business as usual, the project manager is expected to play a key role in leading the stakeholders through the change and acceptance process.

Servant leadership—Due to a lack of formal authority, the need to understand the requirements of all stakeholders and the importance of facilitation, collaboration, and managing expectations, there is a growing awareness that a servant leadership style is paramount for effective project management.

Managing virtual, cross-functional, and multicultural teams—With the continuous advancements in workgroup and communications tools, the increased integration of processes within an organization, and the continuous drive for increased organizational efficiencies, it is very likely that your project team will consist of members from different physical locations (virtual), different functional departments (cross-functional), or different cultures (multicultural, global).

Quality management—Much like the factors driving the emphasis on risk management, the link between rigorous quality management procedures and improved project management practices continues to strengthen.

Requirements management—Closely intertwined with managing quality, scope, and stakeholder expectations, the effective definition and the proper management of both a project’s and the product’s requirements are essential to success.

Facilitating a testing process—Because it is paramount to verifying stakeholder satisfaction with the focus of the project, the project manager is best positioned to facilitate the testing process.

Risk management—Coinciding with the focus on enterprise-wide process improvements and in response to past project experiences, more organizations are placing additional emphasis and formality on their project risk management processes.

Working with PMOs and corporate governance processes—If you are working in any type of corporate or multiple business unit environment, you most likely deal with Project Management Office (PMO) or other corporate governance processes.

Thus Project Management is not just meeting deadlines, in itself it's a very challenging role. The following diagram depicts an overview of Project Management-

By now we know:

• The elements of project management
• The common challenges of managing projects
• The value of effective project management to an organization.
• The merits of project management as a career choice
• The latest business and project management trends that might impact your first opportunity

After the overview of Project Management process we'll focus on the role of Project manager in the coming posts. Till we meet again keep exploring this unique field.

The project life cycle (PLC)

Project management is the discipline of planning, organizing and managing resources to bring about the successful completion of specific project goals and objectives. The project management discipline can be highlighted from various angles and sub-disciplines and contains important issues such as project objective and scope management, human resource management and setting the roles and responsibilities of all participants and stakeholders of a project, planning principles and resource allocation models, etc.

Typically, a project goes through a number of different phases, which is often referred to as the project life cycle, which can be described as follows:

The project life cycle has identifiable start and end points, which can be associated with a time scale. A project passes through several distinct phases as it matures. The life cycle includes all phases from point of inception to final termination of the project. The interfaces between phases are rarely clearly separated, except in cases where proposal acceptance of formal authorization to proceed separates the two phases.

Consequently, the PLC is defined by the time window between the initial start of the project and the final termination and consists of a number of phases, separated by major milestones. The number of phases and their corresponding titles differ from industry to industry and from project to project. Let's now focus on various project phases. 

Project Phases

A project consists of sequential phases. These phases are extremely useful in planning a project since they provide a framework for budgeting, manpower and resource allocation and for scheduling project milestones and project reviews. The method of dividing a project into phases may differ somewhat from industry to industry and from product to product and it can be summarized as follows:
• Concept (initiation, identification, selection). • Definition (feasibility, development, demonstration, design prototype). • Execution (implementation, production, design/construct/commission, install and test). • Closeout (termination and post completion evaluation).

Some argue that the number of phases and the titles are so generic that they are of little value in describing the project life cycle process. Although the construction and presentation of a generic project life cycle seems to be difficult, if not impossible, each PLC shares a number of common characteristics.
• The major milestones between the phases represent high-level decision points. • The phases may, and frequently will, overlap.
Between the various phases are decision points, at which an explicit decision is made concerning whether the next phase should be undertaken. A major review of the entire project occurs at the end of each phase, resulting in authorization to proceed with the next phase, cancellation of the project, or repetition of a previous phase.

Initially in PMBOK the project life cycle concept was not mentioned at all. In the later editions, PMI realized the importance of the “divide and conquer” principle as the complexity and the size of the project increase and included the PLC concept in the book.

More precisely, PMBOK describes the project life cycle as follows:
Because projects are unique undertakings, they involve a degree of uncertainty. Organizations performing projects will usually divide each into several project phases to improve management control and provide for links to the ongoing operations of the performing organization. Collectively, the project phases are known as the project life cycle.
Each project is marked by the completion of one or more deliverable, such as a feasibility study or a detail design. These deliverable, and hence the phases, are part of a generally sequential logic designed to ensure proper definition of the project.
The conclusion of each phase is generally marked by a review. These reviews, often called milestones, phase exits, stage gates or kill points, are necessary to:
• Determine if the project should continue to the next phase. • Detect and correct errors cost effectively.
Although PMBOK presents a sample generic life cycle as shown in figure below they argue that many project life cycles have similar phase names with similar deliverables required but few are identical.

The next figure shows a generic project life cycle which we'll use in our post. It consists of a project conception phase, a project definition phase, a phase in which the project has to be scheduled, the execution of the project, the project control phase and the termination of the project.

At the beginning, in the so-called conceptual phase, an organization identifies the need for a project or receives a request from a customer. In the definition phase, the organization defines the project objectives, the project specifications and requirements and the organization of the whole project. The project objectives need to be refined and translated into a list of activities, a set of technological precedence relations and the resource availability and requirements. In doing so, the organization decides in detail on how it is going to achieve these objectives.

The next phase, the scheduling phase, aims at the construction of a timetable for the project activities. The construction of a precedence and/or resource feasible schedule determines a start and finish time for each activity, and hence, relies on the information obtained by the previous phase.

During the execution and project control phases, the project has to be monitored and controlled to see whether it is performed according to the existing schedule. If deviations occur, corrective actions have to be taken. This control mechanism has been incorporated in the project life cycle by means of the feedback loop between the control phase and the scheduling phase of the above shown figure.

The termination phase involves the completion and a critical evaluation of the project. This information can then be used during the project life cycle of future, similar projects since the specifications of a project, the estimates of the duration, costs and resource requirements are often determined based on averages of past performance.

With this our post comes to an end. We shall meet again with a new topic, till then keep exploring the world of Project Management!.

How project, program, portfolio and operations management are related

A project may be managed in three separate scenarios: as a stand-alone project (outside of a portfolio or program), within a program, or within a portfolio. Project managers interact with portfolio and
program managers when a project is within a program or portfolio. For example, multiple projects may be needed to accomplish a set of goals and objectives for an organization. In those situations, projects may be grouped together into a program.

A program is defined as a group of related projects, subsidiary programs, and program activities managed in a coordinated manner to obtain benefits not available from managing them individually. Programs are not large projects.

A very large project may be referred to as a megaproject. As a guideline, megaprojects cost US$1billion or more, affect 1 million or more people, and run for years.

A portfolio is defined as projects, programs, subsidiary portfolios, and operations managed as a group to achieve strategic objectives. Some organizations may employ the use of a project portfolio to effectively manage multiple programs and projects that are underway at any given time. The figure below illustrates an example of how portfolios, programs, projects, and operations are related in a specific situation:

Program management and portfolio management differ from project management in their life cycles, activities,objectives, focus, and benefits. However, portfolios, programs, projects, and operations often engage with the same stakeholders and may need to use the same resources (see Figure above), which may result in a conflict in the organization.

This type of a situation increases the need for coordination within the organization through the use of portfolio, program, and project management to achieve a workable balance in the organization. The above figure illustrates a sample portfolio structure indicating relationships between the programs, projects, shared resources, and stakeholders.

The portfolio components are grouped together in order to facilitate the effective governance and management of the work that helps to achieve organizational strategies and priorities. Organizational and portfolio planning impact the components by means of prioritization based on risk, funding, and other considerations. The portfolio view allows organizations to see how the strategic goals are reflected in the portfolio. This portfolio view also enables the implementation and coordination of appropriate portfolio, program, and project governance.

This coordinated governance allows authorized allocation of human, financial, and physical resources based on expected performance and benefits. Thus from an organizational perspective :

• Program and project management focus on doing programs and projects the “right” way; and
• Portfolio management focuses on doing the “right” programs and projects.

This is end of today's post, in the next post we shall discuss about basics of Program management.

Project management and it's importance

Project management is the application of knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to project activities to meet the project requirements. Project management is accomplished through the appropriate application and integration of the project management processes identified for the project. Project management enables organizations to execute projects effectively and efficiently. Using project management processes, tools, and techniques puts in place a sound foundation for organizations to achieve their goals and objectives.

Effective project management helps individuals, groups, and public and private organizations to:

• Meet business objectives;
• Satisfy stakeholder expectations;
• Be more predictable;
• Increase chances of success;
• Deliver the right products at the right time;
• Resolve problems and issues;
• Respond to risks in a timely manner;
• Optimize the use of organizational resources;
• Identify, recover, or terminate failing projects;
• Manage constraints (e.g., scope, quality, schedule, costs, resources);
• Balance the influence of constraints on the project (e.g., increased scope may increase cost or schedule); and
• Manage change in a better manner.

Poorly managed projects or the absence of project management may result in:

• Missed deadlines,
• Cost overruns,
• Poor quality,
• Rework,
• Uncontrolled expansion of the project,
• Loss of reputation for the organization,
• Unsatisfied stakeholders, and
• Failure in achieving the objectives for which the project was undertaken.

Projects are a key way to create value and benefits in organizations. In today’s business environment, organizational leaders need to be able to manage with tighter budgets, shorter timelines, scarcity of resources, and rapidly changing technology. The business environment is dynamic with an accelerating rate of change. To remain competitive in the world economy, companies are embracing project management to consistently deliver business value.

Effective and efficient project management should be considered a strategic competency within organizations. It enables organizations to:

• Tie project results to business goals,
• Compete more effectively in their markets,
• Sustain the organization, and
• Respond to the impact of business environment changes on projects by appropriately adjusting project management plans.

This is end of today's post, in the next post we shall discuss about relationship of project, program, portfolio and operations management.

Commonly used terms as defined in PMBOK

Project

According to the PMBOK " A project is a temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product, service, or result." Projects are undertaken to fulfill objectives by producing deliverables. Projects are undertaken at all organizational levels. A project can involve a single individual or a group. A project
can involve a single organizational unit or multiple organizational units from multiple organizations. Examples of projects include but are not limited to:

• Developing a new pharmaceutical compound for market,
• Expanding a tour guide service,
• Merging two organizations,
• Improving a business process within an organization,
• Acquiring and installing a new computer hardware system for use in an organization,
• Exploring for oil in a region,
• Modifying a computer software program used in an organization,
• Conducting research to develop a new manufacturing process, and
• Constructing a building.

Objective

An objective is defined as an outcome toward which work is to be directed, a strategic position to be attained, a purpose to be achieved, a result to be obtained, a product to be produced, or a service to be performed.

Deliverable

A deliverable is defined as any unique and verifiable product, result, or capability to perform a service that is required to be produced to complete a process, phase, or project. Deliverables may be tangible or intangible. Fulfillment of project objectives may produce one or more of the following deliverables:

1. A unique product that can be either a component of another item, an enhancement or correction to an item, or a new end item in itself (e.g., the correction of a defect in an end item);

2. A unique service or a capability to perform a service (e.g., a business function that supports production or distribution);

3. A unique result, such as an outcome or document (e.g., a research project that develops knowledge that can be used to determine whether a trend exists or a new process will benefit society); and

4. A unique combination of one or more products, services, or results (e.g., a software application, its associated documentation, and help desk services).

Repetitive elements may be present in some project deliverables and activities. This repetition does not change the fundamental and unique characteristics of the project work. For example, office buildings can be constructed with the same or similar materials and by the same or different teams. However, each building project remains unique in key characteristics (e.g., location, design, environment, situation, people involved).

Temporary endeavor

The temporary nature of projects indicates that a project has a definite beginning and end. Temporary does not necessarily mean a project has a short duration. The end of the project is reached when one or more of the following is true:

• The project’s objectives have been achieved;
• The objectives will not or cannot be met;
• Funding is exhausted or no longer available for allocation to the project;
• The need for the project no longer exists (e.g., the customer no longer wants the project completed, a change in strategy or priority ends the project, the organizational management provides direction to end the project);
• The human or physical resources are no longer available; or
• The project is terminated for legal cause or convenience.

Projects are temporary, but their deliverables may exist beyond the end of the project. Projects may produce deliverables of a social, economic, material, or environmental nature. For example, a project to build a national monument will create a deliverable expected to last for centuries.

Projects drive change in organizations

From a business perspective, a project is aimed at moving an organization from one state to another state in order to achieve a specific objective (see Figure below).

Before the project begins, the organization is commonly referred to as being in the current state. The desired result of the change driven by the project is described as the future state.

For some projects, this may involve creating a transition state where multiple steps are made along a continuum to achieve the future state. The successful completion of a project results in the organization moving to the future state and achieving the specific objective.

Projects enable business value creation

Business value in projects refers to the benefit that the results of a specific project provide to its stakeholders. The benefit from projects may be tangible, intangible, or both. PMI defines business value as the net quantifiable benefit derived from a business endeavor. The benefit may be tangible, intangible, or both.

In business analysis, business value is considered the return, in the form of elements such as time, money, goods, or intangibles in return for something exchanged.

Examples of tangible elements include:

• Monetary assets,
• Stockholder equity,
• Utility,
• Fixtures,
• Tools, and
• Market share.

Examples of intangible elements include:

• Goodwill,
• Brand recognition,
• Public benefit,
• Trademarks,
• Strategic alignment, and
• Reputation.

Project Initiation

Organizational leaders initiate projects in response to factors acting upon their organizations. There are four fundamental categories for these factors, which illustrate the context of a project:

• Meet regulatory, legal, or social requirements;
• Satisfy stakeholder requests or needs;
• Implement or change business or technological strategies; and
• Create, improve, or fix products, processes, or services.

These factors influence an organization’s ongoing operations and business strategies. Leaders respond to these factors in order to keep the organization viable. Projects provide the means for organizations to successfully make the changes necessary to deal with these factors. These factors ultimately should link to the strategic objectives of the organization and the business value of each project.

Some Factors that Lead to the Creation of a Project

1. New technology - An electronics firm authorizes a new project to develop a faster, cheaper, and
smaller laptop based on advances in computer memory and electronics technology

2. Competitive forces- Lower pricing on products by a competitor results in the need to lower
production costs to remain competitive

3.Material issues - A municipal bridge developed cracks in some support members resulting in a
project to fix the problems

4. Political changes - A newly elected official instigating project funding changes to a current project

5. Market demand - A car company authorizes a project to build more fuel-efficient cars in response
to gasoline shortages

6. Economic changes - An economic downturn results in a change in the priorities for a current project

7. Customer request - An electric utility authorizes a project to build a substation to serve a new
industrial park

8. Stakeholder demands - A stakeholder requires that a new output be produced by the organization

9. Legal requirement - A chemical manufacturer authorizes a project to establish guidelines for the
proper handling of a new toxic material

10. Business process improvements - An organization implements a project resulting from a Lean Six Sigma value stream mapping exercise

11. Strategic opportunity or business need - A training company authorizes a project to create a new course to increase its revenues

12. Social need - A nongovernmental organization in a developing country authorizes a project to
provide potable water systems, latrines, and sanitation education to communities suffering from high rates of infectious diseases

13. Environmental considerations - A public company authorizes a project to create a new service for electric car sharing to reduce pollution

This is end of today's post, in the next post we shall discuss about Project management and it's importance