project management

project management

The Importance of Effective Project Management in Today’s Business World

1. Introduction to Project Management

The heralded performance of project management in the construction of Polaris submarines and the Apollo rocket and in the NSFNET project seemed to be more anecdotal than the demonstration of successful application of a body of knowledge, justifying the existence of theoretical work, however limited its contribution. Major events relevant to policing opened our eyes. The PMI meeting in Mexico and the awarding to Scots project management of the Queen of England’s Award for Innovation, Interest and Creativity in 1996 were such eye-openers. The standard methods, motivated by a drive towards delivering projects on time and within budget and quality, were taught at the Civil Service College, and the government departments became recognized centers of expertise for policing consultancy. Yet, an observation of actual practices revealed that there was remarkably little respect for the basic guidelines, methodologies, and management ideals.

What is the public to believe about project management today? It is a widely recognized discipline, and its practitioners have made much productive and essential effort in ensuring sound development of societies. The advent of computers and operations research in the 1960s had many of us thinking that project management was endowed with a sound theory that could guide practices and research. For academics, the basics were laid and the rest seemed to be the mandate, certainly an exciting research program to some. But life soon appeared to be less simple. What could be predicted and controlled by theory was in reality very limited and this led some to deny the relevance of project management and to forecast its obsolescence or to deny any theoretical relevance and claim that the field was essentially composed of commonsense, simply abused by knowledgeable people.

Introduction

2. Key Principles and Processes in Project Management

Within a formalized project management environment, requests for changes to the project’s scope, time, cost, and quality constraints will be referred to as “change control” requests. Before project execution begins, the need for controls such as change management, configuration management, and risk management will be identified and defined in a partnership agreement between the performing organization and, perhaps, the external entities involved in the project. Subsequently, the performance measurement process will be used to track, review, and approve or reject all formal change control requests associated with the performance norms. A formal change control system will require the project manager to ensure that all parties and agencies involved with the project delivery approve any variations.

Change control

Governance is about getting frameworks in place to ensure that a project is run effectively. It is not about getting involved with the detail of how it is actually managed. It is about implementing structures, processes, and procedures to guide the overall management of this often multi-disciplinary and complex process. Planning, scheduling, performance tracking, project reporting, and risk management tools and processes are necessary for successfully implementing governance. It is important to consider what might actually go wrong and what activities or processes should be in place to identify and mitigate the problems. Highly effective project management is about consistently delivering projects that meet or exceed stakeholder expectations in terms of the range of benefits they provide within cost and schedule constraints.

Governance

3. Challenges and Solutions in Project Management

In addressing enterprise needs, project management evolved rapidly over the past few years. Overall progress has been substantial, including the development of new technologies and methods. Enterprise needs demand constant forward motion. At the same time, like many high-technology development endeavors, project management only makes visible progress when it is built on solid foundations. These are the relationships with other key enterprise management processes, the challenges of managing the enterprise support functions, and the ongoing process of adapting project management to a rapidly worsening environment. These are the challenges of the current project management state of the practice.

Many issues can limit the success of project management in meeting enterprise goals. Perhaps the most important of these is communication. Misunderstandings can be the source of many project problems and can occur within teams, with clients, with management, and outside vendors. Working with new standards and goals, often in a matrix organization context, can provide substantial challenges. Balancing the needs of the current project with those of future projects can be especially difficult in a fast-changing enterprise that emphasizes current earnings. Developing comprehensive solutions for specific project problems requires a comprehensive understanding of a wide variety of disciplines, and such integration is the subtext of this book.

4. The Role of Technology in Enhancing Project Management

Introduction The growing usage of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in the development of Information Systems (IS), particularly over the last two decades, has been linked to the so-called “Information Revolution” as one of the most important phenomena of the 20th century. This revolution grew out of the unparalleled growth of the computer industry which, combined with the development of communication technologies, changed the way we live and work. The transformation has heavily influenced and relied on the extensive research carried out in IS. It has generated several theoretical frameworks, design methodologies and tools whose application has led to major organizational changes and new working practices, in the form of implementation of software packages and personalized applications. Most organizations have introduced information systems with a view to improving their operations, particularly in project management. The potential for improving the processes and results of project-based work is unquestionable.

The goal of this section is to identify and discuss applications of information and communication technologies in facilitating project management. This section provides a relevant background and context for the study, as the use of enabling technologies is proposed as one of the key factors for integrating and improving project management.