Introduction to Project Management

By Tutunaru Daniel

Project management
Project management is the discipline of planning, organizing and managing resources to bring about the successful completion of specific project goals and objectives. A project is a finite endeavor (having specific start and completion dates) that requires the organization and coordination of a group of two or more people, to create a unique product or service which brings about beneficial change or added value. Processes or operations, which are permanent or semi-permanent functional work to repetitively produce the same product or service.

Basic challenges
To achieve goals while honoring project constraints. Typical constraints are scope, time and budget. Project Scope Management includes the processes required to ensure that the project includes all the work required, and only the work required, to complete the project successfully. It is primarily concerned with defining and controlling what is or is not included in the project

 Time Budget

Project Management developed from: Construction Engineering Defense Henry Gnatt and Henry Fayol are responsible for developing the entire discipline of PM. major tools Gnatt Chart, Work breakdown Structure, PERT, CPM etc.

PERT
The Program (or Project) Evaluation and Review Technique, commonly abbreviated PERT, is a model for project management designed to analyze and represent the tasks involved in completing a given project. PERT is intended for very large-scale, one-time, complex, non-routine projects.

CPM
The Critical Path Method, abbreviated CPM, or Critical Path Analysis, is a mathematically based algorithm for scheduling a set of project activities. It is an important tool for effective PM. Essential technique 1. A list of all activities required to complete the project (also known as Work breakdown structure) 2. The time (duration) that each activity will take to completion, and 3. The dependencies between the activities.

Gantt chart
A Gantt chart is a type of bar chart that illustrates a project schedule. Gantt charts illustrate the start and finish dates of the terminal elements and summary elements of a project. Terminal elements and summary elements comprise the work breakdown structure of the project. Some Gantt charts also show the dependency (i.e, precedence network) relationships between activities. Gantt charts can be used to show current schedule status using percent-complete shadings and a vertical "TODAY" line.

Work breakdown structure

The Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) is a tree structure, which shows a subdivision of effort required to achieve an objective; for example a program, project and contract. The WBS may show hardware, product, service or process oriented. In a project or contract, the WBS is developed by starting with : 1. the end objective 2. successively subdividing it into manageable components in terms of size, duration, and responsibility (e.g., systems, subsystems, components, tasks, subtasks, and work packages) which include all steps necessary to achieve the objective.

Example of Work breakdown structure applied in a NASA reporting structure

Approaches to PM
The traditional approach Critical Chain Project Management. Extreme Project Management. Event Chain Methodology. PRINCE2 Process Based Management. Rational Unified Process.

The traditional approach

Identifies a sequence of steps to be completed. distinguish 5 components of a project (4 stages plus control) in the development of a project: Typical development phases of a project Project initiation stage; Project planning or design stage; Project execution or production stage; Project monitoring and controlling systems; Project completion stage.

Critical Chain Project Management

Also known as CCPM method of planning and managing projects that puts more emphasis on the resources required to execute project tasks. an application of the Theory of Constraints (TOC) to projects. Goal is to increase the rate of throughput (or completion rates) of projects in an organization. Applying the first three of the five focusing steps of TOC, the system constraint for all projects is identified as resources Tasks on the critical chain are given priority over all other activities.

 projects are planned and managed to ensure that the critical chain tasks are ready to start as soon as the needed resources are available, subordinating all other resources to the critical chain. For specific projects, the project plan should undergo Resource Leveling. the longest sequence of resource-constrained tasks is identified as the critical chain. In multi-project environments, resource leveling should be performed across projects.

Theory of Constraints
Theory of Constraints (TOC) is an overall management philosophy. Dr. Eliyahu M. Goldratt introduced the Theory of constraints in his 1984 book titled The Goal. It purports to be based on the application of the scientific method and logic reasoning to guide organizations. The publicity and leadership behind these ideas has been dominated by Dr. Goldratt through a series of books, seminars and workshops. Although TOC is often presented as a scientific theory, it has not gained wide traction in the academic community and is largely propagated through profit-seeking enterprises

The five focusing steps

One of the most important processes of the Theory of Constraints is based on the premise that the rate of goal achievement is limited by at least one constraining process. Only by increasing throughput (flow) at the bottleneck process can overall throughput be increased. The key steps in implementing an effective process of ongoing improvement according to TOC are:
0. (Step Zero) Articulate the goal of the organization. Frequently, this is something like, "Make money now and in the future." 1. Identify the constraint (the thing that prevents the organization from obtaining more of the goal) 2. Decide how to exploit the constraint (make sure the constraint is doing things that the constraint uniquely does, and not doing things that it should not do)

 3. Subordinate all other processes to above decision (align all other processes to the decision made above) 4. Elevate the constraint (if required, permanently increase capacity of the constraint; "buy more") 5. If, as a result of these steps, the constraint has moved, return to Step 1. Don't let inertia become the constraint.

The TOC thinking processes

A set of tools to help managers walk through the steps of initiating and implementing a project. When used in a logical flow, the Thinking Processes help walk through a buy-in process: Gain agreement on the problem Gain agreement on the direction for a solution Gain agreement that the solution solves the problem Agree to overcome any potential negative ramifications Agree to overcome any obstacles to implementation Referred to as working through layers of resistance to a change.

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Extreme Project Management.

Fundamentally PERT-based models are not well suited for the multi-project company environment of today. Most of them are aimed at very large-scale, onetime, non-routine projects. Nowadays all kinds of management are expressed in terms of projects. Project management experts try to identify different "lightweight" models, such as Agile Project Management methods including Extreme Programming for software development and Scrum techniques.

Event Chain Methodology

is the next advance beyond critical path method and critical chain project management. An uncertainty modeling and schedule network analysis technique. Focused on identifying and managing events and event chains that affect project schedules.

Major Principles
Probabilistic moment of risk: An activity (task) in most real life processes is not a continuous uniform process. Tasks are affected by external events, which can occur at some point in the middle of the task. Event chains: Events can cause other events, which will create event chains. These event chains can significantly affect the course of the project. Quantitative analysis is used to determine a cumulative effect of these event chains on the project schedule. Critical events or event chains: The single events or the event chains that have the most potential to affect the projects are the critical events or critical chains of events. They can be determined by the analysis.

 Project tracking with events: If a project is partially completed and data about the project duration, cost, and events occurred is available, it is possible to refine information about future potential events and helps to forecast future project performance. Event chain visualization: Events and event chains can be visualized using event chain diagrams on a Gantt chart.

PRINCE2
Structured approach to project management. Released in 1996 as a generic project management method. For managing projects within a clearly defined framework P project managementRINCE2 Describes procedures to coordinate people and activities in a project, How to design and supervise the project and what to do if the project has to be adjusted if it doesnt develop as planned

Process-based management
Advances the concept of project control. use of Maturity models such as the CMMI (Capability Maturity Model Integration) and ISO/IEC15504 (SPICE - Software Process Improvement and Capability Determination). Project is seen as a series of relatively small tasks conceived and executed as the situation demands in an adaptive manner, rather than as a completely pre-planned process.

PRINCE2 model

Rational Unified Process

An iterative software development process framework created by the Rational Software Corporation, a division of IBM since 2003. An adaptable process framework, intended to be tailored by the development organizations and software project teams that will select the elements of the process that are appropriate for their needs.

Phases of RUP
1. Inception - Identify the initial scope of the project, a potential architecture for the system, and obtain initial project funding and stakeholder acceptance. 2. Elaboration - Prove the architecture of the system. 3. Construction - Build working software on a regular, incremental basis which meets the highest-priority needs of project stakeholders. Transition - Validate and deploy the system into the production environment

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