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Technology: Project Management Fundamentals
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Microsoft CPE: Organizations perform work. Work generally could be classified into either operations or projects, although in some cases both of them may overlap. Both operations and projects share many characteristics in common like: People perform both the activities. Both are constrained by limited resources. Both are planned, executed, and controlled. However operations and projects differ primarily in its repeatability. Operations are ongoing and repetitive whereas projects are temporary and unique. A project is thus defined in terms of its distinctive characteristics—a project is a temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product or service. Temporary means that every project has a definite beginning and a definite end. Unique means that the product or service is different in some distinguishing way from all other products or services. For many organizations, projects are a means to respond to requests that cannot be addressed within the organization’s normal operational limits. Projects are undertaken at all levels of the organization. They may involve a single person or many thousands. Their duration ranges from a few weeks to a few years. Projects may involve a single unit of one organization or may cross-organizational boundaries. As projects are often implemented as a means of achieving an organization’s strategic plan they are critical for the organizations growth. Examples of projects could include: Developing a new product or service. Effecting a change in structure, staffing, or style of an organization. Developing a new or modified information system. Implementing a new business procedure or process.
There are a number of software life-cycle models in use such as the waterfall model. Muench, et al. describe a spiral model for software development with four cycles and four quadrants, as illustrated in figure given below:‰ Proof-of-concept cycle—capture business requirements, define goals for proof of concept, produce conceptual system design and logic design, and construct the proof of concept, produce acceptance test plans, conduct risk analysis, and make recommendations. ‰ First-build cycle—derive system requirements, define goals for first build, produce logical system design, design and construct the first build, produce system test plans, evaluate the first build, and make recommendations. ‰ Second-build cycle—derive subsystem requirements, define goals for second build, produce physical design, construct the second build, produce subsystem test plans, evaluate the second build, and make recommendations. ‰ Final cycle—complete unit requirements and final design, construct final build, and perform unit, subsystem, system, and acceptance tests.
Project Integration Management describes the processes required to ensure that the various elements of the project are properly coordinated. It consists of project plan development, project plan execution, and integrated change control. Project Scope Management describes the processes required to ensure that the project includes all the work required, and only the work required, to complete the project successfully. It consists of initiation, scope planning, scope definition, scope verification, and scope change control. Project Time Management describes the processes required to ensure timely completion of the project. It consists of activity definition, activity sequencing, activity duration estimating, schedule development, and schedule control. Project Cost Management describes the processes required to ensure that the project is completed within the approved budget. It consists of resource planning, cost estimating, cost budgeting, and cost control. Project Quality Management describes the processes required to ensure that the project will satisfy the needs for which it was undertaken. It consists of quality planning, quality assurance, and quality control. Project Human Resource Management describes the processes required to make the most effective use of the people involved with the project. It consists of organizational planning, staff acquisition, and team development. Project Communications Management describes the processes required to ensure timely and appropriate generation, collection, dissemination, storage, and ultimate disposition of project information. It consists of communications planning, information distribution, performance reporting, and administrative closure. Project Risk Management describes the processes concerned with identifying, analyzing, and responding to project risk. It consists of risk management planning, risk identification, qualitative risk analysis, quantitative risk analysis, risk response planning, and risk monitoring and control. Project Procurement Management describes the processes required to acquire goods and services from outside the performing organization. It consists of procurement planning, solicitation planning, solicitation, source selection, contract administration, and contract closeout. Relationship To Other Management Disciplines General management encompasses planning, organizing, staffing, executing, and controlling the operations of an ongoing enterprise. General management also includes supporting disciplines such as law, strategic planning, logistics, and human resources management. The current discussion of project management (Figure given below) overlaps and in certain cases even modifies the general management principles in many areas such as organizational behavior, financial forecasting, and planning techniques, to name just a few.
Project management is the application of knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to project activities to meet project requirements. Project management is accomplished through the use of the following 5 processes: ‰ Initiation‰ Planning ‰ Execution‰ Controlling and‰ ClosureThe project team manages the various activities of the project, and the activities typically involve:‰ Competing demands for: scope, time, cost, risk, and quality. ‰ Managing expectations of stakeholders. ‰ Identifying requirements. It is important to note that many of the processes within project management are iterative in nature. This is partly due to the existence of and the necessity for progressive elaboration1 in a project throughout the project life cycle; i.e., the more you know about your project, the better you are able to manage it. The term “project management” is sometimes used to describe an organizational approach to the management of ongoing operations. This approach treats many aspects of ongoing operations as projects to apply project management techniques to them. A detailed discussion of the approach itself is outside the scope of this document. Project Management Knowledge Areas The Project Management Knowledge Areas describes project management knowledge and practice in terms of the various component processes. These processes have been organized into nine knowledge areas
Project Phases Each project phase is marked by completion of one or more deliverables. A deliverable is a tangible, verifiable work product such as a feasibility study, a detail design, or a working prototype. The deliverables, and hence the phases, are part of a generally sequential logic designed to ensure proper definition of the product of the project. The conclusion of a project phase is generally marked by a review of both key deliverables and project performance to date, to a) determine if the project should continue into its next phase and b) detect and correct errors cost effectively. These phase-end reviews are often called phase exits, stage gates, or kill points. Each project phase normally includes a set of defined deliverables designed to establish the desired level of management control. The majority of these items are related to the primary phase deliverable, and the phases typically take their names from these items: requirements, design, build, test, startup, turnover, and others, as appropriate. Project Life Cycle The project life cycle serves to define the beginning and the end of a project. For example, when an organization identifies an opportunity to which it would like to respond, it will often authorize a needs assessment and/or a feasibility study to decide if it should undertake the project. The project life-cycle definition will determine whether the feasibility study is treated as the first project phase or as a separate, standalone project. The project life-cycle definition will also determine which transitional actions at the beginning and the end of the project are included and which are not. In this manner, the project life-cycle definition can be used to link the project to the ongoing operations of the performing organization.
Certain types of endeavors are closely related to projects. There is often a hierarchy of strategic plan, program, project, and subproject, in which a program consisting of several associated projects will contribute to the achievement of the overall strategic plan. These related undertakings are described below. Programs: A program is a group of projects managed in a coordinated way to obtain benefits not available from managing them individually. Many programs also include elements of ongoing operations. For example: ‰ The “XYZ airplane program” includes either the project or projects to design and develop the aircraft, as well as the ongoing manufacturing and support of that craft in the field. ‰ Many electronics firms have program managers who are responsible for both individual product releases (projects) and the coordination of multiple releases over time (an ongoing operation). Programs may also involve a series of repetitive or cyclical undertakings for example: ‰ Utilities often speak of an annual “construction program,” a regular, ongoing operation that involves many projects. ‰ Many nonprofit organizations have a “fundraising program,” an ongoing effort to obtain financial support that often involves a series of discrete projects, such as a membership drive or an auction. ‰ Publishing a newspaper or magazine is also a program—the periodical itself is an ongoing effort, but each individual issue is a project. In some application areas, program management and project management are treated as synonyms; in others, project management is a subset of program management. This diversity of meaning makes it imperative that any discussion of program management versus project management must be preceded by agreement on a clear and consistent definition of each term. Subprojects: Projects are frequently divided into more manageable components or subprojects. Subprojects are often contracted to an external enterprise or to another functional unit in the performing organization. Examples include: ‰ Subprojects based on the project process, such as a single phase. ‰ Subprojects, according to human resource skill requirements, such as the installation of plumbing or electrical fixtures on a construction project. ‰ Subprojects involving technology, such as automated testing of computer programs on a software development project. Subprojects are typically referred to as projects and managed as such. Project Portfolio Management: Project portfolio management refers to the selection and support of projects or program investments. The organization’s strategic plan and available resources guide these investments in projects and programs.