What is Project Management?

 

Project management

Project management as it is practiced today came into being in the post–World War II era. It was the product of a number of forces at work at the time. The development of operations research brought with it the realization that decision tools could be fashioned to allow humans to conduct their affairs in optimal ways. The growth of systems analysis led to an appreciation of the interconnectedness of events and the inherent complexity of modern systems. Its focus on flowcharts also presaged PERT/CPM scheduling techniques (Frame 2002). The Cold War led to the support of mammoth projects of unprecedented size and complexity, projects that needed new management tools if they were to be carried out effectively. The burgeoning global economy, with its emphasis on large infrastructure projects, led to a similar search for new management tools. Together these forces shaped project management for the next four decades. The principal instigators of developments in project management during that time were people in the construction and defense industries. They tended to work on large, complex, capital-intensive projects (Frame 2002).

 

 They held an engineering perspective and gave project management the look and feel of an engineering discipline. Project management knowledge focused on core skills in the areas of budgeting, scheduling, and resource allocation. To a large extent, project management became inextricably linked to its key tools, such as Gantt charts, scheduling networks, and resource-loading charts. Project managers traditionally measure success and failure in the context of the triple constraints. Failure occurs when a project encounters schedule slippages or cost overruns or produces deliverables that do not meet the specs. This traditional outlook is undergoing rapid adjustment. Increasingly, professionals involved with project management recognize that the worst kind of failure you can have is carrying out projects that do not satisfy the customers. Traditional project management emphasizes acquiring basic skills in scheduling, budgeting, and allocating human and material resources. These are the primary tools of project managers who are mere implementers. They are essentially the tools of technicians (Frame 2002). Project management involves not only proper planning but taking reasonable risks.  Project managers must have the knowledge on the different risk they have to take while doing the project. Project managers need to know the consequences of the risk they take and they must have back up plans to ensure that the effects of the risk will not cause more problems for the company.

 

Reasons that contribute to project success

The first of factors for success is a group of External ones like government, community, general economic conditions, ecology, and so on. The second set of factors affecting the viability of project definition is that the project offers a sense of cost-benefit relationship and that the terms of the Financing of the project make sense (Earl 1998). The last factor affecting the project definition is the project’s Timing. Curiously, this aspect is often totally ignored in the project management literature which tends instead to dwell on scheduling methodologies(Earl 1998).The project itself must then be implemented using a range of concepts, tools, and techniques which have traditionally been thought of as the province of project management. These include matters of organizational structure responsibility and contract strategy, terms and conditions; issues of personal leadership and management style, resourcing, systems, and procedural conflict management and industrial relations, team-working, and matters of control and communication (Earl 1998).  Project success can be due to external factors like assistance from the government, community, and others.  It can be due to proper financing, having a sense of balance or use of appropriate timing. Project success can also be due to proper planning and wise use of strategies. Without the use of good information systems and the guidance of a good manager the factors in project success will not be enough. 

 

Difference Between project teams and Virtuoso teams

Project teams allocate functional segments to various functional units. Each functional unit has the responsibility to manage their own segment. They have to make sure that coordination is maintained. Moreover project teams have to follow their project manager; this manager has the most input or the most to gain.  Project teams have different culture and each culture contributes to the outcome of the project. The culture of project teams gives them a separate identity from other teams. It helps in clarifying why such member of the group acts in a different way. Project teams are given specific task that depends on their specific capabilities. One member of the project team is assigned as their leader. He/she makes sure that all the members contribute for the success of the project. Virtuoso teams comprise a group of people that has expertise in a specific field. They are formed to work on an ambitious project. Virtuoso teams are known for their work style which has furious rhythm.  Their structure is more on making sure that the whole group does the project together.  There is no distinct separation of work; the members of the group have excelled in almost all possible categories related to the project.   The culture of the virtuoso teams is focused on gaining excellence.  Virtuoso teams would like to achieve their goal no matter hard it is with appropriate excellence. Virtuoso teams are not easily manageable that is why most companies would rather use project teams than virtuoso teams.

 

Don’t hesitate to assemble the very best and let their egos soar

If company wants to stamp out mediocrity, it should remember the lessons from Sid Caesar’s writers’ group, the West Side Story team, and Norsk Hydro’s A-team: Don’t hesitate to assemble the very best and let their egos soar. If a firm wants excellence in its project and if it wants to make sure that it will have advantage in its chosen field, it should not hesitate to use the virtuoso teams even if such team has a very high ego. The ego of the members should not matter, companies should let the talented but egoistic people to work together to bring the firm to its own goals.  The clashing of personalities by the egotistical members of the group will not last for a long time but their contribution as a group will create a mark to the company for many years to come.

References

Earl, MJ 1998, Information management: the organizational

dimension, Oxford University Press, Oxford.

 

Frame, JD 2003, Managing risk in organizations: a guide for

managers, Jossey-Bass, San Francisco.

 

Frame, JD 2002, The new project management: Tools for an

age of rapid change, complexity, and other business

realities, Jossey-Bass, San Francisco.

 

Reiss, G 1995, Project management demystified: Today’s

tools and techniques, E & FN Spon, London.

 

 

 

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