Project Management

What is a project?
According to Usbr (2012), project is a temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product or service or result. Endeavor undertaken is mean by temporary important the time is defined for starting and end point (Usbr , 2012). Based on this the success of the project is available.Unique product or service or result can be named as unique deliverable because there is no blueprint and  not innovating the same wheel again  (Usbr , 2012).

According to Managementhelp (2011), project can be defined as a time effort that produces a specific result. 

According to Pmi (2012), project is temporary and it has beginning and end time defined with the scope and resources.Therefore it is unique with a specific goal to be achieved at the end. 

What is a project management?

According to Usbr (2012), project management is an application of knowledge, skills, tools and techniques to project activities to meet project requirements. The team who are involve in the project have different abilities to tackle with in order to accomplish success in the project (Usbr , 2012).

According to Tennessee  (2012), project management also can be defined as series of steps which is iterating to complete a particular task with specifics of who will do what and when.

According to Managementhelp (2011), project management is a organized effort to complete a successful project.

Process groups of a project in project management

1. Initiation
2. Planing
3. Executing
4. Monitoring & controlling
5. Completing

(Pmi , 2012)

The relationship between each other can be shown as the following figure. 

Usbr (2012)

Breath range of project management begins with initiation and goes till completing the project. And monitoring and controlling occur during the time period same as execution. Planning, monitoring and control has a collective depth similar to execution to require effort and implication of building the product.

1. Project Initiation - An idea for a project will be carefully examined in this stage in order to determine whether project will be feasible to the organization and will it be beneficial to the organization (projectinsight, 2012). During this phase, decision making team will identify if the project can realistically be completed in the given schedule with the technology and resource allocation (projectinsight, 2012). In this stage a "Project Charter " which is a legal document between the company and client is developed.


2.Planning - The start of the project plan is writing in the planning stage by outlining the work to be performed (projectinsight, 2012). During this phase, team should prioritize the project, calculate a budget and schedule, and determine what resources are needed. According to Pmi (2012), there are 9 steps to be carried out in this stage. The content is

• Integration
• Time Management
• Quality Management
• HRM Management
• Procurement Management
• Cost Management
• Risk Management
• Communication Management
• Scope Management

After this stage is completed a "Project Plan" is developed.

3.  Executing - This is the time to update through the plan by performing coding, designing and testing task which are needed to execute the process (projectinsight, 2012).After this stage is completed a "Status Report" is developed.

4. Monitoring & Controlling - Project managers will compare project status and progress to the actual plan (projectinsight, 2012). Here the scope and the plan of the project is checked according to the scheduled work (projectinsight, 2012). This is carrying on parallel to all above mentioned stages.

5. Closing/ Completing - After project tasks are completed and the client has approve the outcome of the project whether is is fulfilling the predicted outcome or not (projectinsight, 2012). Also here the client is trained to use the  program and also paying employees also done in this stage. 

Skills needed for project management
There are two types of skills need to project management which are known as hard and soft. Hard skills include the technical experienced skills such as numerical problem solving, generally problem solving, risk management, scheduling etc (Gillard, 2009).The soft skills are related to interpersonal skills such as communication, writing, leadership skills etc (Gillard, 2009).

Why manage project?
In order  to ensure success of the project that has been assured in the scheduled time line by meeting dead line to optimize resource (Usbr ,2012).

Project manager manages the expectation of stakeholder. A stakeholder is a person who is interested in a project. There are 2 types of stakeholders such as Direct and Indirect. 

 The expectations can be listed as below.

Triple Constant

All projects are carried out under constraints such as traditionally cost, time and scope. These factors enable to ensure the quality of the project. According to  projectsmart (1950),  the project must balance the 3 features which are listed below. 

• projects must be delivered within cost.
• Projects must be delivered on time.
• Projects must meet agreed scope, no more - no less.
• Projects must also meet customer quality requirements.

In present the four aspects of this tangle have been reduced to three because non of the clients expectations are same for the other (projectsmart , 1950).

pmhut (2012)

Cost - Projects have a finite budget

Time - Projects have a deadline date for delivery

Scope - Many projects fail on this constraint because the full scope of the project is not fully defined or understood at the start.

(projectsmart , 1950)

Project scope and feasibility

The main aims and objectives/ deliverable of this project is define the scope of the project. Also analyzes why a organization need an Information system to business case such as increase sales, more awareness etc. The deliverable will be card payment method. Although the content of the project is done, the content will not be covered within the project.

Content of Project plan 

- Work Break-down Structure

- Deliverable per stage (gives feedback for milestones by reviewing the progress)

- Project estimation (time)

- Scheduling (sequence of activities)

- Tools and techniqures

In order to clearly design the gannt chart PERT technique (Project Evaluation Research Technique) can be used to estimate the duration. In order to calculate this the following formula can be used. 

d= (a+um+b)/6

Also the critical path is very important to project management person. 

Resource Allocation

- Project proposal form

- Project specification form

- Midpoint interview

References

Tennessee (2012) Project Management. [e-book] U.S.: University of Tennessee. https://utworks.tennessee.edu/research/pdt/Mentoring/project_management.pdf [Accessed: 10 December 2012].

Usbr (2012) An Introduction to Project Management . [e-book] U.S.: http://www.usbr.gov/excellence/Finals/FinalIntroPM.pdf [Accessed: 11 December 2012].

Managementhelp (2011) All About Project Management. [online] Available at: http://managementhelp.org/projectmanagement/index.htm [Accessed: 11 Dec 2012].

Pmi (2012) What is Project Management? | Project Management Institute. [online] Available at: http://www.pmi.org/About-Us/About-Us-What-is-Project-Management.aspx [Accessed: 11 Dec 2012].

Gillard, S. (2009) Soft Skills and Technical Expertise of Effective Project Managers . Issues in Informing Science and Information Technology , 6 Available at: http://iisit.org/Vol6/IISITv6p723-729Gillard599.pdf [Accessed: 10 December 2012].

Little, P. (2012) Project management and management of design: Teaching and tools. AI EDAM, 12 (1), p.49-50. Available at: http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=38575&fulltextType=RA&fileId=S0890060498121054 [Accessed: 12 December 2012].

Projectinsight (2012) 5 Basic Phases of Project Management. [online] Available at: http://www.projectinsight.net/project-management-basics/basic-project-management-phases.aspx [Accessed: 14 Dec 2012].

Projectsmart (1950) Understanding the Project Management Triple Constraint. [online] Available at: http://www.projectsmart.co.uk/understanding-the-project-management-triple-constraint.html [Accessed: 14 Dec 2012].

Pmhut (2012) The Triple Constraints Model and Its Disappearance . [online] Available at: http://www.pmhut.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/triple-constraints.png [Accessed: 14 Dec 2012].

http://www2.ds.psu.edu/AcademicAffairs/Classes/IST260W/topic0A/topic_0116_02.html
http://www.col.org/SiteCollectionDocuments/SuccessProjMgt.pdf