Discuss About The Tools Techniques Practicing Project Manager.
Project management is a field that involves management of an entire group of activities that lead to one particular outcome. In order to manage an entire project in a systematic way, project management tools are utilized and suitable project plans are developed.
Centralization is defined as the process by which an entire project is integrated to be controlled by one common authority. While a centralized project may have numerous stakeholders, they need to report to one common authority like the project manager throughout the progress of the project.
There are a number of benefits of centralization that help the progress of a project. Firstly, due to centralization, the duties of stakeholders are clearly defined by the central management (Kerzner and Kerzner 2017). Secondly, there is no chance of conflict during decision making process. Finally, there are no conflicts of interest and hence there is transparency in the management system.
A scope of a project is a useful tool for determining the deliverables and goals of the particular project. During the planning phase of a project, a project charter is generally developed and in the charter, the first task is to define the scope of the project. Without scope definition, the project cannot be executed any further.
There are certain milestones or tasks in a project that must be completed on the highest priority before any other works of the project are executed (Schwalbe 2015). These tasks can be defined using project priority matrix and must be executed on top priority.
A work breakdown structure is a systematic breakdown of different work packages that are included in the project. Generally, a project is divided into different phases and under each phase, there are several work packages. In the work breakdown structure, the phases and the work packages are arranged in a sequential order.
Risk management is a project management technique that is utilized to identify and address the possible risks that are associated with a project. In a project, there are certain risks that arise due to a number of factors like budget, schedule, security and others (Fleming and Koppelman 2016). These risks must be managed at the right time in order to avoid major negative implications in the project.
The main benefit of risk management is that the possible risks in the project are addressed before they actually have a negative impact on the project. Furthermore, risk management process also provide confidence to the team members to avoid any obstacles faced during the course of the project.
Risk identification is an important part of risk management. In this process, the project stakeholders identify the possible risks in the project using certain tools and techniques like risk register and others.
Risk assessment is required to assess the extent of effect of a risk on the project. This phase follows the risk identification phase and can be derived using risk register.
This is a documentation through which appropriate measures to the identified risks of the project are noted down. According to the documented addressing techniques, suitable responses are made to ensure the project is risk free and executed successfully.
Contingency planning is generally done to avoid sudden unforeseen incidents that may cause serious implications on the project (Harrison and Lock 2017). For instance in a construction project, some accidents may occur during the construction process causing loss of resources and even lives. For these cases, prior contingency planning is necessary.
One of the significant benefits of risk management is opportunity management. Opportunity management gives the project manager the power to explore and enhance all the new opportunities available for the project and benefit the organization accordingly.
Contingency funding is required in order to invest in the project when an unforeseen incident or accident occurs. Generally, 10-20% of the total budget for the project is kept aside as contingency budget (Walker 2015).
Time buffer is generally considered if there are uncertainties on the project being completed within pre set schedule. This is required when there is requirement for change management that consumes additional time.
Risk response control is an activity in the project using which risk response activities are managed and controlled according to requirements. If risk responses are not controlled and managed, they may not be as effective as estimated.
Change control management is required to control any type of change management measures taken during the course of the project (Heagney 2016). It is the duty of project manager to perform change control management to bring effective and beneficial changes to the project.
Resource smoothing is one of the project management tools used to redefine allocated resources if they already cross the maximum limit.
Resource-constrained scheduling is a process by which a project scheduling process is developed by considering the resource constraints.
Project constraints are those factors that affect each other if one of them is changed. The types of project constraints are schedule, scope, cost, quality, benefits and risks.
Scheduling problems can be classified according to the types of projects. For instance, in a construction project, any scheduling problem will involve requirements or changes in a construction schedule (Verzuh 2015). On the other hand, in a software project, the scheduling problem will arise due to changes in development or additional time for debugging of the developed software.
Resource allocation methods involve management and distribution of resources throughout the course of the project as per the requirements. Generally the main target is to find the least possible resources that will be sufficient to complete a particular task. Accordingly, resources are allocated to each of the respective activities in the project.
Resource constrained scheduling can have massive negative impacts on the project. The impacts include budget overshoot, unusual amount of required time, additional stress on the workers and others.
Multi Project Resource Schedules are required when the employees or project team members are involved in more than one project at the same time (Binder 2016). In these cases, the resource allocation should be balanced in such a way that each team member does not have to work more than required for committing to multiple projects.
Managing and leading projects are two completely different duties as far as project management is concerned. While project managing requires a wide variety of duties like supervising, monitoring, changing and controlling of a project, leading only requires a limited but important tasks like taking critical decisions, approve budget requests and others.
Influence of a project manager can be a useful medium for the exchange of project currencies (Boud, Cohen and Sampson 2014). It generally depends on the project manager’s ability to influence and contribute to the enhancement of the project team members’ activities.
Managing project stakeholders is a critical success factor for any project. During a project, a number of stakeholders are employed who will take control and responsibility of different aspects of a project like finance, procurement, project supervision and others. Unless the project stakeholders are employed as per their fields of expertise, the project is most likely to move in the wrong direction and ultimately fail.
Social network building is also an important success factor for a project. Building a well developed social network gives more exposure to the project resulting in investment of time and resources by various external entities (Snyder 2014). This is especially important is the commercial projects where social networking building is important to ensure more profit from the project outcome.
Ethics is an important component of project management. Every involved person in a project must abide by certain ethical guidelines of the project. Various parent organizations also have certain specific rules of ethics that must be followed or the violators will face serious penalties.
One of the main duties of the project manager is build trust within the entire team structure as well as of the external stakeholders of the project. Building trust not only increases the transparency of activities in the project but also it is a key for the manager to exercise his influence (Martinelli and Milosevic 2016). It helps the workers and team members to trust the manager when he takes certain critical decisions.
The qualities of an effective project manager are as follows.
The five stage team development model includes the following.
Forming – In this stage, the team members meet and socialize with each other to develop team bonding.
Storming – In this phase, the team members compete with each other to test their abilities as well as team-working skills.
Norming – In this phase, the team starts to perform as a unit as the team members start to collaborate with each other.
Performing – In this phase, the team starts to perform with the highest intensity as well as in proper team unit.
Adjourning – This is the last stage of the project and after successfully done team work, the team members gradually move on to different directions.
Some situational factors affecting team development are as follows.
Building high performance project teams is an important requirement for the enhancement of project performance. In order to build high performance project team, it is important to choose the members who work well in groups and teams and are also ready to help and guide other team members.
Managing a virtual project team is difficult as it involves team members who are far separated from each other geographically. The only mode of communication is via telephone or video call (Lock 2017). Generally, team meetings are held in video conference and the management of the teams are done through efficient monitoring processes.
Project team pitfalls occur due to a number of reasons like lack of proper definition of scope, cost, time and other factors that led to imposing excessive amount of pressure on the project team members.
Project closure is a phase when a project is gradually moving to an end. Some projects require performance testing and evaluation before closing while some projects can be closed based on the approval of the documentation only.
Before closure activities are wrapped up, the project is first review and appraised after which the project report document is created. Finally when the entire outcome of the project comes out to be satisfactory, it is officially closed.
Project audits are required to check whether the project has met suitable quality standards or not.
Post implementation evaluation is important to determine whether the implementation process has been successful or not.
Conclusion
Finally it can be concluded that each of the attributes discussed above are important and integral parts of a project. Each of the factors must be considered with great care in order to ensure success of the project.
References
Binder, J., 2016. Global project management: communication, collaboration and management across borders. Routledge.
Boud, D., Cohen, R. and Sampson, J. eds., 2014. Peer learning in higher education: Learning from and with each other. Routledge.
Fleming, Q.W. and Koppelman, J.M., 2016, December. Earned value project management. Project Management Institute.
Harrison, F. and Lock, D., 2017. Advanced project management: a structured approach. Routledge.
Heagney, J., 2016. Fundamentals of project management. AMACOM Div American Mgmt Assn.
Heldman, K., 2018. PMP: project management professional exam study guide. John Wiley & Sons.
Kerzner, H. and Kerzner, H.R., 2017. Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and controlling. John Wiley & Sons.
Lock, D., 2017. The essentials of project management. Routledge.
Martinelli, R.J. and Milosevic, D.Z., 2016. Project management toolbox: tools and techniques for the practicing project manager. John Wiley & Sons.
Mir, F.A. and Pinnington, A.H., 2014. Exploring the value of project management: linking project management performance and project success. International journal of project management, 32(2), pp.202-217.
Nicholas, J.M. and Steyn, H., 2017. Project management for engineering, business and technology. Taylor & Francis.
Schwalbe, K., 2015. Information technology project management. Cengage Learning.
Snyder, C.S., 2014. A guide to the project management body of knowledge: PMBOK (®) guide. Project Management Institute: Newtown Square, PA, USA.
Turner, R., 2016. Gower handbook of project management. Routledge.
Verzuh, E., 2015. The fast forward MBA in project management. John Wiley & Sons.
Walker, A., 2015. Project management in construction. John Wiley & Sons.
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