Principles of Project Management

Principles of Project Management

History of Project Management

As a result of the fast-moving business world, the need for successful project management has become a key component and not a luxury. While a majority of individuals lean towards to thinking that project management is a novel undertaking for improvement as well as business growth, but the truth is that project management has been in existence for many a long period. Project management was and is still engaged in the design, coordinating and building of the ancient world wonders (Seymour, and Hussein, 2014, p.233). Therefore, all along the history of project management, the primary driving force for project management has remained to be the same, which entails maintaining of schedules, resource management as well as the coordination of dissimilar project tasks and activities. Certainly, as a result of project management undergoing evolution, it has brought about a major distinctiveness between the ancient project management marvels and the modern day projects whereby the present project involves schedule optimisation.

The dawn of the 19^th century came with major challenges in the business environment where business leaders were faced with numerous challenges regarding labour legislation as well as regulations from the federal government (Rolfe, Segal, and Cicmil, 2016, p.52). As a result, Henry Gantt played a vital part in the history of project management and is therefore regarded as the pioneer of modern project management. Gantt is recognised for developing planning in addition to project control techniques to aid business leaders to become successful as well be in the position to abide by the new principles. Therefore, Gantt is remembered for creating the famous Gantt chart that is used for observing as well as control of the project’s timeline. Accordingly, this primary chart outlines the various phases involved a project from start to the end. On the same note, in 1911Fredric Taylor printed a book titled “The Principle of Scientific Management” based on his familiarity in the steel industry. The intention of the book was to equip employees who were not skilled the chance to work on new and complex projects through learning skills in a rapid manner but in a simple way. Consequently, Taylor was able to identify the importance of creating incentive-based remuneration systems by taking the opportunity of time-saving skills, which is a significant technique used by project managers today to ensure time-saving in the delivery of projects.

Moreover, after the Second World War project managers begun to conduct and manage the project by following two mathematical approaches program evaluation review technique (PERT) and the critical path method (CPM). The PERT plays a significant role in analysing project tasks by determining the minimum time for completing a specified task (Kozak-Holland, and Procter, 2014, p.245). The CPM looks at the project activities to determine the time that will be undertaken to complete, the relationship between events as well as their endpoints. Starting for the 1980s to early 2000 the advent of computers have played a basic role in the history of project management since they brought connectivity as well as communication to the front part of project management (Svejvig, and Andersen, 2015, p.287). As a result, of computer project managers are now able to calculate the duration that a project shall take with the help of Microsoft Project.

Project Management Methodologies

A project management methodology is primarily set of directive principles as well as procedures applied in the management of a project. Thus the choice of your project methodology describes the manner in which the work shall be communicated and performed. Nonetheless, the methodology has to have its roots as a fundamental element which dictates the reason for choosing to perform things in a specified way. Accordingly, there are numerous approached used to deliver projects. A successful and good project always comes out of a well-planned as well as implemented project management methodology (Duffield, and Whitty, 2015, p.315). Thus, successful project management is illustrated by an excellent, planning, effective resourcing as well as scoping, resilient management support and not forgetting realistic project outcomes and expectations. Indeed, project management is significant because it allows for strategic alignment to see to it that the product is being conveyed is right and can be able to convey the real value against a business opportunity.

Project management methodology is a system that consists of interrelated procedures, phases tasks, and activities which describes the process of a project from the incision point to completion. Every project phase generates significant deliverables which contribute to realizing a project’s objectives. Similarly, project phasing allows the creation of logical breaks in the project that are related with major decision points. Thus, phases comprise various activities which are categorised with related tasks which when looked at in isolation offers a clear indication of the systematic sequence of the levels to attain project objectives. Each activity has a range of tasks, and tasks are the lowest levels displayed in the work breakdown structure to produce results that contribute to key deliverables.

Project management is subdivided into segments such as initiation, control, and closure to make it easily manageable. During the initiation phase, all projects begin with a concept for a product or a new capability. The concept is then communicated to the project sponsor through a chain of command. The mandate gives an organised method by proposing a project as well as constraints in the project business case. After the mandate has been approved further documentation is prepared to explain the project in a more detailed manner (Marcelino-Sádaba et al., 2014). In this case, the project definition is utilised to avail this information. Thus, this document is significant when it comes to assessing whether the project should carry out or not. The initiation phase outlines the projects, goals, scope, objectives, constraints, risks, assumptions, benefits, vital individuals, durations, and costs. The control phase entails managing as well as tracking the project. In order to attain this, the project manager has to develop a project plan that is mostly expressed in the form of a Gantt chart. The Gantt chart specifies the projects different tasks, timeline as well as the necessary resources required. At the same time, an excellent project plan involves constant milestones which act as a measure for measuring the project’s progress to help keep the project team focussed on both short-term and long-term goals (Todorović et al., 2015, p774). Project closure entails receiving of client acknowledgment feedback from the client that indeed the delivered product is satisfactory. Once this is done the project is signed off and disbanded.

Project Management Maturity

Maturity in project management has been an on-going process that has been pursued by the corporation of all industries. Brookes et al. define maturity as a condition of being mature, complete or perfect development. It is the target of any given organisation to realise a perfect development capacity in the management of project (2014, p.233). According to De Souza, and Gomes, (2015) the scholar notes that maturity can greatly impact on the value that a company is likely to gain through implementing project management. Therefore, the idea of maturity is intuitive which a range of applications in people daily lives. When it comes to project management, maturity is related to the manner in which a corporation has the capacity to manage their projects. The project management maturity model (PMMM) provides a coherent path for progressive growth as well as tactical design to move forward with project management progression in a corporation. Accordingly, project management maturity is a significant component of strategic planning, which offers an approach that acts as a road map in determining as well as compressing the gaps in project quality and resources. Therefore, project management maturity models offer a standardised methodology for benchmarking and measurement as a mapped out a technique for progression.

According to the Software Engineering Institute which was published in the mid of 1980 had the target to aid governments to evaluate the type of best software that contractors could be in the position of delivering complex project software. Thus, the capability maturity model was based on the evaluation of standard practices. As a result, this model has been advanced to adapt so as to fit an expansive range of functions and industries, which has led to the development of a variety of maturity models over the years. The PMMM plays a major role in the development of a project because it aids in the assessment of various areas in a project such as a scope, risk management, resources, schedule, quality as well as the entire project integrations (Albrecht, and Spang, 2014, p.293). Certainly, to be able to successfully deliver a project product, project managers have adopted the five PMM levels which include initial process, structural process as well as standards, organisation standards, managed and optimisation. The initiation level echoes a company that runs in a randomly way. The reason is that there is less control thus it is difficult to project the manner in which the organisation is likely to respond to a specific instance once faced with a crisis (Christoph, and Konrad, 2014, p.167). At this level, the project realises the significance of management and the need for a clear understanding of the primary knowledge on project management as well as accompanying terminologies. The second level helps the project to recognise the common requirements that have to be described and developed for the success of a project. Accordingly, project management maturity plays a significant role towards the successful delivery of a project.    

Bibliography

Albrecht, J.C., and Spang, K., 2014. Linking the benefits of project management maturity to project complexity: Insights from a multiple case study. International Journal of Managing Projects in Business, 7(2), pp.285-301.

Brookes, N., Butler, M., Dey, P. and Clark, R., 2014. The use of maturity models in improving project management performance: An empirical investigation. International Journal of Managing Projects in Business, 7(2), pp.231-246.

Christoph, A.J. and Konrad, S., 2014. Project complexity as an influencing factor on the balance of costs and benefits in project management maturity modeling. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 119, pp.162-171.

De Souza, T.F. and Gomes, C.F.S., 2015. Assessment of maturity in project management: a bibliometric study of main models. Procedia Computer Science, 55, pp.92-101.

Duffield, S. and Whitty, S.J., 2015. Developing a systemic lessons learned knowledge model for organisational learning through projects. International journal of project management, 33(2), pp.311-324.

Kozak-Holland, M. and Procter, C., 2014. Florence Duomo project (1420–1436): Learning best project management practice from history. International Journal of Project Management, 32(2), pp.242-255.

Marcelino-Sádaba, S., Pérez-Ezcurdia, A., Lazcano, A.M.E. and Villanueva, P., 2014. Project risk management methodology for small firms. International journal of project management, 32(2), pp.327-340.

Rolfe, B., Segal, S. and Cicmil, S., 2016. An existential hermeneutic philosophical approach to project management. Project Management Journal, 47(3), pp.48-62.

Seymour, T., and Hussein, S., 2014. The history of project management. International Journal of Management & Information Systems (Online), 18(4), p.233.

Svejvig, P. and Andersen, P., 2015. Rethinking project management: A structured literature review with a critical look at the brave new world. International Journal of Project Management, 33(2), pp.278-290.

Todorović, M.L., Petrović, D.Č., Mihić, M.M., Obradović, V.L. and Bushuyev, S.D., 2015. Project success analysis framework: A knowledge-based approach to project management. International Journal of Project Management, 33(4), pp.772-783.

 

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