A Practical Guide to Project Management

All Rights Reserved © 2001 by David A. Grootenhuis

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage retrieval system, without the permission in writing from the publisher.

Writers Club Press

an imprint of iUniverse.com, Inc.

For information address:

iUniverse.com, Inc.

5220 S 16th, Ste. 200

Lincoln, NE 68512

www.iuniverse.com

ISBN: 0-595-18521-5

ISBN 978-1-4697-0481-4 (ebook)

Contents

Introduction

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER IV

CHAPTER FIVE

Glossary of Terms

Introduction

Why are there project managers?

Project Management as a profession grew out of the increasing speed of change in the business and industrial environments. Project management as a responsibility has existed as long as organizations have experience planned change. A project is an initiative within an organization designed to accomplish a specific goal. Projects have clear start dates and end dates and usually result in some change in the environment.

For many years, the area managers coordinated projects in addition to their other responsibilities. This succeeded if the manager could add the project to his or her regular workload and if the manager had the necessary skills to effectively manage projects. As the pace of change increased, managers were drawn away from their primary responsibilities more often. In addition, while most managers were very knowledgeable in the areas they manage, they may not have the project management skills to facilitate a large project. The most successful manager of engineering may lack the training and attributes necessary to manage projects. Also, a talented engineering manager should be managing engineering, not projects. Project managers benefit the business in two ways: they have the skills and training to effectively manage initiatives and they free managers and line personnel to apply their expertise to their primary responsibilities.

In many organizations, line managers are still responsible for managing projects. In these cases it is crucial that they be well versed in the techniques of project management.

Project management is a process. Project managers facilitate a team through a series of steps that bring them to decisions, plans and the completion of the initiative. Project managers document goals and actions to be taken, monitor progress, identify and assign issues, produce reports, plan and facilitate meetings and coordinate other activities that help the team achieve their goals.

Project managers are not required to have first hand knowledge of the subject of the project. The project team is made up of subject matter experts. By claiming ignorance, the project manager does not threaten the knowledge level of the team members. Team members must explain concepts and issues at a very basic level, which in turn prompts them to look at concepts and issues in basic terms. This often promotes new approaches to problems, issues and projects.

The job of the team members is to bring their expertise to the group and provide the information and abilities necessary to complete the project. The project manager’s job is to orchestrate the efforts of the team members, leveraging their knowledge to complete the task at hand. The project manager must ask the key questions that prompt the group to take an objective view of their situation and think out of the box. Once again, the project manager’s expertise is in the process, not necessarily the subject of the project. The process can be applied to any situation with little modification. Project managers also bring an objective view of situations, unclouded by pre-conceived notions or routine practices.

Project management brings process expertise, organizational abilities and an objective point of view. All of these combine to allow the project manager to guide the group through the initiative at hand, ensuring that proper level of planning and forethought is engaged and providing a more detailed level of reporting to upper management. The project manager also ensures economy of effort, making sure that the team members are focused on the areas that are necessary to the success of the project and eliminating their involvement in non-crucial items.

The goal of the project manager is Closure. As issues are identified, they are brought to resolution and closed, project documents are developed, tasks in the project plan are completed. In all cases the project manager is focused on bringing the group to agreement and moving to the next item.

Project managers must possess a unique combination of characteristics. They must be comfortable leading group discussions, preparing detailed documents, facilitating groups to a conclusion, resolving conflicts and evaluating the relationships between the steps in a process. They must influence individuals over which they have no official authority or may, in fact, be subordinate to.

A key to successful project management is to lead by example. Those responsible for managing an initiative must complete their deliverables on schedule. A project manager that does not deliver cannot expect team members to.

Through the use of project management techniques and a refined project management process, organizations can complete initiatives on time, on budget and achieve the desired results.

CHAPTER ONE

The Project Process

The Project Process

The project management process is a series of steps designed to bring an initiative to its successful conclusion. No matter how large or small the initiative, all projects can be broken into defined steps. The main difference between large and small projects is the complexity of the planning and documentation and the length of time required to complete each phase. The basic phases are:

• Concept

• Budgeting

• Approach

• Scope

• Requirements

• Design

• Build

• Implement

• Review/Signoff

The order of the steps varies with the situation. Projects occasionally slip back and forth between adjacent steps. The Budgeting, Approach and Scope phases are dependent upon each other and projects may revisit these steps several times before they are finalized. In some cases the budget is established prior to the initiation of the project and the scope and approach will be established within the limits of the budget.

Large projects may be in several stages at the same time. For example, facilities may be acquired before the final design details are complete. (As long as the requirements of the facilities have been defined)

In the case of building a home, construction (The Build phase) may begin before the final aspects of the design are complete. Or, the residents of the home may move in (the Implementation phase) before the final aspects of construction are complete.

There are three documents that contain the details of the Project Process. The Project Charter contains the Concept, Budgeting, Approach and Scope. The Project Plan outlines the Requirements, Design, Build and Implements phases. The Signoff Document covers the Review/Signoff Phase. Each of these documents is discussed in detail in the chapters that follow.

Concept

This is where the idea of the initiative is formed. Someone, or some group, has recognized the need for a change and has been motivated to begin the process of implementing it. This phase includes preliminary, often informal discussions with those impacted by the initiative. The individual or group that has initiated the concept will also begin to identify the key team members that should be involved in the project as well as more formal discussions with upper management for funding and support.

Budgeting

The budget is the planned amount of money to be spent on a project. The budget may also outline when the money will be spent. Most organizations have an established budgeting process. Most of these involve an estimate of the number of hours needed to complete the tasks involved and the billing cost per hour (labor), plus the cost of items purchased for the project (fuel, equipment, facilities, etc). Some organizations separate the hourly portion into internal hours (hours worked by employees) and external hours (hours provided by consultants or contract employees). Money spent on personnel to complete tasks on a project is usually expensed. That is, the money is paid immediately and entered as an expense in the accounting system.

The cost of items purchased for the project may be considered expenses or capital expenditures. Expenses are routine costs for items used in the completion of the project. These can include supplies and services. These items are entered as expenses.

Capital is money used to purchase equipment or facilities that become assets of the company. These items can be depreciated. The expenditures are entered into the accounting system as capital and the periodic depreciation is entered as an expense. Depreciation is the amount of value an asset looses in a specific period of time.

The budget for a project combines the estimates of expense and capital and may provide a schedule defining when the money will be spent. This will assist the