At that time, two mathematical project-sheduling models were develop. The "critical path method" (CPM) was developed as a joint venture between DuPont corporation and Remignton Rand for managing plant maintenance projects. And the "Program Evaluation and Review Technique" or PERT, was developed by Booz Allen hamilton as part of the United States Navy's (in conjunction with the Lockheed Corporation) Polaris missile submarine program; PERT and CPM are very similar in their approach but still present some differences. CPM is used for projects that assume deterministic activity times; the times at which each activity will be carried out are known. PERT, on the other hand, allows for stochastic activity times; the times at which each activity will be carried out are uncertain or varied. Because of this core difference, CPM and PERT are used in different contexts. These mathematical techniques quickly spread into many private enterprises. At the same time, as project-scheduling were developed , thecnology for project cost estimating, cost management, and engineering economics was evolving, with pioneering work by Hans Lang and others. In 1956, the American Association of Cost Engineers (now AACE International; the Association for Total Cost Management) was formed by early practitioners of project management and the associated specialties of planning and scheduling, cost estimating, and cost/schedule control (project control). AACE continued its pioneering work and in 2006 released the first integrated process for portfolio, program and project management (Total Cost Management Framework). The International Project Management Associatin (IPMA) was founded in Europe in 1967, as a federation of several national project management associations. IPMA maintains its federal structure today and now includes member associations on every continent except Antarctica. IPMA offers a Four Level Certification program based on the IPMA Competence Baseline (ICB). The ICB covers technical, contextual, and behavioral competencies. In 1969, the Project management Institute (PMI) was formed in the USA. PMI publishes A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide), which describes project management practices that are common to "most projects, most of the time." PMI also offers multiple certifications. PM Approaches There are a number of approaches to managing project activities including lean, iterative, incremental, and phased approaches. Regardless of the methodology employed, careful consideration must be given to the overall project objectives, timeline, and cost, as well as the roles and responsibilities of all participants and stakeholders. The traditional approach A traditional phased approach identifies a sequence of steps to be completed. In the "traditional approach", five developmental components of a project can be distinguished (four stages plus control): Typical development phases of an engineering project 1. Initiation 2. Planning and design 3. Execution and construction 4. Monitoring and controlling systems 5. Completion Not all projects will have every stage, as projects can be terminated before they reach completion. Some projects do not follow a structured planning and/or monitoring process. And some projects will go through steps 2, 3 and 4 multiple times. Many industries use variations of these project stages. For example, when working on a brick and working on mortar design and construction, projects will typically progress through stages like pre-planning, conceptual design, schematic design, design development, construction drawings (or contract documents), and construction administration. In software development, this approach is often known as the waterfall model, i.e., one series of tasks after another in linear sequence. In software development many organizations have adapted the Rational Unified Process (RUP) to fit this methodology, although RUP does not require or explicitly recommend this practice. Waterfall development works well for small, well defined projects, but often fails in larger projects of undefined and ambiguous nature. The Cone of Uncertainty explains some of this as the planning made on the initial phase of the project suffers from a high degree of uncertainty. This becomes especially true as software development is often the realization of a new or novel product. In projects where requirements have not been finalized and can change, requirements management is used to develop an accurate and complete definition of the behavior of software that can serve as the basis for software development. While the terms may differ from industry to industry, the actual stages typically follow common steps to problem solving defining the problem weighing options, choosing a path, implementation and evaluation." PRINCE2 PRINCE2 is a structured approach to project management released in 1996 as a generic project management method. It combines the original PROMPT methodology (which evolved into the PRINCE methodology) with IBM's MITP (managing the implementation of the total project) methodology. PRINCE2 provides a method for managing projects within a clearly defined framework. PRINCE2 focuses on the definition and delivery of products, in particular their quality requirements. As such, it defines a successful project as being ouput-oriented not activity or task-oriented through creating an agreed set of products that define the scope of the project and provides the basis for planning and control, that is, how then to coordinate people and activities, how to design and supervise product delivery, and what to do if products and therefore the scope of the project has to be adjusted if it does not develop as planned. In the method, each process is specified with its key inputs and outputs and with specific goals and activities to be carried out to deliver a project's outcomes as defined by its Business Case. This allows for continuous assessment and adjustment when deviation from the Business Case is required. PRINCE2 provides a common language for all participants in the project. The governance framework of PRINCE2 - its roles and responsibilities - are fully described and require tailoring to suit the complexity of the project and skills of the organisation. Critical chain project management Critical chain project management (CCPM) is a method of planning and managing project execution designed to deal with uncertainties inherent in managing projects, while taking into consideration limited availability of resources (physical, human skills, as well as management & support capacity) needed to execute projects. CCPM is an application of the theory of constraints (TOC) to projects. The goal is to increase the flow of projects in an organization (throughput). Applying the first three of the five focusing steps of TOC, the system constraint for all projects is identified as are the resources. To exploit the constraint, tasks on the critical chain are given priority over all other activities. Finally, projects are planned and managed to ensure that the resources are ready when the critical chain tasks must start, subordinating all other resources to the critical chain. The project plan should typically undergo resource leveling and the longest sequence of resource-constrained tasks should be identified as the critical chain. In some cases, such as managing contracted sub- projects, it is advisable to use a simplified approach without resource leveling. In multi-purpose nvironments, resource leveling should be performed across projects. However, it is often enough to identify (or simply select) a single "drum". The drum can be a resource that acts as a constraint across projects, which are staggered based on the availability of that single resource. One can also use a "virtual drum" by selecting a task or group of tasks (typically integration points) and limiting the number of projects in execution at that stage. Event chain methodology Event chain methodology is another method that complements critical path method and critical chain project management methodologies. Event chain methodology is an uncertainty modeling and schedule network analysis technique that is focused on identifying and managing events and event chains that affect project schedules. Event chain methodology helps to mitigate the negative impact of psychological heuristics and biases, as well as to allow for easy modeling of uncertainties in the project schedules. Event chain methodology is based on the following principles. - Probabilistic moment of risk: Anactivity(task) in mostreal-life processes is not a continuous uniform process. Tasks are affected by external events, which can occur at some point in the middle of the task.
- Event chains: Events can cause other events, whichwill create event chains. These event chains can significantly affect the course of the project. Quantitative analysis is used to determine a cumulative effect of these event chains on the project schedule.
- Critical events or event chains: The single events or the event chains that have the most potential to affectt he projects are the "critical events" or "critical chains of events". Project tracking with events: - Even if a project is partially completed and data about the project duration, cost, and event so ccurred is available, it is still possible to refine information about future potential events and helps to forecast future project performance.
- Event chain visualization: Events and event chains can be visualized using event chain diagrams on a Ganttcharts. Process-based management Also furthering the concept of project control is the incorporation of process-based management. This area has been driven by the use of Maturity models such as the CMMI (capability maturity model integration; see this example of a predecessor) and ISO/IEC15504 (SPICE - software process improvement and capability estimation). Agile project management Agile project management approaches, based on the principles of human interaction management, are founded on a process view of human collaboration. It is "most typically used in software, website, technology, creative and marketing industries. This contrasts sharply with the traditional approach. In the agile software development or flexible product development approach, the project is seen as a series of relatively small tasks conceived and executed to conclusion as the situation demands in an adaptive manner, rather than as a completely pre-planned process. Advocates of this technique claim that: - It is the most consistent project management techniques involves frequent testing of the project under development.
- It is the only technique in which the client will be actively involved in the project development.
The only disadvantage with this technique is that it should be used only if the client has enough time to be actively involved in the project every now and then. Examples of Agile Project Management tools and techniques include: - Scrum (software development)-A holistic approach to development that focuses on iterative goals set by the Product Owner through a backlog, which is developed by the Delivery Team through the facilitation of the Scrum Master. - Extreme Programming (XP)-Alsocalled Pair Programming this method uses small groups and has a highly prescriptive nature - Test driven Development (TDD) model. eXtreme Manufacturing (XM) An agile methodology based on Scrum, Kanban and Kaizen that facilitates rapid engineering and prototyping. - Crystal Clear (software development) - An agile or lightweight methodology that focuses on collocation and osmotic communication.
- Kanban(かんばん(看板))-A lean framework for process improvement that is
frequently used to manage WIP within agile projects. The Kanban process improvement framework has been specifically applied to software development, as Kanban (development). Lean project management Lean project management uses the principles from lean manufacturing to focus on delivering value with less waste and reduced time. Extreme project management Planning and feedback loops in Extreme programming (XP) with the time frames of the multiple loops. In critical studies of project management it has been noted that several PERT based models are not well suited for the multi-project company environment these days. Most of them are aimed at very large-scale, one-time, non- routine projects, and currently all kinds of management are expressed in terms of projects.
Using complex models for "projects" (or rather "tasks") spanning a few weeks has been proven to cause unnecessary costs and low maneuverability in several cases. The generalization of Extreme Programming to other kinds of projects is extreme project management, which may be used in combination with the process modeling and management principles of human interaction management. Benefits realization management Benefits realization management (BRM) enhances normal project management techniques through a focus on outcomes (the benefits) of a project rather than products or outputs, and then measuring the degree to which that is happening to keep a project on track. This can help to reduce the risk of a completed project being a failure by delivering agreed upon requirements/outputs but failing to deliver the benefits of those requirements. An example of delivering a project to requirements might be agreeing to deliver a computer system that will process staff data and manage payroll, holiday and staff personnel records. Under BRM the agreement might be to achieve a specified reduction in staff hours required to process and maintain staff data.
MASTER TEAMWORK BY PRACITICING PROJECT MANAGEMENT
Last update: January, 2014 |
