Project managers must possess the ability to use sound judgment based on the facts available to them, past experiences, and knowledge of current events to make effective decisions. Often, the success of project managers is based upon the outcomes of the decisions they did or did not make. As such, conducting performance assessments, during project implementation and after project completion, enables project managers and project stakeholders to accurately evaluate the success of the project. Projects are innately complex and multifaceted; therefore, project successes are difficult to measure and ascertain. “Based on an extensive review of the project success literature … a clear definition of project success does not exist and there is a need to develop meaningful and measurable constructs of project success” (Mir & Pinnington, 2014, p. 203). Larson and Gray (2014) explain that setting and maintaining a baseline plan is an essential variable in controlling performance and identifying areas for improvement. “The baseline is derived from the cost and duration information found in …show more content…
Luke 14:28 asks “For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the costs, whether he has enough to complete it?” (ESV). 1 Corinthians 14:40 advises “But all things should be done decently and in order” (ESV). Both of these passages reflect the significance of due diligence in developing and maintaining the cost and time schedules. Project implementation and managing control measures is often a complex matrix involving many components and stakeholders, however, conserving the integrity of the costs, time, and quality is essential to continued successful project management. Galatians 6:9 reminds us to be diligent in our efforts; “And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up”
The final activity undertaken on any project is a review of its overall success by an independent resource. Success is determined by how well it performed against the defined objectives and conformed to the management processes outlined in the planning phase. To determine performance, a number of questions are posed.
Picture a person who that is juggling doing several things at once; they are balancing a stick in one hand and another stick on their nose. Each stick has a plate on the top that they want to keep spinning without losing balance or dropping either. There is a lot going on in those actions including the exact timing of when to reach up and spin a plate, constant body movement to keep the sticks balanced as not to fall, and a continued push from the free hand to keep both plates spinning. This paradigm could be used to describe integration knowledge area of project management. Schwalbe (2014) defines project management as, “Coordinating all other project management knowledge areas throughout a project’s life-cycle. This integration ensures that all the elements of a project come together at the right
After a period of meticulous planning, project managers (PM) anticipate that their projects will be executed on schedule and within the proposed budget. According to Maheshwari and Credle (2010), there are internal and external factors that can impede a project’s progress. Therefore, once a project is in motion PMs often rely on tools to assist them with staying on course - and to mitigate project risk. One such tool is the Earned Value Measurement System (EVMS) that can be used to quantify a project 's progress and assist PMs with managing and controlling project costs, instead of merely monitoring costs during various stages of a project. The EVMS can also be used to forecast a project’s completion date and present an analysis of variances, which may occur due to additional or misinterpreted requirements, to determine a project’s earned value (Kerzner, 2013).
Graham, R. J. & Randall, L., Creating an Environment for Successful Projects: The Quests to Manage Project Management, second ed. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 65-113, 2003.
Project success is critical to business performance and still many projects suffer from overruns, delays and failure. Each project is different and consists of risks. According to Morris and Hough (1987), project failure rate are high when one fail to consider and analyze project risks. As per Jiang & Klein (2001), the way project risks are managed has a direct effect on the project deliverables. Tzvi et al. (2002) suggested that there is no risk free project. Project risk management aims to maximize opportunities and minimize threats. This ensures achievements of project objectives. Hence, it is unlikely that a project will be successful without effective project risk management.
It enables managers to close the loop in the plan-do-check-act management cycle (PMI, 2005). Earned Value Management has become the most commonly used method of project performance measurement (Chen and Zhang 2012). Practitioners also refer to Earned Value Management concept as Earned Value Project Management, Earned Value System or Earned Value Analysis, but there is no much difference between these terminologies. Earned Value Management offers the project manager a tool to timely evaluate the general health of a project along the life of the project. Particularly Earned Value Management has been used to estimate cost and time to complete, identify cost and schedule impacts of known problems, accurately portray the cost status of a project, trace problems to their sources, portray the schedule status of a project, provide timely information on projects and identify problem areas not previously recognized (Kim and Duffey 2003). The description and derivation of Earned Value Management elements have been comprehensively described in many sources. (PMI, 2005) classifies the terminology into two categories: key parameters of Earned Value Management including Planned Value, Earned Value and Actual Cost and Earned Value Management measures (variances, indices and forecasts). Additionally the evolution of Earned Value Management concepts raised
Since the concept of Project Management is broad, many different aspects of a business rely on successful Project Management. “Projects” can include product line development, attaining company goals, boosting employee morale, and product costing, to name a few. This area of business is important because it determines every minute detail required to get the product produced and to the consumer. There are several steps required to assure project success. These steps are briefly outlined in the following paragraphs.
Jugdev, K. (2012). Learning from Lessons Learned: Project Management Research Program. American Journal of Economics and Business Administration , 4(1), 13-22.
of project management may be determined at the end of the project; however, the success
Nokes, S & Kelly, S (2008) The definitive guide to project management: The fast track to
People in top management positions, is a key stakeholders in projects success. Top management can help project managers secure adequate resources, get approval for unique project needs in a timely manner, receive cooperation from people throughout the organization, and learn how to be better leaders. The reason why project success come from the project managers, but there are other important factor that make the project success such as takes careful planning, attention to detail and effective communication.
Project management is a discipline based on careful planning, organization, motivation and control of resources to achieve specific goals and meet specific success criteria. Since every project is unique in nature, a project manager must learn to adapt and identify key areas to drive success. Thus, as a learning initiative, we were given a project to manage through a simulation program named Sim4Project. The emphasis of this simulation was on learning-by-doing, just like in a real-life project. Sim4Project provided a good mix of theoretical knowledge as well as hands-on experience. Professor Leonie gave feedbacks at the end of each period to ensure we were incorporating the project management principles learned in the classroom.
Crawford (2000) suggests that project leadership is the highest ranking category among project management competence factors. Project management leadership style affects overall project performance. Recent research supports the idea that successful projects are led by individuals who possess not only a blend of technical and management knowledge, but also leadership skills that are internally compatible with the motivation of the project team (Slevin and Pinto, 1988; Turner et al., 1998). Zimmerer and Yasin (1998) found that positive leadership contributed almost 76% to the success of projects. Negative or poor leadership contributed 67% to the failure of projects. Project leaders need both, relationships and task oriented leadership styles, to cope with the challenges within different phases of project (Slevin and Pinto, 1991). In projects, project leaders must lead their teams towards completing defined goals with in a fixed time scale. Verma (1997) states “Achieving the goal or final aim is the ultimate test of leadership”. Goals and tasks are achieved through people thus making people an important resource for
When planning a new project, how the project will be managed is one of the most important factors. The importance of a managers will determine the success of the project. The success of the project will be determined by how well it is managed. Project management is referred to as the discipline that entails the processes of carefully planning, organizing, controlling, and motivating the organization resources so as to foster and facilitate the achievement of specific established and desired goals and meet the specific criteria of success required in the organization (Larson, 2014). Over the course of this paper I will be discussing and analyzing the importance of project management.
Over the course of my professional life, I have become increasingly involved in project management roles. Doing so has made me aware of the many varied challenges that can face projects and the project managers who are charged with bringing them through to completion. The success or failure of projects, in whatever economic, political or social field, rests not just on the quality of the project’s goals, but also on the abilities of those involved in the project – and above all those who are managing it – to bring it to successful completion. To do this, project managers need to be equipped with a very wide range of skills, many of which are unrelated to the type of project itself. So, for example, a project manager of an engineering project must not only have engineering