| Articles » Accelerating Project Management Success |
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Accelerating Project Management Success |
| by Michael Stanleigh |
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| As we wade through yet another series of economic crises our organizational
imperatives lean towards managing our work and in particular, our
projects, on time and on budget. No longer do we have the luxury to
exceed budget and time constraints. Yet we must continue to meet and
exceed our customer expectations and quality requirements in order
to maintain our market position. |
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| As organizations continue to strive to meet ROI and customer
needs, project management is becoming a critical tool, driving organizations
towards tremendous success. The successful management of projects is not a new fad or strategy but rather a pragmatic approach to work. |
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| What is Project Management? |
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| By definition, a “project “ is a temporary endeavor
(having both beginning and end dates) that will deliver a measurable
end result. This can be the delivery of a product, service or system,
etceteras. Projects can have a total duration of from half a day
to three years and comprise of a single resource to multiple resources
operating throughout the world. |
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| How Do We Develop and Manage Projects? |
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| How do we get our people involved in developing the plans and
successfully managing these plans to meet our quality and customer
expectations? And of course bringing our projects in on time and
on budget? |
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| The management of projects is a process. The Project Management
Process is a simple guide to manage all projects, regardless of size,
to improve their success. When followed, the process ensures that
customer and quality expectations are met and that the project will
occur successfully and be brought to a successful closure. |
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| Where Do We Start? |
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| STAGE 1—Project Initiation: Identify Sponsor and Charter the
Project |
| This stage forms the background information on the project. Projects
can come from anywhere—an accepted proposal, business requirements,
specifications, customer request, etc. The individual who oversees
the project is known as the Project Sponsor. The Sponsor selects
the Project Manager and ultimately will complete the final evaluation
of the project. The Sponsor develops a Project Charter to present
to the Project Manager or they may provide a copy of the business
requirement or customer requirements. These documents outline the
main purpose of the project and expected deliverables. The Sponsor
will select the Project Manager by using a competency evaluation
which verifies their past experiences, skills, and knowledge. |
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| STAGE 2—Project Definition: Develop Project Team;
Agree on Project Deliverables and Ensure Customer and Stakeholder
Expectations Are Met |
| The Project Manager will be accountable for project success so
following the Project Management Process becomes crucial. As part
of Stage 2, the project manager, dependant upon the size of the
project, will select appropriate resources to work with them on
the project. Once selected, the Project Manager brings all key resources
into a “kick-off meeting”. During this meeting, time
will be spent on reviewing the Project Charter, forming what will
now be the project team and developing the Scope Statement. The
Scope Statement will reiterate the project manager’s (and
team if this is a project requiring a team) understanding of the
project’s mandate, its deliverables and overall scope. |
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| Lastly, the project manager and team will develop a list of
customer and other stakeholder requirements. This ensures that their
needs will not be overlooked. Many projects are unsuccessful because
they do not meet the needs of the customers and/or other stakeholders
for whom this project was designed. Defining their requirements
at this early stage makes it easier to integrate their needs into
the project plan. |
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| Although this Stage doesn’t require a lot of time (often
completed within a day), it forms the foundation for project success.
In my experience, most projects that I audit lack a clear Scope
Statement, have never identified and documented the customer requirements
and have spent little, if any time, developing the project team.
It is little wonder why they find, mid-way through the project,
that there isn’t agreement on “what is the scope of
this project”. |
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| STAGE 3—Project Planning: Develop the Project Plan |
| Stage 3 requires the most effort on the part of the project manager
and project team…yet in a relatively short span of time (usually
one to two intensive days…dependent upon the size of the project).
All the activities and related tasks are identified, duration is
attached to each task and a resource allocation to each is made.
The activities and tasks are structured as a sequential flow of
activity known as a Work Breakdown Structure. |
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| In my experience, the level of detail at this stage is often
not sufficient to successfully manage the project and bring it in
on time and on budget. When I am brought in to audit projects I
often find a lack of detail. This generally leads to projects that
lose time and commitment by the team members. As well, these projects
are often faced with schedule delays. |
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| To change the Work Breakdown Structure from a “To Do List”
into a full project plan, dependencies must be created. Every activity
must have both a predecessor (what must be done before this task
can be started) ad a successor (what can begin only when this task
is completed). Milestones are then identified. These represent the
completion of key tasks that if missed, may prevent the project
from successful completion. The final part of the project is to
allocate costs to the lowest level of task possible |
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At this point we have three quality control mechanisms:
- Customer requirement activities identified in the project plan
to ensure that their expectations are met throughout the project.
- Start and finish times for each activity and related task.
- Costs broken down to the lowest level of activity possible.
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| This stage ends with sign-off by the Project Sponsor to
the final Scope Statement and Project Milestones. All project team
members and additional resources will now know what they should do,
when they should do it, how long it should take, what costs are involved
and when finished, who can then begin their task. |
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| STAGE 4—Project Execution: The Project Begins |
| To ensure that the project team is meeting commitments during this
stage, it is important to hold weekly project team meetings. The main
objective for each meeting is to examine each resource’s planned
start and finish tasks over the past week compared to their actual
start and finish dates. We are not looking for blame, rather to identify
the early warning signs of potential problems that can be rectified.
For example, a resource may have underestimated their original time
or were pulled away, etc. The Project Manager can offer assistance
or do whatever is necessary to get the project back on track. |
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| This is also the stage where Change Management is critical.
The very nature of managing projects is that there will be customer
changes, sponsor changes, management changes, or such. In order
to maintain the basic integrity of the project it is essential that
a “Change Request” form be completed and signed by the
Sponsor. Essentially this one-page document includes what the change
is, what impact it will have on the project if approved (more time/money,
etc.), what impact it will have on the project if not approved,
and the recommendations. When signed, it becomes the basis upon
which change can be applied to the project’s baseline, permitting
adjustments to total duration, cost, quality, and so on, of the
project. |
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A Risk Assessment is completed throughout the project.
The project team uses a Risk Management Process to identify two
things:
- What can they do to reduce the likelihood of risks occurring?
- What can they do to manage the risk, should it occur?
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| Throughout the execution the project team will make sure
to review and compare their planned schedule and budget versus the
actual. Any differences can be managed by using the Change Management
Process or the Risk Management Process. |
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| STAGE 5—Project Close: Closing the Project |
| This final step in the Project Management Process includes
control mechanisms, weekly project meetings, and use of the change
management documentation, as well as continuous risk, quality and
customer checks. You should now have a project that is on time and
on budget. |
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| The original Scope Statement may be different than what the final
project actually delivered. As long as there are change management
request forms that have been completed and approved to account for
these differences, then the project is still considered a success.
The final project represents the original Scope Statement plus all
authorized change documentation. If these don’t exist but
the end project differs from the original Scope Statement, the project
is not successful. No excuses as to why!! |
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| As a part of closing the project, it is important
to complete a final Project Close-Out Evaluation. The project plan
will become a template for all future, similar projects. In this
way, the next time you have a similar project, you do not need to
go through this entire process in the same amount of detail. Rather,
you can use the previous project plan as a template upon which to
build the new plan. With the comments on the project evaluation,
you’ll know what durations, budget requirements or other elements
will need to be adjusted. |
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| Knowledge Retention is critical. Knowing the lessons
learned from this project to pass on to other project managers and
teams for future application will help to accelerate the management
of their projects. |
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| Summary: |
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| I have audited many projects, managed many projects, taught
many people how to successfully manage projects and provided presentations
on the management of projects. In my experience I have found that
the reasons for which projects get into crisis, go over budget or
fail to meet customer requirements is that project teams do not apply
a disciplined Project Management Process. The key is to understand
that managing projects is a process…not just knowledge of the
tools and techniques. |
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| About the Author |
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| As President and CEO of Business Improvement Architects, Michael works with executives and senior managers around the world to help them improve operational effectiveness through strategic planning, leadership development, project management and quality management. He has been instrumental in helping his clients reduce waste and increase efficiencies and profits with his clear processes and quality approach. |
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| For more information about this article, please contact
bia™ at info@bia.ca. |
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| Michael Stanleigh is author of the global report: “2010 PMO Global Study: How a Project Management Office Can Improve Organizational Effectiveness”.
For more information about this report, please contact
bia™ at info@bia.ca. |
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| © Business Improvement Architects |
