As the saying goes; “life is one big project, the trick is in managing it.”  We all make plans, schedule activities, and try to manage our time and balance our budgets.  Everyone one of us in our own way is a project manager.  What is Project Management?  Project Management has many definitions. The Project Management Institute (PMI) defines it as “a temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product, service or result”.
 

A project is a unique temporary endeavor with the objective of bringing about specific long-lasting outcomes.  For this reason, it differs from a program.  A program is a collection of related projects and sub-programs that are in line with an organization’s mission.  No two projects are alike.  Even projects that aim to bring about similar outcomes, or duplicated previous outcomes will differ in the process, environment, or the final outcomes themselves.  That is why each project is unique.

According to the PMBOK Guide, Project Management has 5 phases.  They are Initiating, Planning, Executing, Monitoring & Controlling, and Closing.  The number of phases and the way they are labeled may differ from one book to the next, but the processes remain the same.  We discussed in our seminar what a project is, the role of the project manager and team.  We covered the documents and processes required to initiate a project.  The participants were taught the inputs, processes, outputs, and tools needed in the execution phases and how to close a project; however, due to time restrictions, we geared the bulk of our seminar towards explaining the Planning and Monitoring & Controlling phases using practical examples.  Given the time constraints, we focused on those 2 phases because of their importance to the success of any project.

Benjamin Franklin famously said, “If You Fail to Plan, You Are Planning to Fail.”  Project management is no exception.  If your project is not well planned, you are destined to fail in 1 or more project constraints (schedule, budget, and scope).  There are tools and processes in project management that assist in putting in place a well-orchestrated plan.

The planning phase entails identifying the tasks required to complete the project and setting them in order. The WBS (Work Breakdown Structure), is a vital tool used to plan out and sequence the activities required to complete the project.  The activities must be in chronological order.  It is a graphical tool used to depict the hierarchical decomposition of the project into phases, activities, and tasks.  The WBS is created before completing a comprehensive plan, it assists with estimating the resources needed and creating a cost and time schedule.

The PERT Chart (Program Evaluation and Review Technique) is another important tool used for scheduling activities on a chronologically ordered timeline, it connects activities per their relationship to one another.  The first step is to make a list of activities required to complete a project in order.  Those that have a sequential relationship should be indicated. Secondly, the most likely duration of each activity is mathematically determined.  From there the PERT chart is created.  Each activity is mapped out in their relation to one another.

The chart is updated with the duration of each activity; as well as the earliest and latest finish times.  One of the main objectives of the PERT Chart is determining the most critical activities which if delayed cause delays to the project as a whole.  This is known as the critical Path.  The Critical Path helps decipher activities that cannot be delayed from those that have “slack” (can be delayed).  Once students were taught how to prepare and create a PERT chart, they were shown how to determine the probability of completing the project activities on time using a Z-chart along with some other mathematical equations.

The Monitoring and Controlling process oversees and measures all the tasks and metrics required to guarantee that the approved and authorized project is completed within scope, on time, and on budget, while minimizing risks.  What is being monitored here are the 3 constraints that if not controlled negatively affect the success of a project.  Successfully monitoring and controlling a project is not simply observing.

There are mathematical tools used to track the performance of the project.  These tools help to track the 3 constraints which are the schedule, budget, and scoop of work.  The data gathered is analyzed to gain an understanding of how well the activities are being performed in relation to the project plan, and then taking that information and making forecasts and changes are made when needed.

Earned Value Management (EVM) is used in Project Management to measure schedule and cost. The information gathered from EVM indicates how well a project is performing.  EVM is used to analyze performance indexes and variances between the planned and actual schedule and cost of a project at any given moment within its lifecycle.  This way the project manager can monitor whether or not a project is on schedule and within budget.