Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Project Management

Why Projects must be managed?

Projects are inherently complex as it deals with people, money and time.
-People would have various cultural backgorunds, ambitions and pressure. Money is involved as it is in anything and everything else. Projects are usually bound by time because businesses may loose their edge or other benefits.

Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Projects

Projects are temporary endeavors. Temporary does not mean that the projects are small and for short periods. Projects could run for several years. Projects should have a clear beginning and finish. Projects that do not have a definite closing are not projects. Production/Manufacturing, Maintenance are examples that do not have an end. Big projects are naturally complex because of their size, number of people involved and finance. Efforts required to manage small projects are not too much for the same reasons stated for very large projects.

Managing a project is not an art which only a certain people can do. In fact eveyone of us had done many projects in our life. Projects nowadays is commonly associated to what people do for companies and agencies.

Projects need to be done with some planning, estimation, and anticipation for unknowns. Writing the plan and checking them during the course is critical for a project's success. That way one can be sure how the project progresses.

Unknowns are common during the start of a project and one must be ready for the unexpected. How would we react to things which were not planned for?

Projects cannot be successful without the expected outcome. Many projects had been abandoned since the end result could not be acheived for several reasons. May be not enough money, someone who promised to help to complete certain things did not turn up, unrealistic goal etc..

So a project has to be managed efficiently to make it a success.