Key Project Manager Practices

Managing a project can be daunting, but using the right techniques and tools will help the project manager achieve a project no matter how complex or large it might be.  There are seven practices that any project manager can put to good use to ensure the success of the project.

Define the objectives, scope and stakeholders
Firstly, understand the project objectives. Deciding the real objectives will help plan the project.  The client may have many ideas, but often it turns out that most of those ideas are not applicable to the current project.
Scope is the boundaries of the project.  Deciding what’s in or out of scope will determine the amount of work which needs performing.

Determine the stakeholders, what they expect to be delivered and enlist their support.  The stakeholders will review the objectives and scope, and either agree with them, or indicate what needs to be changed before they can give their approval.

Define the deliverables
Define what will be delivered by the project.  Decide what things, whether product or service, will be delivered.  Document them in enough detail to enable someone else to produce them correctly and effectively.
Key stakeholders must review the definition of deliverables and must agree they accurately reflect what must be delivered.

Project planning
Define what activities are required to produce the deliverables using techniques such as Work Breakdown Structures. Estimate the time and effort required for each activity, dependencies between activities and decide a realistic schedule to complete them. Involve the project team in estimating how long activities will take. Set milestones which indicate critical dates during the project. Write this into the project plan. Get the key stakeholders to review and agree to the plan.

Communication
Project plans are useless unless they’ve been communicated effectively to the project team. Every team member needs to know their responsibilities. I once worked on a project where the project manager sat in his office surrounded by huge paper schedules. The problem was, nobody on his team knew what the tasks and milestones were because he hadn’t shared the plan with them. The project hit all kinds of problems with people doing activities which they deemed important rather than doing the activities assigned by the project manager.

Tracking and reporting project progress
Once your project is underway you must monitor and compare the actual progress with the planned progress. You will need progress reports from project team members. You should record variations between the actual and planned cost, schedule and scope. You should report variations to your manager and key stakeholders and take corrective actions if variations get too large.

Change management
By managing changes, the project manager can make decisions about whether or not to incorporate the changes immediately or in the future, or to reject them. This increases the chances of project success because the project manager controls how the changes are incorporated, can allocate resources accordingly and can plan when and how the changes are made. Not managing changes effectively is often a reason why projects fail.

Risk management
Risks are events which can adversely affect the successful outcome of the project.  Risks will vary for each project but the main risks to a project must be identified as soon as possible. Plans must be made to avoid the risk, or, if the risk cannot be avoided, to mitigate the risk to lessen its impact if it occurs. This is known as risk management. Not managing risks effectively is a common reason why projects fail. Download these  Project Risk Management Templates to reduce risk on projects. View the sample risk management templates in PDF - Project Risk Management templates

How to Initiate Projects Successfully

How to Initiate Projects Successfully

Did you know that a large percentage of projects are cancelled before they even reach the detailed planning phase? The most common reason is that they have not been properly defined and scoped, and as a result, they lack the sponsorship needed to ensure their success.

Therefore, it's critical that you initiate your projects as quickly and efficiently as possible, by taking these 6 steps:

Step 1: Develop a Business Case

The first step taken when initiating a new project, is the creation of a comprehensive Business Case. A Business Case describes the business problem / opportunity to be addressed by the project and the alternative solutions available. The potential costs and benefits associated with each alternative solution are also defined.

The Business Case becomes the foundation for the project as it fully documents the reasons for creating the project and the key benefits to be delivered. Once produced, the Business Case should be formally endorsed by the Project Sponsor, before funding is allocated to the project.

Step 2: Undertake a Feasibility Study

A Feasibility Study is completed to identify the likelihood of the alternative solutions actually delivering the benefits stated in the Business Case. Based on the results of the Feasibility Study and the Benefits and Costs portrayed in the Business Case, a preferred solution is identified and once again, is approved by the Project Sponsor.

If you can complete a comprehensive Feasibility Study, then you will greatly improve your chances of delivering your project successfully. 

Step 3: Establish the Project Charter

Once the problem and solution have been identified, a new project is then defined to deliver the solution. The "Project Charter" is documented, which essentially describes what the project sets out to achieve and the boundaries within which it must achieve it.

The project vision, objectives, scope, deliverables, project organization and an implementation plan are all clearly stated in the Project Charter document. 

Step 4: Appoint the Project Team

Now that the project is defined, it is time to appoint the team. The Project Board is established and the Project Manager is recruited to take on responsibility for the project. The Project Manager recruits the Team Leaders and they in turn help recruit project staff. Every team member is assigned a detailed Job Description, defining their role and responsibilities within the project. 

Step 5: Set up a Project Office

The Project Office environment is then established, as the physical place of residence for the team for the duration of the project. This environment will provide the premises, equipment, materials, tools and processes required to enable the members of the project team to perform their roles successfully. A checklist is used to ensure that the Project Office has been set up correctly and will continue to support the Project as needed. 

 Step 6: Perform Review

Once the project has been defined and the team have been appointed, you're ready to perform a project phase review. A Phase Review is completed to ensure that all of the required Initiation activities have been undertaken and to provide formal approval to proceed to the next phase: Project Planning.

And there you have it - 6 steps to initiating projects successfully. 

Developing a Project Plan

Developing a Project Plan

Template Tips: Developing a Project Plan
The first activity within the Planning phase is the creation of a Project Plan.  To create a Project Plan, you should first identify the ‘Work Breakdown Structure’ (WBS) which is a hierarchical set of phases, activities and tasks to be undertaken on the project. After the WBS has been agreed, an assessment of the effort required to undertake the activities and tasks is made.

The activities and tasks are sequenced, resources are allocated and a detailed project schedule is formed. This project schedule will become the primary tool for the Project Manager to assess the progress of the project. The Project Plan should include:

• A detailed description of the project scope
• A list of the project milestones (descriptions and dates)
• A list of the project phases, activities and tasks
• Resources/effort allocation against phases, activities and tasks
• A project schedule depicting when the tasks will be undertaken
• A list of planning dependencies, assumptions and constraints

Project Tips: How to properly Execute a Project

The Project Execution phase is the phase within which the deliverables are physically constructed and presented to the customer for acceptance. While the project team are producing the deliverables, the Project Manager should implement the following management processes to monitor and control the activities being undertaken:

• Time Management (recording time spent against the project)
• Cost Management  (keeping track of project expenditure)
• Quality Management  (assuring and controlling the quality of deliverables)
• Change Management (managing changes to scope, deliverables and timescales)
• Risk Management (identifying, quantifying and mitigating potential project risks)
• Issue Management (documenting and resolving project issues)
• Procurement Management (sourcing of products and services from external suppliers)
• Acceptance Management (gaining customer acceptance of project deliverables)
• Communications Management (distributing communications within the project).

Project Management Life Cycle

Any project you are preparing will proceed more smoothly and with greater effect by understanding and utilizing the Project Management Life Cycle.  It will assist you in narrowing the focus, keeping objectives in order, and of course bring the project to completion on time and under budget.

The life cycle of a project progresses though five steps, which are Initiation, Planning, Execution, Monitoring/Control and Closure. There isn’t a single step that is more important that any other, and each step is critical to the successful completion of the project.

The first step is Initiation. It provides the over-view of the project and how it will be successfully achieved.  The most common tools or methodologies used are Project Review, Plan, Overview and Schedule Reviews.  The new project starts by defining its objectives, scope, purpose and list of deliverables to be produced.  During this initial phase the project manager will be appointed, and he will select his team members according to their experience and skills.

Planning is the second step in the project management life cycle.  The plan must include certain elements, such as a breakdown that is detailed into tasks and the assignment of each task to members of the project team, from start to finish.  There must also be set criteria for defining successful completion of each task.  Typically a risk assessment is included in the Planning step as well.
This phase involves creating of a set of plans to help guide your team through the execution and closure of the project.  The plans created will help manage time, cost, quality, change orders or variation, risk factors and other issues. They will also help you to manage key personnel and external vendors/suppliers, to ensure that you deliver the project on time and within budget.

Execution and Control are the third and fourth steps in the project management life cycle.  These phases tend to be grouped together because each step of execution is measured against the control standard of the project.  The solution for the project’s purpose (usually solving an existing problem) is implemented.  As these steps progress, stakeholders become more involved in the planning for the final step.

The Project Execution is usually the longest phase in the project life cycle and it typically consumes the most energy and the most resources.  The most important issue in this part is to ensure activities are properly executed and controlled. You will need to implement a range of management processes during this phase. These processes help you to manage procurement, client approvals and communications.
The most common tools or methodologies used in the execution phase are an update of Risk Analysis Review, in addition to Project/Business Plan. The planned solution is implemented/incorporated to solve the problem specified in the business requirements.

Closure is the natural end to any cycle, and the project management cycle is no different.  A formal written project review report is developed, containing these elements: the formal acceptance by the client of the result of the project; a comparison of the initial requirements against the delivered product; lessons learned; project resources; and the formal project closure notification to higher management.

Create your own Project Life cycle...

Create your own Project Lifecycle

It you don't want to have to start every project from scratch, then it's worthwhile creating your own Project Life cycle.

How should you do this? What should it look like? And how do you use it? Keep reading to find out how to...

Create your own Project Life cycle...

A Project Life cycle is a series of steps that you take to complete a project from start to finish. Of course, it implies that you can complete the same steps for every project— so is this true?

In principle, yes. Every project will have an Initiation phase, a Planning phase, an Execution phase and a Closure phase. However within these phases, the steps you take may vary slightly between projects.

The trick is to create a lifecycle that is generic enough to use for all of your projects, while still being specific enough to add value and save you time on delivery. Here's how to do it...

Map it out

Every project is delivered in some form of lifecycle. You probably usually define your project upfront, then you'll hire your team, you'll plan and complete a set of tasks to create some deliverables and then get your customer to signoff the output. This sequence of steps are what is called a "lifecycle" and chances are that you're using the same generic lifecycle every time you deliver a project!

So start by mapping out your current project lifecycle on a blank sheet of paper and identify the elements that you know work well, and those that don't.

And improve it

Then try and improve your lifecycle by analyzing why certain steps don't work well currently. Analyze the root cause and identify which steps you could take instead, to improve your chance of success. For instance, maybe "scope creep" is an issue for you, so by putting in place better steps for managing changes to scope, it would help.

Once you have identified the sequence of steps that you know will deliver your projects successfully from start to finish, the next thing you need to do is to "get detailed".

Get detailed

With a clearly defined series of steps, you now need to define the tasks and activities that are needed to perform each step efficiently. For instance, if your first step was to get funding for your project, then do you need to create a Business Case or Financial Plan to do it? What type of person will authorize the funding and what information will they need to do it?

For every step, describe how you intend to do it, the tasks and activities to be taken, and as importantly, who is responsible for doing them (e.g. it is yourself or members of your team)?

Tool up

Great—so you have a crystal clear process for delivering projects. Now how can you do each step quickly and efficiently? Typically project managers use templates, software and examples to help them complete each step faster and more efficiently. With a well documented lifecycle, the right lifecycle steps and good tools, you will be armed and ready to tackle any type of project to succeed.

Get ready

And finally, with all of this collateral, you need to collect it into a single place, ready to use on projects. Many project managers use "MPMM" for this, as you can create a brand new Project Lifecycle and import all of your templates and examples into it, ready for use.

By creating your own project lifecycle or customizing that of another, you can apply a single approach to managing successful projects.

Download a complete Project Lifecycle within MPMM now...