CONTENTS Figure List Preface to the Fourth Edition ‘Acknowledgments Chapter 1 An Overview of Project Management Chapter 2 The Role ofthe Project Manager Chapter 3 Planning the Project Chapter 4 Developing a Mission, Vision, Goals, ‘and Objectives for the Project, Chapter 5 Creating the Project Risk Plan Chapter 6 Using the Work Breakdown Structure to Plan a Project Chapter 7 Scheduling Project Work Chapter 8 Producing a Workable Schedule CChapter 9 Project Control and Evaluation Chapter 10 The Change Control Process Chapter 11 Project Control Using Earned Value Analysis CChapter 12 Managing the Project Team Chapter 13. The Project Manager as Leader Chapter 14 How to Make Project Management Work in Your Company ‘Answers to Chapter Questions Index ‘About the Authors 48 55 68 at 93 112 125 141 156 168 180 185 189 201FIGURE LIST ‘Tianges showing the lationship beteen PC, T,and Lute cyte ofa troubled projet. Appropriate project life yee ‘The steps in managing a project S41. Two pain cuvesin a projet over tie, 3-2. Planning answering questions. 41. Chevron showing misson, von, and problem statement, 4-2, Risk analysis example, Sel. Rsk matrix, 5-2. Riskregistet (6-1. WBS diagram to clean a room, 6-2. WBS level names. 6-3. Paral WHS. 6-4. Responstbiity char, 1. Barchart. 2, arrow dagrams, 3. WBS to do yard project. 7-4. CPM alagram for yard proc. -5, WBS to cleanroom, ‘841. Network to iustate computation methods, 8-2. Diagam with EF times led in 8-3. Diagam showing etc pat,Faure 8-4, Bar chat schedule for yard project. 8-5. Schedule with resources overnades 8-6, Schedule using oat to level resources. 8-7. Schedule with inadequate fost on C to permit leveling 88, Schedule under resource crcl conditions. 8-9, Network for exerci. 10-1, Triple constraint range 10-2, Project change contol form. 10-3, Project change conto og, 1A. BEWS cure. 11-2. Bar chart schedule iustrating cumulative spending, 11-3, Cumulatve spending for te sample bar chart I-A, Pt showing project behind schedule and overspent. 11-5, Project ahead of schedule, spending comecty 11-6, Projects behind schedle but spending correely 11-7, Projects ahead of schedule and underspent 11-8, Percentage complete curve 11-9, "Eaened valve report. 13-1. Leadership style and alignment ‘Al. WBS forthe camping tp. ‘A2. Solution tothe WBS exercise, 'A3._ Solution tthe scheduling exercise Preface to the Fourth Edition Sendinga satelite to Mars? Planning conference or Implement: ing new software? You have chosen the right book. The peat ‘value of project management is that tcan be applied actos in dustries and situations allke, on multiple level It would be if cal to find a more nimble organizational discipline. Whether or ‘ot your title says project manege, you can benefit rom the pra tial applications presented in this book, which is intended as a bref overview of the tools, techniques, and discoine of project ‘management a5 a whole. Three notable topics have been ex panded for this edition, with new chapters onthe prlect man ager as leader, managing project risk, and the change contol process, hough each topic s important individually, together they can establish the bass for project sucesso fare. Projects ate often accomplished by teams, teams are made up ‘of peopl, and people are driven by... projet leaders. Conspe: ‘uousy absent ftom the preceding i the term “manage,” a8 in “project manager” Ifprojct managers manage projects, what do they do withthe people wino make up ther tems or suppart net ‘works in the absence of a formal team? Successful project leaders lead he people on thet eams to consistent goal attainment and“ Preface to the Fourth Eaton | enticed performance. They combine a command af project tools and technical savry with areal understanding of eedeship and team performance. Consistently succesful projects depend ‘on both, Itisa balancing act of execution and skilled people man- agement. Ignoring one or the other inviting proec flue and onganizational inconsistency regarding project performance, Rik isan element inherent in every project. The project manager must consider several variables when determining how ‘much to inves in the mitigation and management ofthat rs, ‘How experienced is my team or support personnel? Do I have the appropriate ski sets avaiable? Can I count on reliable data from previous projets or am I wandering in the wikdemess? Whatever the assessment, project risk is something that needs tw be addressed early inthe ile of the projet. As with anyother ‘process you wil be Introduced to in tis book, rk must be an- ‘aged formal}, with litle deviation from the template, while a: lowing for some fexiblty. Project managers cannot aford to ‘wait for bad things to happen and then fx them. Reactive man: agement is too costly. The practical SiStep process presented on pages 57-62 can and shouldbe applied to any project. How itis applied drectiy depends on the variables that confront that project Death, taxes, and change, Project managers need to expand the list of certainties nite. To paraphrase James P. Lewis, author ofthe fist thee editions of thisbook, in Chapter 3, project aus are caused primary by the allure to plan popes often el my seminar attendees that planning is everything and that mast pro fects succeed or fil up front. This is not an overstatement. But ‘what offen gets lst in project execution isthe absolute necessity to keep the plan curent based on the changes that have alfcted the project fom day one, Have the changes allected the scope of the projec? Has te schedule o budget been impacted in any ig nlfcant way? These ae the questions that must be asked and an ‘swered when applying eective change contralto the project. Flue to manage and communicate change resuls in serious mis alignment and probably fare. Chapter 10 presen the reader [Preface to the Fourth Eton ‘with a practical change contol process that can help ensure prof et succes ‘Asa former Global Practice Leader for project management at the American Management Association, [had the luxury of benchmarking multiple organizations worldwide and Wentied several projectrelted best practices. The applications discussed here represent some of these practices, a6 well at those pre sented Inthe latest version ofthe PMBOK® Guide. With this ex panded edition of Fundamentals of Project Management, hope ‘two enhance your chances of bringing projects in on time, on bua set with an excellent delverable—every time, Joseph J. Heapney Sayre, NY February 2011Acknowledgments ‘A special thanks to Nicolle Heagney for her technical astance in ceating many of the figures and chars presented in te Book Her expertise and diligence made my Ie alot ease. Thanks to Kyle Heagney for allowing me to miss some of his soocer games,Fundamentals of Project ManagementAn Overview of Project Management i ata ee ts aot, anya? Se te steal 1 | stone ws plane ee ae ae \' | Inte PM) has go rom afew thousand menbes | rat 000 navi He haeclya mene Ph te esl eepntin Ropero pokes, evan et cena terse oy wei espn a elten ening ne Ienbe st a nab coetves MU etochaee e angie 3 poten, Todo so nha cana oe Fateh poses whey quiver ovina eta tet Margene Pts PRP) Seger se tenn mut ave mo eres tong Se thowun bun) aps nates eas ae ae Poet agent ded oniede rea hae ‘Apotn eo at a hoet mapa a poe mann ttn pol aes Mes and Toes co sane ae noi teres ohh ering pet ninese Shee ants om pened manapenne ee ces ince he eae hn non oe eas2 Fundamental of Project Manas | An Overview of Project Management 3 general managers handle. And the people n a projet team often dot report directly to the project manager, whereas they do re- ort to most general managers So just what is project management, and, for that matte, hat sa projet? PMI dafinesa project as ‘a temporary endeavor undertaken to produce a unique product, service, or result" |PMBOR® Guide, Project Man agement Insitute, 2008, 5}. This | porary endeavor means that a project is done only one time. tis epee, its nota pec. | Undertaken to A project should have dese starting and ending points (time), a budget (cost, a clearly detned scope —or mag- ritude—of work tobe done and specific performance requirements that must be tet. [say "shoul because seldom does 8 project conform tothe desired definition, These constrains on 2 project, by the way, ae referred to throughout this book 3s the PCTS rargess. Dr. M. Juran, the quality guru, also defines a project as a problem sheild fr solution, like this definition because ite ‘minds me tat every projects conducted produce a unique product, service, or result.” to solve some kind of protiem for acom- | A project is a any, However, I must caution thatthe | problem scheduled ‘word “problem” rypially has a negative meaning, and projects deal with both | for solution, postive and negative Kinds of problems. | yan Forexampl, developing anew products problem, but a positive one, vile an environmental cleanup ject deals wit a negative kind of problem, Project Failures Jn fact, the Standish Group (wnnstanalshroup. com) hes found. that only about 17 percent of all software projects dane in the United States meet the orignal PCTS targets, 0 percent must have the targets changed—meanig they are usually late o ver spent and must have thelr performance requirements reduced — and the remaining 33 percent are actually canceled, One year, U.S companies spent more chan $250 tilion on software devel. ‘opment nationwide, so thls means that $80 bilion was com. pletely lost on canceled projects. Whats wuly astonishing i that {83 percent of allsoftware projec get into trouble! "Now lest you thin 1 am picking on sofware companies, let me sy that these statisti apply to many diferent kinds of pro ects, Product development, for example, shares similar dismal ‘ate ofalure, waste, and cancelation, Experts on predict devel ‘opment estate that about 30 percent ofthe cost to develop @ ‘ew producti rework. That means that one of every thre eng neers assigned to a project is working ful time just redoing what ‘wo other engineers did wrong inte ist place! "also hare a colleague, Bob Dudley, who has been involved ‘in constuction projects for thirytve years. He tells me that ‘these jobs aso tend to have about 30 percent rework, fact that ‘ound dificult to believe, because Ihave always thought of con struction as being firy well defined and thus easier to contol than might be the case for research projects, far example. Never theless, several colleagues of mine confirm Bob’ statistics. ‘The reason for these failures Is consistently found tobe nad ‘equate project planning, People adopt area fre alm approach In an effor to eta job done realy fast and end up spending far ‘ore time than necessary by reworking errors, recovering fom Aiversions down “blind alleys," and s0 on, ‘lam fequenty esked how to just formal project manage- ‘ment to senior managers in companies, and I always cite these st titles. However, they want to Know Whether using good project ‘anagement relly reduces the flues andthe revor, an I can nly say you wil have to try it and see for yourself you can achieve levels of rework of anya few percent using a seat ihe ‘Ban's appoaci to managing profes, then Keep doing what you'te Going! However, don’t beleve you wil nd tis obe true4 Fundamentals of Projet Management | ‘The question | would ask is whether general management makes a dfference. Ife locked up all the managers Ina company [An Overview of Project Management ‘would be better ifthe AMBOK® Guide specined that prof ect manager should facttate planing. One mistake made b i for a couple of months, would business continue at the same levels of perfor mance, or would thse lees decline? If they decline, then we could argue that management must have been doing something positive, and vice versa. I doube that many’ general managers ‘would want to say that what they do doesn't matter. However, we all know that there ae elective and ineffective peneral managers, an tis is true of pro ect managers, 2s wel ‘experienced project managers isto plan the projet fr the team. Not only do they get no buyin to their pln, but that plan usualy fl of hoes, ‘Managers can't think of everthing, theit estimates of task durations are wrong, and the entire thing falls apart after the Drojects started, The fist ule of project ‘managements thatthe people wino must do the work should hep plant The role ofthe project manager is that ofan enabler. Her job iso help the team get the work completed, to “run interference” forthe team, to get scarce resources that team members need, and to butler them from outside forces that Would distupt the work. She is nota project czat She should be—above everyhing—a leader inthe ue sense ofthe word ‘The best definition of leadership that Ihave founds the one by Vance Packard, in his book The Pyramid Climbers. He says, “Leadership isthe art of geting others to want to do something that you be lieve should be done.” The operative Project: manage- mment is application of knowledge, sill, tools, and tech- niques to project activities to achieve project require- ments, Project management is ‘The first rule of project manage- ment is that the people who must do the work ehould help plan it, What Is Project Management? ‘The, PMBOK® Gulde detnion of prof fect’ management is “application of knowiedg, sk, tools, and techniques to project activities to meet the projet requirements, Project managements ac ‘complished through ‘the application and Integration of the “Leaderchip is the complished through the application and | Prelect manage ‘word here's “want.” Dictators get om» | art of getting Integration ofthe 42 ogcaly grouped | ment processes of ers todo things that they want dane, So wat project management proceses comps: | = Pt do guards who supervise prion work | tere to want to Ing the 5 Process Growps: initiating, | initiating, planning, ‘eans, But leader gets people to want | do something that ‘laning, executing, monitoring and con woling, and closing” (PMBOK® Guide, diterence you believe should Project Management Institute, 2008, | ing and controlling, ‘The planning scheduling and con- | be done.” p. 6, Project requirements include the PCTS targets mentioned previously. The varlous processes of initiating, Planning and soon are addressed later in this chapter, and the bulk ofthis book is devoted to explain Ing how hese processes are accomplished. two of work represent the management or administrative pat of the job. But, ‘without leadership, projets tend to just satisfy bare minimum requirements. With leadership, they can ex ceed those bare minimums. [offer a comprehensive application of project leadership techniques in Chapter 13, and closing. | executing, monitor | todo the work, and that ia significant | ance Packarde Fundemantals of Project Management | It Is Not Just Sched (One ofthe common misconceptions about projec management 's that iis just scheduling, At last report, Microsoft had sold a ‘huge number of copies of lrosftProjec®, yet the projet fl lure rte remains high, Scheduling certainly @ major tol used to ‘manage projects, but it isnot near as important as developing a Shared understanding of what the projec is supposed to accom plish or constructing a good work breakdown structure (WBS) to identify all the work tobe done (discuss the WS In Chapter 6), In fact, without practicing god project management, the only thing detailed schedules going to dois llow you to document your flares with great precision! [do want to make one point about scheduling software. It doesn't mater too much which pactape you selec, as they allhave strong and weak poinis. However, the tendency Isto gve people the software and expect hem to Fearn how to use It without any tring, This simpy does not work, The features of scheduling Software ae such that most people don't eam the subtleties by ‘themselves. They don't have the time, because they ae ring to do thei equa obs, and not everyone i god a self-paced learn: ing You wouldn't hit a green person to run a complex machine In factory and pat him to werk without traning, because you ‘nw he will destroy something or injure himse. So why do it ‘with software? ‘One-Person Projects ‘When is managing a projet not project management? When only one person is involved. ‘Alot of people are sent tomy seminars to lara how to manage projets, but they ae the onty person working an their projects, Now itis rue that one person jo canbe called a projec, because ithas a definite starting point, target, end dat, speci perfr mance requirements, defined scope of work, and a budget. How ee, when no one ees Working onthe projet including ouside vendors), there Is no need fora ctl path schedule. A etc, | An Overview of Project Management 2 path schedule one that has a numberof parallel paths, and one of ‘them sioner than the oer and determines hor long tw tke ‘to complete the job o ulmatly, wheter the given end date can bbemet. When you're working on ob by youself there aren't any parallel pats—unless you ae ambidextrous! One person projets do requite good selfmanagement, ot 400d time management, but all you need isa good to-do ist, ‘Which comes fom a task listing, However, unless you are coor. nating the work ofother people, you aren't practicing true project, management. ‘The Big Trap—Working Project Managers tis common to have individuals serve as project managers and equi ako that they do part ofthe actual work in the project. ‘This isa certain prescription for problems, it a tru team, con sisting of several peope, the project manager inevitably fds her seiftom between managhng and geting her part ofthe werk done Naturally, the work must take precedence, ot the schedule wil slp, so she ops to do the work. That means thatthe managing oes nt get done, She hopes twill take care of sel butt never oes, After al if the team could manage itself, there would be no need fora project manager inthe frst pace (temember our angi ‘ment about whether project management mates) Unfortunately, when the time comes for her performance evaluation, she will be tol that her managing needs improving Actually, she just needs tobe allowed to practice management in the fst pace. Yes, for very small teams—peraps upto three o four people— a project manager can do some of te work, Bu, a tee size in ‘ease, becomes impossible to work and manage both, because youare constantly being piled away from the work by the needs of your team members, (One of the reasons for ths station fs that organizations don't fully understand what project management i all about and they think that itis posible for individuals odo bth, The result tht nearly everyone inthe company is trying to manage project, and,2 Fundamentals of Project Managemant | 4 5 tue In every discipline, some of them wil be good att and ‘others will eve no aptitude whatsoeve, [have found that afer ‘etter approach to select a few individuals who have the apt tude and desie to be project managers and lt them manage & ‘umber of small projects. This res *techical” people (to use the {erm broadly todo technical work without having to worry about ‘administrative issues and allows project managers to get really ‘od at thel jobs. Its outside the scope ofthis book to discuss how to select roject managers, bu, fr the intrested reades, the topic i cov. ered Ina book by Wysock and Lewis tiled The World Class Pro ect Manager (Perseus, 2001) You Can't Have It All ‘One of the common causes of project failures that the project sponsor demands thatthe peojct manager must ish the jo by ‘certain tie, within budget, and ata given magnitude oF Scope, ‘iil achieving specific performance levels, In other word, the sponsor dictates all four ofthe project contalts. This doesn't ‘work. ‘The relationship among the PCTS constants canbe writen as follows: C= 13) In words, this sys, “Cost sa function of Performance, Tine, and Scope.” Graphically, tke to show it sa tial, in whlch P,C, and T are the sides and S isthe area, Tiss shown in Figure I-1 In geometry, we know that if we are given values forthe sides ofa triangle, we can compute the area, Or if we know the are and the length of two sides, we can compiite the length of the remaining sie. This translates into a very practical rule of project management: The sponsor can asign values to any three ‘varables, but the proect manager must determine the remain Ing one. [An Overview of Project Management 8 Figure 1-1. Triangles showing the rl between F, ©, T, ana. N /\ T a Solet assume thatthe sponsor requires certain performance, time and scope from the project. I's the project manager’ ob to determine what it wil cos tn achieve those results, However, | always caution project managers that they should have a pare ‘medic standing by when they give the cost gure to the sponsor because she wil probably havea stoke ot heat attack, and the paramedic will have to evive her Invatably, the sponsor exclaims, "How can it cost thet much?” She had a figure in mind and your number wil avays exceed her figure, And she may'say, It it's going to cost that ‘much, we can justly doing the ob” Exactiy) And that is the de sion se should make. But she is certain to ty to get the project, ‘manage to commit to 2 lower number, and, you do, then You only setup yourself—and hero take big al later on. kis your abigtiono give the sponsor a valid cost so that she can make a ald decison about whether or et the projet should be dane. Ifyou allow yourself to be intimidated into commiting to ‘lower numbers ust going to bea dsaster ater on, and you ate far better of taking your lumps nove than being hanged later a, (Of couse, there is another possi, she says she can afford ‘only s0 much forthe ob, then you ean afer to reduce the scope the jo is viable a that cope level, hen the project can be done. (Otherwise, i s prudent to forget this projet and do something else that can make profits forthe company. As someone has said, ship0 Furdamontalo of Project Management | [An Overviw of Project Management there isa hlgher probability that thngs will acldentaly go wrong "suppose the comfr I can take i that we Americans are not the Ina project than that they wil acide go right. n terms of cost ‘only ones who have the problem, but the bad news stat there esas ths means hat ee SANE a higher area ot of dysfunctional projec evryure recognizes the model 4 higher ikelbood that the budget win | There ie a At the simplest level, a project bas a beginning, middle, and be overun than that the projet vel | probability that ed preter theif cycle mode show in gue 1-3, bat ther are come in below budget. This is just an : ‘other vesions that are equaly vai. In my model, you wil notice other way of stating Murphy's law, that | things will acciden- that every project begins asa Concept, wich is always “fuzzy,” and “whatever cen go wrong will zo 1008” | sally go wrong in a ‘hat the project eam must formalize the defaton oft ob betore ee doing any work. Howere, because of our ready fre aim mental, The Phases of a Project | Prelect than ope ttton ofr Ge ments water ee ‘There are many diferent models or the | hey will acciden- ‘Shared by everyone, This invariably leads to major problems as the pases project goes through duringits | tally go right. ject progress. This isilstated bythe example tat flows lifecycle. One of these captures the a ‘oorrequent nature of projects that are not managed wel and is Definition Phase shown in Figure 12. | Some yar ago, a project manager in one of my cen companies Tesh ths opeope al ve the wer and aed meat, "ve is ada coference cal ws ey ‘they invalaly laugh and say “Yes, thatthe way it wotks.” ‘members of my project team, and | ealzed that we don't age on what the projec supposed to accompls,” Figure +2. Lie eyele of troubled proec. assured him tat this was common “What should I do?” he asked. "told him tat he ad no choice ut to get the team members Figure 1-2. Appropriate project ite cycl, ‘CONCEPT "OEFINTION: PLANNING EXECUTION CLOSEOUT EFFORT EXPENDEDIN CANNING2 Fundamental of Project Managemen | all going in the same rection by darying te mision ofthe pro ect He asked me ofcitate a meeting to do ths ‘At the meeting, | stod in font ofa fp chart and began by saying, “Let wit a problem statement." Someone immedatly countered by sayin, *We don’t need to do that. We all now ‘What the problem i." | was unmoved by tis comment I ald “Well Ifthat tue, ljust formality and wil only take afew tninute, and it would help me if we wrote t down, s someone help me get started.” ‘Tm poing to bea lite facetious to llustrate what happened next, Someone said “The,” and I wrote the word on the chart, and someone else sal, *T don’ agree with th ‘Three hours late, we finally finished writing a problem statement. The project manager was right. The team did not agree on ‘what the problem was, much less how to sole it. Tiss funda ‘mental—and i so often true tat I bepin to think we havea de- fective gene in all of us that protubis us rom insisting that we have a good definition ofthe problem before we start the work. Remember, project management is saving a problem on large scale, and the way you define a problem determines how you ‘ill Solve it. Ifyou have the wrong definition, you may come up ‘with the right solution—to the wrong problem! In fac, Ihave become convinced that projects seldom fall at the end. Rate, they fall tthe definition stage. I call these pro} ects headless chicken projects because they are like the chicken ‘that has had is head chopped off and runs around spewing blood ‘everywhere before it nally falls over andi “ofall” dead, Pro} ects work the same way. They spew blo all aver the place, unt someone finally say, “I dink that projects dead,” and indeed it 's, Butt was actually dead when we chopped off ts head inthe beginning just tok a while for everyone to realize I. ‘Once the projects defined, you can plan how todo the work. ‘There ae the components tthe plan: strategy, tactics, and lo- sisics. Stategy ithe overall approach or "game plan” tat will be followed to do the work. An example ofstategy was elated to ‘me bya fiend who i into military histor [An Overview of Project Management 8 Strategy Dring Word War I, defense contactors were under great pes sure 10 bulld weaponry at an Intense level. To accelerate con struction of ships and planes In pariculay, many new assembly ‘methods were invented Avondale shipyards, fo example, worked ‘nthe method of bung ships. The tradional way had always ‘been to build the ship in an uplt position, However, ships bal from steel required welding inthe bottom, or keel area ofthe boat, and this was ver ifcult to do, Avondale decided to bul its ships upside down, to make the welding eases, and then turn them over to complete the structures abore the top deck. Tais strategy was so effective that Avondale could build boats faster, cheaper, and of higher quality than their competitor, and the strategy is sill being sed today, nearly seventy years ater Implementation Planning This pase Includes tactics and logistics. If you ar going to ulld boats upside doven, you must work ou the deals of how twill be done. A fixture’ must be constructed that wl hold the boat and allow it tobe turned aver without being damaged. This is called “working out the tactic.” It aso includes the sequence in ‘which the work willbe done, who will do what, and how long, each step wil take. Logistics deal with making sure the team has the materials and other supplies needed to do thelr obs. Orinaiy we think about providing teams with te ram materials they need, but i ‘the project isin a location where they can't get ood, work Wi soon come to a ging hat. So provisions must be made forthe team tobe fed-—and possibly housed, Execution and Control (Once the plan has been developed and approved, the tear can begin work. Thisis the execution phase, utils incudes con two, because, while the plan Is being implemented, progres Is ‘monitored to ensue that te works progesing according to the plan, When deviations from the plan occur, corrective action is” Fundamentals of Pojct Management | taken to get te projec back on tack, off thls snot possible, the plan s changed and approved, and the revised plan becomes the new baseline against wich progress is tracked. Closeout ‘When all the work has been completed, the closeout phase re quires tata review ofthe project be conducted. The purpose is to lear lessons fom this ob that can he applied to future ones ‘Two questions are asked: What did we do well” and "What do we want to improve next ime?” ‘Notice that we don’t asc what was done wrong. This ques tion tends to make people defensive, and they try 1o hide tings that may result in ther being punished. In fact, a esonseamed, review should never be conducted in a blame ané punishment mode, Ifyou ar trying to conduct an Inquistion, that diferent The purpose of an inquisition is usualy to nd who Is responsible for major disasters and punish them. Lessonsearned sesions should be exec what the words imply have leamed during the past few years tht very few organi: ‘ato do regolar Ison learned reviews oftheir projec, There = ‘arluctance 9 “open acan af warms.” And there a desieto get ‘on with the next job. The problemi that you ae almost sure to re- ‘eat the mistakes made an the previous project if na one knows ‘about them or has an understanding of how they happened so that they can determine how to prevent them. Bu, perhaps most im Portant, you cant even take advantage ofthe good things you dd Hyou don't know about them, thas been sald that he organizations that survive and thive In the future wil be those that lear faster thn their compettos, ‘This seems especially true for project, ‘The Steps in Managing a Project ‘The actual steps to manage a project are stralghtorward, Accom plshing them may not be. The model in gure 1-4 ilustates the steps. etter | An Overview of Poiect Management ® Figure 1-4, The stops in managing «projet (Deine the Probie} (bevel Seunion Opions] Plan the Poet ‘at mse dna? Yio wo | Hw tbe one? emu tietne | | Nowak cst Lieto we eed doit [— Beate te Fan] | Monitor Conte Progress | | fe we on vege Trot et mist be done? Should the plan be changed? [a .S8@ Project) What Shel e improved? Wat ee kwon Subsequent chapters of hs book elaborate on how each step Isaccompishe, Forno here a tie decrtion af he actors Involve6 Fundamentals of Projet Maragoment Define the Problem , ‘As was discussed previous, you need t identify the problem to be solved by the project. Ichelp to visualize the desired end re sult. What wl be diferent? What wil you se, heat, taste touchy tor smell (Use sensory evldence if things can't be quantified ‘What cent need i beng satisfied by the projecta Develop Solution Options How many diferent ways might you go about solving the prob lem? Brainstorm solution altematves (you can do this alone oF a: group, Othe avalable alternative, which do you think wil best solve the problem? Isit more or less casly than other sult able choices? Wil it result in a complete or ony a pata fix? Plan the Project a Panning answering qusions wat mist be done, byw, frown wes, anon try ane te terns afc ques 2 crea al Wed ese sep fore eal n Chae 2tough 4 Execute the Plan as vious. Once the plan i drafted, it must be implemented. I ‘tyne pple pongo es eo i together a plan, then fling to follow it Ifa plan snot followed, there isnot much point in planning, s tere? Monitor and Control Progress Mats deepest oun ee you ee Cex, Uns rogest meniae, you eannot he ste You ssn won be ke having tiny enon butt monitoring te highway sis ong the wa Ot cours i devison fom the pans decovere, you ast ask what mist be done to gt back on tac, of hat ‘Sens ipossbe-haw te pan shoul be modi to reflect new rates ‘49 Overview of Project Management Z Close the Project Once the destination has been reached, the projet is fried, bout there is a final step that shouldbe taken, Some people cll it an aut, others a postmortem (sounds abit morbie, doesn), ‘Whatever you call it, the point iso lear something fom what You just di Note the way the questions are phrased: What was fone wel? What should be Lmproved? What else ad we learn? Wecan always improve on what we have done. Howeve, sing “What did we do wrong?” is Ukely to make people a bit deter sive, so the focus should be on improvement, not on placing blame. More on this later The Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK®*) ‘The Project Management Insitute has attempted to determine 2 ‘minimum body of knowledge that needed by a project managet in order for him or her tobe effective As | mentioned eater ‘when I defined project management, there are five processes defined bythe PMBOK® Guide, topetier with nine genera tees of knowledge, and | val give bret summaries of them, I you ‘Want a complete document, you cn get one by visting the PMI website: wwrxpmLong Project Processes A process away of doing something, As previously mentioned, the PMBOK® Guideidenties five processes that ate used to ma. ‘age projects. Although some of them wil be predominant at cer ‘ain phases of a projec, they may come into play at any time Broadly speaking, however, they tend tobe employe inthe we (quence listed asthe project progresses. That i, inittng is done frst, then planing, then executing and soon. Inthe event that project goes off course, replanning comes int play, and Ifa poy. tis found tobe in serious trouble, may have to Ball the way ‘back to the initiating process to be restarted,® Fundamentalo of Project Managemen | Initiating (Once a delslon has been made to doa pofect, t must be init ated or launched. There ae a number of activities associated with this, One is forthe project sponsor to create a project char tet which defines whats to be done to meet the requirements of project customers. This a formal prooes that soften omitted in organizations, The charter should be used to authorize work on ‘the projec; dein the authority, responsibly, and accountabty ofthe projet team; and establish scope boundaries forthe jb. ‘When sucha document isnot produced, the team members may misinterpret whats requlted of them, and this ean be very cost. fe Ac eee series renee terms re ieee ec a Executing “Thete are two aspects to the process of project execution. One is to execute the Work that must be done to create the product of ‘the profect. This is propery called echnical wor, and a projects conducted to produce a product. Note that we are using the ‘word “product” In avery broad sense. A product can bean actual tangible pece of hardware cra balling It can also be software tr service of some kind, Ian also be a result—conside, for ex ample a project o service an automobile that consists of changing the ol and rotating the tes. There ls no tangible deliverable fr such a project, but there cleat a result that must be achieved, ad if snot dane correctly the car may be damaged as a result. [An verve of roa Managemant eI Executing also refers to implementing the proc pan. Is amazing to fn that teams often spend tne planning a project, then abaidon the planes soon as they encounter some cffculy (Once they do this, they cannot have contol ofthe work, since without a plan thee s no conta The key sto either take cor Tective tion to get back on track with the original plan oto te vise the plan to show where the project is at present and ‘continue forward trom that pont ‘Monitoring and Controlling ‘Montioring and controling can actually be thought of as two Separate processes, Dut because they go hand in hand, they ate considered one activity. Control exercised by compar. Ing where project work sto where it s supposed tobe, then taking action to corect for any deviations from target, Now the plan tells where the work should be, Without e plan, ou don't know where yo should be, so control is impossible, by definition. Furthermore, knowing where you ae is done by monitoring Progress. An assessment of quantity and quality of work s made Using whatever tools are avalabe fr the kind of work being done. The result of this asessment i compated tothe planned level of work; ifthe actual level is atead or behind of the pan, something will be done to bring progress hack in line with the lan, Naturally, small deviations are always present and ae i ‘ored unless they exceed some pre-established threshold oF show a tend toward driting further of course. Closing In too many eases, once the product Is protuced fo the cus tomer’ satishetion the projet considered fished, or closed, ‘This should not be the case. A ial estonleamed review should he done befor te project is considered complete Paling to doa lessonseamed review means that futare proects wil Hely ser the same headaches encountered on the one just cone,Knowledge Areas As previously mentioned, the AMBOK® Guide identifies nine knowledge areas that project managers shouldbe familiar within ‘order tobe considered professionals. These areas flows, Project Integration Management Project integration management ensures thatthe project prop cay planned, executed, and controlled, inciuding the exercise of formal project change conto. As the term imple, every activity ‘must be coordinated o integrated with every other one in order tw achieve the desired project outcomes Project Scope Management Changes to project scope ae often the factors that kl a project. Project scope management includes authoring the job, devel ‘oping a scope statement that will define the boundaries ofthe project, subdividing the work into manageable components with deliverable, verying tat the amount of work planned has been achieved, and specifying scope change contr) procedures. Project Time Management | consider this a bad choice of terms, as “tme management” im- plies personal efforts to manage one's te. Project time man: ‘agement specifically refers to developing a schedule that can be ‘et, then controling work to ensure that this happens! Is tht simple, Because everyone refers to this a scheduling, it should really be called schedule management. (I know, I may be booted ‘ut of PMI for such heresy!) Project Cost Management ‘This i exacly what it sounds Uke. Prolect cast management i volves estimating the cast of resources, Including people, lp: rent, materials, and such things as travel and other suppor deta. ‘After this s done, css are budgeted and tracked to keep the prof ect within that budge. [An Overview of Project Management a Project Quality Management ‘As Ihave commented earls, one cause of project fale i that (quality is orerooked or sacrificed so that aight deadline can be ‘et. tis not very helpful to complete a project on time, only to Aiscover that the thing delivered won't work property! Project ‘quality managementincludes both quay assurance planning to ‘meet quality requirements) and qualty contol (steps taken to monitor results tose if they conform to requirement Project Human Resources Management Project human resources management, often oveiooke in po ects involves identifying the people needed to do the ob; dein, thei roles, responses, and reporting relationships; acquiring ‘those people; and then managing them a the projects executed. [Note that this tpte does not refer othe actual daytoday manag Ingo people. The PMBOK® Guide mention that these sis are necessary but does not attempt to document them. Given that these are the most important skis that a project manager must have, the PMBOKS Guides deficient n miting them. Project Communications Management A the tite implies, profct communications management in ‘volves planning, executing, and contoling the aquisition and A pojct is a temporary endeavor undertaken to produce 2 nique produc, service, or est > Aprojects also a problem sched for soliton. >> Project managements aplaton of owed, sls, tos, and techniques to poet acts to meet projet require. mens Projct managements accomplished by applying the rooesses of nating, planing, executing, monfoing and ntolng and closing. > Al projects are constrained by Performance, Time, Cost, ‘an6 Scope requirements. Only tree of these can have values assigned. The fourth must be cetermined by the project team, > Prot tend to fl bocause to team dss not ake ine to ensue that they have developed a proper defton of the problem being saved > The major phasis ofa project include canoe, denon, ann, execution and con, and chossout, An Overview of Project Management 8 Questions for Review 1, Project management snot just: a. planning rework © scheduling 4. controling 2. The problem with being a working proect manager is thet, ‘na conflict between working and managing, ‘. You don't know wat priorities to set », Your boss wil tink you're slacking of. ¢. There will never be enough ame to do both. 4. The work wil take precedence and managing wil sufen 3. The DO cites 2 Fie owt ie by Pw edly puctcanermaaets oA unger Pn ety poet maeps Auton rst ca (Failure Mode and Effects Analysis) ms a.Nowtt ae 4, Project scope defines: 4. A project manager’ visit othe end date, 2, The magnitude or sizeof te job ©. How often a project hasbeen changed, 4. The lit ofa project manager’ authosty.The Role of the Project Manager a Lhe role of project managers seems to be very misunder stood throughout the word. Because many project man agers ariv at tel pasion as a natural progression ffom thelr jobs as engineers, programmers, scientists, and ther kinds of jobs, both they and ther bosses se the fob as @ technical Jb, This simply fn ue, Ityou remember that every project | that all work is praca roti serie cy | completed on tne, ‘nen there i a tectineal aspect to the jo. However t's 2 queston ot who is | within budget ana responsi for what an poet m8 | Soop, and at the ages who must manage the project and handle echnical sues are sat up toil | correct performance fom the begining wil expan tis | later on, For now, suffice it to say thet the primary responsibility ofthe project. manager sto ensure that ll wok is completed on time, within ‘budget and scope, and at the corect performance level. That is, The primary respon- sibility of the project manager is to ensure | | | Tae Role ofthe Project Manager 2 se must see thatthe PCTS targets are met. Her primary roles to ‘manage the project, not do the work! What Is Managing? ‘The PMI defntion of project management does not completely Capture the true nature of project management, Remember, it Says that ‘projet management application of knowledge, el, tools, and techniques to pofect actives to meet the projet re: ‘quiremen's, Project management is accomplished through the ap lication and integration of the 42 lagcally grouped project ‘management processes comprising the § Process Groups: ii. Ing, planning, executing, monitoring and controling, and cis. ‘ng’ (PMBOK® Guide, Project Management instcte, 2008, p. 6). That sounds nice on pape, but what sit tata petson realy oes when he manages? | don't know if is really posible to convey what manasing ‘actually is, One reason is that project management isa peor ing a7, and iis dificult to convey in words what an acoy ath let, or artist does, However, wre can desrbe the various roles of 4 project manager, and that is the fac ofthis chaptet What shouldbe clear i that you can very wel become someting If ‘you can't describe and define it, so this is a necessary exercise Definitions of Management (One common definition of management says that a manager gets ‘work done by other people. Only a bit of thought is needed to re alize how useless this detntion is. Dictators get work dane by ‘ther peopte, but I wouldn't call that management. Dx. Peter Druckes whom many cedt with being the “ther” of manage. ment because he frst mati people realize that management sas 4 profession, rather than a ob, has sald that a manager Is sup posed to make an unsolcted contbutin tothe organization, ‘Thats, a manager looks around to see what needs tobe done to advance the cause ofthe organization and does it without asking= Fundamentals of Pojct Management | permission or having tobe told to doi. Tiss often called being Proactive, as opposed to reactive, and it ‘at, most important, a manager cant do tis unles she un Apoect manager mis understand the mission and ison of the oranizaton fist, see now he proj they are managing ‘meshes withthe omganiatans mission, andthe ster the rojctoensre thatthe ites ofthe rganizaton re met D> Te ist sas a project manager neds ar people sas, > Dre of biggest taps for poet managers isto perform ‘echnical workin action to managing the jb, because. hen hrs cont btwaen performing te t,t pro} est maraper canna elect tha managers spt, D> Instead of asking for autor, make ceisons youre, take ‘ction thats appropri and doesnot vot poly, and ten Inform your boss what you ave done, '> The project manager's job sto ensure that everyone inthe oc eam has what he nest o is b wl > A project manager must excise both ladersip and man- agement sls. ‘the most important attributes for project ‘managers o have, | always say that peo- ple kis are number one through tree. ‘Then, below tha, comes everyting else. you can deal with people, you can e ther leim to do everything ese or dele fate it to someone who can do it. But being able to do everything ese without being good at dealing with peopl just won't cut. ‘Now the question Is, do you really want 10 be a project manager? Do you like having responsibility wit very Lm ited authority? Do you enjoy working to imposible deadlines, with limited re Sources and unforgiving stakeholders? Aze you, in other words, 2 bie masochistic? Ifyou are, then you will ore being a project manager. you ae the boss of project managers, thes are tings you. should consider in selecting people forthe job. Not everyone is ‘cutout fr the jo, tant attributes for project managers ‘to have, | always say that people skills are number f Project management is not for everyone. I emphasized earlier | ‘that it is nota technical job, Itis about getting people to perform ‘work that must be done to meet the objectives ofthe project. So So when |am asked what | consider to be the most impor- one through three,Planning the Project |) nce Tae toute cooper aes. ‘mont ren sty Sh ete cn nay _by poor project management, especially the failure to plan | property. There are two barriers to good planning, The first | is prevalling paradigms, and the second is the nature of sain sae jef about what the world is like. Yc Apa ell aout what the word ke. You an swt pele belle by hing what they d, cus they Sivas behave onsen withthe dene ele fs not cesar ht they say they Dele but wat hy rely be eye tat counts. Chis ras box Overcoming Oe atonal Dees: acttangOrznzaton Lean as le thee hele one eo espoused as opposed ts hey in practic, Toast tow who tended my senirar oe theo of ret mangement trl ett, pn ete ing wor, be meine convene a esing of is ject team 0 pene an Hit os ced im ut ote confer “ttt ou dag sed he os “Plc or projec,” exlae he low Planing the Project "Oh, you don’t have time for that nonsense,” his boss tld ‘im. "Get them out ofthe conference room so they can pet the tis lar that is boss didnt believe i planning, which ases this question: Why dd he send the flow to training program if he realy dda’ believe in what i aught? Go figure ‘The second reason that people don’ pan is ha they find the activity painful, Some individuals, espctally engineers and pro sTamimers, are concerned that they will be held to estimates of task durations that they have made using ther best guesses. Be- ‘cause they have no historical dato craw a, this sal they can fo, But they also know that such numbers ate highly uncertain, and they are aad that aire to meet established targets wl get them in trouble. As one of my engineers oid me once, *You cant sthedule cea” "replied that this may be tru, ute must pretend we can, because no one wil fund the projct unless we put avn a time Since then, Ihave changed my mind—you can schedule creat ity, within limits. Infact, tere is no beter sil to cteative thinking than a tet deadline. (F you glve people forever, they simply mess around and don’t produce anything, Nevertheless, we find that, when people are requre to plan ‘project, they find the acti painful, and they resist he pain it ‘uses. The net results that they wind up on the pain curve ‘numbered 1 in Figure 31. The net esl of being on ths curves to experience a lot of pan, because the toa pan experienced is represented y the area under the curve. Im curve 2of the gue, thee sa lot of pln erty on, but it iminishes over time, andthe total area under the curve is less than that under curve 1 The Absolute Imperative of Planning Ifyou consider the major function of managing, Its to ensure ‘hat desired organization objectives are met. This is accomplished by exercising control over scarce resources. Hawever, the worda Fundamentals of Project Management | [Planning the Project s Setanta ci by comparing where youre to where you ate suppose tobe ee oes rasa ares ora {at cane ston canbe nen ves hee seaion [Novice ta hi an tfomatonsjstem a giance deiton TFurtiermore, note that two things are 1 necesary for conta to ens. Fist, you | No plan, no controll | ‘musthave a pln that els where you ae supposed toe in the fst place. Ifyou have no pan then, you ¢annot possbiy have canto hink we need oreo ous ofthis almost every iy, because itis ayo age wien yous ccstany being asalted by demands todo than that an» Ilion er thing. Second if you don't know where youare, you cant have contol. Know- | Predicting the future | Ing whee youare iss easysitmay_ | fg eagy Its knowing seem, especialy in deing knowledge a ‘Work For example, you say you expect. Whats going on now to wate ten thousand lines of code by | Shatts hard, 2 tay and youve we eg th = Sind Does it mean you're 80 por | re. ete Cent chore you shold be? Not ono cmon an we mis ctl wih ne cei Yo hay hae a eis vay wt ‘we intend, code (One mening of he Word “power nd domination" Tn conte ne ie ee a eae manigment, ths sometines eae tga ptonal " " ‘the command-and-control approach, arenes a “ mr nee Attherp hat cases ese not olan io baler tat vis most HBSS ET by comparing where te tae to tie pln they eed ogee phone ee ee ereeene eee ma ns wesc te al people have no other desinbleaptoaS | vou, are eupposed wen the deadline is tight thatthe plan becomes reall ime. for employm fa eee tant. Asa simple example, imagine fying into Chicego and (sme mitryora isn) Howe, | tobe 20 that cor- beng ite, You have smesng actos oma estan he Inambstscnomy ve ew eDBOESS. | atte action oan You've never een Chie, nt wien he sete ve dant asks if you need a map, you say, “I don't have time for Theswonémesringsrsoit—and_| be taken whan there at eke then ae renga ig ‘ap. ve gato tony mney as Nee ka lighted in the Idea that contol is exer- | 6 a deviation. sit= Fundamentals of Project Management te —_ nl rape nngemens | Planning Defined own n Fie Stamina sate simpy aowering the questions shown jn Fig 532 They maybe cad he "hn, wo whey a a, hnw long?" questions that you leaned it you ever sted ner ena Hat loa thy Decne answering some ofthese qesions requires ae Ball—especialy questions ike “How long wl that take?” On ts for which na hoy aval hs ey har qoesten twarswer As my engineer sid, "You can't schedule creat Figure -2, Planning is answering questions, Strategy, Tactics, and Logistics Fo plana pret proper, you must attend ta thie ind of 2c Ces th my tae Se permed rng thee fe os These are satey, tacts, and logis. Stag esto the overall med you wl empl todo the jb, sometins refered ta ax a“pame plan,” AS reat in Caper I for thousands of year ostshave been bul withthe eet down so hat wen one wishes op the oat inte wae, itis awed right sie up. Tals method worked fe unl the Planing project = 1940s, wien World War I placed tremendous pressure on ship Yatds to build military ships faster and ships were being bull oct of tel plate, rather than wood. Shipbuilders quickly found that ‘was extremely dificult to weld in the kee aea. From the out. Side, you had problems geting under the ship, and inside you ‘nad to stand on your ead to weld, Avondale shipyards decided that it would be easier to build ‘tee bats if ships were bull upside down, The welding inthe keel area now could be done fom outside, standing above the ship, and to work on the inside one could stand upighe This Staley proved so effective that Avondale could bull boats fasten, cheaper and of higher qualy than its competiors, and the ap. roach sil being used today. “Too often planners choose a projec strategy because it has always been done that way rather than because tis ext You Soul aways ask youre, “What would be the best way to go about this?” before you proceed to do detailed implementation planning. Implementation Planning Once you have decided to bud boats upside down, you must ‘work out al of the detas of how it willbe done. Sometimes we ay that we must be sure to dot al ofthe “Is” and cross all he ts." Thls ib wire you answer those “who, what, when, and Where” questions. Infact, its implementation planning that many people think of when they tak about planning. However, a ‘Well developed implementation plan forthe wrong project st ay can only help you fall more ecient. Logistics ‘Miltary people can quickly el yo the benefit of attention tol tics. You cant fight a atde If people have no ammunition, food, thing, or transportation. Iti losis tht attends ty {hese tng. once sav projec scheduling program reget "ow defunct) tht allowed construction managers te tea ‘When certain quanty of bricks was delivered to thei set2 Fundamertais of Project Management | then showed when they would run out, ven a specific uliza tion rte, This would alert managers to schedule delivery of & ‘new Supply just before the existing stock wes depleted Twas als told about a road construction project in India that had very bad living conditions fer the workers. The food was bad, sleeping conditions were poor, and the workers were sulting Jow morale, The project manager and his staff were al staying in 2 mice hotel In a nearby city, They Analy realized the problem ‘and moved tothe site with the workers, Living conditions imme Giately improved, and so did worker morale. Tiss an example ofthe importance of a peripheral aspect of logit Plan Ingredients Following ae the mindmum ingredients that should be contained ina project plan, It's a good ide to keep these in a centralized project database. Inially, the electronic fle wil contain only the ‘lan. AS the projects managed, reports, changes, and other docu: ments vl beaded, so that when the project completed the le ‘wil contain a complete history ofthe project, which can be used by others as data for planning and managing their own projects ‘Here are the Items that make up the project plan: > Problem statement. >> Project mission statement (see Chapter 4 for instructions on how to develop a mission statement). >> Project objectives (see discussion in Chapter 4) > Project work requirements, including ist of all detiverables, such as reports, hardware, software, and so on I 2 good idea to have deliverable at each mor project milestone so that progress can be measured more easly bp Ext entra, Each milestone should have rer established ‘that wil be used to determine whether the preceding phase ‘of work s actualy Rnished, If no deliverables provided ata milestone, extciteria become very portant. Pani (Pati te Pree a >>Enditem speclatons to be met. Tis i mens ener ‘specifications, architectural specs, building codes, pee rent telat and 0. > Wis eatdovn sac (2) Tisserant 2c oe ha ae eteder e pric obetes AWS so ped Wap pra ‘project scope (see Chapter 6}. once > Std th stn we a working hfs hou be prove Cpe 8) > Reed estures op equ mate pment mse en el te): These must epee fron wih ce (see Chapters 7 and 8). " ‘esceae > Conl swt ee Capes 9, 10, an 11 Major contributors. Use a knear responsibility chat ae ponslbllity chart (see > sae th conten when pase ee Capes 4 Sign-Off of the Plan Once the plan has been prepared, it Should be submitted to staeholders for thelr signatures. tne omBgaresome comment abst ie meaning ofa signature and sugges tions for handing te process: ‘STAKEHOLDER: Anyone who has a vested interest in the project. These DA signature means that the individ | includ ‘bu lis committedo his contribution, Scones agrees withthe scope of work tobe | OFS, customers, done and accepts the specs as valid. | mani Aslgatire on the pat ofa conta. | ™anaers. and ‘utor does not mean a guarantee of | financial people.4 Fundamantals of Project Management | performance. Its a commitment. Because there are factors ‘outside our consol, few of us would Uke to guarantee our per formance. Howeves, most woud be wing to make a com mitment, meaning we promise to do cur best ofall our oigasons. ta | The project plan Spature sweated asa guarantee, | should be reviewed ther ines wil refseo sig o they ‘will sgn without feelng realy com | and signed off in Ghonergenat Neb | Seting not Te pn side set na pop. | #H*@Ugh interoFfice ‘etal renby necting wot by at. | mall eal copies for sear by fal som ws ele may to sy toed deg fd ay mis important pls at wal beet tha Spat hetng b> People shtld he encouraged to “Shoot sn the pn® ding he Tree meeting ater tan Wat Unt prblns develope on Na tray ts des no ea at they Shou pce the plan. The oles ie i (0 eusue thatthe pan workable atl Encourage people ‘to spot problems during the sign-off meeting, not later: Changing the Plan would be nice to think that a plan, once developed, would never change oever, thats unrealistic. Noone has 20/20 foresiht, Unforeseen problems ae almost certain to aris. The impor tant thing is to make changes in an or ery way, following a standard change procedure orderly way, follow- ing a standard change procedure. Make changes in an [Panning the Project a Ifo change contol is exercised, the project may wind up over budget, behind schedule, and hopelessly iadequnte, with no Warning until it ste late, Here are suggestions for nandlng changes tothe pan > Changes should be made only when a significant deviation (ccurs. A significant change is usually specified in terms of Percent tolerances relative to the original targets. D-Change control is necessary to pro tect everyone from the effects of | Any plan is bad scope creep—changes tothe project | which ie not sus that result im additonal work. I i, hangs In scope ate not denied | eptible to change. and managed properly, the project may come in considerably ave Bud ‘get and/or behind schedule Causes of changes should be documented for reference in Planning future projects. The causes should be factual, not blameand punishment siaterents, —Bartolommne de San Conceal (1476-1517) Acompreenste oes fr mang proc change pre: ‘sented in Chapter 10. * Suggestions for Effective Planning Here are some ideas to help you plan eectvely: > Pan plan, ato epee ogee devi la The ting eon Isobe ed iia to actly dorgnzed meet of We ope i Depts any onan Tans ato apne Prefredte meeting sh etn finde ees pr $l and peal sl lepton ac eoneone geo n = angen he meting li shoud ge petal todas qc possi hte we at exelent ges2 Fundamentals of Pojct Management | running meetings (2, Mints Group Coby Tom Kayser the read ele to those > The people who must implement | Rule: The people a pan should pardipte in prepa &. | who must. do the Ofkerwise, you rs Raving contbuos mn ‘whofe no sense of commizmentto te | Ork should partic plan; tht estimates maybe eneneous, | pate in developing nd mar tasks may be forgotten. > The fist rule of panning is tobe prepare to eplan. Unexpected obsaces wil undoubtedly cop up and must be handled, This ao means that you sould rot plan in oo much dtl i teres Ike- ‘hood thatthe plan wil have to be | The first rule of changed, as this wastes ime, vianning ie to be b> Bees unerpctdcbstacs vil crop up avays conduct anaes | Prepared to replant snl te mot iy ones oe Cap ter 5} Develo Plan B ust nase lan A does wrk, Why not itu Plan Bin the fsplae? Bese Pan As beter bt has fe wealneses, Pan B bis wekneses ob they muse di ferent frm hein Fan Aor thre sno we in conden Pan Baba. “The simple way to do arisk analysis Isto ask, "What could gp wrong?” This | ‘dentify project should be done forthe schedule, work | rieke and develop performance, and other pars of the , project plan. Sometimes, simply ienti- | contingencies to fying risks can help avert them, Dut, | geal with them if that cannot be done, a east youl have a backup pln avaliable. One caution: f | they occur ‘you are dealing with very analytical People, they may go into analysis parasis here. You are not tying to Identify every possible rsk—ust those that are fly ely. ‘the plan. [Planing the Project 2 D> Begin by looking at the purpose of doing watever isto ‘be done, Develop a problem statement. ll actions in an organiza. ‘on shouldbe tken to achieve ares, wich another way of saying "scvea problem,” Be arf here ‘oiently what the end wer realy nests | Consider the little tosave the probe. Sometines see | i oj in which te team thinks asolx | mouse, how saga- {on sit for the tent, but tat sot it fonis never wed, resungin stent | U8 an animal i ‘wast the organization, Is which never pet oi Bakown re | entrust life ture abcuse in Chapter to vie the wor into smalet chunks for which you | 2 one hole only. can detelop accurate estimates or dit | peas (ne-toa ne tn, cos and resource reqierens a Project Planning Steps ‘Te basi planing steps area ows, Note that some ofthese topics are covered inthe hext chapter b Define te problem to be soived by | Be sure the project the project. really satisfies the > Devlopamisionstiement fstowes | customer's neede, bysaemensctmar iets | eee ee Develop a poject strategy that wil oman ‘meet all project objectives. what the team Wie a scope statement to deine | thinks the cus- Droject Boundaries (what wil and wa ntbe doe Server eboxka got] Develop a Work Breakdown Structure (WAS) > Using the WBS, esate activity duration, resource requit- ‘ments, and costs (as appropriate for your environment),Fundamentale of Project Managem >> Prepare the project mater schedule and budget. Decide on the project organization structure—whether ma trix or hierarchical (if you are fee to choose), > Create the project plan > Get the pan signed off by al project stakeholders Key Points to Remember > Hfyouave no plan, you have no conta D> The paople who must execute a plan shoul participate In ropaing > Have the plan sgned off in a meding, not by sening ‘trout he interice al > Kao ll pojctdocurenition nan ecronc project te, > Use ext ere to determine when a milestone has artualy oun actives > Require tat changes tothe projet plan be approved before you make hem, > Rsk management shouldbe parol project panting > Aparaciisa beet abut what the word i he > Pinning is answering the who, wt when, Now, ow lang, an how much questons. > Logics rete o supsyng people wth mater and sup- ples they need to do eros. frercse.. ; Wehave aed bos sratgy, tacts, and lags. Which must be eee ts” Whats efit oft? When weld ou pan {or logistics? [CRAPTER Developing 4 Mission, Vision, Goals, and _ Objectives for the Project A) coe st mses any wt hou gent ne ) )) ensuring mat it has a shared ‘understanding of where it is 4] bi ewes aan acs ve DI sion,” “vision,” "goals," and “objectives.” And itis at this | rere se apts cas Hai Defining the Problem Every projet solves a problem of some kind, but pecple ae in line to sip over the definition ofthe problem. This ia big mis ‘eke, The way you detne a problem determines how you wil solve io it citeal that a proper definition be developed, For ferample, too often a problem is deted in terms of solution Person may say, “Ihave a problem. My cat has quit, and | have ‘Ro way to get to work How am [going to get my cat repaled, because Ihave no money todo it™ ‘The problem has essentially boen defined as “How do Ireptr a4 Fundamentals of Project Management | atiteseeteeietes semen oen eer ee eee ee cecal sera i a i crag dconanceaeaat el eel eetseans elericeasaay sate Spun Sennen SEs ae eee pe STEUER ES) con agp esteem ate) | eeemrnee fined the problem in terms of people, and | are and where you signers | mean ema See gate ueaireneaeera a | ots ‘Peopie sometimes define a problem | that prever sy eames seen | Mat prey Rage omctacneced eee eee taney are ne Confusion of Terms tnadisant Sse person ts you that she tanga new ob iad se prs o ove te. Sheedy eis at |eveoping a Mission, Vision, Coss. and Objectives a she must nd 2 place to lve. So she say, “I have a problem, 1 have to find apace to You as her what her mision I, “To And a place to live,” she sys, ‘And how about her vision? "Ta bave pace t ive ‘wer, a itl conkised, "No wonder she is confused AU thre statements sound alle! ‘She needs to understand the diference between thea if she to solve this problem. Remember a problem isa gap. Suppose we were to asc her {o tellus where she want tobe when her problem ls saved, She ‘Would say,“ would have a place to live inthe new cy.” “And Where are you naw?" you ask. “have no place to lve,” she says, ‘Then the gap Is between having place and not having one This can be sated simply as “I have no place to lve.” As, ‘eed, thisis the problem she i tying to solve But—would just anyplace be okay? Of course not. She oesnt wan to lve unde abridge, altkough homeless people Sometimes do, So if you ask hes, “What kind of place ae you ooking or she can tell you. “It needs to have three bedrooms, the house must be of a certain size, and I prefer a certain style,” she says, Tis fs hee sion for the kindof place she wants to lve in. That vision lteratly paints a picture in her mind, and, when she nds « lace that comes close to that picture, she will have “rived at her destination, This ls the function of vsion-—it defines “done.” Her mison, then, to finda place that conforms to he vi sion. Another way to Say tis that the mission ofa projects ‘Ways to achieve the vision. In doing so, it solves the stated problem, So you may want diagram las shown in Fgue #1 Note that the vison has been spelled out as alist of things she Tus have, along with some that she wants to have and tow that would be nice to have she could ge them, she anFundomentalaof Project Management 1” Figure 4-1, Chevron showing mission, vision, and problem statement. Probie TInava no place to lve. THUSTS_[ WANTS [NICE 2 bosroms|eoomter |tvepocein ara famiy issor “ori a place tat mast 38 Trusted ae many tthe hers a posse The Real World song the mission, vision, Okay, now we know the ferences among, nso ste wo you ner pe and our oto poe poner wl a “ete our i So,” wthoat ny mention of problem sateen is esl that Some discussion of the sponsor's vision ofthe end res il pc but eve atm be sty So he fs ret of busines fora project tam Isto develop these into a form that everyone wil acept. . “Thea poll” pobiem you sec at syns wi undoubted have en You amision tt based a detmon oor be sted, Senet i et non wil be incorrect, and you wal have to confront ‘Wise, you will spend lot ofthe organization's money, only to Developing a Mision, Vision, Goals, and Objectives 0 find that you have developed the right solution tothe wrong problem. The Real Mission of Every Project {said earlier thatthe mission i always to achleve the vision, ‘Howeve should ad thatthe vision you are trying to achleve the one the customer bold. Another way o sa tis Is that you are tying to satisy the customers needs, Thats the primary ob, Jectve. Your motive may be to make a profit in the process, but ‘the mission js always to meet the needs of the customer That ‘means of couse, that you must know What thase needs are, and Sometimes this st easy, because even the customer st cear ‘about them. So you have to translate or interpre as best you can, Nour best safeguard sto keep the custome nove in te py ect from concept to completion so that there fa constant check ‘on whether what you are doing will achieve the dested result The mission of the project canbe writen by answering tho ‘questions: 1 What are we going to do? 2. For whom are we going to doit? sion statement dens “what” you are doing; "how" you ate ping ‘odo ts project sateey and shouldbe dealt wth separately Developing Project Objectives Once a mission statement has been developed, you can waite ‘Yout project objectives, Note that objectives are mich more spe fic than the mission statement itself and define resus that mest >e achieved inorder for the overall mision to be accomplished. ‘Also, an objective defines the desired end result50 Fundamentals of Project Management 2 et eet] ay van sh scaler by 10 oaks oming That deed one ot tad The ar 6 vel shee tht tect i per form a number of tasks. These might ir | Goal setting has tude ping tet int my compute: | ses dieionally been reviewing some other literature on the tople about which Iam wating, cling | based on past cole tk 2 qeston ft caen Son an pining he cate pot Ing hand ene some evsons cnpiter, ge flowing anya may help You remember the eset quale thatastenent of objects ms ave performance. This to perpetuate the sins of the past. Evmmasensam | Ta ‘Specific — Realistic An objective specifies =e wet ot | wnaneatn aaa od Jectives. He argued that ther sno point In setting. quotas for a manufacturing sans tetvecmmtact | Semone tn peice tegen | ont Reetemars eee | trom tee ‘capably ofthe system can'tbe achieved, practice has tended that result. An ob- Developing a Mission, Vision, Gals, and Obectes On the other hand, according to Deming, if the sytem isnot stable (nthe statistical sense ofthe word, then agin there fy ‘eed to specify a quote, ince there Is no Way to OW whet te ply ofthe system i In ject work, we may krow the cpelityof a person by looking at his or her past peformance, but, unless you have o {age umber of samples, you have no way of knowing exacty ‘atthe person cand, sac thee isle varity in peopey ‘esformance. Furthermore, i does no good to base «quot on ‘What someone ee ha done, The quota mist be vai forthe por, Sn whois going todo the jo this time, We all Keow that some people are capable of mor ouput Gian others. So dering the measurement and atalnblty aspect, goal or objective setting i very dificu. | go into tis mere (Chapter 6 when I discuss tie estimating. | have found th folowing two questions tobe useful both 'n Setting obecives and in monitoring progress towand there objectives: |. What is our desired outcome? This called the outcome {amet helps keep you focused onthe sul you ae yng {o,chleve, rather than onthe efor: being expended to get there, 2. How will we know when we achieve it? I cl this the ev denice question This queston is very use for easing cit eiteia for objectives tha cant be quatied ‘What follows area coupe f examples ofcbecives Our objective sto develop a oneminute commercial to so Kit contrbutons to WAYZ oar on local TV stations y une 5, 2012 > Our objective isto aie $600,000 in funds ftom local view: ers by September 18, 2012.m2 Fundamentals of Project Management | The Nature of Objectives Note that these examples of blectives donot say how they will be achleved. I consider an objective tobe a staterent that tells me what result i tobe achieved. The “how is problem solving, ‘and I preter to Keep that open so that solutions can be brain stormed ltt. Ifthe approach is written into the objective state- ‘ment, it ay lock a team Into a method that isnot really best for the project. Assessing Project Risks Once you have established your objectives, you can develop Plans for how to achieve them. Unfortunately, the best plans Sometimes don't work. One safeguard in managing projecs i to think about the risks anesd that could sink the Job. This can be done for crivcal objectives and for otter parts of the plan, ‘The simplest way to conduct arsk analysis isto ask, "What could go wrong?” of *What could keep us from achieving our objective?” Its usually best to list the riss fist, then think about contingen- cles for dealing with them. One way to look at risk sto divide a fip chart page im half have the group brainstorm the tisk, which you write down on the lft side ofthe page, and then go back and 1st the contingencles—things you can do to manage the risks if they do mate rialze, An example of tsk analysis for photography projet is shown in Fig It ie helpful to as- of the following: > The schedule > The budget > Project quality ute 42, > Customer eatie- ‘One benefit of doing a rik analysis in this manner i that it may help you avert some risks, When you cannot aver a risk, you wil a east have a backup plan, Unexpected rss can throw a projet into @ ‘alin. faction 2088 risks of failure [Developing a Mission, Vision, Goals, and Objectives Figure 4-2. lak analysis example What could go wrong? | Contingency Bracket the exposure ‘Take extra photos Hand carey to client Allow extra time 1. Exposure wrong 2, Shots unacceptable 3. Film lost or damaged 4. Weather delays | mentioned this polnt previously, but it bess repeating: You are not trying to identity every posers, just some of the more likely ones. This pone shouldbe made to team members who are highly anaiyical | Risk analysis ‘or who perhaps have a tendency to be negative n general Alo, sk naps &- | Should not lead to ‘ways has 2 postive thast—that is, you_| analysis paralysie! axe asking, “Irit happens, what will we dd about” You don't want people to say, Ain't fll” In Chapter 5 | present detailed tol and techniques to adress "isk management nthe project environment. Key Points to Remember > The way probsmis dened deterines how you wl soe. > Apoblem sa gap between where you ar and where you ‘ant be, wth obstacles making tard to reach he goal ‘gnalby seis nota problem. Obstaces must exit for here ‘bea problem. D> Visions wha te ales wl ook he" dts “ana” > Themision so aciovo the vison answers the two que tions “What are we going to do?" and “Fr whom a we ing to do |o Fundamentals of Project Management > Odjetves shou be SMART > You can ent rks by ating, “Wa could go wrong?” Frercise. Choose a project tat you re going to do or perhaps have just stared. Answer he questions that follow tothe best of your bit. I you need to confer wih others to answer some of them, fine Remember the people who have to folow the plan should partici pate in preparing it > What are you trying to active with the project? Wht ned does itstist for your customer? Who eracty is going to actualy use the projet Gfverables) when iis fished? (hat is, who is your real customer?) What wil singush your deliverable fom those aleady avaiable tothe customer? > Wie a roti statement on the basis of your answers to the first question Whats the gap betwoen whee you are now and ‘here you want o be? What obstacles prevent easy movement to close the gap? > Wie a mission statement, answering the two basic question: 1. Whatare we gong todo? 2. Forwhom ae we going todo it? Talkto your customer about ese Issues, Do nt present your wrt- ‘en sialeenis to her nstead, see whether you can get conta ‘ion by asking open-ended questons. you can, you may have to ‘eviso what you havo ween Creating the Project Risk Plan | seuss ncaa managements te stn sce procs of aang ane ee prea a Soom te wkten omy poiet erates wdelenaaen [intmalbas wi tier or | henehe projec ok por nung fay oe ste Mo enta Ok near ene ie ia dane: Thee we song | ect manager tobe werd atgrrietrenngeens | 22 aero comprehensive project | Proactive regarding sckvim sow: oe fot nnet |. the rumeabie ‘be proactive regarding the innumerable ee manners things lec ‘and do go wrong with a | things that can pro Wit skp fa freed to manage reacvey when | 24 40 00 wrong things go wrong—easily the most ex- with a project. pening Anyone ets ise and cy sey eng pln A te Cabot ahi nonce a eae A formal, compre- plan allows the proj-<6 Fundamentale of Projet Msnagerent i pe NEN | presented. Here we presenta comprehensive approach to po} ect risk management, Defining Project Risks sk anagerent es ent nee le Acer tending te is tate roe mst bed ‘The sores of ret ee os mie, empeastng fe need for wethaugton, dete ln pil exp lets of ey em meme wets emerge eh fies an gospels, Ts etn node pec Concepts fan ty isis wit sel eda xy the pees Many pict mangers wa oolong oases hk ctor and delay ther pn base they ase they dat know ough fe that tere ae to any unkown. This se come ‘on rp that ou shal yo vo During te aon pase ofthe projet ie fle on aa igh lee asesent ust be contre, ou td your ten meters shoul lea ue ‘gic approach to “what can go wrong” and begin laying the foun- Scan or the tae pao oli, Wheat ts uno, projects often experience the neste Impact of ss that become reals, Sk) Project risk manage ‘hat mipht have been prevented ot mit ee fated through contingency planning, | ment is “the process Tis reactive behavig and You MSC conducting rok lvein the proactive word tobe succes fulasa project manage Potential oppor | management plan tunes are sometimes refered to at | - positive risks, where the project man- ing, Identification, ager strives 10 optimize te poste im- | analyste, response act on project objectives, - perme aeons | planning, and mor ‘agement i identifed as one ofthe nine | toring and control ‘nowedge areas ofthe AMBOK® Gude, Coa ‘The PMBOK® Guide descrbes project | on a project? Creating the Project Rsk Plan a "sk management as “the proces of conducting risk manage iment planning identification, analss, response planing ant ‘monitoring and control on a project By detniton, 2 procon ‘at be considered a formal, controled undertaking with ite or ‘no variation. When applied to proceses, variation often eas tneficlency. I imporant for you to manage nhs fom by applying an agreed-upon process to establish the sk manage iment len, Gien the reais and variables ofthe sypel projet vironment, certain amount of Rex is appropiate. As you {pln experience in managing rls, an inte fel for fexby Wil develop depending upon style and the length, width, dept and breadth ofthe projets, The Six-Step Process ‘The Sx-tep process isa common and practical approach to es {ablshng the project sk plan, This process should ot be eented Ina vacuum but rypicalyinvoivesa great deal of research and at Jaboraon with the project team, Step 1: Make a List Brainstorm, Making ist of potential ks tothe project shoud ot be an alysis uta formal bastonming seats a ideas are capture, Steps 2 and 3 of he Proves low fora veting ofthese ides. | Step t: Make a list, Jes important that the entse team get involved indenting treats and highlighting what cn go ‘wrong. Some project managers mae he mistake of tying toc Compl thon thet own fo ow team members capes sherk, This is shorted and a bad iden Ts inal seg of the proces must be coliborative and invalve the indneale ‘ho ate expert at that potion ofthe projet wark for wich ae eorate,Leneage te intact canal ns Your team, Ifone or more members ae left out, ts eee ‘ome rst wil remain unidentified and pose a heat o oj,Ea Fundamentals of Pojct Management | sucess. Rembes invoieeveryone— procurement specials wl note ell i identying potent software development problems, an vee vena ‘When you work with the support of a informal tee, you witneed ioe dscpned and rea tata certain amount ofr seach s necessary before moving forward. This may Include phone cls, ema, office wists, or videoconferencing—what éveritakes elt the Information you need. You typical start ‘withthe informal team members or conrbuos to the poet and nat alaogueas to what might go wrong Usual, these flscusions identify other ancllary Individuals who should be contacted, Funciotl department managers can be very bell fn thse cheursances, lier sisting deco ientfing ot ers nthe department who cn. In ether case, you should take a hose approach to estab lishing the is, a all types of ks wil nee to be dented and deat with according Steps 2 & 3: Determine the Probability of Risk Occurrence and Negative Impact 1 am combining steps 2 and 3 because they ae the prioritization factors, They assist you in vetting the Ist of risks. These two steps allow you to prize all idetied threats to the project and help you de termine how much time, effort, staf, and money should be devoted to pre ‘venting or mitigating each, Again, thls must be accomplished notin a vacuum Dut with fll input irom team members and subject matter exper (SMES) How probable i that each risk will become a realy? Tals question needs tobe asked and answered. Its often sufcient to use a High: Medium-Low (HML] scale and apply it to the lst of bralnormed sss. Ifa risk is considered highly probable, it re coves an Hs the probability medium, itrecelves an Mi and if of risk occurrence Steps 2&3: Deter mine the probability and negative impact | creating the Project Rik Plan D the pobre nL These sould ote apple abivaty emphasing the net fre erin Fra yt pe ae ik eames ely Row bay daze he cfs een gion Dats oe alate, ‘lesa ofthe roe shud be cried When ng i Bega nyc ony he ak nes ely, ow tte het, cette, pe Woh nd Soani The oat sep? and 3 etn vis cyte ie vith caespaing reli poate epte npet sk Prbattay x 8 c > zrze crete ster se a Sepereaes ramon tee =mieeeemoaeeeatee sai renpmasier acs oe ‘alue to each isk. The probability scale can be based on a range seeiGaeten oattetoneaaet ae ke Probab x + 3 7 c 2 D 5oo Fundamentals of Project Management | According to this ana, isk C wl demand most ofthis project, ‘teams attention because of I ratve value of 28K. It should be noted that the seme method can be used to focus on schedule ‘Impact or even resource utlization. ‘Step 4: Provent or Mitigate the Risk ‘Some risks canbe prevented others can only be mitigated, Earth ‘quakes ar the rerement ot an important stakeholder instance, ‘cannot be prevented, Some rks can and should be prevented in step 4 Ifa risk hus been dented and you have the abi lity to prevent lis occurrence, do so. Proactivtys the project manager's best friend. Kl the risk before it has a chance to grow and fours, ‘and you won't have to dea with it aga, For example, if vendor or suplers targeted for your project and one of yout team members has had previous dealings with the company and was not impressed, ne wil inform you thatthe sppler’ material deliveries ae frequen ate and often rected “Assuming tat the suppl is nota Sle souree (your only choice), you can prevent the rk by ning an alternate supplier that more reliable For those risks that cannot be prevented, an attempt shoul be made to mitigate or lessen the probablity and/or impact should they occur. Using the example ofthe unrelable supply, if you must use that company, you can create concrete steps to pro actively expedite the delivery of the materia, thereby milgzting the impact ofthe risk. If management thretens to depriortize ‘yur project, you can lobby on your projec’ behalf, mitgating the chances that his wil cou: Step 4: Prevent or mitigate the risk. Step 5: Consider Contingencies Preventive measures are those steps taken before the risk becomes realy Contingencies represent the specific Step 6: Consider contingencies. [eating the Project Rik Pan a ‘actions that wil be taken ifthe risk occurs. Here, you answer the question “If thersk becomes realty, what will We do"? For example f acceptance testing fora suppliers wie has ‘ben identi a medlumn to high risk ana tes alr occurs, an appropriate contingency might be to supply engineering supp at the vendors expense. Another contingency might be to sth fo ‘another predetermined vendor fhe has widgets ln tock. CContingences ae direct linked tothe prontization factors Inrotuce in steps 2 and 3. I the risk sa high prorty (high probably, high negative impact) you wil wan to identify mul Ble contingencies. Since there i good chance thatthe rk wil (ceur and that when it does, it wil hurt he project, you want to be covered. Ifthe risk falls inthe midale range of the prota tion scale, you should establish a least one contingency. These Hiss that fall inthe lower level should not requite muh aten tion ts best to invest your effors elsewhere. When estabish ing your contingencies, be careful o the very low probability, very high impact rik. These tend to be totaly ignored because ofthe ow probability, but they can and sometimes do bring po. ects down, ‘Step 6: Establish the Trigger Point ‘The tiger points often the most important element ofthe po ect risk plan. There isa direct relationship between the tpyet point and the contingencies, eve to its rane, the igger points the pot at o hic the is becomes enougy of ae. | SP*P 6: Establish aly thatthe project manager needs [the trigger point, ‘wgger the contingency. eis judgment call meant to maximize the value of the predetermined contin fency by implementing i at the optimal time. Tigger too soon and you wil probaby spend time, effort, or money for no good reason, Tigger too late and you may end up experiencing the full impact ofthe occurrence, with litle vate added by imple. menting the contingency. Let's return to our exarnrie.Fundamentals of Project Management ‘a usualy relable supplier has experienced labor isues and has shut down because of strike, perhaps your contingency plan has identified suppliers Band C a altertives, Ech has widgets in stock and has quoted a lead time of two calendar weeks for prep and delivery. I the required delivery date is February 15, ‘Your trigger should include the two-week lead time plus afew days! bulfer. An appropriate trigger point here would be January 231, Ifthe contingency afecs a task or tasks on the critical path {eee Chapter 7), additonal butler days shouldbe considered. The trigger shouldbe a specific point In time ora defined range of te. Most project managers conser this tobe the ck lest part of the project rk plan, but itis well worth the effort. (Often, in my role as consultant, | come acoss wellthought out plans that were wasted due to untimely or nonexistent contin: ‘gency implementation, The trigger pints a best practic for po fect managers that wil improve the eficacy ofthe ene pln. Establishing Reserves ‘The mast comprehensive risk plan cen be compromised if youre alize tat you do not have te ime or means to take appropiate action, Establishing reserves enables you to leverage the plan ois fullest poten- | The moet compre- tia, The bestlad plans are impotent ‘without the time and/or budget to allow | hensive risk plan can {or efective implementation. As aresult, os teed eri cnngeny and | P compromiced if Tanagement reserves, ‘you realize that you ‘Contingency reseresaredesiemated. | “46 not have the time amounts of time and/or budge to ae: unt for is to the project that have | or means to take been identified and actively accepted. ‘Tney are created to cover knownrisis» | @Ppropriate action. the project. Theres diet relationship between contingency reserves and the previously dscussed Six Step proces (ota sini approach). Once the process com Creating the Project Risk Flan plete you shoul estimate the required reserves to cover the sks that have been identified and accepted. For example, I your project team has identied the loss ofa key team member to retrement as 2 high-priority isk [probability and impact), contingency actions will equite the hiring of a re placement ftom outside the organization, The cost and schedule frnpact ofthe ising process and team member assimiation must be estimated and added tothe contingency reserve. ‘Management reserves are designated amounts of time and/ ‘or budoet included in your plan to account for sks to the project, that cannot be predicted. Sometimes you don't know what you don't know. Management reserves are created to cover unknown risks tothe projct. For example, the cutrent project involves a high percentage of research and development and an analysis of past similar projects using actual (historical data) incates aha rage budgetary overrun of LO percent his 10 percents not at tributed to any particular risk event. However, it should tigger the need fora 10 percent increas to the overall project budget as ‘management reserve, Managing Multiproject Risks Many, if not most, project managers find themselves leading ‘mare than one project. The multiprject manager confronts Unique isues not normally encountered when managing single project. In the multproject word, many projects overlap or ex perience direct dependencies with other projects, simla o those tna typical network dlagram [see Chapters 7 and 8) "Two perspectives are required here. Fst, you must focus on the individual project and the asoclated risks foreach. Then, you ‘must assess your entire portllo and determine the nature of the relationship ofthese projets. Your porylois the sum ofa) projets under your purview. The relationship among thee po} ects may vary widely "A program typically involves mubiple projects working ward the completion ofa single deliverable. These projects must al be“ Fundamentals of Project Management | property integrated toward this end, Inthe potlio environment, you must identity where the projects coinlde or ovetiap with re gard to any projet work. You then determine what might go ‘Wrong in these areas where the projets “touch.” ‘The same is done in the program en: vironment, where project relationships are usualy more cleat defined. For ex: ample track and field includes event in volving four runners that must pass @ baton from one tothe othet. The fastest team does not always win because the baton may not be handed off smoothly, or it may even be dropped, Many proF cts wil have direct pregecessorsucces: sot eatlonships (one must be completed before the next can begin) nthe pro gam world. In order to promote a smooth transition from one projec tothe next, you must focus on this “baton” handof. The rmultiprojet ris plan focuses on just these events. involves multiple projects working ‘toward the com- pletion of a single deliverable, Coordination Points In either cas, the areas where the procs touch are called o- ‘ordination pots, You need to identify these pont, after which a standard mlptoject sk plan canbe created tis imporiant to emphasize thatthe Six Step focus here must be on the coordina tion points exclusively. n realty, you focus on creating ask plan foreach project ndividually to manage itraprojct rks and then tum your attention tothe coordination points and perform the same proces to manage inlerroject sks The portfolio ot pro ‘gam risk pan is meant to supplement and enfance the individual, risk plan inthe multipoject environment. Risk Matrix ‘A useful tool when managing many sks across projects isthe A program typically moe [Creatine the Project Risk Pan Figure 5-4. Riek mati, Hon Impact Med tow ‘wed Tigh Probability (Once the threats have been plotted onto the risk matrix, an HOME prioitizaton can be applied where the highest pricy "ks are positioned toward the upper right comer and lower pt ity ones toward the lower left. You can then color code indivi ual ss as they apy to each project. In thefog ofthe portiolio ot rogram management word, this can prove to be avery effective approach. Risk Register ‘The risk restr ia useful tol in managing actions taken eget ‘ng accepted risks to the project, ss shown in Figure 5:2 Figure 5-2 Riek rogiater [re [ne] eae | ome [> nme]ee Fundamentals of Project Management | ‘Te rs reitrsthe last ngredien of te projects pan. It Isa living, breathing dynamic to! that can help you to track tsk stats as your project matures through the ifecyele. The ns reg ister also helps you Identify ownership of contingency implemen talon, outcomes of actions take, and active and inactive risks. Ia thorough risk analysis isnot developed, you and your team wil iv in the reactive worl, puting ot fes throughout the project fe cyte. Tiss easily the most expensive way to op crate In tems of time, eft, and money, and i wil jeopardize the success of any project. You must invest youself early by ‘adding this crucial element to your overall project plan. ‘Key Points to Remember >> Project risk maragemant should begin ety inthe procs and conte tug tee cycle. Ae) to success in dea ing with iki to Sart ely and tay the foundation fo ik management; be proactive, not reactive; manage risks for- mally wt a process; ad be exible > The Si-Stop process to etalisting a projec rik lan n= cludes mating ist of poten sks; determining the prob- aby of isk occurence; determining ts negative impact reventing or migatng the sk; considering cantngences; and esabshng age pols fr acwaing contingencies. > Estabishing coningeney and management eserves enables you to leverage your project isk plant ts fils poteta. > Goorinaon points must be identified and analyzed inthe mutipropct isk environment > A sandr isk matics usu too when maragog many risks across proc. > Tho skys can bean efecve too fr organizing end oan treats ta th project. | creating the Projet Risk Plan a Brercise . veces {ose one of your carer cet ros, nd pain th Sic Se oz He to trae oe od each, tn HA oa epee base stale Pk ‘three risks and establish: ner > Prevent measures > Contingencies Tigger points “wo or three bullet points foreach should sue.Using the Work Breakdown Structure to Plan a Project | a previous chap, sad that planing answers the 1) | Sass viata fe vnc tg ong |] |} take2", and “How much will it costa". Planning the “| |) whats vital projects frequently fall because a significant {part ofthe works forgotten In aditon, once tasks have “= een identied, the time and resource requirements must be determined. This is called estimating. ‘A major problem in project planning is determining how Jong tasks wil take and what t wll cost todo them. Inaccurate estimates are a leading cause ofpoject failure, and missed cost targets are a common cause of ies and recrimination in project management The es sel wolf acomplsinga of hes ashe work breakdown structure (WBS). The idea behind the WBS is simple: You can subdivide a complcated tsk nto smale tasks unl you reach a level that cannot be further subdivided. At that point, tis usually ease to estimate how log the small ask will Using the Work Breakdown Structure to Plana Project 63 take and how much it wil cost to pexform than It would have been to estimate thse factors forthe higher level [Nevertheless sil not easy t estimate task durations for activites that have never een performed before. Because this I ‘the typical situation in engineering hardware and software devel ‘opment projects, we might expect many of these estimates to be In eror, and this seems to be demonstrated by experience. Sil, the work breakdown structure makes iteasetto estimate know edge tasks than any other tool we have. A Simple Example ‘Asan example, if want to clean a oom (see Figure 61), might ‘opin by picking upciothes, toys, and other things that have been the boss. After that, she forgot al about the job, ‘Two months passed. Then the bomb was dropped. Her boss appeared al smiles, “Remember that estimate you did forme on, the xyz job” Sine had to think hand to remember, but, as her boss croned on, itcame back to her He piled aig stack of specifcatons on her desk. "Its your ob now” he told her an drifted ff again nto ‘manager dreactiand, As she studied the ple of paper, Kren fet herself growing, ‘ore concemed. There were significant dferences between this Set of specs anc what her boss had told her when she did the es ‘imate, “On, wel, 'm sure he knows tat,” she told hersel [Using the Work Breakdown Structure to Plana Project 77 Fnaly, she managed to work up a new estimate for the job fon the basis ofthe real specs. [twas almost 50 percent higher than th ballpark figure. She checked her figures carefully, as sured herself that they were corec, and went to see her bes, He took one look atthe numbers and went ballistic. “What are you tying to do to me?” he yelled“ slready told the old ‘man We would do itfor the orginal gure. I can't tell him i's this such more. Hel kil me, "But you tld me it was usa ballpark number you needed," Karen argued, “That's what | gave you But sis thing ike the job Lust.) Ong oF the primary eat bigget” “Lcan'thelp that," her boss argued, | causes of project “L already gave him the figures. You'll 7 have to fnd a way to do itfor the org | falures te that nal bid" ballpark estimates Naturally, you know the rest ofthe story. The job cost even more than | become targete, Karen's new estimate, There was lat of ‘moaning and groaning, but, in the end, Karen survived, Ob, they Aid send her off oa couse on project management—hoping, 10 doubt, that she would lear how to estimate beter n the fare Here ae some guidelines for documenting estates Show the percent tolerance thats kely to apply. Tell how the estimate was made and what assuraptions were use. > Spec any factor that might et the val ofthe estimate (such as wheter the esimate wil sil be vad in six month). Could you fault Karen for anything? Well, perhaps, If she failed to tel the boss that 2 ballpark estimate might have a toler. ance of perhaps +25 percent bu tat the margin of eor could range from 10 percent to +100 percent, then she allowed him ta tink that the estimate was better than it was. Also, she shoal hhave documented all working assumptions, explaining how she~ Fundamentals of Project Management did the estate, what project she hed used for comparison, and so on. Then, if management stil pulled a whammy on het, at leas she would have had some protection, fn fac, its impossible to make sense of any estimate unless these steps ae take, so they should be standard practice Consensual Estimating In recent years, anew method of estimating knowledge work has been developed that seems to work better than oder techniques. Rather than have individuals estimate task durations, the new method asks atleast three people to estimate each activity inthe project that they know something about. They do this without ddscussng their Ideas with one another. They then met to find ‘out what they have put on paper. Ina typical stuaton, cere may be arange of mes, such as, for example, ten day, twelve day, and thirty days, in which two of the estates are cose together, but ones very ifferent. How do you handle the discrepancy? ‘The best approach isto discus what each person was con sidering wen he made the estimate, It may be that the person ‘who put down thirty days was thinking about something thatthe other two had overlooked. Or, conversely, the other two might, convince the thiryeday person that his number is way too igh and get him to come down toa figure nearer teir estimates, [a any case, they ty to arrive ata number thatthe all can suppor. ‘Thisisclled consensus. ‘There are three advantages to this approach. Fist, noone per son is onthe hook for the final number. Second, nexpecienced ‘people lear to estimate from these more experienced, Third, sev: al people at likely to collectively consider more sues than any ‘ne person would do working alone, For that reason, you are ‘more likely to get an accurate estimate although tis important 10 remember that cs stil by defition not exact! Improving Estimating Ability People cannot ear unless they receive feedback on thelr perfor al ed Using the Work Breakdown Structure to Plana Project. ‘ning to improve your ped ut you never tne youre, oa hve no ea whee ou ere ing ae You cold be doc ometing tat save! yeu foun br oun knit nthe sae wo yous taunts Duteve record ie act tine fey odo tt ey ever ng gt eer texting Furthermore tet og fsccpopes rng testa yo ns es : rose oat ou wl 205 an pone atone aug a er > Do not o wok out sequencing of acts when you de- velop a WES. You wil do het when you develop a schndu. DA WBS tes the entre project togenu.tprtay ays scope ‘aphicaly, lows you to assign resources, permis you to |geeop estimates of tine and costs, and ths provides the si or the schedule and the bude. > Anesimate sa quss, nd an act esti an axymeran! > Be care hat ballpark estimates dont became tyes Donia esirig god way lt ‘for which no history exists, * seis Key Points to Rement> range for supplies and equipment. > Select campsite D> Moke st preparations. > Make ste reservation > range time off rom work > Select route to site > Propare menu for meas > Identity source of supplies and equipment > boat car, > Pack sutases, > Purchase supplies. > Arange camping tip (poet). (CAR Scheduling Project Work no ofthe play features that dstingulshes project manage ment from general management isthe special attention to Scheduling, Remember from Chapter 1 that Dr: J. M, Juran says a project isa problem sched ‘ed or solution, Project manage- Unfortunately, some people i think that project management is noth | en fe not just ingbut scheduling and thisis incorrect. | scheduling. Scheduling i ust one ofthe tools used to manage jobs and should not be considered the primary one. People today tend to acquire sched- lling software, of which there iS a) Suggestion: What- abundance, ané think that will make | SN@gestion® | them instant project managers. They | ever echedl Soon find that that idea is wrong, Int, | software you itisneay impose ose hesotware | °FEWATE You tflecively unless you understand project | choose, get some ‘management and scheduling methodol . owinparicusn professional train T do have one suggestion aboxt sot | ing on how to use It.a Fundamental of Project Management | | Seneduing Project Wore 2 ware. Whatever you pic, get some profesional taining on how ‘use it In the eary days of personal computer, there was pretty signlcantdifrence between the lowend and the high- end software that was avaable, The low-end packages Were Pretty easy use, whereas the high-end anes were not. Te gap between low- and highend software hascosed to the point that this so longer true. They are al dificult to use now, and the trtning materials (tutorials and manuals that come wit the soft ‘ware ae often not very good. In adation, it's hard to ind me to work through a tutorial without elng interupted several tues, which means that seflearing is eficult. The mest eff dent way sto take a cass. Do check out the instructors knowledge of project manage ment before choosing which class to take. Some of the people teaching the software know ver ite about project management itself and, when you have questions, they cant answer ther. ‘You should expect to spend from two to three days of chs room time becoming realy profcent with the sofware, Tha st good investment, consiering the time the sotware cen save you in the Jong run A Brief History of Scheduling ‘Untiaoun 1956, the ony tol for scheduling projets was the Duar chart (ee Figure 7-1). Because Henry Gant developed & complete notational sytem for showing progress with bar charts, they ae often called Gantt chars. They ate simple to ‘constrict and read and remo the best tool 0 se for comm nicating to team members what they need ‘odo win given time frames, Arow diagrams tend to be to compllated fr some teams, Nevertheless, iti often heigl to show an arow lagram to the people doing the wor so that they understand Jnterdependences and why its Importane tat they complete certain sks on tine ar chars do hav on serous cravhack—“iis very lifeult to detemine the impacto ip on one task on the rst ofthe Flguro 7-1. Bar chart, a be = e —, Time roject (eg if Task A in Figure 7-1 gets behind it hard to tel how this wil tet the rst ofthe Work) The reason is thatthe a chart in ts original format) dd nt show the interdependen cles ofthe work. (Contemporary software does show links be tween bars, making them easier to reed, The actual name for these br chars is timeline erica path schedules") To overcome tis problem, two methods of sctedullng were developed in the late 19505 and eaty 1960s both of which wse aw dagrens tbeapnrethesequcntaltndmealiees, | CPM: Critical Path tionships among pofect actives. neot | Method these methods, developed by Du Pont, Is called Critical Pach Method (CPM), | PERT: Program and the other, developed by the US. oan Navy and the Booz Alen Hamiton con. | E*@luation and salthg group, is called Program Braua- | Review Technique tion and Review Technique (PERT) ‘Although it has became customary to cal all arow diagrams PERT networks, stictly speaking the PERT ‘method makes use of probability technique, whereas CPM does ot In other words, with PERT itis pol to calculate the prob ably that an activ wil be completed by certain tine, whereas that snot posibe with CPM,Network Diagrams To show the sequence in which work performed, diagrams Ike those in gure 72 are used. In these diagrams, Task Ais done before B, while Task Ci done in pera! with them, ‘The network inthe bottom half of Figure 7.2 wses actiay-on arrow notation, in which the arrow repesens the Work belng done andthe cc represents an event. An events binary hat i, ithas either occurred ori has not. An activity, om the other hand, canbe partially compete, Note that this special use of the word “event.” We speak ofa football game as an eveut, even ‘ough it spans time. In scheduling terminology, however, an ‘events a spec point in time where something ha us stated ‘or as just been fished, Figure 7-2. Azrow diagrams. ‘A activty-on-nodonenwork -atvty A ety 8 =) ratty © An activity-on-arrow network ‘The network inthe top half of gure 7-2 uses atiy on: de tation, wich sows the wrk aa box o node, athe rows show the sequence n which the work is ptformed. Events ae not shown in actvtyon-node networks ues they ae mflestonespoint inthe projet at which major portions of the work are competed Why two fom of diagrams? Probably a tyranny to canfise the unintated. Actual it simpy happens thatthe schemes ‘were developed by different practitioners. 1s one beter than the other? No. ‘They both get the ame results infeuing | The erttical path te out when work i supposed tobe com pleted. Both forms are wed athough | thé longest path sctiyeosodeis ued anit more tan. | through a project the othe, simply ecause much of todays penona computer softwares | RebWork Because programmed to use node notation. it has no elack, all ‘Whats the Benet of using either (CPM or PERT? The main advantage is | activities on the that youcan tel whether itis pessblet© | eiical path must rmeet an important project completion dite, and you can alo tell exactly when. | be completed ae ‘varius tasks must be ised inorder to meet that deadline, Furthermore, you | S¢heduled, or the «can tel which tasks have some leeway | end date will begin and which do not. In fact, both CPM ‘and PERT determine the critical path, | %0 elip—one day for ‘hich defined as the longest seis of | each day a crttical activites (that cant be done in paralle) | °°7 1°49 ‘and which therefore governs how early | activity ie delayed. the project can be completed The Reason for Scheduling [Naturaly, te primary reason for scheduling a project sto ensure ‘hat the deadline can be met. Most projects have a dezlin im posed, Furthermore, since te crea! path method helps identiwich actives il detemie teen dt it abo es ie Tow te projet soul be marge weve eu to pci avay wh sted and sper of our me epding revs, do on, The sted CTngsotwore nse today show te vewed fol ad a tae shoul ot become Sesto ete Ts ak very uy fo eae sels that look god on pepe ut ont Wot npc: The ahr s say tat Fess ae alte to te work when comes oe. fe ues eoouce soca Sande Fropety schedules ae nett eles Fortunately, today’s scheduling software One company) haniles resource allocation falny wel, | found that when Dut We tve dca fe mete used to the software manuals, In this It eto braving book Wesinpyoxmine now netwets|_pople work on Su oso eee mem | Rati pepe lam: Gate le ‘scope and re workers’ produc~ teschmge eter na grenargniae | Contatt dz make cence ospend_ | Pty doubled! te ngeteapah Tete 0 poms Worth cosifeng here. One that If ope changing stat ns et nt chug Une eng sper ang unt Seton db Sop hangs mos enor case sonething soot Beer atenn o wha eng dove the bogning aly ede spe cee. Stor, pines arching oe, mangement oes nov have ty a togeier Gener, he ran Yi tile eo much Wort bribe aunbe of eorces eal ‘Weal fave "st sof ings we watt todo penal, Dut we have fo pt seo thet on hold unt tine, money or buh become sale. The sue ste of onarzations Erperince shows tat wen you nave adi working ot ‘any pret roduc safes, One company und, a =n ‘ala een oped havig pale waren male projects, employees’ productivity doubled! That obviously Is, ‘lg slglicant. ‘What does CPM have todo with hs? Knowing where the cit ‘cal paths ina project allows you to determine the impact onthe project ofa scope or priority change. You know which actives ‘wil be impacted most heavy and what might need tobe done to regain lost time. In aio, managers can make iniormes deci sons when you can tll tem the Impact of changes tate project. ‘Thus, CPM canbe an invaluable tool when used proper Definitions of Network Terms ACTIFY An szthay aways consumes time and may ao ‘consume resources, Examples include paperwork, lator, negotiations, machinery operations, and lead times for purchased parts or equipment. CRMICAL A ential axtay or event fs one that must be achieved by a certain time, having no tatituce [ack or float) whatsoever CCRITCAL PATH The ctl paths he longest pat through a net- work and determines te eariest completion of project work, EVENTS Beginning and encing points of activites are noun as events. An event isa specie pont in tine. Events ace commonly denoted graphical by 2 dre and may cary identity nomenclature (2 ‘wor, rumbers,alpharumee coves) MILESTONE Mies are events that representa point ina project of special significance. Usually its the Completion of major phase of the work. Project. reviews are often conducted at milestones. NETWORK Networks are called “arrow diagrams.” They pro Vide a graphical representation of a proect pan ‘honing the relationships ofthe activities.Constructing an Arrow Diagram As was pointed out in Chapter, @ work breakdown stucture (WBS should be developed before work on the project sched led Also, we sw hata WES can contain fort foto twenty level To usta how a schedule is consiricted ‘rom a WBS, ‘We consider simple ob of manning the ard around a home, ‘The WBS i shown in Bure 73, Inthe cae of ls WS it appropriate to schedule he sks atthe aves eve. Howeve, ths not avaye tue, Sometimes ‘wok sbroken down to lve 6 but ont, {tiles upolev Sareentered ino tie| Don't echedule Schotle, Te eason sat you may not rable to eep level tats On schedule, | Ore detall than Thats, you can't manage tat tent. | you can manage, So you schedule at level that youcan | me ‘manag. Ths lows the general ule that you should never lan (or sedul) In more dtl than you can maage. Some po} et, sch 8 overtaling a lange power pneratoy ae scheduled Figure 7-3. WBS todo yard project. Jn increment of hous. Ober are sched in days, while some igeonstrction jobs ae schedule tothe nearest ont ‘While panning into mach deal is undesirable, you plan Jn too litle deal, you might as well nt bother. Asa practical example, a manager told me that his staff wanted to crete schedules showing tasks with twenty sixweek duralors. He protested that | & good rule of the staff would never complete such ; schedules on tine. They would backend | thumb to follow is (oz ier, he argued. — “What he meant was that thee is a | *h@ ieesk cna Iotofsecuntyinatwentysiewesk tsk, | have a duration ‘When the sar date comes, ithe person doing the task is busy, she might say, “I much greater than arora up day ori. | four to ok weeks six-week atv. gt started tomor row.” Thls continues untl se realizes | For knowledge work, she has delayed too long, Then theresa | durations should big ry of activity as she resto ish on tine, All the Work has been pushed | be in the range of ut the endo te ENTS HEEK | ome to three Weeks, ‘good rule of thumb to follow is | because knowledge that no task should have a duration much greater than four to six weeks. A work Is harder to ‘orentysacweek task can probaby be | track than tangible broken down into five osx subiasks. Such plan general keeps peone rom bucked loading “Thee are two ways you can develop a schedule. One isto dog tthe end and werk bak unt you ave atte begining ‘The second metho sto start atthe begining and work toward the end Usual tis eases to Sart at he beginning ‘The ist step sto decide what canbe done frst. Sometimes, several ass can start atthe same ime in that ease, you simply draw them se by sid aed start working fom there, Noe the work.” runaamentaie oF Froject Management | | [seneauing Project work a Figure 7-4, CPM dlagram for yard projec. ooter resto kee ll tne in he ste increment Doin ous and inated evrting in mits he conver to bos and nue as Sop For sched ty ave snp ep evening in es, sages tn you den your nebo paper an chek it frog enstency Beto enteng yng non etter shed og. neve opal, te computer Wilt | nother rule te Yous garage geregecurrent tux | Another rule ls to Evaiea imprest avngcome om | Keep all times in the er we aaa berth, | 94me increments. a fa import orenenber hat \gszen! — "ra! there usually no slgte solution fo eto pole, That sree ee iit re the row progesion inte dagam nRgre 74 Itcometnes kes seve diagram bt fered than you have done, There maybe pats Rertons ble he equendng can be worked out complet ofthe dagam hat Rave tobe done na en ede buon “Tus sal rect might be thought of as having tire pes there ex, Forel, you cn deliver pape ntl ou preparation exceaton and eeu. Tet are tee pas tive printed them, othe dagen sowee tat sequence, fn ss plo up as usin eu suid be wrong, The concn that tee sno sale at ‘ment, and get out hedge clipper. The | Schedules should ‘solution, but a diagram can be said to Gamay tts ince bagging grass i. . berwrong i oles oe f tuneing clings and haute vashto | b@ developed accord "The hetwo fore yard pojet_| 10 @ hand to tal the dump, ing to what is logi- could get alot more complicated. You | whether a network indngihsscedule agra, [have Could have edge fone sidewartand | foots ieotsedng wish sie | aly posslble, and tage back sdevat.You could tax | '© 4bSolubely cor- tlagnm whats lgtaly post ten | resource allocation Siri tind nso | rec, but canbe ‘del wt resource tattoo ach ont and bac an 0 on ul ere foes hover onebeingne, en hould be done later SSooseed trmateittoo conplanea | aid to be wrong if there realy cn be no paral us.On | hig wl yo th We dont usualy tr to capture ex | loge le violated. the other hand, If I can enlist help from a e actly how we will do the work, just a ‘the family or neighborhood youth, then | optimum echedule. the pist of it. pall tis wep ots esp ‘The next sept fgue ou how lang wl keto othe fpatet an chal aft were pole to et lp. Tse | jb. Te einates far each sk are mate by wing hs ke Pec ipa renee na work et, rou wl neve | Ing account how ngeach acy has taken nthe pas Re fposcleput gether You wl be wonying but who vl be mer though ta the estimate vel ony or teva arable todo the work and end up in analysis paras ‘Who i going 10 do the task. Ifmy daughter, who ls sixteen, doesscorer os agen anager the lawn mowing using a push moves, t wil probably take less time than if my soa, who is only twelve, does the same tsk. in ‘the folowing chapey, we see how o find the cial path through the network so that we can know how longit will take Key Points to Remember >> Projet managerent is no jt scheduing > Arow cagrams alow an easier assessment of the impact of sip on aproect hans possbe wh Gant chats. > Sched ta lvl of deta tat can be managed. > No task should te scheced with a duration much grater ‘han fut six weeks, Subd longer asst ache his jetve. Software and engnesing tsk shoulé be vided Erecise. eee eee For the folowing W8S (Figure 7-8), draw an arrow diagram. One soldion is shovm in the Answers section, Figure 7-5. WBS to cieen room, ‘Producing a Workable Schedule ce a suitable network has been drawn, with durations |) assigned wo all activites, itis necesary to determine where ‘the longest path isin the network and to see whether it will || meet the target completion date. Since the longest path through te project determines minimum project duration, any activity on that path that takes longe than planned wil cause the end date to sip accoréingy, so that path is called the cntical path Schedule Computations Normally, you would let a computer do these computations for You, $0 You may wonder why its necessary to know how to do them manually. Mi belie is that unless you know how the com. putations are done, you donot fully understand the meanings of oat, ary and late dates, and so on, Further, you can easly fll, Prey to the garbagerin, garbage-out malady. So here Isa brie! treatment of how the calculations ae done by the computer. (For ‘ost schedules, the compute has the aded bonus of converting, times to calendar dates, which sno easy task to do manually‘ist, consider what we want to know about the project. IF starts at some time = zero, we want to know how soon it can De finished, Naturally, in most actual Work projects, we have been tod when | Failure to consider we must be fished, That's, the end date ti ‘sdicated Furermore, the start date fe | "@#0Urce allocation the jb soten constrained for some ee | In @cheduling almost. Son: resources won be avaiable, ‘von be writen, or atither pejece | Way leads to a won't be finished until that te. So | schedule that can- scheduling usually means trying to the ‘work between two fxed points in time. | not be achieved. ‘Whatever the cas, we stil wan to know how long the project wil take to completes iit won't fit nto there ‘quired time tame, then we wil have to do something t shorten the critica pach. In the simplest form, network computations are made forthe network on the assumption that acy durations are exacly as specie. Howeve activity durations are a function ofthe level of resources applied tothe wor, and, that level is not actually availble ven it | Initial echedule comes time to do the work, then the 5 Scheduled dates forthe task'cannot be | Computations are met. (ts for this reason that network | made aso computatons must ultimately be mage | Ade a8uming ‘with resource limitations in mind, An- | that unlimited other way to say this Is that resource at | sesources a location's necessary to determine what | T@6°UrESS are a ‘kind of schedule is actualy actieval_| able, This yields the allure to consider resources almost always fads to a schedule that cannot | best-case solution, be met. Sill the fst step in network computations isto determine ‘where the critical path is inthe schedule and what kind of lat tude is avallable for noncntical work, under ‘deat condilons, [Naturally the deat stuaton sone in which unlimited resources are avaiable, so the fst computations made forthe network are ‘done without consideration of resource requirements. Its this ‘method that is described in tis chapter, and resource allocation methods are defered to scheduling software manuals as | said previously. Network Rules In onter to compute netwark start and finish times only two rules apply to all networks. These ar listed as rules 1 and 2. (Other rules are sometimes applied by the scheduling software It sell These ae sticty a function of the software and are not ap ple to all networks. Rule 1. Before a task can begin, al tasks preceding it must be complete. Rule 2, _Artows denote the logical order of wot Basic Scheduling Computations ah Scheduling computations are ilustated using the network in i ture 81, Fist, let us examine the node bores in the schedule ach has the notations ES, LS, EF LE and DU. These mean: ES = Enry Start 18 = LateStat EF = Eatly Finish LF = Late Finish DU-= Duration fof the tsk) Forward-Pass Computotions Considering acy ine neta sch 5 pcg ash fom the yrs drton oem mince Amin st fat ate = aor can fh eat tern minutes tte Ths, wecan ener 15 inthe el beled2 ‘runaamentais oF rojeor management | Figure #1. Network to ilustrate computation methods, | Preaueing a workable Schedule 97 Figure 2. Diagram with EF mes filed in Putting gas in the mower and the weed whacker takes only five minutes. The logic ofthe diagram says that both ofthese tasks must be completed before we can begin trimming weeds, cutting the front grass, and edging the sidewalk. The cleanup task takes fiteen | The Earliest Start minutes, wheres the gas activity takes i Only re minutes How seoncan theo. | f0" # FA6Ki6 the lowing activites start? Not unt the | latest Late Finish cleanup has been fished, since iis the longest ofthe preceding activites of preceding tasks, infact, then, the Early Finish for | That fe, the longest cleanup becomes the Ea Start for the next thre tas Is avays rue that the | Path determines latest Early Finish or preceding tasks | the earllest that a ‘ecomes the Early Start for subsequent i tasks. That the longest path determines | following task can howentysubsequentasiscanstr. | be started, Flowing this ral, we can fin Ea ies Start nes fr each ts, as shown in gure 82. This shows ‘thatthe projet wl take a total of L65 minutes to complete fall ‘work conducted exactly as shown, We have jus performed what 5} ae called forwardipass computations to determine Easiest Fish times for al activities. Computer programs do exactly the same thing and additonal convert the times to calendar dates, making, (quick work ofthe compuratons. RULE: When two or more aces precede anotoractivy, ‘he carst ime when that activ cane started she lengarof the durations of he shits preceing ft NOTE: The tine datormine forthe oor nl event athe east fish forthe project in working time. Once ‘woskonds, holidays, ana oer breaks inthe sched Up are accounted or, the nd date may be conse aby llr tan he oars fh in working ine. Bachward-Pass Computations ‘A backward pas is made tough the network to compute the lates start and latest ns tes foreach activity in the net ‘work. To do that, we must deci how late the project can fish By convention, we generally dont want a project to end any ater than its earlest possible completion. To stretch it out longer ‘would be inefficientWie also won ins (for now) thatthe project end eater than the east possible ish celeltd inthe previous steps I ‘we wat lh eae, we wl havo redraw te network or shorn some ac. | When doing back- titles by applying more resources or working more efficent. For now, ‘we wil accept the 1é5minut working, | tions, always use time and lett be the Lavest hf ines ‘the emallest num- Ir Hauling Avay Tash has a Late Fish of 165 minites and has a dura | PO" f0r Phe LF of tion of 45 minutes, what is the latest | previous activities, that could tar? Cay we subtract 45 fom 165, we have 120 minutes, which the Latest tat for the tsk, Proceeding in ths manne we gt LS tes for Basing Grass and Bundling Cupping of 90 and 105 minutes, respec tively One ofthese two numbers mist be the LF me fr eth af the preceding actives, Which one? ‘Well, assume we try 105 minutes. ¢ | When an activity we doa, the schedule would sy that Beal Gras coud sa alae w 105. | N48 NO Float, i ie minutes, since subsequent ests can | called critical, since Dog a soon as preceding fas ere ‘shed Bute 268 30min fer Bag. | Falure to complete reo te 105m Stine, weal | work me acheduled nish at 135 minutes, whic i Tater | a than te 120 minutes revosy deter | Will cause the end mines, and we willmis te 1eSminite | date to slip. nd te forthe project. Therein wen we ae dng Bawa pas calculators he Last Fishora preceding sk vl vay be the sallesta the ‘ae Sar es forte subset ss, (per Wy say Ss i: Always sete sales number) ward-pass caloula- RULE: When two or more acti fllw ants the test time that the procseng act can be achovedie the “smaterat ne tres Now examine the path in Figure 8° that includes activites ‘lghlighted by bold lines. Each activity has the same BS/LS and [BP/LF times. There is no float (or latitude fr slippage) on this path. By convention, an sctvity with no float is called erica and a total path with no fat is called the critical path, which ‘means that If any of the work on this path falls behind schedule, then the end date will sip accordingly. ll ofthe actives that have ES/LS or EF/LF times tat ifr are said to have foat, For example, Trim Weeds as an ES time of teen minutes and an LS time of sty minutes, giving it forty-five minutes of foa. ‘The final network is shown in Figure 83, Note that some tasks have the same EF and LF umes, as well asthe same ES and 1S times. These tass are on the cra! path In Pure 83, they ate shown with bold outnes, to indicate exaciy where the ext eal path es ‘Te crllal path activities have no latitude, They must be ‘completed as scheduled or the entire project wil take longer than 165 minutes. Knowing where the cical path is tells a manager ‘where his atenton must be applied. The other tasks have lt tude, or foat. This doesnot mean that they can be ignored, but they have less chance of delaying the projec if they encounter problems, The Edge Scdewalk tas, for example, hasan ES ume of teen minutes and an LS tie of seventy-five, The difference between the two is sity minutes, whch isthe oat forthe tsk ‘What good i the foat? Well, we know we can start the task as lateas seventy-five minutes int the jab and fil fish te pro} fect on time. If your son is doing this task, he can watch asi minute television program during tha time and sl et his Elin, task done on tie. Remember, too, that the times ae all estimates: This means that tasks might take more of less than the scheduled tle. So long a they do not take Ioner than the scheduled time plus the avallable float time, the job can be completed on time. Critical tasks, which have no lost, must be managed in such away that they take the scheduled time. This is usally done by adjusting the resources (effort) applied, either by assigning more resources or by working overtime (increasing resources in ether as.we rrunaamentaa or rrojece manager to have a false sense of secuty and put off starting, under the assumption “I can always make up one day." By the time they start, they often have slipped several days and find that they cannot fish as scheduled, We say that they backend Jatt task by pushing all the effort toward the back end. It a task has a duration greater than six weeks it isa good idea to subdivide it, creating an arial break if necessary. Then review progres at that point. That wil help keep ion target >It the prope dong the work ait na develop the network, lant tiem and show them the meaning oot, Dent hie ftom them, However, ie them ar ehar to wk to itis mich eset reas bar char hana net i gm. Sow them tat they use up Hat on ier ts, then the forint zy Become ota, aig the eo ple who must do those activities feeling really stressed. Its posible to shorten a task by adding resources, reducing it scope, doing soppy (poor quality) work, being more efi cient, or changing the process by which the work is done. ‘With the exception of doing soppy work, all ofthe methods ‘maybe accepabl, A reduction in scope must be negntiated ‘wit your custome, of couse. > Scheduling is done iniallyon the assumption that you will have the resources you plane on having, If people are shared ‘with other projects orf you plan to use the same person on several tsk, you may find that yu have her overoaded. Mod: em softare generally wams you that you have overioaded your resoures and may be able wo help you oie the problem, Converting Arrow Diagrams to Bar Charts ‘While an arow diagram is essental todo a proper analysis of the relationships between the actives Ina proec, the bes working, tools the bar cart. The people doing te work wil nd it much tasler to see when they are supposed to start and fish thelr obs if you give them abr chart. The arrow diagram in Figure €-3 has [Producing a Workable Schedule 108 been porvayed a6 a bar chart in gure 84, making use of what was eamed about the schedule from the network analy. Figure &-4. Bar chart schedule for yard project Note that the citcal path in the bar char is shown as solid black bars. Bars with Noa are dravn hollow with aline walling to indicate how much fats avaliable. The task can ee a late as the point at which the traling line ends, ‘Ths fay conventional notation Scheduling software aways allows you to print a bar char, even though a CPM network is ‘sed to find the crcl path and to calculate floats. One caution: ‘Many programs display the etal pat in red ona color monltor and ofen color stared tasks with green or bive. When thes bars ate printed on a blackand-witte prints all of them may look ack, impiying that they ar al erital,conhsing the peopie tying to reed them. [tis usually possible to have the computer display shading or cosshatching instead of color so that when they are printed in blaceand-white, there wil ke no ambiguity Assigning Resources to Tasks ‘have already sald thatthe fst step in developing a schedule is to assume that you have unlimited resources, because this thewo Funasmantais of rroject Management | Figure €-, Diagram showing crite! path, —— (eas ale on | Goa ry eee ee ceay ates cs aa ea eaten aaa eeeerea area eee Sines eee enuigerasa ‘te pe pe nen ine eg ee | pork re evn cee eee ees eae ‘asl; then, when problems occur, they miss the end date. If there i eer aoe It is bad practice to schedule a project 60 that overtime is required to meet the schedule, since If problems are encountered, it may not be possible to ‘tw pact the end dat for the entre projec, since, once a task runs out of fot it becomes part of the catal pat tn fact, he true meaning of the word “rcal” that there isno oat. The task must be done on tine. Using the Network to ‘Manage the Project 4s Uhave indicated previous, the point fh of developing a CPM diagram isto uses | Path. to manage te project. this snot done, scheduling i simply a worthless exercse. So here are some point- ets that Ihave found belpul in managing my ov jobs: ‘Once you have used up the float on a ‘task, it becomes part of the critical Try to stay on schedule. tis always harder to catch up than to stay on target to begin wth > Keep float in reserve incase of unexpected problems or bad estimates, Apply whatever efor is needed to keep critical tasks on Schedule. Ia task onthe crtal path can be finished ahead of schedule, doit Then start the next task D> Avoid the temptation to perfect everthing that's wha the next generation product or service all about. Note: [al ‘ot sayit is okay to do the [ob slopply or that you should’t do your best work. I said don't be tempted to make it per ‘fect. By definition, you will never reach perfection >> Estimates of task durations are made on the assumption that, certain people will work on thse tasks. someone else ac: tually sed, you may have to adjust durations accordingly This is especialy true ifthe new person i less sklled han the intended resource. D> This was stated in Chapter 7 but s repeated here because of {ts importance: No task shouldbe scheduled with a duration ‘much greater than four to six weeks. I'you do, people tendDest station you can ever asume, and if you cant meet your project completion date with an unlimited resource schedule, you may as well know it eat. Howeve, once you have dete. ‘mined that the end date can somehow be met, you now must sve whether your asumpton of unlimited resources has over Toaded your avallable resources, Normally, you wil ind that you have people double-and tripe Scheduled, which cleariy won't work. These kinds of resource ‘verioads Can be resolved only by using computer software, except for very simple scheules. This is where the software realy excels, and yet estimates are thal onl ew percent fall the people who ‘purchase software actually ws it to level esoures. Consider the small schedule in Figure 85. It contains only ‘our tasks. Two are critical, and two have float, Task A requires ‘vo workers itis tobe completed in three weeks, and tasks B ‘nd Gneed one person each, When It comes time todo the po Figure 8-5. Schedule with resources overoaded. Sel Need2 Need 1 Need 1 soap Need2 Have 3 available Time, weeks [LYrodueng @ Workable Schedule 105, ect, however, you find that there are ony three workers aval able, How di this happen? Its possible that no more than three people were ever aval. able, but because you followed the rule to schedule in parallel tasks that could logically be done in paral, you inevitably ove loaded your people. I is also posible that, when the plan was conszucted, four workers were avalale Bu that one has since been asigned to another jo that as prirty aver yours. ‘Whatever the reason, this schedule won't work unless some thing s changed. There are a number of possiblities. There are three areas to examine, You should frst see whether any task has enough float to allow it to be delayed until resources become avalble. In ths pariular example it turns out that this s pos sible, The solution is shown in Figure 8:6, (Ofcourse, this solution is ance textbook example that just happens to work out Its never so easy ina teal project. Notice Figure #6. Schedule using float to level resources. = Need2 Need1 Need 1 co ee Need2 Have 3 available Time, wooksthat task C has enough float that it can side over and wait unt activity Bi fnshed, But what usualy happens is that ask C runs ut of fat bere B is completed. Ao assume tat task D needs three people, rater than two. AS you can se, this complicates the station considerably. Ths is shown in Fie 87. Since this isthe typical situation, we must be prepared to handle it. There are two mare places to look for help. The fists ‘he functional eatonship among the variables CIR TS) You stould ak wheter you can rede sop, cane the Seni ore pero. sy prac te pial, at heather maybe Forex ont can Feces al he ot clea ol beac the lent Of ou, you ea gua Fens Figure 6-7, Sched wit inadequate float on © to pormitieveling. = Need 2 Need 1 Need 1 goomp Neod3 Have 3 available Time, weeks [Lrroauang a wornanve scneaue we time, you won’ have to consider ecacng scope or performance So you go shopping Yau ask the manager who “oWns" the resources whether she can prove another person. She says sadly that she cannot and that she was even considering tying to take back another of the tee she has aleady given you. Somehow you convince her not ‘todo this, You then ask te projec sponsor iit s okay to reduce scope. Is not. Ts also not okay to reduce performance, Nor can you Bnd a contact employee in time to do the jb. You are between a rock and a har place. So you now ask whether there Is another process ‘that could be used todo the work. For example, if you can spray. paint a wal instead of using ol it may go much faster Suppose you ty this end agan you come up empiy-banded. You decide the only thing left todos resign your job. You never really wanted tobe a project manage, anyway But wait Perhaps there Is something else you can do. ‘Think bac to what I sald eater. You use up al the fat on Gand itisnawacitical-path task. When you tell your software televel resources, it wants to know whether you want sched tle within the avalable fat (or slack, a8 it als called), Ifyou ‘iy "Ves," as son asa task runs ut of fat, it won't move over an further, This is also called time ertea resource leveling, be cause time is ofthe essence for your project. (It always is} However, suppose you answer “no” tothe question “Do you ‘want to level within the avalable lac?” In this case, you are teling the software to continue sing tasks over until resources ‘become avallable, even ift means sipping the end dae. (This is called resource rticalleveling| When you try this with our ex ‘ample schedule, you ave atthe solution shown in Figure 8-8, Not bad, unlessyou can‘ live with the sip In fact, sometimes the sip isso bad that it seems almost ridiculous, Your proect vas originally going o end in December ofthe current yeat Now the software says it so starved for re sources that it will end in the year 2013! Ridiculous! What good Isa schedule that goes out that far?reyes mmaragemeny | Figure 6-8. Schedule under resource Need3 Have 3 available Time, weeks It canbe used to bring the isue to everyone's attention It shows the impact of indequate resources and forces a rede as described earler—that if everyone believes your schedule inthe fist place, Ihave ust had an experience with fellow who said that he didi elieve the schedules in the fst plae because be thought they were always untealsti, so an untealiste sched ‘le subjected to fancy calculations den prove anything to im. 1'm sure that tre, Hoveve, if people are wiling to accept ‘he limitations of what we are doing when we plan 2 project, this Js atleast a vay of showing the Linitadons you face. Everyone ‘must understand that estimatings guessing 28s true of matket ‘and weather forecasting, neither of which has aselat record ‘Moreover, al activites are subject to varlation, as Ihave pointed out If people don't understand this, then I suggest you tum in your project manage’ hat fora bette ob [Lrreaucing a wornaove scneauie we Resource Availability ‘A major factor in dealing wit resource aocation i the avalabilty af ech person to do project work. One puelne tat industrial en ‘Fees follow stat no person is avalale to wore more thar BO Dercent of the time. Ifyou assume an elghthour day, that means 6.4oursa day avalable for work, and prudence syst just make tsb hous. The 20 percent lost aralablty goes to thre factrs called PFD. P means personal—every individual must ake breaks. Fis fr fatigue—you lose productive tie as people get tired, And D means deays—people lose time waling for input rom others, supplies, or insctons on watt do. Experience shows, however, that the only people who are avalale to work even 80 percent ofthe time are those whose Jobs tie them to thle workstations. Tiss true for factory work ters and others who do routine jobs like procesing insurance tJaims (and even these people move around). With knowledge ‘workers, you never get 80 percent ofa day in productive work. The figure is usualy closer to 50 percent, sind it maybe lower! One company that I know of dd atime study in which people logged their time every hour for two weeks, and they found thet project work accounted for only 25 percent of their time. The est went to meetings, nnproject work that had o be dan, old Jobs tht were fnsned long ago but cate back to the person who ‘originally Worked on them, Work on budgts forthe next year, customer support, and on and on, ‘Most sftare programs allow you to spel the number of ‘working hours needed fora ask and the percentage ofa day that a petson will work onthe tsk; the software then tansats those estimates into calendar time. So, as an example, if a person Is working on your project ony halftime and the task she is doing Is supposed to take twenty hours of actual working time, then it will be a week or more) before she finishes I. tis especialy important that you know the aval of peo ple to do project work, or you wil preduce schedules that are ‘worse than useless. [say worse, because they wil be misleadinglyshort and they will weak havoc vith your organization, Do aie study to determine the number, then weit And if people don’ ike the fact that alot of imei being lost to nanpojet actives, chen ‘cottect the problem by removing those csrupive activities. ‘The usual solution i that people must work overtime to get thelr project work done because of al the esruptions that occur uring the day. The problem i that studies have found that over- time has avery negative impact on productivity. So its a losing battle. Short-term overtime sine, but long spans jst get organ zations into trouble Key Points to Remember D> You shoud grarerescurc iatns when you bi dve- ning a chet. vo tasks cnlogealbe doe nga, aw he rat way > The crcl paths the ae thats longest and has no oat. Note that you can hav proj on which th tak wt he longest pan isnt tical because has oat D> Nobody is avalible to do productive work more than 80, percent fa workday. You se 20 percent to personal ime, fatiue, and dlays. Erercise. * eee For the networkin Fqure 8-9, calculate the eal and ate tines and ‘he oat avaliable on noncrical activites. Which aces form the erica path? Answars are inthe Answers section atthe back of tho book [Producing a Workable Schedule Flguee 6-9, Notwork tor oxeriee, we] a] fe] arta sparen) | bere La] sfisheeoProject Control and Evaluation [| ph verse taken wp to now hasten for one pupose—io {| By sete onl afte project. Ts wat is expected © |p) project manager—that she manage organization resources Dy) insico a wy at tea resus ative However, there are two eanotaons tothe word “conto, and itis imporan hat we use he one thats appropriate in today’s word, One meaning of “contol retro domination, power, command, We contol people and things {rough the use ofthat power When we ay “ump,” people ak, “How high” At eas they wed to I dest work tat el today TThae previously discussed ie fect that project managers often have at of responsi but ie ato Le examine that and see whether ts ela problem, T have asked several comporate offer pesdents and vice resident) “Since you have tof auto oes that aulhoty fumanoe that people wl da vat ou want done?” frm, tey answe, “Ne "What does get them odo what you want done?” “Wen he end naj, they hav want todo they say. “Then what des your authosty do for you2® Lak Project Lontrot and Evaluation 13 “a igs ete eh eee sanctions re, batt Sore i tht having aberiy so gonte tou vl vessleta perpen too your ag en You ave tet to dol wilngy td a sa Fahne Seat) there reo Kd to donat neato e dene of authority: One ie ‘Aunt ind tatty into | omer wigan tats, | POWET over People, tour hagte prison int | andthe other is thst be rd we dobar ‘of organizational problems. | meet proj- ithe ability bo make) ct munges whe hae poe tuges_ | deck Se mllon of aloe ts much Somlln mone ca} yerwmo mat | act unilaterally, fave alepenluns poe apo) tx anand Dug hve ee port foe he work was Sted and he projec ages spenng win te = rove of Ge pln why el se ate ge te Se Farwe frapoved expends? Oxy devin for Dar gang rol re date Neto then th pl shl be fered tree ae changes ‘cone the mesg beng eto eager, On te one hand ey eed, tus you tae S35 tion of ur money" Oo the oer ha ty re But ‘hen Youspend yu mustave ey Senay gute y amare | A Agochecmneeongs Miter aunt One {pte ne Ser We ut oo me ober nem | amaye takes i whic cmestaece | prorty over a fad Gen You be The ene inert, we compan ht peo | ste one, ble eaistons wets moe Tel in ecco, Sg ay aecegenits al soc er tapta thane ns and toSo the fist meaning f “control” has a power connotation. Another meaning is summed up by the highlighted definition. ‘This defntion wes introduced in an ear chapter. Control's the act of compating progress to plan so that corective action can be ken when 8 deviation from planned performance —_ cccuts. This efnition imptes the use of | P&P® Prog information as the primary ingredient of | agalnet plan 20 contol, rather than power Thus, we ‘ ‘ak about management information sys- | HAP corrective ‘ems, and, indeed, these are the essence | action can be ‘of what i needed to achieve contol in ee taken when a Unfortunatly, many organizations | deviation occure Dave management information systems that are good for tracking inventory, sales, and! manufactuing labor but not for tacking projects. Wher such systems arena lice, you will hav to rack progress manualy. Achieving Team Member Self-Control Untimatety, the oni way to contol a proect is for every member (ofthe project team to bein contol of his own work. A project ‘manager can achieve control at the macro level ony if itis achieved atthe micro level. However, this does not mean tht you should practice mictomanaging! It actually means that you should set up condions under which every team member can achieve contol of his own efforts, ‘To do this requires five basi conditions. To achieve set control, team members ned: |. A clear definition of what they ate supposed to be doing, ‘with the purpose stated 2, A personal plan for how to do the requtted work [roiet control and Evaluation we 3. Skls and resources adequate to the tase 4, Feedback on progres that comes dvcty fom the wotk sell 5. A eat definition of thei authority to take corective action ‘when there ia deviation from plan and it cannot be zero!) ‘The fst requtement i that every team member be cleat about what her objective is. Note the diference between tasks and objectives, which was discussed in Chapter 4. Sate the ob- Jectve and explain tothe person it necessary what the purpose ofthe objectives. This allows the individual to pursue the objec tive in her own way. The second requtement i or every tam member to have a personal plan on how todo the required work. Remember, if FOU hve no plan, you have no contol This must apply a the ind vidual, as well as atthe oveal, project evel, ‘The third requirement is thatthe person have the sil and resources needed forthe job. The need fr resources is obvious, but this condition suggests thatthe person may have to be given traning if she is lacking necessary sls. Certainly, when no em- ployee is avalable withthe required sls it may be necessary to ‘ave team members rained, ‘The fourth requirement Is that the person receive feedback on performance tat goes dinect to et If such feedback goes through some roundabout way, she cannot exercise self contol To make tls clas if tam members building a wall, she must be able to measure the helght ofthe wall, compare it to the planned performance, and know wether she i on track. ‘The fifth condition is that the individual must havea clear de fnltion of her authority to take corective action wen theres a deviation from plan, and it must he greater than zero authriy# If she bas to ask the project manager What todo every tine a devi ation occurs, the project managers sil controlling Furthermore, many people have o seek approval for every minor action, this puts areal burden on the project managerwe unaamenvans on ereyecs munagememy | Characteristics of a Project Control System ‘Toe contol system must focus on project abjectires, with the ‘lm of ensuring thatthe project mision i achieved. To do that, the conttol system should be designed with these questions > What is important to the organization? >What are we atempring o do? D> Which aspects ofthe work are most important to track and control? >What are the critical points inthe process at which conto shoal be placed? Control should be exercised over what is important. On the other hand, what is controlled tend to become important, Thus, ‘fbuugets and schedules are emphasized tothe excusion of qual i, only those willbe controlled. Th project may well come in ‘on time and within budget, but atthe expense of quality. Project managers must monitor performance carefully to ensure that ‘quality doesnot sufer. ‘Taking Corrective Action A contol system should focus on response—if control data do not result action, then the sytem i ineffective. That is if contol system doesnot use deviation data to diate corrective action, it 1s not realy a control system bat simply a monitoring system. If you ae diving and reaize that you have somehow poten on the ‘wrong read but do nothing to get back on the righ oad, you are not exercising control, ‘One caution here, though. once knew a manager whose re sponse to a deviation was to gp into the panic mode and begin ‘icromanaging, He then gotin the way of people tying wo solve the probiem and actually slowed them down. Had he let them alone, they would have solved thelr problem much faster: [[Proyect Control and Evaluation 7 Timeliness of Response “The response to conte data must e tne I action oc too ite, i wl be ineffective. Thi equenty a serious probe Data on project satus ae sometines delayed by four to six ‘weeks, making them useless a bas fr taking cetectve 2c tion. deal nfomation on poet satus should be avalable on a realtime bass. In most cases, that not posible. For many oj, satus reports that are prepared weekly are adequate ‘Utinatey, you want toi out tor many hours people actually work on | When people fill out you project and compare that gure to — ‘what was planned for them. This means feme reparts ty, that you want accurate dt. In some | without writing cases, people fl out weld tine reports ‘ett angen dom tee | 40¥M what they di ages cay Toa rena in bunch | daily they are mak of ftion, since mos! of ws cannot re ‘member with any accuracy what we did |’ 'n up fiction. Such a week se, lade-up da As difficult as it may be to do, you eaeie gamete need to get people to record thelr work: | almost worse than ing times daily so that the data wil 7 mean something when you collect | "? asta oe all them. What int fr them? Pertaps nothing Perhaps fture es mats wl be beter as a esl of your havngcolected acura Infomation on tis project. In ary ease, you need accurate dt, ‘or You may as wel At waste your time collecting tem, "When information collection i delayed foto lon, the man ager may end up making things worse Instead of betes Lag in feedback systems area favo tpi for systems theorists. The pvemmentsatemps to conto recesons and ifton some tines involve lg delays, os ares of which te government, winds up doing the exact poste of what should have been done thereby making the eenomfe situation wore ‘There i one pint abou contol hati imporant to note If every member of the project tam Is practicing proper conchmethods, then reports that are prepared weekly are just checks and bales, This isthe dested condition, Designing the Right System (One contro systems not key to be core forall projets, It may ‘eed tobe scaled down for small projects and beefed up fr large ‘ones. Generally, a contol system adequate fo a large project wil overwfelm a smal one with paperwork, hile one thats god for small projects won't have enough lout for a big projet. Practicing the KISS Principle KIS stands for “Kept simple, stupid!” The smallest contol efor. that achieves the dested rsa should be use Any corsl data that are not esental shouldbe eliminated. However as was ust ‘mentioned, one common mistake isto try to contol complex projects with systems area Socal No problem is so ‘To keep conto simple it's 2 good | big or 80 compli- Idea to check periodically that reports that ate generated are actually being | S@¥ed that It can't ‘used for something by the people who | be run away from. receive them, We sometimes create re ports because we believe the informa | —ChartePrown (Charles tion in them shoud be useful to others, | Sehols, Reams) butif the recipents don't actualy us it we are kidding ourselves. To tet thls pot, send a memo with ach reporting people to et you know whether they Want 1 receive future reports; you donot hea rom them, thet names ‘will be removed from the distribution, You may be surprised to find that noone wses some of our repos. Those repors should be dropped complete Project Review Meetings ‘There ae two aspects to projec: conto. One can be called main- ‘tenance, andthe othe aims at improvement of perfomance. The maintenance review just tris to keep the proect on tack. The [rtrect Loner ana tvatuation 2 improvement review tres to help project teams improve perfor ‘mance, Thre kinds of reviews are routinely conducted to achieve ‘these purposes. They are: 1, Status reviews 2. Processor lssonseamed reviews 3. Design reviews Everyone should do status and proces revlews, Design re vlews, of course, are appropriate only ifyou are designing hard ‘ware, sofware, or some sort of campaign, such asa marketing campaign, {A salus review i almed at maintenance. It asks where the project stands on the PCTS measures that we have used through ‘out this book. Only ifyou know the value of al four ofthese can you be sure where you are. This isthe subject of Chapter [1 ‘Process means the way something is done, and you can be sure that process always affects task performance, That is, how Something is done affect the outcome. Fr that reason, process Improvement isthe work of every manager How thls s done i covered inthe next section, Project Evaluation Aste dictionary defition says, o evaluate a projects to attempt to determine whether the overall stats ofthe works acceptable, In tems of intended value tothe client once the job i fished Project evaluation appraies the progress and performance ofa job and compares | eevaleusate: to them to what was orginally planned. oe ‘That evaluation provides the bass for | determine or judge ‘management decisions on how to pro- | the value or worth of ceed with the projet. The evaluation must be credbie inthe eyes of everyone | —The Random Hovee affected, or decisions based ont wil not | OtetionaryFRED or re be considered val. The primary tool for project evaluation isthe project process review, which s usually conducted at major mil stones throughout te te ofthe project. Purposes of Project Evaluation ‘Sports teams that practice without reviewing performance may et really good at playing very badly. Tat is why they review ‘ame fms to see wire they need to Improve. In other word, ‘the purpose a review isto larn lessons that can help the tear to avoid doing things that cause undsiet outcomes and to con ‘tinue doing those thet help. The review should be called a lessons learned or process review. ‘have deberaely avoided the word aul, because nobody likes toe audited. Historical, an audit has been designed to ‘atch people dong things they shouldn't have done so that they ‘an be penalized in some way. I you go around auditing peopl, you canbe sure they will hide from you anything they don’ want youto know, and itis thoe very things that could help the com> pany leam and grow. As Dr W. Edwards Deming has pointed out, there are to kinds of organizations inthis world today—those that are geting boter and those that are dying, An organization that stands tls dying jst doesnt Know iy The reason? The competition fs not siting by ily. Itis doing new things, some of which may be better than what you are doing I you aren't improving, you will be pused by,andsoon you wonthavea | Good management ratket, The same is ue of every part ofan | of projects can give ‘organization. You can’t suboptimize, im- ‘co! 7 proving jst manufcturing,Youhave to | YOU # competi Improve every department, and that I~ | advantage. cludes ow you run projects. Infact, good project management can give you 2 real compet itive advantage, especially in product development. If you ae sloppy in managing your projets, you don’t have good contol of Project Control and Evaluation ca development costs. That means that you have to eter sla lat of producto charge large margins to cover your development css So thatthe poets woth doingin the fst place. Ifyou ca’ sll Jot of widgets, then you have to charge the large margin, It your competitor on the other hand, has god cost contol, itcan charge smaller margins an stil be sure that it recover I Investment and makes money. Thus, it has a compete advan tage over you because ofits etter contot of project work. ‘Aaaitionaly, in order to learn, people require feedback, ke that gained by a team from reviewing fae ns. The inst phase of 2 rect th order to lear, we should be 2 final process review, con ducted so thatthe management of poj- | Must have feedback, cs can be improved. However sucha | Furthermore, proces eview should not be conducted only at the end of the project Rathes, | tend to learn more ‘process revlews shouldbe done at major i Inlestones nthe projet or every tiee_| 0M mistakes than months, whichever comes fs, so that | ftom euccesses, learning can take place as the Jab pro: | 3, spose Furhemoe, sprog is ee | Pall though that ling into serious trouble, the process | may be to admit, review should reveal the dffclty so thata decison canbe made to continue or terminate the work, Fellowing are some ofthe general reasons for conducting pe slo projet process reviews. You shouldbe able to Improve project performance together with the management ofthe project. Ensure that quality of project work doesnot take aback seat to schedule and cost concer, > Reveal developing problems erty so that action can be taken to deal with them, De Kdentity areas where other project (current or future sould be managed diferent.Me unaamensaie or reece management | > Keep clients informed of project status, This can also help ‘ensure thatthe completed project wil meet the needs of the client > Reaftrm the organizations commitment tothe projct forthe benefit of project team member. Conducting the Project Process Review Ideally, a project process review should be conducted by an inde Pendent exatniner, who can remain objective inthe assessment Of nformation. However, the process review must be conducted in spirit flaring, rether than ina climate of blame and pun ishment, If people are aftald that they wil be “strung up” for robems, then they wil ide those problems if tall posible ‘Even so, openness is hard to achieve. In many organization, the climate as been punt for so long that people ae reluctant to reveal any | Process reviews lessthanperfect aspects of project pe formance. Dr Cis Argts, in his hook | ONducted as Overcoming Organtzational Defenses: | witch-hunte will acitating Organization Learning, has described the processes by which organi | produce witches, zations continue nective practices. All of them ae intened to help individuals “save face” or avoid em barassment. Inthe end, the also prevent oganizatona earning ‘Two questions should be asked in the review. The fst i. “What have we done well sofa," and the second is “What do we want to improve (or do better) in the future?" Notice tat am not asking “What have we done bady2" That question serves only to make everyone defensive, because people will assume ‘hat you wl punish them for tings done wrong. Furthermore, there i lays the posit that nothing has been done wrong, Dut there is always room to improve Final te resus of the review shouldbe published. Other ‘wise, the ony people in the organization who can take advan tage oft are the members ofthe team just reviewed. If oer [Projet control ana Evaluation 2 teams know what was learned, then they can benef rom that Information. In the next section, we look at what the report should contain, ‘The Process Review Report ‘Acompany may decide to conduct process reviews in varying de sees of thoroughness, trom totaly comprehensive, to part, t0 Jes formal and cursory. A formal, comprehensive proces review should be followed by a report. The report should contain asa ‘minimum the folowing: Curent project status. The best way to do this is to wse ‘earned value analysis, a5 presented in Chapter 11. Howeves, ‘when eared value analysis snot use, the current status should still be reported as accuetely as possible Db Fature status This ia forecast of what is expected to hap ‘pen in the projet. Are signlicant deviations expected in sche: ll, cos, performance, or scope? Ifso, the report should specly the nature ofthe changes. > Status of critical tasks. The report should descibe the sti tus of tcl tasks, particularly those on the erica path, Tasks that have high levels of technica sk should be given special at- ‘enilon, as should thse being performed by outside vendors ot subcontractors, over which the project managet may have lm: ited control. > Rsk assessment, The report should mention any Ident fied risks that could lead to monetary lss, projec allure, or other Sables, > Information relevant to other projects. The reprt should describe what has been eared om this proces review tat can ‘oF should be applied to other projects, whether in progress or about to star. > Limatations ofthe process review. The report should men: ‘on any factors that may imi the val of the process review,‘Ave any assumptions suspect? Are any data missing ot perhaps «contaminated? Was anyone uncooperative in providing informa ton for the process review? 4 a general comment, the simpler and more straightforward 4 project process review’ report, the better The information should be organized so that both planned and actual rests can be esi compared, Sigicantdeviaons shuld be highlighted and explaine Key Points to Remember > The mearing of cont hats imporanto project managers isthe one that concerns the use a formation, comparing actual progress ote lan ota acon can be tla to co ‘eat fr devin fom ln, D> The only way a project realy incon isi a team mem bers arin conto of thr own Wok. D> Tho fortused to contol a project shouldbe worth, You ont want to spend $100 fo purchase a $3 ater. fore ale > Iyou tle no action in response oa vito, you have 2 ‘monitrng system, nat conta system, > Phot worng times muse recorded ely people wat ‘week to capture wha they hae done, thy ray on memory and end up wring down estimates of what hey 6. Such ta arena good for future estmaing. D> Project evaluation is dno to determine wheter & project, ‘shoul canine orb canoe. Process vows ale should wan eam nade to improv pertrmance. The Change Control Process | 7 Be most comprehensive elective project plan wil be wasted if some method of controling change isnot implemented, |) Just as your diligence and ably to invest in planning d- |) recty fect project successor allure, soto does the estb- + lishment of change contol proces, The AMBOK® Guide addresses the change proces, stating, ‘When issues are ‘ound wale project work i being performed, change requests are ‘ssued which may modify project polices or procedures, project cope, project cost or butdgt, project schedule, or project. ‘qualt.” Ifyou do not keep the plan cut rent, you have no plan, The egal base- line plan the foundation) wil no longer be valid and wil lose i effectiveness in Other projects are added due to consolidation D> The cent changes the requirements> Market conditions shit >> Problems encountered by engineering Schedule Delivery date acceerated Competition pressures > Client requests early delivery Budget >> Management pulls 20 percent of the project budget > Raw material costs escalate D+ Project wor requis the addition ofa team member Understanding and dentiying likely sourees of change to your projects will asst you in remaining proactive, Te change contol proces wil equite a decision a to whether ar nat to proces the ‘change request and then determine the most ective way to more forward, Some decisions are easy: the customer requests 2 leh: mate design improvement othe project champlon de priortizes, the project and slips required devery three months. But projet fate dictates that many change requests require dffcultassess- ‘ments, analyses, and various approvals before the change can be processed. tis not always evident whether a spel change adc Vale or merety cosmetic adjustments to the projet plan. The for tal change contol proces realy s your fend. As you wil see fn te next section, It helps guide you through the gray areas of change that often develop asthe project matars, The Six Steps in the Change Control Process ‘The change contol process can vary but usualy includes a un ber of important and mandatory steps In this section Lousine ix tne cnange Control Process 19 common steps that are found in 2 typicl project change contol process, Organizational culture, procedure, and project type seat affect how the sep are implemented, The proect manager ‘ypicaly receives a change request fom the requesting ent in Aividual/department/customer|. tts point, tis important that ‘ou confirm the curent version of the projec plan If the change 's processed its impact will be measured against the plan an a Justmens made accordingly. Keep the baseline cure. Step 1: Enter intial change control information Into your change contro log, Entering intial change contro information into your change con two log serves as the surumary of all actions taken regarding ‘changes requested and/or processed, A detailed changelog ca ultimately serve as a biography of the project as I matures (see Figure 103 on page 136). Step 2: Determine ifthe change should be processed, By determining if the change should be processed, you take on the role ofthe projects gatekeeper. All too often, Ihave seen pr ‘ect managers aept changes simply because they are requested If ‘the change doesn’t make sense—iit doesn't add value or should ‘not be processed lor other reasons—push back. Request carics tion of justification to help you arrive at a reasonable deckon, If the change is rejected, lg it and stop the proces. If the change accepted, bepn assessing the impact othe project plan. Tis yp lcally done by ascng this question: "How does the change affect the sdes of my tangle: scope, schedule, and budget?” Quality, objective and otereements ofthe projec should aso be considered winen assessing Impact. Prepare recommendations {or implementation and then complete the change contol form. ‘Step 3: Submit recommendations to management and/or the customer for review and approval Recommendations for review and approval shouldbe submitted ‘to management and/or your customer, including those for mpactave vs age manages | assessment. Other approvals should be obtained as necessary (ie, functional department managers). Make appropriate modi cations as comments are received from these stakeholder Step 4: Update the project plan, Don’ forge to update the project plan! This canbe and sometimes |sforgtten inte frantic pace ofthe projet environment. Itishere that you wil crate a new project baseline. Ths wil become the currentpan. Step 5: Distribute the updated plan. ‘As previously mentioned, communication when the updated plan ‘scistributed sereal. You use this step to ensure that al stake- holders are aware ofthe change and the adjusted baseline plan (for instance, revision 7). the distribution isi incomplete, mis alignment will occur between the projet team and one or more of the stakeholders, Imagine your project team working on rev sion 3 while the Calforniaofce is working onthe original plan (this is actualy a bad memory fr me}. ‘Step 6: Monitor the change and track progress against the revised plan. The impact ofthe change activi may be minor oF severe, good cor bad, Don't forget to check te proc triangle to ensure that it remains balanced ‘Organizational culture Impacts how you establish the change cantal process and manage changes to your project. Be flexible. often ask my seminar attendees if they have an esting change ‘contol proces 10 gulde them; some do, but mest don. Tht r- flees my own experience. When | moved fom the defense indus ty (strong project processes) tothe adult learning environment (ss proces), needed o adjust, Ifyou are faced wit an environ ‘mext where there are no change proceses in place, that ia good news, bad news scenario. The ifcaly isin establishing change contol while facing resistance to change, as wel as general ape thy. Nobody wants sign anthing, and there site suport in the decon making pres. Do ie anyway Iti important for you to maintain contol f the project through these changes. Ia sake holder or department mansgerigature cannot be obtained, we the department or stakeholder/manager name on the change cor ‘nol form and note the dat, This i @ control mechanism, not 2 “otha,” As project manage itis Your responsibilty to fight cope ‘creep and keep the triple consrats tangle balanced and under tontol. This yourtoal for your project. The good news inthe a> sence of any process isthe absence of any proces. You can se this ‘up any way you like because there is nothing to replace. Yes, hs vil be de consuming and a lt of work, but the payotf wil be your process, your ste. or those who work in an environment with established change contra procedures, use them. Quite often these procedues ae designed to manage changes tothe product, R&D depart rents), not the project. Make sure you take hoisc approach 0 ‘change and focus on the project isel. The Change Control Form The cage cant! om te cnlng acento ‘hogy potas Ts Geant pe mango ie singe cry procesing charges that afc the po} | The change control SRSEQSER Garis ft | tom the cont pletely upon acceptance of the requested | ing document for Sse Te ap soe an recotd kesping and requires analyses | the change process. Sony an alstson its em Sri teksten ntsojetatr eer, Wits Siar cone oily, tno ns bea re+ sumornenvane or eeajcr management | Figure 102. Project change contol orm. Projet Tite: Mong Rlostion Post Date wn2201| Projet N0= 710 TaskNas 16 Revision Nos 1 Date Revd 87132011 ———————— Onjeetive Sateen Reon of he acount depeeestn blasted uae for 22 psoas ‘ine se bangs rth Deseo aa : Desoto Chang; ‘he gavin bevallen ue Auge 2 2. Ts wil cue at yy mt sno ser cel ply ue ye ctr ye ta sedan os ay 7 SS tar ll comme tse foriwo days =RESmE Hanne ‘Schaal Change lafematon| [Rg TSR Ong Sat 0g Cap. Ney Sart Ney Camp.) (sale scat —wt aa — vi — 9 —] Live sage conan roe 19 Figure 102 is a very comprehensive, detalled version of a ‘change form. Its important that you review the form and adjust itt Your own percelved requirements when managing changes as the projet matutes. You may need to streamline the template, ‘or you may want to expand some portions. This is your call. Ifthe ‘document s too cumbersome, you wil se effeeney. you sim- pli too much, key data wil be lst. (Overview data are input atthe top ofthe form, including project number, revision number, and date revised. I always ‘ude the objective statement on my change documents to en sure continuity and eliminate uncertainty. Change can breed ‘uncertainty, and uncetanty isnot your frend. As changes mu ‘ipl on 2 typical project, include the orginal objective state ment. Tals will keep stakeholders from wondering if the objective hes changed because of the latest adjustments. I the impact is significant, a new objective statement may need to be agreed upon and communicated per the form. A bref de scription ofthe change is appropiate, and the reason should be incuded, as well. Inthe mercurial projet environment, it may be diffcult seven months and thny-seven changes into the pro} ect to recall why the team generated change order Number 2. ‘Add the five other projects you might be managing to the sce- ratio, and you can see how this added element of contrat can De helpful. Reason for change can also sere a a check on the system to ensure that value is added by implementing the Schesiule change information and estimated costs bring us ‘ack othe triple constants triangle. Iti ruc that you quantify ‘the estimated impact of te change on both the projet schedule and the budget. Some project managers prefer less deta than is shown in Figure 10-2 and quan the impact by noting the over allschedule delay or time saved. This your cll and is usualy de termined by sje, organizational culture, projet type, and soon Sometimes, estimated costs are actual costs already realized ot ‘quotes ecelved from vendor. Again his will depend upon. al of the variables asocated with the change.‘An effective change contol form is obviously Important for project conto, but it can also come in hand ‘Acoleague of mine, group program manager fr the Amer ‘can Management Association Intemational {AMAl, was asked by a ect report managing a course revision project she could co ize 25 percent of@ Train the Trainer course book. He to her st was probably note good Idea because the production costs, ‘Would be exorbitant. When she brought back a more reasonable request with appropriate approvals, the manager moved forward ‘wit the change, impacting the buigt by about $10,000. At the subsequent steting committe review, he was asked about the budget increase. Expecting the question, he offered his next slide, a copy ofthe change request form, which two ofthe com mittee members had signed. He was able to proceed without needing an asprin. Thresholds How much change is enough to trigger the process? Are there changes that are just not signicant enough to justly fling out the form, acquiring signature, and mak- ing othe investments of ime ander? | Are there changes ‘These are important question forthe pro . ct manager and thy ofer an excellent | Phat are just not ume to consider thresholds. Most project processes require yout employ p04 pr} fect and business savvy. I the change is | to justify filing out. considered minor and the project pan can absorb the change with minimal impact, make necesary adjusments and mave on | signatures, and (see Example I). I, however, a severity ‘threshold has been exceeded, this should | ™aking other inveot- trigger action by you and your team to im | mente oF time and plement the change contol process (see Example 2, eae significant enough ‘the form, acquiring Example 1: Ifa $5:millon projet must endure a $10 change, {would be a poor decision to tigger he co ‘ reasonabie tvashold might be S500, ‘depending upon budget constrains and industry standards Example 2 ¥ your project dsadine is fou mons frm the dato ofthe change roquest and the estimated Schedul daly is one Wook, Be chango process shouldbe triggered. Schodule twesrocs require ‘more analysis based upon cial path im tions (or Not) ard duran to complete, As al ‘ways, YOu wil nad to ako the tempertir of the project environment during tho éecsion- making process. Because of the everchanging environment that surrounds mest projects, thresholds are flexble, and you wil often require ‘input fom teammates oF othe stakeholders to determine the i pact of @ change n te projet. fyou have done your homework and invested tine ant effort in managing the previous project ie ‘je processes, you wil be in a much better postion to make in formed decisions regarding change. ‘The Change Control Log ‘As Tmentioned eae in this chapte, the change contol og en ters the picture in Step | of the change control process. AS you might expect, [tis another contol mechanism designed to ier tly proposed changes and trac these acepied throughout the process. Figure 103 is a template that you can use as presented, streamline, or expand as you deem necessary. In the absence ofan ‘organizational standard, [recommend that you adopt a singla, ‘comprehensive approach to tracking changes across projects. You ¢an add or omit Information as appropiate, ‘As with many project templates, the concepts simple bt notFigure 10-3. Project enange contro og. 7a es always easy to apply, Discipline is the key ingredient her. As changes risks, and crcl pth issues are siting about, you rst be dscipined enough to stop what you are doing and work, the log, Much of the information you ‘input will seem seltevident or trivial, ut the simplest detail may loom large as the project progresses. Change Number, Date of Change Request, and an abbre- ited Desclpon of Change ae stan dard information. The approach wsed in Figure 103 also inches columns for the requestor and status. There will be instances where a change wil be ac- cepted but budget, schedule, technology, Skil set, ot something ese presents a blockage to delay or even prevent imple- ‘mentation. Ipreer O/C, open or closed, to identify status. You should then transfer Schedule Impact and Budget Impact fom the change contol form and update as nee essary. Many project managers add a column for scape ot obj: tive impact prior tothe final input thats reserved for comments or miscellaneous issues. Typical comments may concem stake holder elutanc, technical problems, or remarks regarding other projec sues, ‘As changes, risks, and critical path ues are swirling about, you must be iplined enough ‘to stop what you are doing and work the log. Line enange Lontrot rrocess The Project Spin-off ‘Think about some drastic changes that have afected your pro} ects in the past. Sometimes project change, whatever the source, can be grounds for spinning off «new project while continuing withthe orig nal, Sometimes itis appropriate forthe ‘ew projet to simply replace the org nal due to stil set requirement, loca tion, budget demands, deprioitization, ‘ora host of other reasons. There are aso ‘changes so severe that they justly cos {ng the projet down. When you gt hit ‘withthe big one, isnot often easy and never fun. It doesn't even need to be ‘one change; it may be an accumulation ‘ofchanges that dramatically impacis the project. In any case, you need to have arm grasp ofthe impact ‘nthe project and your recommendations moving forward. This an often bea sles ob, and you will need o persuade with good data rom the project pian. “The project spin-oft usually occurs When the change isso dramatic that you and your tesm determine that an Sometimes project change, whatever the source, can be grounds for spin- hing off a new proj- ect while continuing with the original. “The project spin-off extiely separate project shouldbe ini | usually occurs when fate Tis could due to scope “et | he change le eo dra plosion” or ane oF more ofthe many reasons previously detailed. Ie new | matic that you and project moves forward with the exist | soup, — dng one, it can often be managed in| YOU team determi pale, requiring coordination and | thatan entirely eep- alignment. if 2 new project manager i fakes over it probale that you wil | @Pa¥e project should Decalled upon to coach her up to speed | be initiated. as the project if cycle is begun. Itis inYur best interest todo a thorough job here. Some of your tara resoutces may be shared or transfered, depending upon the ir dividual project circumstances, Ifthe new project becomes a satelite, or subpojct, the im- pact sa ess drastic, and the new team wl usually repr: drectly| ‘to the orginal project managet In contas, f the new projet re aces the old, ou may jst move onto other project. In the event that makes sense to Keep you In place, manage the new project & you did the orginal. Begin atthe beginning—plan, Then cone nue through the project ie eee as appropiate. If important hete to capture al ofthe work and data that can be useful mov ing forward onthe new projec. A careful analysis should be done to separate the whest fom the chaf In some case, skillset re quirements wil require inavidual tam members tobe replaced. You may have to recrultan entirely new tam, again depending on ercurstances ‘You may, s project manage, decide thatthe project should be kale: good tuck. n my experience, it canbe a dif thing to fo, but not imposible. Ite projet has lst ts value, make your case, Use data, not emotion. The easons can be many and varied, butifyou have done your job, you wll have the meats to persunde with fas. Embracing Change Don't fear project change; embrace and manage it. This doesnot have tobe a lificltskif you have Invested youre ad the po} ‘ect team in esablshing a formidable pan. As with scope crep, changes often represen necessary adjustments tothe original pro ect plan Is how you manage these changes that makes alo the alilerenc and helps you deve the proect on time and an budget, ‘wah an excellent delvrabe. [Lume enange von vroce38 we ‘Key Points to Remember > Change must be controled ard communicated > Understanding and idenityng tly sources ot change as- ‘es you in ealning proactive. Typical sources of change ‘ne scope, schedule, and budget austen, > fis crucial to keep he baseline pan cure. > Th sk common steps you wl taken atypical chang con trl ress arto ent the inital change cor intormaton ito your change cong; determine ith change shoud be processed; submit recommendations to maragement anor the customer fr evil and approval update he pj- ‘tpl, cstibute the updated pln; an manor th change and rack progress aganst he reid plan > The change contol form andlag are your primary contig oourens, > Thresholds shoul be estabishd when determining your r= gorse to poet chang. > Proect spin-off usualy occurs when the projec change so ‘ama that you and your eam deterine tat an entirely supra pojec shoud be itd. Brercise..... Identity a recent change to your projet that required a response. (On the bass of what you've leaed in tis chap, answer the fo- lowing questions: 1, sit appropriate to accep the change? 2, Shoulda change contol document be bggered?‘3. How cia this change impact te projet tangle? 4. To whom shouid the esponse be comerunicated? 5. What change thresholds are appropriate to establish for his projet? Project Control Using Earned Value Analysis ‘ontrol i exercised to achleve prolect objective, and we ‘know that there are performance, cost time, and Scope ta. ‘ge that ae always important. Furthermore, we have seen that control is exercised by comparing performance to plan and, when deviations ot variances occu, taking corective action to bring performance hack on target. As [sal in Chapter 9, the review that is concerned with ‘maintenance ot straghtorwand project contol isthe status re view, This review asks where the project isin terms of all our PCTS varlables, Each time progress Is reviewed, you must ask these three questions: 1, Where are we (in terms of PCTS}? 2. When there is @ deviation, what caused if 3. What should be done abou the deviation? Note that there are only four ations that canbe taken in re sponse to question 3. These are:1. Cancel the project. 2, Ignore the deviation 43, Take comective action to get back onto the planned progress. 4. Revise the plan to reflect a change in status that can't be corrected Sometimes a project gets so far off tack that it fs no longer viable and the best thing todo so cancel. Of cour, this step ‘snot taken light, but it shouldbe taken in cases where you ae lust going to throw good money after bad. Cut your losses and et on with something beter. As for ignoring a deviation if you can conto o within a ce tain percentage tolerence and you ate within those limits, you should usualy ignore a deviation unless it shows a trend that wil ete eventual take outside te ims. Otherwise, tweaking, ‘may just make the stuation worse. As for taking corrective action, there sno way to tell what this means, a Its specie to each project. Sometimes working people overtime gets a project back on track. Or pethaps you need to ad people, or cut scope, or change the process. You ‘mus determine what must be done for yout project. In the event thatthe projects stil viable but nothing can be done to get it back on track, you may have to revise the plan. OF ‘course, you can also consider working verte or reducing scope, since these | Another day, ‘were not originally cae for: What lam realy refering to here, however, isa. | @N@bher zero, ‘ation in which you cannot recover and | —Aleata (Car Suzan) you are revising the plan to show that | Our Gang comedy series the costs wil increas, the deadline will sip, of some other change tothe plan wil occur Measuring Progress ‘One of the hardest things to do In managing project sto actu ally measure progress. When you are following a road map, you [mee omror ving carmen vane Anayses wo, ‘monitor the road signs and see whether they agree with your planned route. In well defined jobs, such a contruction projects, itis generally faity easy to tell whee you ere. You can measure the heght of a brik wal or see whether all the conduit isin stalled, and so on. That i, you can tll where you are when a part ofthe work is actually inBhed: When work is pooiy de fined and itis only pally complete, however, you have to est: ‘mate where you are. ‘This i especialy true of knowledge work—work done wit ‘one’s head, rather than one's hands, I you are wing software ‘code, designing something, or wang a ook, it can be very hard ‘ou how far long you are and how much you have let todo. ‘Naturally if you can’t el wiere you are, you cant exercise ‘contol, And note that use ofthe word “estimate” in measuring progres. What exactly isan estimate? Ta gues. And so we ae guessing about where we are. Yes. Well know where we are when we et there, Unt we actully anv, we're guesing. ‘Does this not sound like something tom Alice in Wonceriance Heavens. ‘What was that definition of control again? Let's se—compare where youare How do you Know where you are ‘We're guessing = agunst where you are supposed to be. How do you know where you'te suppose tobe? (0b, that’s much easier. The plan tells us. But where di the plan come ftom? Tevas an estimate 00. (Oh. So fone guess doesnt agree withthe other guess, we're supposed to take corrective action to make the two of them agree, i that i “That's what thls guy says in ls book. ‘Must be a book on witeraft and mags ‘Wel, since its impossible to know for sure where we are,then pethaps we shoud just give upon the whole thing and keep running projects by the seat of the pants. Right? ‘Wrong The fact that measures of progress. | The difficulty of are not very accurate does not justify the conclusion that they shouldn't be used, | measuring progress Remember, if you have no plan, you have no conto, and if you don’t try t0 ‘monitor and folow the plan, you det nitely don't have contzol. And if you have no conto, there is no semblance ‘of managing, You're just tiling around, ‘What's important ta note, however, 4s that some projects are capable of tighter control than others. Wel deined work, which can be accurately mea sured, cant be controlled to tight tlerances, Work that is more nebulous e.g, knowledge work) has to allow larger tolerances. ‘Management must recognize tls and accep It. Otherwise, You 0 crazy trying to achieve 3 percent tolerances. I Uke trying to push a noodle into astalght ine or mall ly to @ wall conclusion that it shouldn't be done. You cannot have control unless you measure progress. Measuring Project Performance/Quality you think measuring progress is hard, tay measuring quality. Were the bolts holding the steel beams together putin ‘propery? Ae all the welds sound? How Go you el? “Tiss the hardest variable to track, and one that often sues as a conse ‘quence. As, so much attention tends to be focused on cost and schedule perfor ‘ance thatthe quality of the work is olten surfed, This cah be adssty, in Work quality is most likely to be sacrificed when is required to avoid ‘thie tendency, does not justify the deadlines are tight, Constant attention [rove vontror sing rare vue Anais ra some cases resulting in lawoults against a company for damages ‘that result fom poor-quality work. Project managers must pay special attention tothe quality ‘arabe, n spite of the dificuly of tracking Earned Value Analysis Itis one thing to meet a project dealin at any cost Its another todo i fora reasonable cost. Project cost contro is concemed ‘with ensuring that project slay within their budgets, wile get. tng the work done on time and atthe corect quality. ‘One sper fr doing this, called eared value anabss, was developed in the 19606 to allow the government to decide ‘Whether a contractor should reclve a progress payment for work done. The method is finally coming into Is own outside gover. ‘ment projects, and i is considered the corect way to monitor and control almest any project. The method i aso caled simply variance anabsis. Variance analysis allows the project manager to determine ‘rouble spots inte project and to take corrective action, The fo. Jowing definition ae useful In understanding the analysis > Cost variance: Compares deviations and performed work. > Schedule vartance: Compares planned and actual work completed. > BCWS (budgeted cost of work scheduled: The budgeted cost, ‘of work scheduled tobe done i a given time petiod or the level ofefiort that i supposed tbe performed in that perio > BCWP(budgeted cost of work performed): The budgeted cost ‘of work actually performed ina given perod or the budgeted level of efor actually expended. BCWP is also called eared value and is a measure of the dolar value ofthe work actually ‘ecompished in the period being monitored,> ACWPlactal cast of work performed) The amount of money (retort) actualy spent in completing work ina given period. Variance tresbois can be established that define the level at \which reports must be sent to vatlous levels of management within an organization, Cost Variance = BCWP ~ ACWP Schesiule Variance = BCWP ~ BCWS Variance: Any deviation from plan By combining cst and schedule vttances, an integrated cast/ Schedule reporting sysem can be developed. Variance Analysis Using Spending Curves ‘Variances are often plotted using spending curves. A BCWS curve fora projects presented in Figure 11-1. Itshaws the cumulative spending planed fora project and is Sometimes called a base tine pan ‘In the event that software not avalale to provide the nec: essary data, Figure 11-2 shows how data forthe curve are gener ated, Consider a simple bar chat schedule. Only three tasks are ‘involved. Task A involves forty aborhous per week a an average Toaded labor rate of $20 per hour, so that task costs $800 per week. Task B involves 100 hours per week o labor at $30 per hu, 0 it costs $3,000 per week, Finally task C spends $2,400 er week, assuming sity hours per week of labor t $40 per hour ‘At the bottom of the chart, We se that uring the fst week. $3800 is spent for project labor; in the second weet, both tasks A and Bare running, so te labor expenditures $3,800. Inthe third week, all three tasks are running, o labor expenditure i the sum. Df the thre, of $6,200. These ae the weekly expends The cumulative expenditures are calculated by adding the cost for each subsequent week tothe previous cumtlatve toa ‘These cumulative amounts are ploted in Figure 11-3 Tiss the spending curve forthe project ands called a BCWS curve. Since Figure 11-4. BCWS curve. Time Figure 1-2. Bar chart schodule ius “cumulative spencig, ‘ad esto si = ser Task A io waa}so bi) Sone Task B Task ¢ 3 vl] lelelele ly be le Spondinal 8 1313/8 [8 18/8 |S comune! al ( EIS Spending] 8 /8/8 [8 |B /8|8 (8itis derived direc ftom the schedule it represents planned per formance and therefore is called a baseline plan, Furthermore, since control is exercised by comparing progress to plan, thie curve can be used asthe bass fr such comparisons so thatthe Project manager can tel the status ofthe program. The next se ion presens examples of how such assessments ae made, ‘Examples of Progress Tracking Using Spending Curves CConsder the curves show in Figure [1-4 On a gven dete, the project is supposed to have involved $40,000 (40K) in lebor [BCWS}. The actual cost ofthe work performed [ACWP] is COK. “These igurs are usually obtained from Accounting and are derived from all he tmecars tat have reported labor apple to the prof ec, Fnaly the budgeted cost of work performer [BCWP) i 40K Under these conditons, the projet would be behind schedule and overspent Figure 11-5 tusrates another scenario, The BCWP and the ACWP curves both fall atthe same point, GOK. Tals means tha the project is ahead of schedule but spending correctly forthe amount of work done, Thenext set of curves illustrates another status. In Figure 11-6, the BCWP and the ACWP curves are both at 40K. This means the project behind schedule and under budget. However, be ‘cause the manager spent 40K and got 40K of value fri, spend: Figure 11-9, Cumulative spending forthe sample bar chart a %. a 0 0 0123456789 Time [rises kine eae battens ore omer wing projet behind ehodlo ‘nd overspant Figure 1-4, Plot Lever suet enews at of Time ‘ev= cost variance sv = schedule variance «sos... CWP Figure 1-5, Project ahead of schedule, spending correctly. woe} Da ot Time rails ov = cost variance Acwr sv= schedulevariance 0... BCWPIng is correct for what has been done, There is a schedule var ance, but not a spending variance, Figure 117 looks ike igure 11-4, except thatthe ACP and ‘the BCWP curves have been reversed. Now the projects aheed of schedule and underspent. Variance Analysis Using Hours Only In some organizations, project manager are held accountable not {or coss bat only fr the hours actually worked on the project and forthe work actually accomplished, In this case, the same analysis can be conducted by stripping the dolar of te gure. ‘Thisresults inthe following: > BCWS becomes Total Planned jor Scheduled) Hours D-BCWP becomes Farmed Hours (Scheduled hours % work accomplished) > ACWP becomes Actual Hours Worked. Using hours ony, the formulas become: Famed Hours ~ Planned Hours Labor Valance = BCWP ~ ACWP = Eamed Hours ~ Actual Hours Worked ‘Tracking hours only does lead to one loss of sensitivity. ACW is actually the composite of labor rate variance times a laborhours variance. When only laborhours are tracked, you have no warning that labor rates might cause a project budget problem. Nevertheless, this method does simplify the analysis, and presumably tacks the project manager only on what she ‘an contol. [Lego won vg anne vame mays » Figure 1:6, Project is behind schedule but spending comect. Labor Budae ee ove neo cael sv= schedule variance Bcwr Figure 11-7. Projects ahead of schedule and underspent. zg Time cost variance schedule variance oeResponding to Variances {eis not enough to simply detect a variance. The next steps to un erstand what t means and what caused it, Then you have to de. ‘ile what fo do to cmtect forthe deviation. Eat, explained that there are four responses tht can be taken when there isa devie oa rom plan. Which ofthese you choose depends in part on what ‘caused the deviation, Folowing ar some general guidlines: >. When ACW? and BCWP are almost equal and large than CWS (see Figure 11-5), i usually means thet extra resources have been applied to the projec, but atte labor rates eignally anticipated. This can happen in several ways. Pethaps you Planned for weather delays, but the weather has been good and ‘you have gotten more work done during the analysis period than Intended, bata the correct cost. Thus, you are abead of schedule ut spending corec, When ACWP and BCWP are neatly equal and below CWS (see Figure 11-6) it usually means the opposite af the pre ‘lous situation; that, you have not applied enough resources. Pethaps they were stolen from you, pethaps it has rained more than You expected, or perhaps everyone has decided to tke a va ‘ation at one. The problem with being in this positon is that it Usually resul in an overspend when you ty to catch up. >. When ACWP is below BCWS and BCWP i above BCWS. [see Figure 11-7), you are ahead of schedule and underspent. ‘This generally happens because te orignal estimate was toe con Servative (probably padded for safey), Another posi that You had @ lucky break. You thought the work would be hander than it was, so you wee ale to ge ahead. Sometimes it happens ‘because people were much more efleent than expected. The problem with tis variance ls tha it ces up resources that could ‘be used on other projects. The economists cal his an opportunity cost, There also a good chance tht if you were consistntiy padding estimates and were bidding aginst other companies ot oe, you probaly Inst some bis. If your competor ting eagle for tie etinates wile you ae pang Your, hen our ures re key ob ihe ad you wise thebl Acceptable Variances ‘What ae acceptable valance? The only answer that canbe given to his question 8 eal depends” It you ae doing { welldefined construction Jo, the variances canbe n he fange of 3-3 percent the ob ls research and devel opment, acceptable variances incense generally fo around “10-15 percent When the job pote revere, the sy ie the lit. napne for example, thot you worked fora po. Iaceitcl company and your boss, “Tell me how lon it wile and how meh wl sto You to discover nd de telopacie for ADS." or evey oppizaton,youTaveto deo tances though espetene Tet yu sar tying reduce hen, Allproges stn Stet oedice vara in what we do, We il ever ebceit to ar unless we emia the proces gtr, but 20 aso bethetapet Using Percentage Complete to Measure Progress most common way to menue progeto simpy xtinate yeretap cpl Fas he BE meas, bat Exec a dlr vale, wheres percentage complete does ota ht conven. Wien percentage complete measures are plated overtime, ou tend io get a cuve ike the one shown In gue 118k ss more of less neni up to aboat 80 or 90 percent, then turns horizontal mesning tat no frter progres is being, nate), stays there fora we, ten, al oF sen, he work SeompleeFigure 11-8. Percent compete curve. Percent Complete Time ‘The reason is that problems ae often encountered neat the fend ofthe task, an alt of effort goes nto trying to solve them During tat time, no progres is mace Another par of the problem isin knowing where you are to degin with, We have already said that you are generally estimet: ‘ng progress. Consider a task that has a ten Week duraton Ifyou ask the person doing that task where he I atthe end ofthe fst ‘week, he is likely to tel you, “10 percent" at the end of week ‘70, "20 percent; and so on, What he is doing s making a re ‘verse inference It goes ike thi: Its the end of the fist week on a ten week tas, so | must be 10 percent complete.” The tat he realy doesnt know where hei. Naturally under such cond ns, contol is very loose. Stl this isthe only way progress ca be measured in many cases, ‘Key Points to Remember > Corrs exis by analyzing om te pan, > Wel dined pres can actor contol ver varons ‘an pootycetned ones, > There a tendenoy o satin ually wen deatines are cat wo meat. D> Wisma enough recognize a varnc, ts cause mist de- ‘mind so thal eorectve acon cn be taken. > Ascetabl vatiancus can be determined ony through xper- fence. Evry syste has a capably. Your team my have he abit to manta tts toerances on ter werk than ater ‘tam, hrercise . wane Consider the report in Figure 11-2, showing earned value figures fora project Answer the question by analyzing the dat. Answers are provided inthe Answors suction atthe back othe book, Figure 1-9, Earned value report. ‘uestons: 1. Is the tsk abead or behind schedule? By how much? 2, le the task averspent or underspent? By how much? 23, When the tsk is competed, wilt be overspent or underspent?Managing the Project Team 1p) he previous chapters have concentrated primarily on the tools of project management—how to plan, schedule, ani contol the work. Unfortunately far too many project )- managers see these tools sal they need to manage sue | cessfully. They asemblea team, gve the members theit Instructions, then sit back and watch the project sel estruct, Then they question whether there might be some Haw in the tool. Inal keno, the problem was with how people wee man aged. Even in those cases where a prablem with the tools may have existed, itis often the falue of people to property appt them ‘hat causes the problem, so again, we ate back to people ‘The tools and techniques of project management are a nec ‘essary but nat suftent condition for projet success, AS have stated, i you cant handle people, you wil have dffclty manag ing projects, especialy when the people dont “belong” to you. Related to this is the need to tum a project group nto a tearm, Far to lt atenton fs paid to team building In project manage ‘ment. This chapter ofr soe suggestions on how to go about i ‘Team Building ‘Building an effective team beglns on the fst day ofthe teams existence. Faure to begin. te tean-bulfing process may result Jina team that is more ike a group than ‘team, Ina grovp, members may be in- | Teams don't just volved in but not committed tothe a tities ofthe major. happen—they The problem of commitment is a | must be built! major one for both organizatlons and project teams, It s especialy signcant in matrix organizations, fn Which members ofthe project team are actually members of functional groups and have thelr own bosses but report the project manager ona “dotetne” bass. Later in his chapter [present ules fr how a project manager ‘an develop commitment to a team. For now, lt us turn to how to get team organized so that it gets off to the ight stat (For an indepth treatment of this topic, see Jim Lewis's book Team -Based Project Manzgement) Promoting Teamwork through Planning ‘Apiary cule of planning s that those individuals who must in: plement the plan should patcpate in preparing I. Yet, leaders often plan projects by themselves, chen wonder why their team ‘members seem to have no commitment tothe plans. ‘All planalng requires some estimating—how long a ask will take, given the avalablty of certain resources, and soon. In my seminars, I ask participants, "Do you often find that your boss thlnks you can do your work much fster than you actualy can?” ‘They laugh and agree. As tel them, it seems tobe some kind of psyehologial law that bosses are optimstc about how long it ‘wll take thet taf to ge 2 Job done. ‘When a manager aves a person an assignment that allows Inadequate time to perform, the Inlvidual natualy feels dis“ couraged, and her commitment sHkely to suffer: She might say, “Ill give t my best sot,” bat her hearin ally in it. Getting Organized Here are the four major steps in organling a project team: - Decide what must be done, using work breakdown struc ‘ures, problem defiitions, and other planning too, Determine stafing requirements to accomplish the tasks ‘ensfied in the frst step. 3. Recruit members forthe project team, 4. Complete your peoject plan with the parcpaton of team members Recruiting Following are some of the citeia by which teat members shouldbe selected: >The candidate possesses the sls necessary to perform the Tequied work at the speed needed to meet deadlines. >The candidate wil have his needs met through participation in the project (se the March and Simon rules discussed ater in this chapter > The applicant haste temperament to fin with other team ‘members who have already been recruit and with the po ect manager and other key players, >The person wil not object to overtime requirements, tight, timetables, or other project work requirements, Clarifying the Team's Mission, Goals, and Objectives Peters and Waterman, in thelr book Jn Search of Eeelence, have ‘ald that excellent organizations “sick to thelr knitting” They stick to what they ae god at and do not oof on tangents, ty ing to do something they know nothing about imagine, a5 an ‘example, a hockey team deciding o ply basketbal.) NNurerous cafe suis and atles have been wniten about organizations | IF possible, the en that went ff on tangents, a eat cost, | sine beam should because they forgot thelr mission. The " same can happen to project teams. t | participate in devel- members ae not clear on the team’s |, 5 rion, they wil ake the team where | Ping the tears ‘hey think it is suppesed to go, and that | mission statement. may not be the diretion intended by the orem ganization. Th procedure for develop- | This ls a tremen- dng a mission statement is covered in. | dous team-building ‘Chapter 4, sono more willbe said about it here. However, working with your | activityin iteelfl team to develop a mision atement sa ood far butlng activity in ise, Conflicts between Individual Goals and the Team's Mission Experience has shown that team mem bets are most commitied to a team | A manager should when thei individual needs ae being ‘met. Sometimes members have what are | MY to satisfy the called hidden agendls, personal obie- | needs of the organi- tives that they do not Want anyone to . ‘know about, because they are afraid | zation, while ofmul- other members wil uy to Bock them | taneously helpi thetrebjectvesare krown, Since aman. | *#ne2Usly helping ‘ager should ty to help individual mem- | individual satiofy ‘bers achieve their personal gvls, while | heir own needs achieving team goals as wel, the team ipa- leader needs to bring hidden agendas | through par be heped to achieve his goa. Ofcourse, | tion in the project. ino the open so thatthe individual cenmonger y ‘person may occasonally havea goal that runs so counter to the team’s goals that no reconctation s possible In that case, the team leader can discover what the persons goa i, the individ ‘ual can (deli) be moved to nother team in whlch his goa can be reached, Team Issues ‘There te four general iss with which team mus del, These are goals roles and responsi, proces, and relatos In this chapter, we have dak with cating the team’s mison, foals and objectives, Ths aay the fist and mos important Spin developing tan. Once that is done, people must understand thelr oes, These mut be cleat defined. Whar sexpectedoteach | deal with: individual and by wher The one rob Jem that seems common is that team goals leaders think they early communicate | roles and this infomation to team members. Ye, ‘when you ask team members if they are_| "@8ponsibilities Every team must cleat on thet gals and roles, you fre | procedures ‘qwetly get negative respons, “ ‘The problem is with our failure to | relationships solicit feedback trom team members in order to be sure that they understood; in addition, members themselves are sometimes reluctant to admit that they havent "understood. This appears to bea result of aur tendency in school ‘to put people down for asking “stupid question.” So, rather than ‘admit that they don’t understang, they interpret what they have been told and try todo the job the best they can, Project leaders must estalsh a climate of open communica ton withthe team In which no one feels intimidated about speaking up. The best way todo this is to comment on the prob Jem: "I know some of you may fel reluctant to speak up and say you don’t understand, but we cant operate that way, Please tee! fee to be candi, If you don't understand, say so, If you don't, ee with something, say so. That sth only way We can suc Cee. el be yo ave tine oS the pone, mc es find time to do it over because one of you filed tounderstand what was expected." | There io nto euch ‘have aso found that peonierespond | fe very postvey when Lam wiingtoadmr | *Hing a6 a stupid tattoo desi sometig eel | queetion—except ‘ram apprehensive or concert about Spies, 'you prec seat | Péthaps the one you {nfaliblty no one ese sikely to aémit | were afraid to ask. ‘a weakness. But, then, who wants to ‘deal with a demigod? A litle human tally goes a long way toward breaking down bariers. I know this contradicts what some managers have been taught. The macho notion of inal bllty has been with us fora long time, and I beleve Its the ‘cause of many of our organizational problems. Is time to aban don it fr realty. Working Out Procedures Deng with how we do comes net. The Key wotd hee 1 greases The work mate done ws eficenly an o e fecoey es poste, td inprovement of Work paces very npr ote tla Tis com Syed wengiety se | Scaled personal {oa a peer of work es 4 Soto mate te aratzaon mare | Hy conficks are competitive, often simply the RS cay eae othe ‘with proces that they getso foewsed on | result of people's doe te wat tact eam. | tay of gee ser ine Row t's dane ero tam ‘Sou tap wotargtongesouh sx | personal ok, Thie Chul weltet gus Onerese, | laok can be resolved ‘he team may get very good a doing te | through training, vonRelationships in Teams Friction occurs in neaty every interaction between human beings ‘There are misunderstandings, conflicts, personaly clashes, and ety jealous. Project managers must be prepared to dea with these. Infact, i you realy dsike having to del wit the behav. ioral problems that occur on projects, you should ask yourself ‘whether you realy want to manage projets at al Like tor not, the behavioral problems come with th job, and allure to deal ‘with them wil sink a projet eventual One thing o be aware of stat many personaly Cashes are the result of people's ack of good interpersonal sis. We have never been taught how to sit down and werk out diferences with ‘others 9, when the inevitable conflict happens the sltuation ust, blows up. The best way to minimize the impact of such problems Isto provide traning forall eam members (including yoursel in interpersonal ski. This are has been sorely neglected in many organizations because there seems tobe no bottomline impact. It ishard to demonstrate that there willbea $10 etum ona $1 tar ing investment. Because of our inablty to quantify the benefits of skis train Jing, we don't provide it. Yet, i we have capital resources that don't work well, we spend whatever is necessary to corect the problem, Interestingly, our human resources are the only ones that are renewable almost indefinitely, but we flo tae steps to ‘keep them functioning eflectvey. Ava project manage, you oe ‘eto yourself to manage this aspect ofthe Job. ‘Stages in a Team’s Development. “There axe a numberof models that descrbe the tages that teams ‘or groups go through onthe way o maturity. One of the more pop tar ones has selexplanatory ies forthe tages: forming, storm ing, norming and performing. ‘Inthe forming sage, people ae concerned with how they ‘wl itn and with who call the shots, makes decisions, an so ‘on. During this stage, they look to the eaer [or someone els) to [Emagen une rope ve wo sire them some struture—that so gv them a sense of rec ton and to hep them get stared. A leader lure todo this may result in loss ofthe team fo some member who exercises what ‘we cal informal leadership. ‘The storming stage is frstatng for most people. When the team reaches tis stage, people bepin to question thelr goals. Are they on the right rack? Is the leader realy leading tern? They sometimes pay soo the leader during ths stage ‘A the rrming age, they ae be ington ner onennd oS | The most popular {de down to work. They have ‘norms {unwiten rules) about how they berms for the wil wore together and they feel more | stages of team ‘comorable with ate another Fach nd vidual has found her place in the team | development are: anv knows what to expect ofthe others toratiig Filly, when the team reaches the peyforming stage, the ener’ jobs eset. storming ‘Members generally work well gether a row, enjoy deingo, and tend to produce rorming bighqualty resus, In other words, we | performing can realy cll them 2 tama ths pint. Leading a Team through the Stages ‘A newly formed team needs considerable stricture, or it will not be able to get started. As [noted inthe previous section, a leader ‘who fal to provide such suctue during stage 1, the forming stage, may be elected by the group, which will hen look for leadership from someone else. A directive style of leadership is called for in the forming stage. ‘uring this stage, members aso want _| A directive style of to getto know one another and wantto | 1, dership te al tnderstand the role each member wil | '@#dership le called play onthe team, In stage 1, the leader | for when a team le in Ist help team members get to know ‘one another and help them become clear | the forming stage.8 at es nd reponstii ede who ae very aon ected nk afr ror ee Toy ae eas "to von” wine hdpog mente po fon oe ner They vw ih prey Sou acts va wast nm ly ‘meescat ater sen tn thse Auge see ahi Rho roman wc ou a teeth “yen etn he tea start with Kf pay ore one ay tole members become seated pulse ay, ih po ree prem ct ao a a le, tee must be some mechan forty people ‘know each other. neces ‘As the ou conn to dere, tenes sage 2, sem. tng He, feope ae begining to hate ome anes They sort io queston the goapt ge we data we Sie ote Sng ‘he eer mus we uence or et ‘suasion to assure them that they are | Style of leadership indeed on wack, ey need aloof | riate ‘chological suppor, as well They must |» PPreprate at he assured by the leader that they are | the storming stage. Vale, hat hy sei tte sees Of the team and on. In ter word, members need some srokingin i sap, Teresa tendency to ey tsp tls sage, as manage fe acon with ti conic at oc To sweep ie At under te rg and pretend ht doesnt ext Eo minke Te conic must be managed so tat t doesnot become de sci, rtm ote vole, is, the gloup wil keep coming back to | In the norming this sage to try to resolve the confit, and this wil init progres, Beter to | °*88®, the leader ay now and gett over with, should adopt a sth team entersstage 3, norman itsbeconing dow it bose | Participative style Deginning to see themselves asa team | oF leadership. A selling or influence and take some sense of persona identity fom membership inthe group. Members are now involved in the work, ae becoming, Supportive of one another, and, because of thet cooperetion, can be said to be more ofa team than a group at this point. The leader needs to adopt a participative style inthis stage and share decision making more than in stages 1 and 2. ‘By the time a group reaches stage 4, performing Iti areal team, The leader can gener sit back and concentrate on what if analysis of team progres, planning for future work, and so on This is a delegative stye of leadership tm boprtteThe tam tachi, | Delegatveleader- feuyand member ae wal 6 | Shire che proper Pate in tre scomplsinents Inne | iP 8 the prop Sgr, thee shouldbe sigs of exna. | ty inthe per- tad hing around, 2 al exo ea ‘ment in working together, forming stag i Sina ornenter ttre | seams development team aya single sage forever, * it encounters obstacles, It may drop | Note that delega- fect sage’ andthe acer n> | tie dove not mean reds tmstbace sp ‘Gesuge Smanapnentsy wh’ | abdcation! ite Pe Membeshlp In project teams often changes. When new seers come ot Boat, You shoul conser that oa shor time te tem wl al ako tage I and yu wl Rav ake Ittac trough the aes un ech matey aa se pecaly important tat you help everyone get Tov te ew fenber and understand wt his ole wil ef te ea Ts does tate some tine ft ts exe You Wan! he tam 0 prowess oper Developing Commitment to a Team [A the Beginning of thls chaps, I pointed out that helping team members develop commitment to the project is major problem for project managers. Team members are often assigned oa projectsimply because they are the best available people, not because ‘hey ae the best people forthe job. When tis happens, they may have no commitment to the tear, In their Book Organizations, March and Simon present fre Tules for developing commitment to a team or organization. Those rules ere: | Have team members interact frequently so that they gan a sense of beinga team, 2, Be sure that individual needs ae being met through parte pation inthe team, 3. Let all members know why the projec is important. People ‘don't working on a “oven” 4, Make sure all members share te goals of the tear. One bed apple can spol the bare 5. Keep competition win the tam toa minimum. Compe tion and cooperation are opposites, Let members compete ‘with people outside the team, not within Note that heist rule cannot ways be flowed ithe tam istered pogapica In tat ae, members soul "ee" frequent trough teleconferencing, videoconterencing, and/or an Intemet-ased tol. ames in sshle to think of yourself spar of | Watch the ‘team If the team never gets together in movie iainoee Stand and Deliver for an excelent A Final Suggestion example of true you want some good models af how to ‘work with teams, take a look atthe best | !@adership. coaches and see how they dot Be care ful, though, not to mode! the supermacho coach's behavior. That might work okay with a sports team, where people are there because they want to be there, but its unlikely to work well vith a project team whee the members are there because they have tobe. [abo suggest that you watch the movle Stand and Deliver and see how jaime Escalante deals with his kis. Then, thernext time you are tempted to complain that you have alot of responsiblity and no authority, ask youre how a teacher (who has even les authority than you do) can get a bunch of kids to ‘work so hard. How did he get them to go to summer school oF take math two periods a day? Then you wil bein to realize what ‘owe leadership all about ‘Key Points to Remember Teams dant ust happen—ihey must be uit > Having the entre eam partcgate in planning sone way to tart he eam-buling process D> Deal wit goals, rofes and esponsibites, proces, and eltionstips, that rd, > So-called personaly conics are often caused by tam ‘members’ oor itrprsoral sks. For teams ta function vel, al members shold receive ang ints area > The syle of eacestip appropriate fr a team depands on its tage of development. inthe forming stp, ts ceca. storming, ts inuening, th nmin Stage, sth oa partpatve sty. ina, when te team reacts the per- ming stage, you can be delgave.UDA ot Importance of motvaton 1 wil ao discuss confit elton, teatn synergies, an a practical approach to leading project meet Ings (not managing the). a sma Laying the Foundation ‘Before youcen ae to understand andiead ates, you shoud ject Manager fess engl tren fons ent sychoanalss but a practical lookin the mor at your own be 4s if havior and probable drivers of tis beavlot This typical provides valuable insight regarding your actions, as well as thase of your team members and other project stakeholders. Understanding Leadership Characteristics ‘When leading proect management seminar, [ten ask the atten des tore thet hats ftey have ena tne on any en {ou must take an art and discipline approach in the proj tis a rhetorical question, asked to emphasize the need to maxi ct envionment when fading yout pect eu ie at mie every nteaton,Cien the ante pace of he pet nt of managing people an the dsciplin of eppng the renmet, mod err encounter cn be necessary project processes to be successful. [hear it all ‘considered critical. An improved under- | An improved under the time, beense i's ue It Sanding of yourselfand your sakes has been my experience that the | There is a higher willead to more efcientcommunicaton | P€nding of yourself beople ctor ea he and ote i the and beter project adenhip decisions. | and your etakehold- most challenging part of the project | probability that ‘Your ability to persuade, motivate and van equation, The pet champion 20 | things wil aclden- res cole ingrove When you. | @°@ Wl lead to more rember, functional manages, suet iy the foundation ring these p20. | efficient communic matter experts, and virtually al stake- | tally go wrong in a le sis, you avoid behavioral misalgn hades ned be ete anise) | roeoe than that Rent wid satehoder oo a’ lees. | cation and better to ensure project success. Chapters land | PPA Your understandingofiaderstip char | project leadership 2inodued detnions of nec at | they wll acciden- tests nda al, stent and trip, and Chapter 12 ete eager weaknesee—indetes ow you hous. | decteions, Ship syle tothe stages of project team | tally go rlght. flex your style and adjust to the stake- evelopment. Now I'm going to focus holder and the situation. This produces beter overal alignment, ‘on What it means tobe a project leader, understanding stengths ‘Which leads to greta eflenc. In ems of est practice, the more and weaknesses, creating constituents, and understanding the ‘ase you become, the greater the chance for projet success. 16Understanding Leadership Styles "nave seen many project fal because the project manager insists ‘hat stakeholder adjust wo te leader’ style. As mentioned eal, Project team maturation requires you to progress tom the die {ve leadership sve to the deegative approach. Tiss logical and ‘ples to most eam seenaros, emphasizing the need for Nexii Sty In your approach. As you move through atypical project day, however, you are faced with many and vated interactions, re: {iting a smooth transition from one leadership style tothe next. Some project leaders possess a ‘atural aptitude for this, whereas ort- | Justa a chameleon es need to work at it. You should in ‘est me and effort in developing this | Chanaes ekin color skill Just asa chameleon changes skin | to maximize eurvival,, color to maximize survival, so should Yyouadjust your approach to people, st- | © Should you ad- tutions, and cieumstances ease | Just your approach prec efficiency ‘Most of us have @ natural prefered | 0 people, situa style that we are comfortable with aptiy ‘rcum= ‘named the comfort zone. Tiscan often | ONS and circum ‘ake the transition from project man- | Stances to ensure ger to leader dificult to begin with, [t joct effic ‘easy fr you to operate when you ae | Project efficiency. ‘behaving natural. When crcumstances require you to break out of this area, though, i requines a certain amount of work, To be an effective project leader you shouldbe cognizant of the relue tance you wil probably encounter when changing yout own be havior If the directive style is indicated when dealing with a Stakeholder and it happens to be your least pretered, make @ conscience effort to be disciplined and nimble enough to motity Your prefered approach and be dec, Al ofthis attention {0 Project leadership detail wil result in improved alignment amtong your leadership ste, your stakeholders behavioral chat acteristics, and the numerous project scenarios encountered on 8 ally bass, Figure 131 presents a good visual context of this alignment: Figure 1-1. Leadership style and alignment. Your an steno Behavior se | Ld rarer Scene Creating Project Constituents tothe te tenet etary, vey te tenon was pl he ‘concept of project manager as leader. In a typical status meetin, team ember ported pres eating ined action fens [the same as today). IF the work was not completed, the team ‘member was often singled out, or perhaps his functional man ager was called Turnover was commonplace inthe project team environment. ‘Times have changed. Etfective project leadership is recog nized by colleges, precttioners, and, yes, authors, as an integral art of overall project succes. The rise of project base organize tons (in whch most work s accomplished through projects), the ‘virtual nature and teach of gibal projects, and cultural diversity have all conteibuted to the demand for Better leaders, not just‘mangers of teams. Leaders need constituents, and project lead ers are no exception, Creating a Consistency in Working Relationships To create a consttuency, eam members an stakeholders who enthusisticaly perform or support the ‘ojct work, you need to engender rug. | Ib fs important to an respec, perhaps even admiration It | 4 is important to “walk the talk" and estab- walk the talk” and 4sh 2 consistency in working relaton- | establish a consie- ships. For example, i's coach in any Spar employs a ery, demanding style | tency in working an then abandons it midseason, the | relationships, ‘teatn will be confused and confounded, rips and is performance wl likely siler, Constituents do not ex: ect perfection, but mos requ consistency fram thet project leaders. Ifyou adopt this appract wl hae a postive on team and stakeholder morale. Encouraging Risk Taking ft and the Elimination of Aithough it sounde Fear of Failure counterintuitive, As project leader, you should encourage | mistakes can ss takingard ty to eliminate the ear of once failure. Ite team is aad to make nis» | Sent important takes its aby to perfor te high evel willbe impeded. ts important to lever. | PPortunitles. Not ‘ae everyone's knowledge and capability | Only can you learn 10 marinize member’ consibution 0 | fom your the project. ough it sounds counter | 2™ YOUr mistakes, ‘intuitive, mistakes can present important | but you can use 2pportntes, Not only can you leam | them to mold ber from your mistakes, but you can wie | Mem to mold be: them to mold behavior and set the tone | havior and set the of he team environment. During my ex ‘eet as poeticadey one ofthe bestprac | POM® OF the team ‘es that earned was to take advantage | environment, [The Project Manager as Leader 3 ofthe fist mistake I made, I would announce wat I id wrong, Say, *Mybad,” and then explain how Intended to fx the problem. It team member se tat you are open and willing to stare your steps chances ae excellent that they wil act accordingly and > wlng to tate prudent risks asthe project proceeds. Establishing a Positive Culture of Dissent “AI tes are left at the door” is one ofthe fst statements I make When meeting withthe team forthe fst time. This isan inpor ‘ant ground rale that wil lp you estabish a pasitve culture of cdssent Ifthe projects in the second phase, storming, and meet ings are overly cotial and agreeable, you have a problem. Tiss, ‘in all ikeihood, a dysfunctional team tha is operating ina con strcted environment. This does not mean that you encourage conflict, but you wil want to promote a variety of perspectives. As project lade, it isimportan for you to create an envionment that encourages the exchange of ideas and opinions, fee ofthe threat of reprises. This positive culture of essen hess you keep ‘ideas fowing and assists you in making strategic an tactical de sions. Ifyou are surounded by "yes" people, devoid of he nec essary vetting of ideas, the project wil most Ikely stagnate, and you vl ose the real value of your constituent, Motivation ‘All project managers require team members to complete activ ties and accomplisn work on time, AS an effective project leader, you need to add an additonal element maximum performance, Gering ie most from your team requites You to focus on team ‘members as individuals, not Justa collective of workers meeting, deadlines Ifyou mosvate the individuas, you motivate ine team and establish the foundation fora high performance environ ment. Conversely, an unmotivated project tam will have dif cul sueceeding regardless of how the technical aspects ofthe project are managed, Some profct leads use slfassessment tons to identify traits and posstle motivational tigers ofthe team members, While‘these have proven o be elective in many Instances, prefer the ‘more tradonal approach of spending time with team members and other Key stakeholders to find out what makes ther tek If You invest time to speak and Isten ta team metnbers over coffee ‘on a Tuesday morning (ry to avold Monday, as some of us need ‘to acust rom tne weekend) and acknowledge the contributions of colleagues over a beverage at happy hour of an cccasional lunch you wil stengthen the relationship and usualy gain insight Into who they ae, The more you know, the Bete equipped you vel be wen the need to motivate arses, MBWA, or management 2y walking around, was introduced in the 1970s by Bll Hewett and Dave Packard and became known as “the Hewlett Packard (HP) style." I stresses this tectique andi stil practiced by po} ct leaders, CEOs, and manages at al levels because It works, This i especially true inthe typical project envzonment where the leader is managing without formal authority. If you lack ‘he authority ote them, you need the aly to motivate thet, Cleat, As soon as pssibe, an accomplishment, big ar smal, Should be acknowledged and celebrated aba team, AS projects begin, certain amour of ena must be overcome. Start by celebrating the small itories, and, a the projec progress, Continue to acknowledge good work as_| *# momentum appropriate, Many project leaders cele | going by knowin, bate with the team as milestones are mae reached of predetermined goals are ac-_ | YOUr team and en- complished at the end of each project phase. Whichever method you employ, it 's your job to Keep the momentum gong by knowing your team. and ensuring high morale, suring high morale. Project Leadership and the Team Environment ‘As mentioned ear, the dea ofthe project manager as leaders 8 relatively new concept In the recent pas, tam member roe, ‘onfcezesoluton strategies, and symerges were not considered lt is your job to keep critica to overall project succes, AS a project leader today, you need to adres all ofthese areas. This Section highligh proven techniques for leading project eams and expands the focus tin clude eiseibuted virtual teams Identifying and Developing Team Member Roles ‘Attugh you resent te gue that bold the tam ogee, yeu Carats sgh eo win brome ye ied of pect teem member Sa sets en eons comune overalprtomance es va mined nto, at it Isat an mporat cone As th rot pores ni alsoflenesume roles ttf uly th ea xonent ‘ith te orto eingcofict. noe cases itecomes eet thatthe chen oth, eslngin daly ses and nea sent ota pject wo, you ne to enya orb eng wears at pater esta sg poet raport. ach team member pest fra purpose, ein ne otal or site: mater experts In rdrfr the tan op you must observe te cars of ‘he goup. Be poste an len danger zones were potential cooley ace Lok for opportunist coordinate tam ‘ember efor ree om sean o levee ter combined fle. Your gal st promot sys formu ean per formance A common deen seg ces “The whe Is ayeter than the sum of ts pars As projec ea ee th is {Smithing oyu to ste fo and saline ob Determining the Appropriate Approach ‘to Conflict Resolution A project teams experience conf at some pont, and, a 1 em: phased eater, much of i's healthy and positive, Its when con ict becomes destructive to project work and reatioships that you ‘eed to take action, Personality isues, conictng priors, stake- holder disagreement, tight schedules, and technical sues all can be considered root causes of confit inthe project envionment. How you deat wit the sues that arise wil be a determining ac ‘or in your effectiveness as project leader Most of us develop ourre. Fundamental of Project Management | ‘own ste for dealing with conflict. As mentioned eae in the chapter this can lead toa comfort zone that hinders your ability to flex your style to it the stuaton. Susan Junda presented ve ap. proaches to address conflict In te project environment (Project Team Leadersiyp: Bung Commitment Through Superior Com ‘munication; American Management ASociation, 2004), |, Avoidance. Often called the flphtsynérome, avoidance occurs ‘when an individual delays the sue, withdraws from the ste ation, or avo the confit altogether 2. Accommodating n tis stance, an individual focuses on meeting the needs of the other person tothe exclusion of everything ee. 3. Compromising. This isan attempt to in the mide ground sn which neither party gets all hat it seeking 4, Collaborating Here, both parties work together to come to 1 mutually beneficial solution; this is typically a winwin seenato, 5, Foreing/Competing. This s the *my way or the highway” approach, wen one Individual forges ahead with his ide. Your task sto determine which approach s most pproptate tiven the project conflict scenario, If you have invested youself In guty understanding your project constituent, thistask becomes less diticult. Exteral conflicts require that you make a more thorough assessment ofthe situation and indvidval(s) before you ‘make an informed decison. Whichever approach you choose, re ‘member to focus on the fats, not the emotion. Leading Project Status Meetings ‘Toe portance of project satus meetings s underrated, Yes, ost ‘organizations hold too many meetings that ake up to much tie, hut status meetings are cial wo your projects success. If every (CEO realized the amount of ime and money wasted on inefcent [The Project Manager as Leader 7 etn reat woul be ne© | You ae project seth ale dete ne pants. You as project leader are responsi- leader are responsi- Be ov mating your sat aeetns | befor malin your aha, coat opto a Hbucsoucvatyacion bret | etatue meetings emly tun project status meetings: efficient, effective, > Status the works don't expend valu. | and productive. able ime accomplisng the work in the meeting > Establish meeting ground rules such as: * Minimum number of members for a quorum (enough to hold the meeting. + Consensus (in case ofa deadlock, fre members gre then ‘he meeting proceeds, withthe posshiity to revs the sue, * Allies are et tthe door tis worth mentioning again). Confident (everyting said stays in the meeting room). © One person speaks ata time Start on time; end on te, > Appolnt a tnekeeper to help you Keep to your schedule. Recruit scribe to record and dstibute meeting minutes >> Focus on participation to ensure that every voce I heard > Do not alow extended sidebar discussions >> Ensue that all electronic devices ae off or on vibrate When establishing ground rules it important to include all ‘eam members to ensure Duy, Ifyou ty to dictate these to the ‘team, nobody will adhere to them. Some project teams altemate the role of scribe. Thisisabad Idea, Ifyou appoint single scribe, ‘that individual wll develop ecient babs of recording and ci ‘wibutng the mlnutes in a timely manner. [the Job rotates tome Fundamentals of Project Management | share the work, each week wil produce a diferent style, and no single teen member wil develop the alorementioned efclences. Working with Virtual Teams “Brussels, we have a problem,” I remember saying these words to a team member following my previous decsion to suspend ‘Weekly videoconferencing, ald not understand the communica ‘lon challenges that were lacing my global team atthe time Needless to say, the decision was reversed, I your team resides in other buldings or is spread across the lobe, you should ieatiy ‘Your spect challenges and plan to avercome them, "Most virtual teams encounter blockages that are unique ct ‘hat are much more likely in a geographically dspersed envio ‘ment. Communication on every level can become an aft, 4S ‘ence, a circus oa torment, When team members are not down the hall or up stars, clarfcaton can become a project ‘in ise. Things tend to gt let in tans Communication on every level can Jaton, They fall through the everpresent | become an art, a but often unseen cracks. Add miticul tural or multiingual eam members, and | S¢l@n¢e, a circus, factions can develop along those ines. | or a torment. Cuiturldiferences, i not dented but Jet to fester can prevent the development of el team unity. Dit ferences in work habits, protocol, and style are more common. and consequential, ‘To combat these added challenges, you must go back to be sles When it comes to understanding your team members and stakeholders. st thatthe project Kickoff meeting be fice face, ‘This may prove very dificult, especialy when extensive travel I involved, butt is crucial to team bondkng and future morale. You ‘Wil ind that hss something that must be sold to management othe project champion I this is the case, estimate projected ‘ests and benels and present them as often ss necessary it once took me six atiempts unt | go "yes". lt your organization lacking the latest vital communication [ Te Project Manager as Leader 0 ‘ob cme asgaty whee Sel thereto investin spd ‘by highlighting the costs and negative effects of outdated programs en isthe oj press cn ao be ws aa as any oppor orinralinercon mong ea ee publ sep ovcne eo ecana traction and Sn edge ares key Points to Remember > The mare age you become in ang others, the greater the chance or project sucess. 1b Mis nortan to “walk th tak’ and statis consistency in you working razors. Enoowaging risk an, emina- ing tear of flure, and estblsting a postive culture ot ds- Sent wi make you arma efecve project lead D> Its your jb to tep the mame going by knowing your team end ensuing high more > Asa project aes you read a be abet iden and devon team mabe oes, dterine th appropriate aporoach 0 confit resolon, ad project stats mestings, and work wth Erercise : sete ete projet evo Your aptn. Mate a iol en mpran poet adentp sucess at el Seve Bar cn al foe ent hues Then onset your om ees (ic bates or angst Wich eas ay ned Inporenen?|