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10.1 Project Management Basics

Learning Objective

The objective of this section is to attain a basic understanding of the part of a project managing director in the lifecycle of a GIS project.

Projection management is a fairly recent professional endeavor that is growing chop-chop to keep pace with the increasingly complex job market. Some readers may equate management with the posting of clichéd artwork that lines the walls of corporate headquarters beyond the nation (Figure x.1). These posters often depict a multitude of parachuters falling arm-in-arm while forming some odd geometric shape, nether which the poster is titled "Teamwork." Another is a beautiful photograph of a landscape titled, "Motivation." Clearly, any job that is like shooting fish in a barrel enough that its workers can be motivated by a pretty pic is a chore that will either shortly be washed past computers or shipped overseas. In reality, proper project management is a complex job that requires a wide knowledge base and a multifariousness of skills.

Effigy 10.i

Management is more posting vapid, buzzword-laden artwork such as this in the office place.

The Project Management Institute (PMI) Standards Commission describes project management as "the awarding of knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to projection activities in social club to meet or exceed stakeholder needs and expectations." To assist in the agreement and implementation of project management, PMI has written a volume devoted to this subject titled, "A Guide to the Projection Management Trunk of Noesis," also known equally the PMBOK Guide (PMI 2008). This section guides the reader through the basic tenets of this text.

The primary stakeholders in a given projectionA temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product or service every bit a means of achieving an organizational goal. include the project managerAn employee with the responsibility of planning, executing, and endmost a given project. , project team, sponsor/clientThe sponsor/customer hires the projection director and his or her project team to provide some services and/or products. , and customer/end-userThe customer/end-user, which may or may not be the sponsor/client, is the person or people who will use the service or product. . Every bit project director, you will be required to identify and solve potential problems, problems, and questions as they arise. Although much of this section is applicable to the majority of information technology (It) projects, GIS projects are specially challenging due to the large storage, integration, and functioning requirements associated with this particular field. GIS projects, therefore, tend to have elevated levels of risk compared to standard It projects.

Project management is an integrative endeavour whereby all of the project'south pieces must be aligned properly for timely completion of the piece of work. Failure anywhere along the project timeline volition result in delay, or outright failure, of the project goals. To accomplish this daunting chore, five process groupsProcess groups outline and organize a multitude of private activities and actions that projection managers must employ to reach the overall goals of the projection. and nine projection management knowledge areasProject management cognition areas represent those subject areas that managers must be cognizant of to ensure that all the goals of the project will be met. accept been adult to see project objectives. These process groups and noesis areas are described in this department.

PMBOK Process Groups

The five project management process groups presented here are described separately, just realize that at that place is typically a big degree of overlap among each of them.

Initiation, the beginning process grouping, defines and authorizes a particular projection or project stage. This is the point at which the scope, bachelor resources, deliverables, schedule, and goals are decided. Initiation is typically out of the hands of the project management team and, as such, requires a high-level sponsor/customer to approve a given course of action. This blessing comes to the project director in the form of a project charter that provides the authority to utilize organizational resources to accost the issues at hand.

The planning process grouping determines how a newly initiated projection phase volition be carried out. It focuses on defining the projection telescopic, gathering information, reviewing available resources, identifying and analyzing potential risks, developing a management programme, and estimating timetables and costs. As such, all stakeholders should be involved in the planning process group to ensure comprehensive feedback. The planning procedure is likewise iterative, meaning that each planning step may positively or negatively affect previous decisions. If changes need to exist made during these iterations, the project manager must revisit the plan components and update those now-obsolete activities. This iterative methodology is referred to as "rolling wave planning."

The executing process group describes those processes employed to consummate the work outlined in the planning process group. Mutual activities performed during this process group include directing projection execution, acquiring and developing the project team, performing quality balls, and distributing information to the stakeholders. The executing process grouping, like the planning process group, is often iterative due to fluctuations in project specifics (east.g., timelines, productivity, unanticipated hazard) and therefore may require reevaluation throughout the lifecycle of the project.

The monitoring and controlling process grouping is used to observe the project, place potential bug, and correct those problems. These processes run concurrently with all of the other process groups and therefore span the entire project lifecycle. This process group examines all proposed changes to the project and approves only those that do not alter the overall, stated goals of the project. Some of the specific activities and actions monitored and controlled by this process grouping include the project scope, schedule, toll, output quality, reports, risk, and stakeholder interactions.

Finally, the closing process group essentially terminates all of the deportment and activities undertaken during the 4 previous process groups. This process grouping includes handing off all pertinent deliverables to the proper recipients and the formal completion of all contracts with the sponsor/client. This process group is too of import to signal the sponsor/customer that no more charges will be made, and they tin now reassign the project staff and organizational resources every bit needed.

PMBOK Projection Management Knowledge Areas

Each of the five aforementioned process groups is available for apply with nine different knowledge areas. These knowledge areas incorporate those subjects that project managers must be familiar with to successfully complete a given project. A brief clarification of each of these 9 cognition areas is provided here.

Project integration management describes the ability of the projection manager to "place, ascertain, combine, unify, and coordinate" the various project activities into a coherent whole (PMBOK 2008). Information technology is understood past senior projection managers that there is no single fashion to successfully consummate this chore. In reality, each manager must apply their specific skills, techniques, and cognition to the job at hand. This noesis area incorporates all five of the PMBOK process groups.
Projection telescopic management entails an understanding of not only what work is required to complete the project simply too what extraneous work should be excluded from projection. Defining the scope of a project is usually done via the creation of a scope plan document that is distributed among squad members. This knowledge area incorporates the planning, as well as the monitoring and controlling process groups.
Projection time direction takes into account the fact that all projects are discipline to certain time constraints. These time constraints must be analyzed and an overall projection schedule must exist developed based on inputs from all project stakeholders (meet Section 10.two.1 "Scheduling" for more on scheduling). This cognition area incorporates the planning, every bit well every bit the monitoring and controlling process groups.
Projection cost management is focused not only with determining a reasonable upkeep for each project task simply also with staying within the defined upkeep. Project cost direction is often either very simple or very complex. Detail care needs to be taken to work with the sponsor/customer as they will be funding this attempt. Therefore, any changes or augments to the project costs must be vetted through the sponsor/client prior to initiating those changes. This cognition area incorporates the planning, as well as the monitoring and decision-making process groups.
Projection quality direction identifies the quality standards of the project and determines how best to satisfy those standards. It incorporates responsibilities such equally quality planning, quality assurance, and quality command. To ensure adequate quality management, the project manager must evaluate the expectations of the other stakeholders and continually monitor the output of the various projection tasks. This knowledge area incorporates the planning, executing, and monitoring and decision-making procedure groups.
Projection human being resources management involves the acquisition, development, organization, and oversight of all team members. Managers should endeavour to include squad members in as many aspects of the task as possible so they feel loyal to the work and invested in creating the best output possible. This knowledge area incorporates the planning, executing, and monitoring and decision-making procedure groups.
Projection communication direction describes those processes required to maintain open up lines of communication with the projection stakeholders. Included in this knowledge surface area is the determination of who needs to communicate with whom, how communication will exist maintained (e-mail, letter reports, phone, etc.), how frequently contacts will be made, what barriers will limit communication, and how past communications will be tracked and archived. This cognition area incorporates the planning, executing, and monitoring and decision-making process groups.
Projection gamble management identifies and mitigates hazard to the project. Information technology is concerned with analyzing the severity of take chances, planning responses, and monitoring those identified risks. Risk analysis has become a complex undertaking every bit experienced project managers understand that "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure." Risk management involves working with all team members to evaluate each private job and to minimize the potential for that risk to manifest itself in the project or deliverable. This cognition area incorporates the planning, as well as the monitoring and controlling process groups.
Project procurement direction, the terminal cognition surface area, outlines the process past which products, services, and/or results are acquired from outside the projection squad. This includes selecting business partners, managing contracts, and closing contracts. These contracts are legal documents supported by the force of law. Therefore, the fine print must be read and understood to ensure that no defoliation arises between the two parties entering into the understanding. This knowledge area incorporates the planning, executing, monitoring and controlling, and closing process groups.

Project Failure

Irish potato'south Law of Project Management states that no major projection is completed on time, inside budget, and with the same staff that started it—do not expect yours to exist the commencement. Information technology has been estimated that only sixteen percent of fully implemented information technology projects are completed on time and inside budget (The Standish Group International 2000).The Standish Group International. 2000. "Our Weblog." http://world wide web.pm2go.com. These failed projects result in an estimated loss of over $81 billion every year! David Hamil discusses the reasons for these failures in his web feature titled, "Your Mission, Should You Choose to Accept It: Projection Management Excellence" (http://spatialnews.geocomm.com/features/mesa1).

The first noted cause for project failure is poor planning. Every project must undergo some blazon of planning-level feasibility written report to make up one's mind the purpose of the project and the methodologies employed to consummate it. A feasibility report is basically used to determine whether or not a project should be given the "green lite." It outlines the project mission, goals, objectives, scope, and constraints. A project may be deemed unfeasible for a multifariousness of reasons including an unacceptable level of risk, unclear project requirements, disagreement among clients regarding projection objectives, missing central stakeholders, and unresolved political issues.

A 2nd cause for project failure is lack of corporate management support. Inadequate staffing and funding, as well as weak executive sponsorship on the part of the client, will typically result in a project with niggling hazard of success. One of the virtually important steps in managing a project will be to determine which fellow member of the client's team is championing your project. This private, or group of individuals, must be kept abreast of all major decisions related to the project. If the client'due south project champion loses interest in or contact with the effort, failure is not far afield.

A third common cause of project failure is poor projection direction. A loftier-level project manager should have ample experience, educational activity, and leadership abilities, in improver to beingness a skilled negotiator, communicator, problem solver, planner, and organizer. Despite the fact that managers with this wide-ranging expertise are both uncommon and expensive to maintain, information technology only takes a failed project or ii for a customer to learn the importance of securing the proper person for the task at hand.

The concluding cause of project failure is a lack of client focus and the lack of the end-user participation. The customer must exist involved in all stages of the lifecycle of the projection. More than than i GIS project has been completed and delivered to the client, only to observe that the final product was neither what the client envisioned nor what the client wanted. Likewise, the end-user, which may or may not be the client, is the about important participant in the long-term survival of the projection. The end-user must participate in all stages of project development. The creation of a wonderful GIS tool will well-nigh likely go unused if the end-user can discover a better and/or more cost-efficient solution to their needs elsewhere.

Primal Takeaways

Projection managers must employ a wide range of activities and actions to attain the overall goals of the project. These deportment are cleaved down into v procedure groups: initiation, planning, executing, monitoring and decision-making, and closing.
The activities and actions described in this section are applied to nine management knowledge areas that managers must exist cognizant of to ensure that all the goals of the projection will be met: integration management, scope management, time direction, cost management, quality management, human resource management, communication management, adventure direction, and procurement management.
Projects tin neglect for a multifariousness of reasons. Successful managers will be aware of these potential pitfalls and will piece of work to overcome them.

Exercise

As a student, you are constantly tasked with completing assignments for your classes. Remember of one of your recent assignments every bit a project that y'all, as a project (assignment) manager, completed. Describe how you lot utilized a sampling of the projection direction process groups and knowledge areas to consummate that assigned task.