Project Managment

#snsinstitutions#snsdesignthinkers#designthinkingUntil 1900, civil engineering projects were generally managed by creative architects, engineers, and master builders themselves, for example, Vitruvius (first century BC), Christopher Wren (1632–1723), Thomas Telford (1757–1834), and Isambard Kingdom Brunel (1806–1859).[7] In the 1950s, organizations started to apply project-management tools and techniques more systematically to complex engineering projects.[8]

As a discipline, project management developed from several fields of application including civil construction, engineering, and heavy defense activity.[9] Two forefathers of project management are Henry Gantt , called the father of planning and control techniques,[10] who is famous for his use of the Gantt chart as a project management tool (alternatively Harmonogram first proposed by Karol Adamiecki );[11] and Henri Fayol for his creation of the five management functions that form the foundation of the body of knowledge associated with project and program management.[12] Both Gantt and Fayol were students of Frederick Winslow Taylor 's theories of scientific management . His work is the forerunner to modern project management tools including work breakdown structure (WBS) and resource allocation .

The 1950s marked the beginning of the modern project management era, where core engineering fields came together to work as one. Project management became recognized as a distinct discipline arising from the management discipline with the engineering model.[13] In the United States, prior to the 1950s, projects were managed on an ad-hoc basis, using mostly Gantt charts and informal techniques and tools. At that time, two mathematical project-scheduling models were developed. The critical path method (CPM) was developed as a joint venture between DuPont Corporation and Remington Rand Corporation for managing plant maintenance projects. The program evaluation and review technique (PERT), was developed by the U.S. Navy Special Projects Office in conjunction with the Lockheed Corporation and Booz Allen Hamilton as part of the Polaris missile submarine program.[14]

PERT and CPM are very similar in their approach but still present some differences. CPM is used for projects that assume deterministic activity times; the times at which each activity will be carried out are known. PERT, on the other hand, allows for stochastic activity times; the times at which each activity will be carried out are uncertain or varied. Because of this core difference, CPM and PERT are used in different contexts. These mathematical techniques quickly spread into many private enterprises.

At the same time, as project-scheduling models were being developed, technology for project cost estimating , cost management and engineering economics was evolving, with pioneering work by Hans Lang and others. In 1956, the American Association of Cost Engineers (now AACE International ; the Association for the Advancement of Cost Engineering ) was formed by early practitioners of project management and the associated specialties of planning and scheduling , cost estimating, and project control. AACE continued its pioneering work and in 2006, released the first integrated process for portfolio, program, and project management (total cost management framework).

In 1969, the Project Management Institute (PMI) was formed in the USA.[15] PMI publishes the original version of A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide) in 1996 with William Duncan as its primary author, which describes project management practices that are common to "most projects, most of the time."[16]

Project management types

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Project management methods can be applied to any project. It is often tailored to a specific type of project based on project size, nature, industry or sector. For example, the construction industry, which focuses on the delivery of things like buildings, roads, and bridges, has developed its own specialized form of project management that it refers to as construction project management and in which project managers can become trained and certified.[17] The information technology industry has also evolved to develop its own form of project management that is referred to as IT project management and which specializes in the delivery of technical assets and services that are required to pass through various lifecycle phases such as planning, design, development, testing, and deployment. Biotechnology project management focuses on the intricacies of biotechnology research and development.[18] Localization project management includes application of many standard project management practices to translation works even though many consider this type of management to be a very different discipline. For example, project managers have a key role in improving the translation even when they do not speak the language of the translation, because they know the study objectives well to make informed decisions.[19] Similarly, research study management can also apply a project manage approach.[20] There is public project management that covers all public works by the government, which can be carried out by the government agencies or contracted out to contractors. Another classification of project management is based on the hard (physical) or soft (non-physical) type.

Common among all the project management types is that they focus on three important goals: time, quality, and cost. Successful projects are completed on schedule, within budget, and according to previously agreed quality standards i.e. meeting the Iron Triangle or Triple Constraint in order for projects to be considered a success or failure.[21]

For each type of project management, project managers develop and utilize repeatable templates that are specific to the industry they're dealing with. This allows project plans to become very thorough and highly repeatable, with the specific intent to increase quality, lower delivery costs, and lower time to deliver project results.