Project Management: The Discipline from POME by Gautam KOppala

Project Management: The Discipline

The word discipline has more than one definition, according to dictionary. The two definitions are: 1) the “rules used to maintain control,” and 2) “a branch of learning supported by mental, moral, or physical training.” Project management, therefore, is a discipline (definition 2) which requires discipline (definition 1). In other words, project management is a unique branch of learning that deals with the planning, monitoring, and controlling of one-time endeavors.

Some Characteristics of Project Management

Project management is a unique career and profession. Its origins can be traced back to efforts such as U.S. Department of Defense major weapons systems development, NASA space missions, and major construction and maintenance efforts, as well as comparable efforts in Europe. The magnitude and complexity of these efforts were the driving force in the search for tools that could aid management in the planning, decision making, and control of the multitude of activities involved in the project and especially those going on simultaneously.
Project management is not just scheduling software. There is a misconception that project management is no more than scheduling using PERT (Program Evaluation and Review Technique) or CPM (Critical Path Method) to be found on a piece of software. A more realistic view is that scheduling software is a small part of project management. Software has permitted time scheduling, resource allocation, and cost management to be done much more efficiently and therefore in less time, in more detail, or both. Thus, a project can be planned and executed more precisely, leaving more time to perform the other aspects of project management.
Project management is different than operations and technical management. Operations management can be characterized as managing the steady state. As soon as the operation is established, the concern is more with maintaining the operation in a production mode for as long as possible. Technical management tends to focus on the theory, technology, and practice in a technical field concerning itself with questions of policy on strength of materials, safety factors in design, and checking procedures. However, executives tend to be concerned about setting up a new operation (via a project) in order to implement organizational strategy. Project management, then, is the interface between general management, operations management, and technical management, which integrates all aspects of the project and causes the project to happen.
Project management Focuses on Integration. If there is a single word that characterizes project management, it is integration—to integrate this discipline with other driving factors within every organization. Below is a sampling of those driving factors which influence project management and equally as important, which project management the discipline influences.
Strategic Planning: The Directive. Decisions from the strategic planning process become the directive from which projects are initiated. Project practitioners need to see the connection between the Strategic Plan and the project. Strategic Planning converted into an ongoing Strategic Management Process continues to review strategic objectives and filter down any changes so that the project manager can redirect his/her efforts appropriately.
Project Resource Allocation: The Critical Success Factor. The project manager must ensure that the allocation of specific resources is adequate but not overcommitted and that the right resources are assigned to the right tasks. This is not a simple procedure because of the number of activities that can be in process simultaneously. Fortunately, project management software provides assistance by identifying overloading or underloading of any one resource or pool of resources. Having identified any problems, human judgment is still required to evaluate and make the final decisions. This essential process both determines the cost of the project (budget) and provides oversight.
Change Management: The Differentiator. Typically change of scope and change of baseline plans come to mind when we say Change Management in the context of project management. However, every project creates significant changes in the culture of the business. Additional focus needs to be paid to planning and managing cultural change generated by projects.
Quality: Win/Win or Lose/Lose. A Quality initiative begins at the same time as the project management discipline. Quality management in the form of Six Sigma and other approaches combines project management techniques with the quality improvement techniques in order to ensure verifiable success.
Mentorship: Transfer from One Generation to the Next. Every person who leaves a company/agency or a division/department takes with him/her the “history,” the “networking,” and the “knowledge” of past projects. Cultures survive by passing knowledge from the elders to the young. To keep the information needed to perpetuate the project management culture in house, proactive mentorship programs are established to orchestrate the passing of “culture” onto new project practitioners.
Metrics and Close-out: Inspect What You Expect. Originally, metrics were the data collected after a project was completed to be used to plan for the next project(s). As project management has evolved, we’ve learned that we can’t wait until the end of a project to set thresholds and collect the data. Management wants measurement metrics throughout in the project that can be managed using Executive Scorecards or Dashboards. Control procedures need to in place before the project proceeds so that the records can be complete from the beginning. If not, valuable effort can be consumed in retracing the records after the fact, and control can be lost before the project really gets started. Furthermore, legal tests of prudence, common in the utility industry, are better dealt with when accurate and complete records of the project are available.
Productivity: Doing More with Less. The drive to do more with less money and fewer resources, to do it faster, and to produce the highest quality deliverable will never go away. In order to accomplish this mandate, the biggest bang for the buck comes from increasing productivity. Project practitioners use new and creative techniques (automated and non-automated) to facilitate greater productivity.
Maturity Tracking: Managing the Evolution of the PM Discipline. With increased visibility, project management is being asked to account for what it has contributed lately and more importantly for what it plans to contribute tomorrow. In order to answer these questions, a reasonable maturity growth plan specifically designed for the project management discipline is constructed, which evaluates today’s environment to ensure planned rather than chaotic growth.
Teams: Even More Distant. Remote or distant teams face the challenge of geography and diversity. Project management needs to address variables such as multi-functional, multi-cultural, multi-generational, multi-gender, and multi-personality project environment
Risk: The Defeating Factor. Risks are the holes in the dike. Too much vulnerability in the dike can make it crumble. If risks are isolated and the potential holes they present are plugged up, the dike will remain sound and solid. The sub-discipline of Risk Management is a major area of focus; one emerging approach is to use the techniques for controlling negative risks (threats) to capture positive risks (opportunities).
Competencies: Today and Tomorrow. Initially, project practitioners focus on their subject matter expertise, such as financial analysis, telecommunications design, or marketing creativity. Those who became involved in projects transition to competencies, such as scheduling, status reporting, and risk management. The next movement is to add general business awareness skills/competencies; such as financial knowledge, facilitation, leadership, problem solving/decision making, and creating/innovation. Each of you must ask what’s next in your world.

Behind these integrations exists a superstructure in the form of processes, procedures, and/or methodologies.

Gautam Koppala,

POME Author

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