Information Systems Strategic Planning – Week #8 Lecture 2

Project Management

Businesses are cracking down on processes and procedures, the days of programmers writing programs that were notes on a napkin are going away in favor of more structured project management. The Project Management Institute (PMI) develops procedures and concepts necessary to support the profession of project management (www.pmi.org ) and has three areas of focus:

• The distinguishing characteristics of a practicing professional (ethics)
• The content and structure of the profession’s body of knowledge (standards)
• Recognition of professional attainment (accreditation)

Project Management is focused on three interdependent variables: cost, time, and scope (how large a project is).

Business owners are concerned with the time it takes to develop and implement new solutions, the more time it takes, the more money it costs. Therefor when possible the scope of projects is smaller and better defined. Selecting and defining projects is a primary role of a Project Manager. Three common techniques for selecting projects

1. Focus on organizational goals
2. Categorize projects
3. Perform a financial analysis

The factor that usually determines if a project will move forward is the financial analysis. If the solution costs more than it will return, it is often left on the shelf. If the project is a ‘go’ then a project charter is created. A project charter is a document issued by the project initiator that formally authorizes the existence of a project and provides the project manager with the authority to apply organizational resources to project activities and includes

• Project scope statement
• Project objectives
• Project constraints
• Projects assumptions

Many companies are using the SMART methodology of project management – see the graphic below for the meaning of the SMART acronym. Using a methodology helps the project stay on track and to be delivered on time and under budget (at least that is the hope!).

Important Project Management tools

The project plan is perhaps the most important project management document, it is a formal, approved document that manages and controls project execution. A well-defined project plan should be:

• Easy to understand and read
• Communicated to all key participants
• Appropriate to the project’s size, complexity, and criticality
• Prepared by the team, rather than by the individual project manager

The last item, being prepared by the team is an important point. Since it is prepared by a team, each member of the team feels ownership as they had a stake in creating the document.

Two primary diagrams used in project planning include PERT and Gantt charts. A PERTchart shows dependency and the critical path (the longest tasks in each segment)

A Gantt chart is easily created by several software programs. It is a visual representation of the dates and dependencies of resources (people) and their tasks.

Conclusion:

This week you have focused on development methodologies and project management. You have learned that Agile is a methodology that is being used by more and more companies all the time. It has a focus on reducing development time and costs. You also learned that a project manager must focus on managing three primary areas to ensure success: People, Communications, Change. Once approved a project is monitored by documents such as a Gantt chart.

This week in your final assignment you will pull together all of the pieces of your strategic plan. You will also describe one project and make a simple Gantt chart. You do not have to use special software, you can sketch it out. If you DO want to use software you can sign up for a free account at http://www.tomsplanner.com/ (this is OPTIONAL).