Thoughts on Chapters 5 – 9

Chapter 5 – Risk Management

In a sense, all of project management is the management of risk. The steps and tools of managing that risk include the schedules, analyses, and plans in each of the categories of identified risk.

Perhaps ‘risk’ is a less helpful work to describe the inherent uncertainties involved with any project. Contingencies; constraints; conditions of the project are all useful descriptors of issues the Project manager will manage.

As with so much in life, recognition and acceptance are the critical elements in success or failure. The project manager will want to realistically look at the nature of the project; investigate and analyze with her team the various contingencies; and explore as many viable responses as possible – all of this within the context of recognizing the possibility that other events will intervene to upset the initial assumptions.

Above all of these considerations, the project manager has the responsibility to gain the trust and support of the sponsor, along with the good-faith efforts of her team. She does this by honestly presenting the facts as they develop – good and bad – so the sponsor and the team members can make reasonable and rational decisions about the work product, and ultimately, the continuation of the project.

Chapter 6 – Work Breakdown Structure

The WBS represents the project infrastructure, and it is crucial that the team develops this in conjunction with the Project Manager. The WBS provides the opportunity to look at the project in a detailed way and forces the team to answer the 5-Wh questions.

Project Management shares aspects with exploration in that someone (sponsor; PM) identifies an outcome and generates enthusiasm and support for the project; the team is assembled; needs and obstacles are identified; plans and contingencies are considered and put in place; action is taken; and adjustments made until success is achieved.

In some sense, project management is the process of answering: What are we doing? Why are we doing it? Who will help? How will we do it? How will we know we are done?

Chapter 7 & 8 – Realistic Scheduling & Accurate Estimating

Here we have the convergence of the art & science of project management. Scheduling involves the detailed aligning of activities to ensure the smooth flow and timely completion of the project. Estimating involves the, sometimes, experience-based ‘informed guesswork’ of the project manager and his team to time and align work units.

Tools like the GANTT and PERT charts, processes like resource leveling and critical path evaluation are vital to visualize the pieces of the project. At the end of the day, these are all just tools. The project manager must ‘keep her eye on the ball’ and involve and encourage the team members to actively participate in keeping the project on time and under budget.

The whole process benefits when the team looks at the project from a Total Quality Management (TQM) approach similar to Agile project management. The review cycles have to make sense for the pace, scope, and delivery-time of the project and/or its components.

Chapter 9 – Balancing the Trade-off – cost; schedule; quality

If the previous chapters described the ‘art-and-science’ of project management, then this chapter describes the ‘alchemy’ of project management. “Time-Money-Quality – You can have any two”. This well-worn phrase describes the challenge for the project manager who seeks to please all the constituents involved in a project.

Critical in this discussion is to honestly discuss up-front what the 3 pieces mean to folks – financially; emotionally; professionally; and chronologically. Some folks will have their reputations tied to the successful completion of the project and be willing to spend whatever it takes to come in on time. Some will only be concerned with the cost to the enterprise. Some will want the most elegant deliverable possible. Whatever the circumstance, you the project manager will manage more effectively if you dig out this information early in the process, and keep an eye on the possibility that folks may change their minds along the way.

Recognition is the key. Then, you must act. Those who succeed often follow this advice: “Today, not tomorrow”.