Project Management Articles
The Purpose of Project Management and Setting Objectives
Project Management has developed in order to plan, co-ordinate and control the complex and diverse activities of modern industrial and commercial projects. All projects share one common characteristic - the projection of ideas and activities into new endeavours.
The purpose of project management is to foresee or predict as many dangers and problems as possible; and to plan, organise and control activities so that the project is completed as successfully as possible in spite of all the risks. The ever-present element of risk and uncertainty means that events and tasks leading to completion can never be foretold with absolute accuracy. For some complex or advanced projects, even the possibility of successful completion might be of serious doubt.
Project management can involve the following activities: planning - deciding what is to be done; organising - making arrangements; staffing - selecting the right people for the job; directing - giving instructions; monitoring - checking on progress; controlling - taking action to remedy hold ups; innovation - coming up with new solutions; representing - liaising with users.
Setting Objectives
Effective objectives in project management are specific. A specific objective increases the chances of leading to a...
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How to Define Tasks for MS Project
Training is an important step in learning to use Microsoft Project. It is a complicated piece of software which is very powerful but can be frustrating to the new user. Instructor-led courses let users get proficient with the software much more quickly than self-study will.
However MS Project training courses teaches students how the use the software and not how to plan projects. Slapping in arbitrary and unrealistic schedules simple makes Project an effective way to track the company's downfall.
Let's start with the basics: proper task definition. All projects break down to individual tasks assigned to individual people and if the tasks are not well characterized the plan is doomed to fail.
Think In Hours Not In Weeks
One of the most common mistakes new project planners make is to define the tasks far too broadly. If the plan has a task such as "Write documentation - 2 months" then there is no way that task will be completed on time.
When a planner creates such a large task then no thought has been given to the individual steps the task comprises and that...
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