Project management as we know it today has evolved in order
to plan, coordinate, and control the complex and diverse activities of
modern industrial, commercial, and management change projects.
Clearly, man-made projects are not new; monuments surviving from the
earliest civilizations testify to the incredible achievements of our
forebears and still evoke our wonder and admiration. Modern projects,
for all their technological sophistication, are not necessarily greater
in scale than some of those early mammoth works. But economic pressures
of the industrialized world, military defense needs, competition between
rival companies, and greater regard for the value and well-being (and
hence the employment costs) of working people have all led to the development
of new ideas and techniques for managing projects.
All projects share one common characteristic - the projection of ideas
and activities into new endeavors. The ever-present element of risk and
uncertainty means that the events and tasks leading to completion can
never be foretold with absolute accuracy. For some very complex or advanced
projects even the possibility of successful completion might be in serious
doubt.
The purpose of project management is to foresee or predict as many of
the dangers and problems as possible and to plan, organize, and control
activities so that projects are completed as successfully as possible
in spite of all the risks. This process starts before any resource is
committed, and must continue until all work is finished. The primary
aim of the project manager is for the final result to satisfy the project
sponsor or purchaser, within the promised timescale and without using
more money and other resources than those that were originally set aside
or budgeted.
Six
Sigma Project Management Employing Six Sigma for the business environment is for
achieving well-defined goals. The project selected for deploying
Six Sigma is not self-sustaining and can develop...
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Much of the development in project management methods took place in
the second half of the twentieth century, spurred by impatient project
purchasers (who wanted their projects finished quickly so that their
investments could be put to profitable use as soon as possible). Competition
between nations for supremacy in weapons and defense systems played a
significant role in the development of project management techniques,
and the process has been accelerated by the widespread availability of
powerful, reliable, and cheap computers. Project management is more effective
when it makes use of these sophisticated techniques and facilities and,
in this sense, is a highly specialized branch of management.
Planning and control must, of course, be exercised over all the activities
and resources involved in a project. The project manager therefore needs
to understand how all the various participants operate, and to appreciate
(at least in outline) their particular skills, working methods, problems,
and weaknesses. This demands a fairly wide degree of general experience
so that, in this practical sense, project management is akin to general
management.
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