©Sheila Belayutham

History of Project Management

©Sheila Belayutham

LEARNING OUTCOME

At the end of this lesson, students will be able to:

 Recognize the history and current development in
project management.
 Discuss the overview on project management.
 Identify the characteristics of a project.
 Understand project management benefits and trade
offs.
©Sheila Belayutham

THE HISTORY

 The concept of project management has been around since the

beginning of history. For ex: The Roman structures or even
the Egyptian pyramids.

 These were massive projects where funding, materials and

labor had to be managed and coordinated within a time frame
to complete a project.

 With the start of the industrial revolution the needs of

business and industry became more complicated and often
grew in scale. The need to manage a budget, supplies and
labor often across the country or even worse, another
continent, was really the ultimate test of management skills.
©Sheila Belayutham

THE HISTORY
©Sheila Belayutham

THE HISTORY

 In the United States, the forefather of

project management is Henry Gantt.
 He invented charts and diagrams to document and
measure the processes involved in Navy ship
building during WWI.
 This enabled him to see the big picture and analyze
all the functions involved in ship building. The Gantt
chart became an important tool for project
management and has been used for the last 100
years.
©Sheila Belayutham

THE HISTORY

 The 1950s marked the beginning of the modern project management era.
 Russia’s lead in missile technology became an important issue when
members of the U.S. military questioned the so called “missile gap”. The
safety of the nation was at stake and the military needed to put their own
missile program in place immediately.

 A project management program called PERT (Program Evaluation and

Review Technique) devised by Willard Fazar was put into place to manage
the program. PERT charts followed a critical path methodology allowing
managers control over huge and complex projects that involved
complicated tasks and logistics. Today, PERT is still the standard for all
U.S. Navy Projects.

 During the 1960s science principles were being applied to business

methodology. The most important theory that a business or company could
be compared to the human body. A business has skeletal, muscular,
circulatory and nervous systems in place just like a human. In the human
body when those systems integrated and worked together successfully they
produced life or in the case of business, carried out a project.
©Sheila Belayutham

THE HISTORY

 In 1969, the Project Management Institute (PMI) was

formed to serve the interest of the project management
industry.
 The premise of PMI is that the tools and techniques of
project management are common even among the
widespread application of projects from the software
industry to the construction industry.
 In 1981, the PMI Board of Directors authorized the
development of what has become A Guide to the Project
Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide),
containing the standards and guidelines of practice that
are widely used throughout the profession.
©Sheila Belayutham

PROJECT MANAGEMENT NOWADAYS

 Globalization has helped elevate the importance of

project management worldwide since many
companies are expanding or setting up new
businesses in other countries.

 The need for new and more sophisticated tools to

accomplish complicated project management
functions has evolved through the design and
manufacture of web based project management
software.
©Sheila Belayutham

Overview of Project Management

 Projects have been managed for as long as there has

been projects
 “Project Management” term only 35 years old
 Its influence has been very small
 Its potential influence in the future is huge
depending upon using a broad definition of a project.
©Sheila Belayutham

Overview of Project Management

 One definition of a project

 A series of activities undertaken by a group of people which
is intended to achieve a result.
 Therefore all construction activities are projects, so
are research activities, product developments, one
–off engineering activities (traditional PM sectors)
 Also included are military activities, all goverment
initiatives, all business initiatives, all legal cases,
all big social events and all premeditated crimes
 Includes all deliberate creation of “things” and all
deliberate changes to “things” undertaken by
groups of people
©Sheila Belayutham

Overview of Project Management

 Rate of increase in the number of projects has

increased due to rapid scientific, technical & political
development in the last 200 years
 PM as a science have only been developed over the
last 40 years
 In PM traditional sectors, only about one third uses
PM
 Its use in other sectors is tiny but growing fast
©Sheila Belayutham

Overview of Project Management

 Changes in PM:
 becoming more concerned with the soft
techniques & less with the hard techniques
 From predictable model of PM to the
unpredictable (predictable – project according to
plan if plan is good enough, project clients will
not change their minds, impose design freezes;
clients obj. org & people will not change). A
rejection of the stable model
 Development continues: Programme mgmt,
mgmt by projects, change mgmt, risk mgmt
 Interest in managing interfaces: from adversaries
to allies
©Sheila Belayutham

Overview of Project Management

 Future of PM
 Is
it a FAD?
 Most mgmt ideas never last more than 10 years

 PM will survive mainly due to 2 reasons

 It is essentially simple – one week project manager, only 2/3
aspects of PM is more important than the total of everything else
 IT is capable of extremely wide application (esp when PM is
managing how to get from State A to State B, cheaply & effectively,
it is the mgmt of change;others are mgmt of no change, mgmt of
the status quo)
©Sheila Belayutham

INTRODUCTION TO
PROJECT MANAGEMENT
©Sheila Belayutham

Project Management: Official Definition

 Project Management is the skills, tools and

management processes required to undertake a
project successfully. It incorporates:
 A set of skills.
 A suite of tools.
 A series of processes.
©Sheila Belayutham

Project management components

©Sheila Belayutham

Project Management: Unofficial Definition

Project management is about organization

Project management is about
decision making
Project management is about
changing people’s behavior

P roject m anagem ent is about

creating an environm ent conducive
to
getting critical projects done!
©Sheila Belayutham

Laws of Project Management

 When things appear to be going better, you have

overlooked something.
 No system is ever completely debugged. Attempts to debug
a system inevitably introduce new bugs that are even
harder to find.
 A carelessly planned project will take three times longer to
complete than expected
 A carefully planned project will take only twice as long.
 Project teams detest progress reporting because it vividly
manifests their lack of progress.
©Sheila Belayutham

What is a project?

A project is a set of people and other resources temporarily

assembled to reach a specified objective, normally with a fixed
budget and with a fixed time period. Projects are generally
associated with products or procedures that are being done for
the first time or with known procedures that are being altered.

Graham (1995)
 What is a project?
©Sheila Belayutham

 A Project is a temporary
endeavor undertaken to
create a unique product or
service.
Temporary

Unique
 Project
©Sheila Belayutham

 Endeavors of any size may be a project

 Large and small projects demand different
handling
 Temporary
 Distinguishes projects from operations
 Unique
 Not the same old thing
©Sheila Belayutham

Examples of Projects

 Planning a wedding

 Designing and implementing a computer system

 Hosting a holiday party

 Designing and producing a brochure

 Executing an environmental clean-up of a

contaminated site
 Holding a high school reunion

 Performing a series of surgeries on an accident victim

 What is not a project?
©Sheila Belayutham

 Emergency response to operations

problems
 Callouts
 Repairs and troubleshooting

 Routine operations support

 Maintenance of equipment
 Minor modifications and tuning of equipment
©Sheila Belayutham

Characteristics of a Project

# a project is a unique undertaking: each one will differ

from every other in some respect.(hence an atmosphere
of risk and uncertatinty)
# projects have specific objectives (or goals) to achieve
# Projects require resources
# projects have budgets
# projects have schedules
# projects require the effort of people
# measures of quality will apply
# projects require temporary organization
# projects are not permanent in nature
©Sheila Belayutham

Project Definition

A project is an organized work towards a pre-defined

goal or objective that requires resources and effort, a
unique (and therefore risky) venture having a budget
and schedule, requires a temporary organization and is
not permanent in nature.

Zulkiflee Yusof (2002)

©Sheila Belayutham

Objectives of Project Management

1. To ensure that the project is correctly

designed to meet its objectives

2. To ensure that the project is completed on

schedule, within resources and budget

3. To provide a mechanism for monitoring the

project
©Sheila Belayutham

To ensure that the project is correctly

designed to meet its objectives

• ensure that the project objectives and outcomes

are fully agreed by all involved

• ensure that the objectives are achievable

• ensure that the objectives satisfy customer needs

©Sheila Belayutham

To ensure that the project is completed on

schedule, within resources and budget

• ensures that the resources and budget are agreed

and are consistent with the needs of the project

• ensures that the life of the project is clearly defined

©Sheila Belayutham

To provide a mechanism for monitoring

the project

• ensures project does not depart from agreed path

• provides mechanism for examining project

progress (quarterly progress reports, agreed regular
communication….+ ?????)

• provides mechanism for correcting or stopping

failing projects (project restructuring)
©Sheila Belayutham

Why Project Management?

 Today’s complex environments require ongoing

implementations
 Project management is a method and
mindset…a disciplined approach to managing
chaos
 Project management provides a framework for
working amidst persistent change
 Project Management Trade-Offs
©Sheila Belayutham

Cost Scope

Quality

Time

Irwin/McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, 2000

©Sheila Belayutham

Project Management Trade Offs

 The time constraint refers to the amount of time

available to complete a project.
 The cost constraint refers to the budgeted amount
available for the project.
 The scope constraint refers to what must be done to
produce the project's end result.
 These three constraints are often competing constraints:
increased scope typically means increased time and
increased cost, a tight time constraint could mean
increased costs and reduced scope, and a tight budget
could mean increased time and reduced scope.
©Sheila Belayutham

LIFECYCLE OF A TROUBLED PROJECT

©Sheila Belayutham

APPROPRIATE PROJECT LIFECYCLE

©Sheila Belayutham

In Project,
What do you actually Manage?
©Sheila Belayutham

In Project, What do you actually Manage?

 Managing Projects is a matter of keeping:

SCOPE, SCHEDULE & RESOURCES in balance.

1. SCOPE Is the range of tasks required to accomplish

project goals.

2. A SCHEDULE indicates the time & schedule, as well as

the total project duration.

3. RESOURCES are the people, & equipments that

perform or facilitate project tasks.
©Sheila Belayutham

PROBLEMS OF PROJECT

THE MAJOR PROBLEMS ENCOUNTERED IN

MANAGING PROJECT:

1. INADEQUATE RESOURCES

2. UNREALISTIC DEADLINE

3. UNCLEAR GOALS OR DIRECTION

4. TEAM MEMBERS UNCOMMITTED

5. INSUFFICIENT PLANNING

6. COMMUNICATION BREAKDOWN
©Sheila Belayutham

HOW IS PROJECT SUCCESS DEFINED?

1. On Time

2. Within Budget

3. Quality Conformance
©Sheila Belayutham

Project Management Activities

 Analysis and design of objectives and events

 Planning the work according to the objectives
 Assessing and controlling risk (or Risk Management)
 Estimating resources
 Allocation of resources
 Organizing the work
 Acquiring human and material resources
 Assigning tasks
 Directing activities
 Controlling project execution
 Tracking and reporting progress (Management information system)
 Analyzing the results based on the facts achieved
 Defining the products of the project
 Forecasting future trends in the project
 Quality Management
 Issues management
 Issue solving
 Defect prevention
 Identifying, managing & controlling changes
 Project closure (and project debrief)
 Communicating to stakeholders
 Increasing / decreasing a company's workers
©Sheila Belayutham

Benefits of Project Management

 Satisfied customers
 Additional business
 Expansion of career opportunities
 Satisfaction of being on a winning team
 Improved knowledge and skills

When projects are successful, everybody WINS