Your Project Management Coach: Best Practices for Managing Projects in the Real World

Your Project Management Coach: Best Practices for Managing Projects in the Real World

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About the Authors

Bonnie Biafore is an only child, so learning to play well with others did not come until much later in life. However, she has always been an unrepentant organizing fool, which is obvious to anyone who examines the storage bins in her garage with their neatly segregated collections of nuts, bolts, screws, fuses, and other items of home maintenance.

Bonnie earned a Bachelor of Science in Architecture and a Master of Science in Structural Engineering, but neither of those fields quite did the trick. Through a number of fortunate coincidences, Bonnie ended up managing projects, which, with training and experience, turned out to be an appropriate and satisfying career for her. Project management helped her social skills immensely and fulfills her desire to get things done and keep things organized. In 2003, she earned a Project Management Professional (PMP) certification from the Project Management Institute.

When she isn't managing projects for clients, Bonnie writes about project management, personal finance, investing, and technology. She applies her incorrigible sense of humor to writing about those dry subjects in such a way that people might actually want to read about them.

Bonnie is the author of more than 20 books, including Successful Project Management, Project 2010: The Missing Manual, and several other award-winning books. When she isn't working, she hikes in the mountains with her dogs, cooks ethnic food, and works out. She is also wrapping up work on her first novel. You can learn more at her website, www.bonniebiafore.com or email Bonnie at [email protected].

Teresa Stover can't think without a pen or keyboard in hand and can't function without a task list, complete with work estimates and schedule. As supervisor of a technical publications department for a Silicon Valley startup in the late 1980s, Teresa came face to face with the art and science of project management. Desperate to know who needed to be working on what on any given day, she discovered Gantt and PERT charts and has never looked back.

Since then, Teresa has worked more than 20 years as a technical communication and project management consultant for software, manufacturing, business, and education. She specializes in project management for entrepreneurial startups, nonprofit organizations, and content development endeavors. Her clients have included Apple Computer, National Semiconductor, Boeing, MetLife, and the Puyallup School District. Her work passions are clarity, organization, and process.

Teresa conducts workshops on project management, business, and writing topics and has authored 15 books, including Microsoft Project 2010 Inside Out. Other recent achievements include recognition for her work in instructional design, web content, and nonprofit organizational development.

Teresa lives in southern Oregon with her husband, Craig, and her German Shepherd, Draco. With this book finished, she hopes for new opportunities for exploration and experience, conversation and creativity. She also plans to volunteer more for her favorite cause — Josephine Community Libraries, a nongovernmental organization that runs the member-supported, volunteer-run local public library system.

For more, visit Teresa's website, www.stoverwriting.com. Teresa welcomes emails from readers sent to [email protected].

About the Technical Editor

Bob McGannon, currently based in Canberra, Australia, is an author, speaker, trainer, and consultant and is the owner of three project management–related businesses in the United States and Australia. He has 27 years of project management and information technology management experience and has delivered project management services in eight different countries.

Bob is certified as a Project Management Professional (PMP) by the Project Management Institute. He is also a certified Prince2 Practitioner, a certified IBM Corporation Project Executive, a certified DMR-P project management mentor for the Boeing Aircraft Corporation, and a Certified Master Project Coach by the International Institute of Project Coaching.

Bob is the author of a blog entitled Intelligent Disobedience that can be accessed at mindavation.com/IDBlog/. He also can be heard on the In My Judgment weekly podcast which can be accessed at www.mindavation.com.

Credits

Executive Editor

Robert Elliott

Project Editor

Christina Haviland

Technical Editor

Bob McGannon

Production Editor

Rebecca Anderson

Copy Editor

Nancy Rapoport

Editorial Manager

Mary Beth Wakefield

Freelancer Editorial Manager

Rosemarie Graham

Associate Director of Marketing

David Mayhew

Marketing Manager

Ashley Zurcher

Business Manager

Amy Knies

Production Manager

Tim Tate

Vice President and Executive Group Publisher

Richard Swadley

Vice President and Executive Publisher

Neil Edde

Associate Publisher

Jim Minatel

Project Coordinator, Cover

Katie Crocker

Proofreader

Dawn Adams

Indexer

Johnna VanHoose Dinse

Cover Image

© Bruce Lonngren/iStockPhoto

Cover Designer

Ryan Sneed

Acknowledgments

Behind every book is a team that is responsible for turning the rough drafts of the authors into something wonderful. This book is no exception. Our thanks go to Christina Haviland, Nancy Rapoport, and the rest of the Wiley folks for their guidance, support, and patience as this book wound its way to publication.

It is hard to find the words appropriate to thank Bob McGannon, whose official role for this book was technical editor. He provided many of the helpful techniques you'll find in this book. He regaled us with project management stories and helped set the Let's not take ourselves too seriously tone for the book. Best of all, he brought us back on track when we strayed from reality with his signature Whoa, Nellie! comments.

Introduction

Projects come in all shapes and sizes — from monumental undertakings, such as building the Great Wall of China, to less grand endeavors such as developing a new product for your company, to smaller projects that can be just as satisfying, such as helping your beloved only child get into college and out of your hair. In days of old, when pharaohs and emperors could direct thousands of minions to do their bidding, managing budgets, meeting delivery dates, and using resources effectively might not have been as important as they are today. On the other hand, the consequences of failing to achieve objectives were probably grim.

Today, projects are more abundant than ever. But the business climate has changed and continues to evolve. Organizations want more work done more quickly or more benefits delivered for less money. Change is the only constant, but even the pace of change has accelerated. A haphazard approach to projects just won't do.

Common sense goes a long way toward getting things done in projects, even if you don't have formal training in project management. But, add in good project management practices and your projects will run more smoothly and deliver objectives more dependably. As you work on larger and more complex projects, project management processes become even more important. How else can you hope to achieve project goals while staying on top of thousands of tasks performed by hundreds of team members over several years?

Sometimes, a project might throw you an unexpected curve that has you wondering what to do. Maybe the pressure is on to get something done and you need to choose the most important action you can take to make your project a success. Perhaps your new project management assignment takes you into aspects of project management you've never dabbled in before.

At times like these, you probably wish you had a project management expert in the next office to coach you and give you sage advice. If you aren't so fortunate, this book can help. The authors of this book have managed their fair share of projects and learned techniques for resolving problems and getting things done more effectively. Most important, they have learned that the most helpful information doesn't come from academic textbooks but from the real world of projects and from other project managers. With that principle in mind, the authors have written this book to help both beginning and experienced project managers take their project management skills to the next level.

If you are new to project management, you will learn the processes that make up project management from start to finish. Each chapter describes the processes you utilize, explains the benefits of performing those project management activities, and warns you about the potential pitfalls of skipping them. More experienced project managers will appreciate the advice and tools in each chapter that help tame challenging project management situations.

Overview of the Book

Whether you want to learn about project management from the beginning or get guidance on a project problem, your time is precious. The goal of this book is to help you get up to speed quickly or find the specific nugget of knowledge you need — not waste your time with dense, dry dissertations on all things project management.

If you're managing a project for the first time, this book acts as your mentor by explaining the fundamentals of project management in an easy-to-swallow, engaging style. You can learn which activities are essential, which are optional, and which are needed only in specific situations. The book uses stories and examples to make concepts and techniques easier to understand.

If you're already managing projects, the book regularly dishes out handy advice for managing projects more successfully, avoiding the more common project management mistakes, and dealing with the realities of managing projects.

How This Book Is Organized

Your Project Management Coach is a resource for beginning and experienced project managers. If you're just starting to manage projects, this book explains the basics so you will be able to avoid common project management mistakes and start off on the right foot managing your projects.

Managing a project isn't a linear progression from start to finish. Before your project is done, you'll revisit various aspects, sometimes several times, for example, as you gradually fine-tune your project plan to satisfy all the project objectives. The chapters in this book introduce project management activities in the order in which you typically perform them from the beginning of a project. You will learn which processes you might revisit and repeat, or perform simultaneously with others.

For experienced project managers, there's no need to read the book cover to cover. Simply jump to the topic you need to prepare for your next project management activity or resolve the latest project situation.

The book is organized in parts that map to the project management process groups outlined in the Project Management Institute's Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK). That way, readers who are new to project management can start by learning how to prepare a project for success with the activities performed in the initiating process group. The remaining parts describe what you do as a project manager to plan, execute, monitor and control, and finally close a project.

The following is a brief summary of what each chapter covers. The book builds on topics from previous chapters, so you'll find cross-references to related topics. In addition, the chapters include handy advice in tips, notes, and warnings. If you're preparing to take the Project Management Institute's Project Management Professional Examination, take note of the cross-references that map material in chapters to the corresponding domains and tasks in the examination outline.

To help beginning project managers get started, Part I provides some background on projects and project management. Chapter 1 describes what makes a project a project and also shows how to differentiate project work from other types of work. Chapter 2 is a high-level introduction to project management. It covers a lot of ground but it provides a solid orientation before you learn all the specifics in later chapters.

Part II discusses the processes for planning projects. Chapter 3 details the steps in the initiating processes that take a project from a mere idea to a plan. Chapter 4 provides an overview of all the essential elements of a project plan, including scope, cost, and schedule. In Chapter 5, you learn how to identify the work to be done in the project and how to create the work breakdown structure. Chapter 6 introduces estimating, including who should prepare estimates, when to use different levels of estimate accuracy, what you estimate, and which methods to use in different situations. Once you estimate the project, you can turn to Chapter 7 to learn how to plan for the resources you'll need to perform the project work. Chapter 8 brings together the work breakdown structure, the estimates, and the resource plan to build the project schedule. Here you set the task sequence, apply dates, and assign resources to tasks. You also optimize the project plan, balancing scope, time, and cost, along with resources, quality, and risk.

In addition to the project schedule, a project plan has several additional sub-plans that describe how you will run the project. Chapter 9 explains how you create the quality plan, including the complementary roles of quality assurance and quality control in the project. Communication is a huge part of project management, so Chapter 10 begins by describing techniques for communicating effectively. Then, it explains how to build a communication plan to make sure that everyone involved in the project receives the information they need in the most effective way. Chapter 11 covers setting up a change management plan, which describes how you will manage the inevitable change requests that arise in every project. In Chapter 12, you learn how to work with your team to identify and analyze project risks, plan responses to the most dangerous risks, and track risks and issues.

Part III covers the processes for executing a project. Chapter 13 describes the initial activities, such as obtaining formal approval to begin work and saving a baseline for the plan. This chapter also discusses obtaining resources, whether they come from within your organization or from vendors. Chapter 14 provides an overview of techniques for handling a variety of situations: defining good processes that team members will use, making decisions, solving problems, making things happen, and resolving conflicts. Chapter 15 includes tips and techniques for running effective project meetings, whether it's a weekly status meeting, a management presentation about a proposed project, or a brainstorming session. Chapter 16 returns to the topic of team members, this time to discuss how to transform individual team members into a functioning team and also how to evaluate team members' performance.

Part IV includes monitoring and controlling projects. Chapter 17 describes the data to collect about a project, including time, status, quality, cost, and other information. Chapter 18 introduces several methods for evaluating progress and performance. Then, if you find that your project is off course, Chapter 19 describes methods for bringing the project back on track.

Part V covers processes for closing a project and wrapping up all the loose ends. Chapter 20 covers how to determine whether the project was a success and how to obtain sign-off that the project is complete. It also describes other activities you must perform to close a project. Chapter 21 explains methods for documenting the history of your project for the archives. Chapter 22 details the importance of collecting and recording lessons learned throughout the project or at the end.

Part VI takes project management further with methods for an organization to expand its effectiveness while managing multiple projects. Chapter 23 describes the services and advantages a project management office can bring to an organization that implements many projects. Chapter 24 explains how project portfolio management can help an organization meet its business objectives. Coming full circle, Chapter 25 covers techniques for capturing and evaluating project ideas to determine which of them merit approval and support as a project that will help fulfill the organization's strategic goals.

The book includes three appendixes. Appendix A provides the answers to the questions in the Test Your Knowledge sections at the end of each chapter. Appendix B includes sample project management forms used throughout this book and that are also available for download from the companion website. The third appendix is a Glossary of project management terms.

Who Should Read this Book

This book can help project managers at several stages of experience advance to a deeper level of experience, applied skills, and understanding. For example, if you're graduating from supervising a few tasks with a few team members to managing larger projects and teams, you can learn project management basics from project initiation to final closure by reading this book from start to finish. Reading the chapters in sequence is also helpful for experienced project managers who want to prepare to manage larger, more complex projects.

On the other hand, if you want to increase your understanding and skill in specific aspects of project management or learn about a knowledge area unfamiliar to you, such as risk management or managing a portfolio of projects, you can jump right to the corresponding chapter.

Tools You Will Need

You don't need specific software or technology to learn the concepts and soft skills described in this book. However, for all but the tiniest projects, you will need a few programs to manage projects effectively. Here are the basic types of programs to consider:

A project scheduling program: To plan and manage more than a couple of tasks and resources, you need a program to help you build a project schedule and track progress. Microsoft Project and Primavera are two of the more commonly used programs.

A word processing program: Documents are a natural result of running and managing projects, so a word processing program is a must.

A spreadsheet program: Some aspects of project management, such as risk and quality management, benefit from the numerical processing and analysis that a spreadsheet program, such as Excel or OpenOffice Calc, can provide.

A presentation program: Communication is a huge part of project management and the work that team members do. Depending on the size of your project, you might need a presentation program, such as PowerPoint, to communicate information to your team members or stakeholders.

What's On The Book's Website

The web page for this book can be found at www.wiley.com/go/ProjMgmtCoach. It includes files for the sample project management documents referenced in the chapters in the book, such as a cost estimate spreadsheet, communication matrix, change request form, and lessons learned questionnaire. These files are set up so you can use them as the basis for your own project management document templates.

The web page also includes a link to our blog, where we'll periodically post thoughts on a wide range of project management topics. We invite you to visit the blog and join in on the discussion.

Where To Go From Here

What we enjoy most about projects is that each one is unique so they are always interesting. They provide us with the opportunity to learn about new industries, new technologies, new people, and new ways of doing things. At the same time, project management provides an ongoing opportunity to learn and grow for as long as we're up to the challenge. We hope that you'll find projects and project management to be as engaging and captivating as we do. Most of all, we hope that the information in this book helps as you manage your projects. If you care to share your project management experiences, we'd love to hear about them.

Part I

Understanding Projects and Project Management

Chapter 1: Getting to Know Projects

Chapter 2: Getting to Know Project Management

Chapter 1

Getting to Know Projects

If your boss walks into your cubicle one day and says I've got a little project for you to do, you probably don't even think twice. You've tackled your share of projects at home and at the office so you already know that quite often they're simple, short-term assignments. When you're finished, you wipe your hands and go back to what you normally do.

At some point, you probably think about taking a more structured approach to handling them. Perhaps you want to try your hand at bigger projects, increase your success rate on the projects you perform, or simply get them done with less drama and fewer surprises. The first thing you want to know is what makes a project a project. They come in all shapes and sizes, but projects share a few characteristics that differentiate them from day-to-day work. This chapter provides a definition of a project and describes each characteristic. It also discusses how projects differ from other types of work.

What Is a Project?

It's tough to get through a week without working on some kind of project, at work, at home, or both. Projects span a broad range of endeavors and so you'll meet them regardless of what line of work you're in. If you've built a deck in your backyard, thrown a party, bought a house, or remodeled your kitchen, you've worked on projects. In the work world, producing a new marketing brochure or website, developing new products, building a new corporate campus, and landing on the moon all represent projects. What do all these undertakings have in common? The following is one definition of a project:

project is a unique endeavor with clearly defined objectives and deliverables, clear-cut starting and ending dates, and, most of the time, a budget.

Figure 1.1 shows how all the pieces of the project definition fit together. But what do all the components of that definition really mean? What is a unique endeavor? What are clearly defined objectives and deliverables? What are clear-cut starting and ending dates? And how does a budget fit in? The following sections discuss the various aspects of a project in more detail and provide several examples so you can identify projects when you see them.

Example Projects

This book uses four different projects as examples. The sections in this chapter explain why each of these examples meets the criteria for a project.

Backyard deck construction

Almost everyone has worked on a simple construction project, so this example acts as a link between what you're learning about project management and your experience with projects so far. Building a deck in the backyard is a simple example of a construction project.

New product development

Companies develop new products and services all the time, so you may run into a project like this at work. Later in this chapter, you learn how a project to develop a new product is different than actually manufacturing or providing the product to customers.

Exhibiting at a trade show

A trade show is like a lot of other types of events, such as parties or conferences. They require a lot of planning and preparation up front in order to make the big finale a success.

Training program development

Whether you want to teach your kids about money or have an assignment to develop training for your company, the development of a training program is a good example of a project.

Figure 1.1 Elements of a project

A Project Is a Unique Endeavor

Every project is unique, although the differences can be large or small. Some projects are performed more than once, so you might mistake them for ongoing work. For example, a landscaping contractor might build dozens of backyard decks each summer, but each deck has aspects that make it unique. The variations from project to project are what make managing projects so special and interesting. Not only is every project different, but every day that you manage one is different, too. Here are some examples of how projects are unique:

Backyard deck construction: Your idea of the perfect size and shape of a deck can be different than your neighbor's. You can choose from a variety of materials. The types of supports you use depend on whether the backyard is soft dirt, sand, or solid rock. The schedule could be affected by a long string of bad weather or whether you hire kids or a professional contractor.

New product development: Every product is a little different from every other product, even the previous version of a product your company already sells. For example, your company's new product, the in-town hover-scooter, requires different designs, different components, and different testing procedures from a traditional scooter that has wheels on the ground.

Exhibiting at a trade show: The audiences for trade shows can vary from the do-it-yourself construction crowd to professional contractors. Trade shows take place in different locations. The procedures you must follow to ship materials to the show or the crews that you use on site vary depending on the trade show organizers.

Training program development: The topic of a training program can affect the way you teach and the tools you use. The materials for a course vary depending on whether it's taught in a classroom, online, or through video. Courses for adults are designed differently than those for school-age children. The duration of courses vary.

A Project Has Clearly Defined Objectives and Deliverables

Projects have a point. Otherwise, you or your organization wouldn't spend time, effort, and money doing them. Projects are run in order to achieve a goal — a problem to solve or an opportunity to take advantage of. Although you might be able to sum up the purpose of a project in a single sentence, that purpose usually represents a number of specific objectives that the project must achieve and deliverables that you must hand over to call the project complete.

Clearly defined objectives and deliverables are important because you use them to tell when a project is done. Otherwise, a project can seem to go on forever because it's never quite finished. Similarly, clearly defined objectives and deliverables help you determine whether a project has been completed successfully. When you spell out objectives and deliverables, it's easier for everyone involved to tell whether the objectives have been met and the deliverables match the description you started with.

Who's Responsible for Achieving Business Goals?

As a project manager, you are rarely responsible for achieving the business goals that led to your project being started. Typically, your project is defined to produce deliverables and achieve intermediate objectives that business managers can use to drive the business results they want.

Vaguely defined or missing objectives lead to the demise of many a project. Without clearly defined objectives, you can end up working on a project long past its due date because you can't tell whether you're done. Or you can work longer and spend a lot more money because you didn't accomplish what you were supposed to. Yogi Berra famously said, You've got to be very careful if you don't know where you are going because you might not get there. The same could be said for projects with poorly defined objectives.

The following are some possible objectives and deliverables for the four example projects in this book:

Backyard deck construction: Your primary deliverable is a constructed stable platform for your deluxe gas grill and outdoor dining set. You might have other deliverables, such as a building permit to construct the deck and a signed inspection report confirming that the jewel you built is ready for action. But you might also have an objective for a deck built with low-maintenance materials so you can entertain more and maintain the deck less. Maybe you want to save money so you choose a simple off-the-shelf design so you can build the deck yourself over a few weekends. And you also want the deck completed in time for your annual end-of-summer barbecue.

Your objectives and deliverables enable you to assess whether the deck is done and meets your requirements. If the gas grill and furniture don't tip over, you've obtained a stable platform for your outdoor meals. The design you picked includes a list of materials and instructions, so you know you're done when you've used up the materials you purchased and the deck looks like the last picture in the how-to guide. If you don't have to sand and stain the deck, you've achieved your low-maintenance nirvana. And you completed the deck in time for your barbecue, so you met your schedule.

New product development: You might develop a new product to enter a new market, increase revenue, or to keep up with new technology. If returns or high levels of customer support have been a problem in the past, your objective might be to develop a product that's easier to maintain or more dependable. Or you could design a product to decrease manufacturing costs so you can reduce the selling price or increase your profit margin. Those business objectives drive the specifications for the product. Your project's deliverables could include a prototype that the customer and executive team approve along with the documentation that tells the manufacturing team how to build the products your organization will then sell.

Exhibiting at a trade show: Vendors usually attend trade shows to reach potential new customers. You might have an ancillary objective to see what your competition is up to or find out what customers think about your new products and services. The deliverables for this project might include the booth you set up at the show and the marketing materials you pass out. You might also have an objective to spiff up the booth and marketing materials to bring them up-to-date with your company's offerings and make them look fresh.

Training program development: If you work for a training organization, the deliverable could be a new course to offer to students. In a corporation, you might develop a training program to improve customer service, increase productivity, or increase quality. Another project objective might include development of new training features that improve students' comprehension of the material.

A Project Has a Beginning and an End

Projects are temporary, so they have a clear-cut beginning and a clear-cut end. Usually, the end of the project is the primary focus for the people involved in a project. The people who initiate a project want to enjoy the benefits that come when the project objectives are achieved. In addition, you, as the project manager, and the rest of the people working on the project, will be able to add it to your list of accomplishments and move on to something else.

As you learned in the previous section, the project goal and clearly defined objectives are essential to identifying the end of a project. When you've spelled out a project's objectives clearly, you can tell when you're done and bring the project to an end.

Note

In addition to the final date for a project, you usually have a passel of intermediate deadlines to meet, whether you're trying to enclose a structure before cold weather sets in or your contract includes specific dates for milestones, which in turn trigger payments from the customer.

The following are examples of clear-cut ends to projects:

Backyard deck construction: The end of the backyard deck project comes when you move the grill and dining set onto to the deck for your first barbecue. However, you might have other deadlines such as obtaining an inspection certificate from the county.

New product development: The project to develop a new product is complete when you turn the product over to manufacturing.

Exhibiting at a trade show: A trade show isn't over when the last attendee leaves. As a vendor, your trade show project is complete when you get your gear back to the office and wrap up the action items from the event, such as turning the list of new leads over to the sales team.

Training program development: A training program is complete when the course materials are ready and the program is ready to schedule.

A Project Usually Has a Budget

Most projects don't have the luxury of a blank check for the cost or unlimited resources to get the work done. Projects usually have a financial budget that must be met, similar to the budget you follow for your personal spending. And they almost always have to work with a limited amount of resources or a finite number of hours from the people who do the work.

Here are examples of project budgets:

Backyard deck construction: You decide to use this year's bonus to build a deck in the backyard, so you have $5,000 to get the job done.

New product development: The executive team in your organization determines that developing a new product has to cost less than $200,000 in order to achieve the company's required annual return on investment of 15 percent.

Exhibiting at a trade show: The director of sales has allocated $30,000 to cover the cost of attending a trade show based on the estimated sales that will result from the event. In addition, two sales people and two marketing people have been assigned to handle all aspects of preparing for and attending the trade show.

Training program development: The training program is forecast to save the company $50,000 by the end of the first two years of training employees. Your boss has given you a budget of $15,000 to develop the training program.

Tip

Once in a blue moon, you might manage a project that doesn't have a budget, but that doesn't mean your options are unlimited. For example, a project is essential to the survival of your company so the CEO has told you to do whatever it takes to make the customer happy. You might ask the CEO for more people or submit expense requisitions for approval. However, at some point, other alternatives might make more business sense. Even if you aren't asked to work within a budget, it's a good idea to build your own budget and aim to meet it. Chapter 6, Estimating Work and Cost, discusses building a budget.

How Do Projects Differ from Other Work?

Work that remains the same day after day, that is ongoing work or operations, is not a project. For example, delivering the mail to mailboxes on a route is ongoing. If you work in the accounting department, you might spend your days recording payments or paying bills.

Some projects might appear to represent recurring work. However, small differences make each project and the work it entails unique. The following list describes ongoing work that is similar to the four example projects:

Backyard deck construction: Each deck project is a little different. The terrain of your yard, the ground you build on, and the weather can affect your project. So, you could go to your local building supply store and work with a designer to come up with the deck of your dreams. Then, you get drawings and the building materials you need to construct the deck in your backyard. On the other hand, the building supply store that stocks the building materials you use or the company that manufactures the deck components performs the same work day after day.

New product development: A new product development project does just that — it develops a new product and delivers documentation about how to manufacture that product. The project also includes tasks to turn over information to manufacturing so that that team knows how to build the products correctly. But once the product is in the hands of manufacturing, the production line does the same thing every day to pump out products to sell.

Exhibiting at a trade show: If your organization attends trade show after trade show, your marketing department might have a team assigned to prepare standard materials for the shows. Some members of the team spend their days gathering copies of marketing collateral and then ship the materials to their destination.

Training program development: Although developing a training program is a project, teaching a course can become ongoing work. Although each class of students might be different, the overall work in presenting a class is the same. Or, if you offer online training, the ongoing work is keeping the website operational and up-to-date.

Summary

A project is work you undertake that is both unique and temporary. A project has specific goals and objectives. The good news is that a project ends when you achieve those goals and objectives. Most of the time, a project must be finished using a fixed amount of money or resources. It's important to be able to differentiate projects from ongoing, repetitive work, because projects require different management techniques.

Coach's Review

Use this section to assess what you've learned in this chapter and to apply it to a real-life project you're currently working on.

Test Your Knowledge

Test your knowledge of the material in this chapter by answering the following questions. See Appendix A for the answers.

1. What is the key characteristic that differentiates projects from other types of work?

2. Describe two ways that clearly defined objectives help a team complete a project successfully.

Project Challenge

Describe work you have done in the past or are working on now and explain why that work is or is not a project.

Chapter 2

Getting to Know Project Management

You have projects to do and you want to complete them successfully — without making yourself or the people on your team miserable. Projects can present challenges. They may be incredibly complex or they might have to be finished in record time or with only a tiny budget. At the same time, customers could change their minds or not know exactly what they want to begin with.

To conquer the challenges your projects face and achieve the desired results, you and the people on your team have to work smart. That's what project management is all about. What you do to manage projects should help you achieve the results the project is supposed to deliver or prevent problems that get in the way. If it doesn't, you shouldn't waste time or resources on it.

Getting projects done right boils down to knowing what you're trying to do, figuring out how you're going to do it, and then making sure you did it. This chapter introduces you to the five project management processes that help you address those areas. You'll also learn about several areas of expertise a project manager needs to master to make things happen the way they're supposed to.

Project management isn't one size fits all. You can use different approaches depending on the project size and complexity, and how clear the solution is, how tough your constraints are, and so on. In this chapter, you meet a few different methodologies and learn the pros and cons of each one.

Project managers have to master a diverse set of skills (although, fortunately, you don't have to do everything yourself). You tackle technical tasks such as building schedules, evaluating variances, and calculating financial results. At the same time, you need a host of soft skills including effective communication, good people skills, business savvy, leadership, and more. This chapter summarizes what it takes to be a good project manager. The rest of this book digs into these topics in detail.

What Is Project Management?

You don't need jargon or technical concepts to