D R S U E G R E E N E R

PROJECT MANAGEMENTA PRACTICAL OVERVIEW

THE 6 PHASES OF A PROJECT?

1. Enthusiasm2. Disillusionment3. Panic4. Search for the guilty5. Punish the innocent6. Praise and reward the

non-participants.

SERIOUSLY, PROJECTS CAN HIT TROUBLE

Through:• Inadequate project definitions at

start• Not making a sufficient business

case for the project to stakeholders (costs and benefits)

• Lack of communication within teams

• Allowing insufficient time for actions• Inadequate definitions of roles and

responsibilities

• Lack of control & co-ordination through the project

• Ignoring constraints and thinking the project is more important than ongoing work at the client organisation

• Ignoring risks

THE PROJECT LIFE CYCLE

1. Identify problem2. Gather data3. Analyse data4. Generate solutions 5. Select the best6. Plan the implementation7. Implement and test8. Monitor and evaluate.

Too theoretical –

it rarely happens this

way

THINK OF A PROJECT YOU HAVE COMPLETED E.G. AN ASSIGNMENT

1. When did you first get or get given the idea? At what stage in the process? How much later was it before you knew what you had to do? what steps were involved? By you? By others?

2. How did you plan it? Did you decide on the resources needed or was it decided for you? (tools, equipment, supplies, people etc)

3. Once underway, did it go to plan? In budget, time & quality? Any unforeseen problems? If so, how did you cope?

4. On completion were there resources unused?

5. After completion did you analyse what happened? Ideas for improvement?

REALISTIC PROJECT CYCLE

Initiation• Defining the project objectives & scope• Structuring the projectPlanning• Scheduling the project• Analysing the plan for risks• Reviewing the plan and assumptions• Establishing controlsExecution• Action• Keep monitoring controls,

changing where neededClosure• Report to stakeholders• Review for future learning

HOW DO WE GET STARTED?

• Projects:• Have unique outcomes• Are concerned with change• Take place over a limited and defined period of time• Use a variety of resources

• To manage a project successfully you need to meet the needs of:• The client organisation• The project• The project team

WHAT DO WE NEED? INFORMATION

• Information about the project• Clear, specific, numerate, accurate

• Duration, cost/budget, complexity, importance to client, risk, level of innovation, links with other projects

• Stakeholders to the project

• Any key milestones - dates• Information about the project team

• Expertise, skills, time allocation

• Knowledge about the project

• Commitment

• How to connect and share

• Project roles and responsibilities

THE PLAN• Verbal agreement and brainstorms are not plans• Plans need to be recorded, in a way that is shareable and can

be updated easily through the project• Plans have overall outcomes but also tasks which must be

tracked and achieved in relevant order• Plans must:• Have enough detail to be meaningful but not too complex• Be easily understood by all in the team• Be easy to change, update, revise• Be easy to use for monitoring project progress & helping

communication• A good plan will be based on a Project Specification – giving

scope, aims, key milestones and deliverables which everyone signs up to. This is the project sales document

THE PLAN IN DETAIL

• Deliverables from the project

• Overall timescale, cost/budget

• Actions needed to achieve deliverables within time span at budgeted cost

• When these actions should start and finish

• Who will carry out the actions

• What resources (information, data, tools, research) are needed to achieve these actions

• A work breakdown schedule (WBS) will summarise all the above

INTERDEPENDENCY OR HOW PLANS GET TANGLED

• Some actions must be completed before others, other actions can be simultaneous

• A Gantt chart is the simplest way to identify and communicate these interdependencies• Needs a horizontal timescale• A vertical list of activities/tasks• A horizontal bar for each activity to

show duration against timescale• Should visually show critical path

through the project

• More complex projects are likely to need Critical Path Analysis (CPA) or a network analysis showing time slack between activities eg PERT or a software tool like PRINCE2

GROUPS INTO TEAMS AND HOW TO MANAGE PROJECT MEETINGS

PROJECT TEAM MEETING GUIDE 1

• The goal is effective meetings where discussion takes place, all perspectives are respected and you leave the meeting with a sense that you’ve made progress towards the project goals

• First meeting• Get acquainted• Discuss how you’ll handle meetings• Elect a co-ordinator, a recorder and a time-keeper (can rotate)• Clarify the project• How will leadership be provided for various phases/key tasks

of the project?• Plan how you will communicate and how often• Make sure everyone signs up to the project specification and

the work breakdown schedule

OR USE THE FOLLOWING QUESTIONS..

THE TASK CYCLE – QUESTIONS TO DISCUSS IN THE TEAM

Purpose: Why is the team here and what exactly is the reason for the task

ahead? How does the task fit in to ongoing client systems? Output (s):

What outputs are needed? What will they look like? When are they needed? Who are they for? Will client staff need training?

Process: How can we achieve the outputs? What methods or means can we

use? What ground rules can we agree? Capability:

What knowledge or information do we need? What skills or resources would help? What is the minimum needed before we start?

Roles: Who will do what? Do we have specific expertise? Contacts?

Monitoring: How will we keep track? What systems do we need?

PROJECT TEAM MEETING GUIDE 2

• Planning future meetings• Set regular meeting times in

calendars but cancel if not needed

• Set a beginning and end time for meetings

• Time agenda items before or at start

• Prioritise what must be done at the meeting and what could be left over

• Prepare for meetings• Ensure you have completed all

your set tasks from previous meetings

• Send agenda to team members

PROJECT TEAM MEETING GUIDE 3

• Running a meeting• Start and end the meeting on time• Stick to the agenda – time keeper takes charge• Use the task cycle and the project specification and work

breakdown schedule• Use brainstorming techniques for creative sessions• Attack problems, not the people in the group. Try to reach

consensus, Give a little and take a little.• Divide up the tasks, take turns in doing various tasks

• Transition to next meeting• During the meeting, record decisions, deadlines and

assignments• At end of each meeting: review decisions and deadlines, make

certain all team members know their responsibilities, evaluate your meeting processes, how your group worked and suggest improvements

• A simple way to do this is to use someone’s mobile – set to video and pass around the team – everyone says what they agreed to do by when. Keep it very short and upload to a common space – see later slides.Video minutes

HELPFUL HINTS FOR SMOOTH PROJECT ACTION

• Plan for contingencies• Accept things will go wrong• Your project is not alone,

remember the implications for client staff and systems

• Keep talking to all members of the team, don’t let one go quiet

• Time planning – Gantt charts can be adjusted and should be kept updated

• Committing to take action means exactly that. Not giving excuses for non-completion

• If you can’t do what you agreed, communicate fast, don’t wait until a meeting to own up

• Take ownership – at least of part of the project

• Always ask questions, never pretend you understand if you don’t

• Keep the client in mind – this is not about the project team, it’s about the deliverables to the client

• When you bring information to the team, always give the source / evidence

• Make a difference – or why do it?

• The client presentation is not the end, evaluate and learn

PROJECT EVALUATION

• Have the objectives been met?• Are the benefits of the project quantified to the client?• Did the project outcomes fit with the client’s organisation?• Are the sponsors or clients of the project satisfied with the

outcome?• Was the project delivered on time?• Did the project keep to budget (that includes people hours and use

of any resources)?

BUSINESS CHALLENGES• Four groups: Four business

challenges• How can you see the

projects in each team shaping?

• Can you predict common milestones?

• How can you share activity within the groups?

• Consider Trello (video intro at https://trello.com/guide/go_deeper.html)

BUSINESS CHALLENGES• Four groups: Four

business challenges• How can you stay in

touch for free without trawling through emails and worries about incompatible messaging systems?

• Consider WhatsApp(download to phone at https://www.whatsapp.com/download/