PROJECT MANAGEMENT MADE EASY

Have you ever projected yourself ten years into the future and visualized what life style you are going to have. You may make a wish list right now jotting down such items as a super car preferably Lamborghinis, a private jet Falcon 2000 type, and a villa with river valley view. Or you may be realistic and wish for a decent flat, a family car and enough liquidity to have an extended holiday once for a while. If you plan well, execute it meticulously, you would certainly reach your goal. Perseverance or, simply put, firmness of the purpose would make your dreams come true.

While I wrote “plan and execute”, I raised a hint that I was talking of a management process. This is a wide subject, indeed. It includes project management which follows the same approach i.e. planning, implementing and controlling. It is the wave of the future. It provides necessary tools for improving ability to plan and control. It is a result-oriented way which teaches a step-by-step approach to hit your target.

In a layman language, a project is a task or a plan or a scheme. It is an attempt to achieve a purpose. It is not something routine, it is something special, tailor-made or unique.

Here are two widely accepted definition of a project:

1. A project is a temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product or service. (Project Management Institute).

2. A project is a one-time, multitask job that has clearly defined starting and ending dates, a specific scope of work to be performed, a budget, and a specified level of performance to be achieved. (James P. Lewis)

Both definitions contain the same attributes. While one says “a temporary endeavor”, the other puts a constraint of starting and end dates. It has to be. You cannot have project going on for ages. It differs from operations which, of course, are carried on for centuries. Bear in mind that construction of a sugar mill is a project but producing sugar is an operation.

Olean Sugar Mills, Java, Indonesia is in operations for the last 70 years and would be a candidate for world heritage site. It is powered by steam engines with a dedicated rail which hauls cane from the adjoining fields. It outsmarts the Puffing Billy Train of Australia.

Of course, The Great Pyramids of Giza took 80 years but that was done manually by 30,000 slaves under the whipping masters. Can you think of it now!!

Another attribute of project is Uniqueness. One may incline to say how projects are unique when there are 80 sugar mills in Pakistan producing the same product.

Fortunately, I have visited most of them in my career with a Development Finance Institution. They all differ in manufacturing processes (carbonation, sulphitation, defecation), in using raw materials (cane, beet, corn, rice) and varieties like crystal or liquid, white or brown.

There are two soda-ash plants one at Khewra, Punjab and another at Karachi, Sindh.  While their products are indistinguishable, their raw materials are pole apart. One uses rock salt and the other sea-salt. And that is uniqueness of each plant.

Also, quality of the end-product or service makes a project unique. An up-coming 7-star hotel at Islamabad would be a lot different from exiting hotels like Marriot and Serena. Similarly, machinery composition of a spinning unit producing a high-quality yarn would be different from the one setup for low quality yarn. The latter would have a much larger back-process than the former.

As stated earlier, management deals with the planning and control. It is simply the act of getting people together to accomplish the desired goals

Fayol and Taylor are from amongst pioneers in management discipline. There differ only in their approaches in managing. While Taylor viewed management process from the bottom-up, Fayol viewed from the top-down. They agree on the basic functions of management which are (1) planning, (2) organizing, (3) directing, and (4) controlling. Some may include ‘leading’ as a management function but leading could be a part of directing. Management is often included as a factor of production along with machines, materials, and money. In a nut-shell, Management is a process that is used to accomplish organizational goals.

If I now describe Project Management, someone may get furious and say how it differs from what has already been stated. It would not be wrong to give such observation. After all, the project management is sub-set of the management.

A little about historical perspective. As mentioned earlier, Fayol & Taylor introduced the management process. Later, Henry Gantt came into the limelight. He is known as father of planning and control techniques. With his introduction of a simple chart, Gantt Chart, the management entered an era of Scientific Management. It was given a boost when CPM and PERT were developed in 1950s. At the same time, technology for project cost estimating, and engineering economics was evolving. In 1969, the Project Management Institute (PMI) was formed to serve the interests of the project management industry.

Project Management is the process of planning and directing a project from its inception to its completion in a given time and at a given cost for a given end product.

This is, however, a narrow description as it does not take into account external forces which affect the project at every step. It must be remembered that:

(i) All time and cost estimated are based on assumptions made at the of original planning.

• Estimates are made after reviewing the past trends and up-coming known events. Usually, a check-list is consulted to ensure that no aspect is left un-examined.
• Political turmoil in election year, wide power interruption and load-shedding in dry seasons or floods problems in monsoon are kept in mind while preparing estimates.
• Similarly inflationary pressure is to be taken into account and liberal contingencies made to offset its bad effect.
• Feedback is taken from the past experience and appraisal standards are updated and strengthened to avoid time and cost over-runs.

(ii) Actual time and cost would vary from estimated ones because of many internal and external factors.

• Of course, one cannot predict catastrophes and upheavals but a lot depend on project duration. The lesser the duration, the meager are the chances of its being affected by external factors. In normal time, influence of external factors is not more than 5% and it is good risk.

• This is not the case with internal factors which can be put into two major categories: Dishonesty and Inefficiency. There are various tools and techniques to curb dishonesty like propriety audit.

(iii) Time, Cost and Scope can be traded off against each other.

• There is a clear trade-off between time and cost. If there is an advantage to enter the market early, the manager can speed up the process even if it involves exceeding budget.
• Similarly, Cost-Capacity Factors favor project expansion. A simple example would explain the concept. A wooden box of 8 cubic inches can be made by joining six penal of 2” X 2” or 4 sq. inches. If each penal is increased by one inch in length and width, it would increase the cost by 125% but the capacity would increase by238% from 8 cubic inches to 27 cubic inches.

In September 2008, a suicide attack badly damaged a hotel at Islamabad, Pakistan. The owners vowed to put it back in operation within three months which nobody believed. But they did and the hotel resumed operations with the first dawn of 2009.

Pakistan First Motorway progressed by the initiative shown by one political figure. It went into a back-burner with the change in political scene but gained momentum when the same political figure staged a come-back. But the project suffered time and cost over-runs. Even it design got changed to accommodate some vested interest. It broke a cardinal rule that a motorway should be a shortest route. On the contrary, it is 80 km longer than the conventional route via Grand Trunk Road, concieved and implemented centuries ago by Sher Shah Soori.

Project Management plans and directs the process of completion of a project to enable it to reach, in the best possible way and with best possible results, the intended objective of the project.

This is first chapter in Project Management Course taught at university level. I would add more hubs. Tentative Outlines are given below:

• An overview of the subject
• Organization: Form & Structure
• Budget
• Time
• Managing Risk
• Resource Management
• Reducing project duration
• Leadership
• Teams
• Out-Sourcing
• Monitoring Physical Progress
• Time & Cost Control
• Evaluation

NEXT - Organization Form & structure