Navigating Project Management: Strategies, Organization, and Scope Control - Essay Sample

A project is an interrelated set of activities that has a definite starting and ending point.

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A project is an interrelated set of activities that has a definite starting and ending point.A project is a set of interrelated activities, which turn input into the desired output (Krajewski, 2013). The project team identifies and documents the tasks that ought to be carried out and adopted to achieve the project's intended outcomes (Kerzner, 2017). Identifying necessary tasks helps the project team divide the work packages into manageable activities that depend on each other. These smaller activities are easy to execute and manage.

Projects often cut across organizational lines.

When a company is preparing a project for implementation, the organization must be effective (Kerzner, 2017). Most firms adopt the matrix management where employees report to more than one leader. To better manage a project's activities, the supervisors appoint group leaders who ensure the smooth running of activities assigned to the various groups.

Projects, and the application of project management, facilitate the implementation of operations strategy.

An operations strategy is defined by its approach, the current market analysis, and other competing priorities. Projects often focus on vectors such as prevailing market prices, varying market demands, and possible solutions for the changing market (Kerzner, 2017). The guidelines provided by the project's details deliver the operations strategy with a plan to implement operations functions that make maximum use of resources and achieve a long-lasting competitive strategy.

Project managers should be able to organize a set of disparate activities.

Effective project managers play a crucial role in the success of a project. Among the tasks that a good project manager must focus on are the diverse activities in project planning (Meredith et al., 2017). The manager must organize to determine the project's requirements, revise the project's cost implications, outline the critical success factors, and assess possible risks before starting the project.

A pure project organizational structure houses the project in a specific functional area.

The organization of a project dramatically determines its success (Krajewski, 2013). If the organization's structure is flawed, communication between the authority and the other project team members may not be accessible. If the project manager is not in constant contact with either the head of the project team members, it may not be easy to successfully run the project (Meredith et al., 2017). Its organizational structure houses the proper functioning of a project.

Scope creep is one of the primary causes of project failure.

Adjustments are not a bad idea in a project until they spiral out of control and the manager no longer has control over the project. Proper estimations during the planning phase are critically essential to prevent scope creep (Kerzner, 2017). Suppose any changes on the project are of dire importance beyond the planning phase. In that case, they must be implemented with moderation, considering all possible outcomes to minimize the adverse effects on the project.

The work breakdown structure is a statement of all work that has to be completed.

The work breakdown structure is the required input which aims at providing the desired outcome. Tools in project management information such as change control, the cost of budget management, planning, and scheduling are used to analyse the inputs (Radujkovic & Sjekavica, 2017). The project team must be familiar with the required tasks before the project kicks off. The information on the tasks ahead avoids confusion and helps the team to work towards a common goal.

The network is a planning method that is designed to depict the relationships between activities.

The work-flow, the tasks, and the responsibility of a project are represented in the network diagram. The diagram uses arrows to show how various activities depend on each other. As the project advances in phases, it may grow in complexity, too (Kerzner, 2017). The network diagram is an uncomplicated representation of the interdependence and relationship between activities. It acts as a guide for the project team to follow. Visual representation of information helps people to understand data better. It further improves the retention of the acquired knowledge (Krajewski, 2013). From the network diagrams' data, project managers can smoothly estimate the required jobs and track project progress.

A relationship that determines the sequence for undertaking activities is a precedence relationship.

The precedence relationship of activities shows the order in which actions must take place. The technique arranges the activities in boxes with arrows showing how the activities must be carried out (Krajewski, 2013). Precedence relations indicate that a particular activity cannot be carried out until another action is complete.

A critical path is any sequence of activities between a project’s start and finish.

A project contains a network of activities that result to certain outcomes in an overall time taken (Krajewski et al., 2013). The order of the intended activities which ascertain the period of a project is called a critical path. All the scheduled activities must be carried out for the project to be appraised as a triumph.

References

Kerzner, H. (2017). Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and controlling. John Wiley & Sons.

Krajewski, L. J., Ritzman, L. P., & Malhotra, M. K. (2013). Operations management: Processes and supply chains (Vol. 1). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.

Meredith, J. R., Shafer, S. M., & Mantel Jr, S. J. (2017). Project Management: A Strategic Managerial Approach. John Wiley & Sons.

Radujkovic, M., & Sjekavica, M. (2017). Project management success factors. Procedia engineering, 196, 607-615