The Basics of Project Management

The simple definition that can be given to project management is the planning and management of different and complex tasks with the sole of aim of achieving a deliverable at the end of such project.

The most important requirements

The deliverable can be anything ranges from a new product, technique or new software. This means that whatever it is, changes will have to occur as a result of such exercises.

There are many areas under which the business that is to be formalized are and these areas include:
• Customer service
• Premises
• Product manufacture
• Financial, legal and professional procedures
• Research
• Health and safety
• Research and development

But it’s crucial to note the fact that if desired outcome is not forthcoming and cannot be predicted accurately, then entrust the tasks to the project management technique for proper planning and organization. In addition to these points raised, it assesses the risks and makes sure the resources available are enough to get the job done.
There are stages involve in the successful management of a project, and each of these stages may have sub-stages, especially if you dealing with a large and complex project. There are:

1. Proper documentation of the business requirements
As a matter of fact, the business requirements document must describe in vivid details what the project all is all about. It should include things like the in-scope, out-of-scope, assumptions made, constraints and time scales.
This document is like a summary of the project and can be used to ascertain what is going within the project and where the project already stands presently. Also, the expectations of the stakeholders can also be managed effectively with the use of this document as it contains acceptance criteria that can use to define whether the project was a success or otherwise.

2. Documentation of the functional specification
This document goes a step further in describing the look and feel of the product as the first document does not state this. This additional document specifies how the deliverable works and also describes how the end product will look like. It goes further to explain how the end-users will make use of the deliverable and what experience will they have.
The functional specification document should also contain all the sections related to the business requirement. This way, every functional can easily be traced back to the original business.

3. Creation of the project plan
Creation of the project plan is crucial to successful project management and needs to be seen as such. The project plan will include vivid information about all the tasks to be carried out, the equipments and the employees, dependencies and estimates of time to be taken.

In a complex project, several other tasks will be performed and need to be in parallel in order not to go beyond the estimated time for the whole project. Though, these information are just basics of project management but all in all, if necessary actions and procedures are given their dues from the beginning, project management is going to be more fun than you thought it would.

Learn how to use Continuous improvement and build a culture of stopping to fix problems, to get quality right from the first. Enroll in the Certified Lean Project Manager®