An Introduction to Project Management

Facilitator: Mr Brian O’Reilly MBA PMP

Southeastern Vietnam Delegate Community Building - EuroCham
MBA Program Coordinator – Vietnamese German University (VGU)
 Workshop Outline
1. Introduction
2. Project Management overview
3. The Roles of the Project Manager and Project Team
4. The Project Initiating process
5. The Project Planning process
6. The Project Execution process
7. The Project Controlling process
8. The Project Closing process
9. Conclusion

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 1. Introduction

 This workshop will provide you with an overview

of project management and help develop your:

 Knowledge of project management,

 Skills in using project management tools and
techniques,
 Attitude to proactively apply the knowledge and skills to
projects that you are familiar with.

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 Expected Outcomes
 After this workshop, you should be able to:

 Understand the basics of project management.

 Understand the principles, methods, and techniques
that people use to effectively plan, implement, and
control project work
 Help complete projects on time, within budget, and
on target.

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 Your Facilitator:
Mr Brian O’Reilly
MBA PMP

 Experience with Project Management:

 Worked for over 15 years in Civil Engineering on
projects involving the design and construction of roads.

 Worked in organisational change management, and

organisational restructuring projects.

 Worked in IT, marketing, product launching, and other

corporate projects.

 Over 16 years experience in developing and delivering

project management higher education & training
programs.

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 2. Project Management overview
 Many people become project managers by accident.
 Learning project management skills can help you complete
projects on:
 time,
 budget, and
 target.
 Project management is not just
for project managers.

All of mankind’s greatest accomplishments ---

from building the great pyramids to
discovering a cure for polio to putting a man on
the moon --- began as a project.

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 What is Project Management
 Project Management is a set of principals, methods, and
techniques that people use to effectively plan and control
project work.
 The objective of project management is to optimise project
cost, time, and quality.

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 Project Characteristics

 Have a specific objective (which may be unique or one-of-a-

kind) to be completed within certain specifications
 Have defined start and end dates

 Have funding limits (if applicable)

 Consume human and nonhuman resources
(i.e. money, people, equipment)
 Be multifunctional (cut across several functional lines)

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Project Life Cycle

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The Importance of Project Management
 Compression of the Product Life Cycle

 Knowledge Explosion

 Triple Bottom Line (planet, people, profit)

 Corporate
Downsizing

 Increased
Customer
Focus

 Small Projects
Represent Big
Problems
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Project vs Operations Management

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 3. The Roles of the Project Manager
and Project Team

 The role of the project manager can be a tricky one.

 This is especially the case where the project manager has

no formal authority over the people they must work with
to get the job done.

 This section defines the roles of the project manager and

the project team members.

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 The Role of a Project Manager

 Planning
 Organizing
 Integrating
 Controlling
 Leading
 Decision-making
 Communicating, and
 Building a supportive climate for the project

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 People Skills

 It is necessary for the project manager to use both direct

authority and persuasion and to know when to use each.

 They need to be a master of communication and to

have the skills to manage conflict and change.

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 Project Skills
 Can you estimate costs and prepare workable schedules
and adequate budget plans?

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 Integration Skills
 One of the primary duties of a project manager is
coordination of the many project elements.

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 Technical Skills
 A project manager
 must understand what needs to be done technically,
 but will not have the same depth of understanding as
the subject matter experts working on the project.

 However, they must know if potential pitfalls exist.

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 Knowledge of the Organisation
 Without understanding of the organization’s:
 culture,
 policies,
 personalities, and
politics,

the project will most likely fail.

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 The Make Up of a Project Manager

 Flexibility and adaptability.

 Preference for significant initiative and leadership.

 Assertiveness, confidence, persuasiveness, verbal fluency.

 Ambition, activity, forcefulness.

 Effectiveness as a communicator and integrator.

 Broad scope of personal interests.

 Poise, enthusiasm, imagination, spontaneity.

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 The Make Up of a Project Manager
 Able to balance technical solutions with time, cost, and
human factors.

 Well organized and disciplined.

 A generalist rather than a specialist.

 Able and willing to devote most of his time to planning and

controlling.

 Able to identify problems.

 Willing to make decisions.

 Able to maintain proper balance in the use of time.

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Responsibility, Authority
and Accountability

Authority Responsibility

Accountability

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 The Role of Team Members

 They must know what they are supposed to do,

preferably in terms of an end product.

 They must have a clear understanding of their authority

and its limits.

 They must know what their relationship with other

people is.

 They should know where and when they are falling

short.

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 4. The Project Initiating process
 A clear project definition and detailed objectives are
critical to the success of the project.

 Whatever time you and energy you need to define the

project properly in the planning stage is much less that
what it will cost to fix problems after the project is
completed.

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 Defining the Problem or Opportunity

Define the problem or opportunity that makes the

project necessary or desirable by:
 Getting a clear definition of the problem to be solved or
the opportunity to take advantage of.
 Determining the client’s needs and wants. Distinguish
between the two.
 Gathering sufficient background information about the
current situation.
 Learning and thoroughly understanding the business
reasons for the project.

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 Types of Projects

 Market driven ~ designed to fill a need

for your customers

 Crisis driven ~ a fast solution to a

specific problem

 Change driven ~ the need to change

current operations to become more
effective

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 Establishing Project Objectives
 “You can have it cheap, quick, or done right.
Pick any two”

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 Time, Cost, Scope
 Time - Easy to measure. Client wants the project NOW!

 Cost - More difficult to measure. Influenced by

specifications, compliance, and technical requirements.

 Scope - Project Manager must write a clearly defined

scope statement that clearly defines the desired end
product, service or process including quality standards to
be met.

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28
 Project Charter
• The Project Charter is a document that formally recognises
a project and states the project approvals by the client, or
senior management, and the authority granted to senior
management.

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 Getting Approvals and Commitments
for Project Management Plan

 Getting written approvals from the customer, client and

senior management.

 Remember, unless it is on paper it has not been said.

 Determine what the commitments mean.

 Make sure that everyone understands what is expected of

them.

 Obtain funding for budgets, personnel equipment,

accommodation and other resources.

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 Stakeholders

 For every project it is important to clearly identify:

 the client who requested the project,

 the other stakeholders who have an interested in the project, and

 the customer who will use the product, service, process, or plan
the project produces.

 Some projects get into serious trouble because they have

several clients who each want something different from
the project.

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 Who is the Client?

 The client is the person who requests the project.

 Be sure to get commitment of support from the client.
 Ask the following questions to the client:
 Who is authorised to make decisions for
the project?
 What access does the project manager have to the
client?
 What approvals does the client require at which stages of the project?
 How will these approvals be obtained and how long will they take?
 Who has the authority to formally sign off on the project when it is
completed?

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 Other Stakeholders
 A stakeholder is someone else who has an interest in the
project.

 They may be people in other departments, suppliers,

vendors, other government agencies, management or
stockholders.

 Information should be
disseminated to
stakeholders throughout
the life of the project.

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Stakeholder Analysis

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 Risk Management
 Possible sources:

• Technical
• Administrative
• Environmental
• Financial
• Resource availability
• Human
• Logistical
• Governmental
• Market
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 Assessing Risk

High Impact High Impact

Low Probability High Probability

Impact

Low Impact Low Impact

Low Probability High Probability

Probability

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 Responding to Risk

 Response Plan: This should be developed before

the risk event occurs. If the event occurs then
execute the plan.
 Possible Responses:
 Avoiding
 Transferring
 Mitigating
 Accepting

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5. The Project Planning process

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The Need for a Planning and Control System
 Planning and controlling are closely related

 With proper planning a project manager can exercise

effective control over the project.

 It is recommended to spend at least 25% of the project

effort in planning.

 Projects, regardless of the amount and quality of planning,

will always need adjusting.

 Any good planning and controlling system must be:

 flexible enough to incorporate required changes,
 but rigorous enough to provide control.

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Creating a Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)

 A Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) defines the work to be

completed in a project.
 The WBS is the basis for time estimating, resource
allocation, and cost estimating and collection.

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 Rules to Create a WBS

 Include 100% of the work necessary to complete the goal.

 Don't account for any amount of work twice.

 Focus on outcomes, not actions.

 A work package should take no less than 8 hours and no

more than 80 hours of effort.

 Include about three levels of detail.

 Assign each work package to a specific team or individual.

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WBS Sample

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Estimating, Sequencing, and Planning Activities

Estimating:
 Good estimation is critical for successful completion of a
project – on time, on budget and on the mark.

 Use the WBS as the basis for creating activity estimations.

 Estimating is not an exact science.

 Projects often involve a greater degree of uncertainty.

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 Sequencing
 An important part of project planning is determining the
logical workflow of the various activities you identified in the
WBS.

 Network diagrams are used that represent a graphical flow

plan of activities that must be accomplished to complete the
project.

 The diagram illustrates which activities must be performed in

sequence.

 It also shows the planned sequence of steps, with all

dependencies.

 Project management software will automatically prepare

network diagrams and bar charts.

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 Precedence Diagram Method

A C

Order Deliver
Pipe Pipe

D
Start Lay Finish
Pipe
B

Dig
Trench

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 Arrow Diagram Method

Dig Trench Lay Pipe

Start Finish

Finish to Start Activity A must finish before activity B can begin

Start to start Activity A must begin before activity B can begin

Start to finish Activity A must begin before activity B can finish

Finish to finish Activity A must finish before activity B can finish

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Bar (Gantt) Chart

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 6. The Project Execution process
 Establish your leadership
 Organise the team for optimum performance
 Institute operating guidelines
 Figure out what types of reports and other paperwork
that you will need
 Keep them headed in the right direction.

 Effective Communication is so important

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Project Management Problem Iceberg

DELEGATION
OF AUTHORITY TO
PROJECT MANAGER

EXECUTIVE
MEDDLING

LACK OF UNDERSTANDING OF HOW PROJECT

MANAGEMENT SHOULD WORK

LACK OF TRAINING IN COMMUNICATIONS /

INTERPERSONAL SKILLS

MANY OF THE PROBLEMS ASSOCIATED WITH PROJECT MANAGEMENT WILL

SURFACE MUCH LATER IN THE PROJECT AND RESULT IN MUCH HIGHER COSTS

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 Initial Meeting
 A formal meeting should be called with the client,
customers, project team members and other relevant
stakeholders.
 This meeting provides a great opportunity to define the
roles and responsibilities of everyone present and
communicate the project plans clearly and
concisely.

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 Project Communications Plan

 Project information should be communicated to all

stakeholders, the project team, functional managers,
senior management customers and clients.

 Communication should be at an appropriate level for all

groups.

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Project Management Knowledge Areas

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 7. The Project Controlling process

 Monitoring and control is the process of comparing actual

performance to the plan to determine the variances,
evaluate possible alternatives, and take appropriate action.

 The ability to control a project is directly tied to the

effectiveness of the project plan.

 Problems will always occur but they should be kept to a

minimum.

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 Principles of Monitoring and Control
 Set up a formal process to control changes in the project.

 Don’t micro-manage.

 Elevate problems to the lowest level of management that

can make the decision and take action.

 Be consistent, calculating and reporting schedule progress,

cost expenditures, and scope performance throughout the
project life.

 If you have more than one project, be sure to handle

significant, highly-visible projects first and more often,
followed by average and then low priority projects.

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 Establishing a Plan to Monitor
and Control the Project
 Determining Information Needs
 Determining Data Collection Methods
 Determining Frequency of Data Collection
 Status Information
 Variances
 Reports
 Course of Action

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 Variances

 The cost variance.

 The time variance.
 The scope and quality variance.
 Impact on the project.
 Whether impact is a problem.
 Cause of variance, including reasons and people involved.
 Whether the cause of the variance will create variances
elsewhere in the project.

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 Reports

 What the plan says should be happening.

 What is ACTUALLY happening (status).

 Variance between plan and status.

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 Courses of Action

 Implement the decision.

 Follow up to ensure that the action solves the problem.
 Take additional action if necessary to solve the problem.
 Document the decisions that make significant changes in
the approved plans.
 Take preventative action to ensure that similar problems
don’t happen again.

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 Common Causes Cost Control
 Poor budgeting practices, such as:
 Basing estimates on vague information
 Failure to plan a contingency budget
 Failure to correctly estimate R&D activities
 Failure to consider inflation on the cost of materials and/or labour.

 Receiving or analysing data too late to take corrective

action.
 A climate that doesn’t support open and honest disclosure
of information.
 Indiscriminate use of the contingency budget by activities
who overrun budgeted costs.
 Failure to re-budget.

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 Scope Changes

 Frequent scope changes may be an indication of

inadequate up-front planning.
 They most often occur because of errors and omissions in
the planning stage.
 Changes make be caused by either internal or external
events.
 Internal events include inadequate planning as just
mentioned and senior management decisions.
 External events may include changes top government
regulations, new technology, new products or competitors.

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 Resource Control

 Be sure that all team members understand the basic

objectives of the project and know how their tasks
contribute to the project.

 Have team members prepare individual plans for

accomplishing their work.

 Ensure that team members have the appropriate skills and

resources to do their jobs.

 Empower team members to accomplish their tasks by

giving appropriate authority and information. Provide
supervision and feedback.

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 8. The Project Closing process

 Project closure involves taking formal steps at the

conclusion of a project to get acceptance of the
final product, close project records and reallocate
personnel and other resources.
 A good project management plan will include
steps to close the project.
 The purpose of project closure is to verify that all
work has been accomplished as agreed and that
the client accepts the final product.

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 Project Closure activities
 Ensure all payments are made
 Complete a financial reconciliation
 Completed project documents including final reports
 The remaining budget, materials and other resources are
properly dispersed
 Project closure is also a time to recognise individual efforts and
celebrate project success.
 Final evaluations and reviews should also be completed at this
stage.
 The project manager should also ensure that the team
members have a smooth transition to other projects or work
assignments.
 It is recommended that a project checklist be created.
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 Project Closure Checklist:
Check here
when
completed
Project
1 Have all activities of the project plan been completed?
2 Have all work orders been completed?
3 Have all contracts been completed?
4 Have all outstanding commitments been resolved?
5 Has the client or customer accepted the final products?
6 Are all deliverables completed?
7 Has agreement been reached with the client on the
disposition of any remaining deliverables?

8 Have external certificates and authorisations been signed and

approved?

9 Have all audits been completed and issues resolved?

10 Have ongoing maintenance procedures been activated?

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 8. Conclusion

 Project Management overview

 The Roles of the Project Manager and Project Team
 The Project Initiating process
 The Project Planning process
 The Project Execution process
 The Project Controlling process
 The Project Closing process

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 Final Activity
 Can you please write down three actions that you will
undertake over the next two weeks to improve your project
management skills.

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 Questions Please

Thank you very much

Regards

Mr Brian O'Reilly MBA PMP

Southeastern Vietnam Delegate Community Building - EuroCham
MBA Program Coordinator – Vietnamese German University
(VGU)

E-Mail: brian.oreilly@vgu.edu.vn
Website: www.vgu.edu.vn
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