This is not a statement made by a client who lost a project in the crowds, but by one who was wondering how his project will be accomplished.

The scene is a common one; a project manager is showing her client the plan for the scheme which entails four phases. The manager proceeds to describe the project stages enthusiastically. “So, here is the initiation phase, then we move to the planning stage, after that we execute the project, and finally we close it.”

The client sat their in silence, but with a confused look. He finally said the words that were on his mind, “but, where is my project?”

The client was not joking. He was very serious with his question and very right to ask it. The project manager in the above example listed the processes that will be used to manage the scheme. However, these apply to any project, and they have nothing to do with actually getting the work done.

So, to have a plan that merely shows the management activities of the project would be a mistake that might lead to failure. While the managerial activities are important, however, they should not be the focus of the plan. Instead, it is work that produces the product or service that should take center stage in a project plan. 

While this sounds like common sense, many project managers fall into this trap: Labelling the management processes as the project phases, when they are two different things.

The project phases define the actual stages of the technical work to be done to get the job completed. These phases vary depending on the type of project being undertaken. 

For example, the phases of building a house might be: Earthwork, foundation phase, skeleton construction, finishing phase, final earthwork.  However, for building software, the phases would not be the same.

 For software, the phases might be concept, design, development, testing, and handover.  So, the stages of the project will vary and be different depending on the project’s product.  These phases will result in the final product. 

Now, managing these project steps requires management processes, which are initiation, planning, execution, control, and closing. While the phases vary, the management processes for a project do not vary regardless of the industry. So, if one is building a house, the management of the house will require the same project management processes as building a rocket ship.  However the phases of the project themselves are different.

This is why a project manager needs to fully be aware of the phases required to complete a scheme before attempting to develop a plan. While he might not be the technical expert to determine these phases, he can get that knowledge by consulting and working closely with technical experts who know what it takes to develop the product.

However, sometimes project managers forget about the phases and stick to what they know best, which is management activities when they develop their plan. The project management activities are only part of the plan but not the core of it. The core of the plan should describe the actual work required to develop the product, not the activities required to manage the project.

Many problems arise from the lack of understanding of the difference between project phases and project management processes. One of them is the development of a poor quality and inaccurate plan, which might result in project failure. The other problem that might arise from the misunderstanding is the wrong assumption that planning is done only as the first phase of any project, when in reality, planning should be part of every phase and continue until close to the end of the project.

Every phase needs to be planned, and at the end of every phase, the plan might be revised based on knowledge gained in the previous phase. 

While there are differences between the phases of a project and the project management processes, there should be, however, integration between the two. Both project phases and project management processes focus on gathering the right requirements from stakeholders.

Also, both of them will have activities for quality assurance and quality control. Finally, both should be designed taking into consideration the need to manage risk throughout the project. 

So, project phases and project management processes are different but should be integrated together to ensure project success. Either of them alone will not be enough to achieve project success.

Both are needed and both need to be integrated together. The ability of the project manager to do so is part of his integration skills, which he can get trained on through formal project management training.

Tuesday, March 6, 2007