Discussion about the knowledge areas of project management

This project depicts both positive and negative impact and also the importance of implementing project management methodology in the business organizations to ensure a successful outcome. The project chosen for this report is implementation of Information System in ABC software Private Limited. A discussion is conducted based on the impact of three of these knowledge management areas in project success. It is crucial for the project managers to consider professional project management practices so that it can avoid project level issues.

Time management, cost management and risk management are the three major knowledge areas of project management therefore for successful accomplishment for any project or to make a better design of the project these factors are required to be analyzed (Kerzner,  2017). As soon as the project practitioners discover new project practice and methods the body of knowledge grows and should be updated accordingly by the project team members and project manager. PMBOK is a collection of different set of data and how these data and practices can help a project to meet the success are elaborated in this section.

Use of time management

Time is referred to as a commodity which project managers always requires more  desperately however there is always time lack. The process of time management is crucially the capability that helps to organize as well as plan the total time which is spent over the activities in the project development days (Svejvig & Andersen, 2015). A positive result from time management can increase the productivity and effectiveness of the overall business organization. This is a key perspective of PMBOK project management and it includes skills like planning, goal setting and prioritization for a better performance. Professional time management always gives benefit to the project regardless of the size of the project (Fleming & Koppelman, 2016). Similarly the Information system development project has also maintained the allotted time slot. The overall stress level of the project managers and project team members gets reduced with the maintenance of this approach. Apart from this, it can minimize the procrastination. In addition to this, it helps the project team members to become much focused to their job roles. Time management gives a sense of achievement to the project associates.

The example chosen for describing the importance of time management in project implementation is implementation of Information System in ABC software Private Limited. While implementing this project the project manager has followed all the rules and regulation of time management. The designers and developers have also considered project management tools in terms of Gantt chart, PERT chart while implementing this project. Before initiating the project the project manager has developed a Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) to manage the total time properly (Too & Weaver, 2014). The entire IS development project was divided into small segments and based on the complexity of each of the project activities the resources and time slot are allotted to each of the activity. After that it become the responsibility of the project manager and the project team members to accomplish that specific activity within the allotted time slot. The members have successfully followed the time segmentation. Due to accurate time management the IS project has reached the objectives and goals of the company.  

Use of time management

Project cost management is referred to as the other important knowledge area for project success. This is the process through which an entire cost assigned for a particular project can be well managed (Heldman, 2018). The project cost management includes certain phases in terms of resource planning, cost estimation, cost budgeting and cost control. All of these phases are needed to be followed accordingly by the project managers to make sure that the project has met the success line. In the resource planning phase the needful resources are determined such as equipments, materials including their qualities and how these are utilized while performing the project. In the cost estimation phase based on the project requirements the total cost of the project was measured.  In the budgeting phase the overall estimated cost is allotted to the individual’s work. Professional project cost control allows the project manager to avoid any cost changes.

While developing the Information System development project for ABC software Private Limited the project manager has maintained the Knowledge area of cost management. The cost management helps to control the project specific cost and also the overall project cost (de Carvalho, Patah & de Souza Bido, 2015). Through this the project manager can also estimate the future expense and predefined cost can also be maintained successfully with this cost management approach. The project manager of the IS development project has successfully maintained the cost management approaches and avoided further cost related risks and challenges that may interrupt the success of the organization.  

Any partially successful project can also become a failed one of the risk management approaches are not properly followed by the project managers. In order to manage the risks of any project four basic steps are followed such as risk identification, risk assessment, risk prioritization and risk mitigation (Hornstein, 2015). If three of these steps are properly followed by the project manager then the risk related issues will be completely minimized rather resolved. Risk management makes a project easier with better quality assessment and decision making power. The issues of communication are also minimized with this risk management approach.  Based on probability and impact of risks the risk management strategies are needed to be designed and developed y the project manager and project team members.

The example considered for the risk management application is Information System development in ABC Software Private Limited. The organization has followed all the risk management steps properly before developing the mitigation strategies. At the first phase the team has uncover some potential risks and then analyzed them on the immediate nest phase (Kerzner, 2017). In the risk prioritization phase based on the impact and probability of the risks those are prioritized and it is found that security of the Information System is the main risk that needs to be mitigated immediately. Then the risks are all evaluated and treated accordingly. The project manager has incorporated security level risk mitigation approaches in terms of encryption and application firewall and DMZ to keep the confidentiality of the system and their consumers as well.

Example

In order to design and develop this specific project the project manager has adopted PMBOK project management methodology (Fleming & Koppelman, 2016). This life cycle methodology is comprises of five phases including project initiation, project planning, project execution, monitoring and control and project closure. After following all five of these phases a project can reach its objectives.

In the PMBOK knowledge areas the group of process are consists of some chronological phases following which a project needs to be conducted. Management of the mentioned knowledge areas are regardless of time and location. Theses process groups can conducted both vertically and horizontally. The Project management knowledge areas considered for this specific report are cost management, time management and risk management. According to PMBOK theory project integration is the way through which a project can reach its goals and objectives. In order to design and implement an Information System the ABC software Private Limited should concentrate on the project integration management for unify the whole.

Project initiation: The project initiates with project scope statement development, setting objectives and project goal design. Then the project manager and the project team members need to focus on the objectives and follow the direction through which the objectives can be reached.

Development of project charter- Before initiating the project the project manager needs to design the project charter outlining the entire project in a single document (Kerzner & Kerzner, 2017). Before listing the target audience the project manager needs to consider the potential risks that may interrupt the success of the project. In this phase the associate project risks are also identified.

Developing project management plan: In this phase a project plan should be prepared considering risk, time, cost of the project (Binder, 2016). The stakeholders associated to the the IS development project risk that may occur needs to be mitigated. In order to avoid overrunning cost and overrunning time related to knowledge areas the project should be planned.

Directing project management work: In order to direct the project in this phase the knowledge areas are focused. Before executing project proper application of knowledge, tool and techniques are very much crucial to be considered by the project managers and the project team members (Mir & Pinnington, 2014). In this process the IS system will be passed through unit testing, integrated testing and acceptance testing. For successfully integrating the phases together all small units are tested and then integrated. Though, before launching the project internal consumers should accept the project.

Monitoring and controlling project work: The barriers of cost, time and risks will be dramatically reduced while sharing information from one side to other. Currently the company has realized the extent to which the set of knowledge can be shared across the business organization. However, they have also realized that, many of the recent knowledge areas can be accessed through small part of the company. The company has implemented certain knowledge centric prcatices through which the knowledge can be distributed throughout the project boundary.

Project closure: The project closure phase deals with activities such as stakeholders sing off and post maintenance program. As soon as the project was completed the stakeholders assigned for the project were signed off and accordingly to avoid future technical risks certain additional security measures are also introduced to the system in terms of encryption, application firewall etc (Nicholas & Steyn, 2017). Introduction of these knowledge based practices the issues of cost, risk and time will be diminished completely. 

Conclusion

From the entire above discussion it can be concluded that, the project managers need to consider all project parameters accurately to make sure the success of any project. Time management, risk management and cost management are the leading constraints that help to drive any project towards successful results. It is assumed that in order to design any project properly or to get a better design outcome PMBOK theory needs to be considered by the project managers. Time is referred to as a commodity that project manager wants the most but mostly the amount of this is estimated at least. Even the upper management and the clients judge the project success on the basis of these factors. In the Information System development project of ABC Software Private Limited the project manager also considered three of the project parameters. As a result the project result has avoided overrunning cost, time. Apart from this the possible risks are also mitigated during the project implementation phase. The project has successfully reached maximum rate of success with a minimum amount of efforts. The benefits of cost, time and risk management in a project success are all elaborated in this report.   

References

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Fleming, Q. W., & Koppelman, J. M. (2016, December). Earned value project management. Project Management Institute.

Harrison, F., & Lock, D. (2017). Advanced project management: a structured approach. Routledge.

Heldman, K. (2018). PMP: project management professional exam study guide. John Wiley & Sons.

Hornstein, H. A. (2015). The integration of project management and organizational change management is now a necessity. International Journal of Project Management, 33(2), 291-298.

Kerzner, H. (2017). Project management metrics, KPIs, and dashboards: a guide to measuring and monitoring project performance. John Wiley & Sons.

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

Mir, F. A., & Pinnington, A. H. (2014). Exploring the value of project management: linking project management performance and project success. International journal of project management, 32(2), 202-217.

Nicholas, J. M., & Steyn, H. (2017). Project management for engineering, business and technology. Routledge.

Svejvig, P., & Andersen, P. (2015). Rethinking project management: A structured literature review with a critical look at the brave new world. International Journal of Project Management, 33(2), 278-290.

Too, E.G. and Weaver, P., 2014. The management of project management: A conceptual framework for project governance. International Journal of Project Management, 32(8), pp.1382-1394.