Project Management for Engineering, Business and Technology

John M. Nicholas, Herman Steyn

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781000092561
• Edition: 6
• Topic: Technology & Engineering
• Subtopic: Project Management in Engineering
• Index: Technology & Engineering

Project Management for Engineering, Business and Technology is a highly regarded textbook that addresses project management across all industries. First covering the essential background, from origins and philosophy to methodology, the bulk of the book is dedicated to concepts and techniques for practical application. Coverage includes project initiation and proposals, scope and task definition, scheduling, budgeting, risk analysis, control, project selection and portfolio management, program management, project organization, and all-important "people" aspects—project leadership, team building, conflict resolution, and stress management.

The systems development cycle is used as a framework to discuss project management in a variety of situations, making this the go-to book for managing virtually any kind of project, program, or task force. The authors focus on the ultimate purpose of project management—to unify and integrate the interests, resources and work efforts of many stakeholders, as well as the planning, scheduling, and budgeting needed to accomplish overall project goals.

This sixth edition features:

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• updates throughout to cover the latest developments in project management methodologies;

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• a new chapter on project procurement management and contracts;

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• an expansion of case study coverage throughout, including those on the topic of sustainability and climate change, as well as cases and examples from across the globe, including India, Africa, Asia, and Australia; and

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• extensive instructor support materials, including an instructor's manual, PowerPoint slides, answers to chapter review questions and a test bank of questions.

Taking a technical yet accessible approach, this book is an ideal resource and reference for all advanced undergraduate and graduate students in project management courses, as well as for practicing project managers across all industry sectors.

Part I

Philosophy and concepts

1 What Is Project Management?

2 Systems Approach

The two chapters in this section describe the philosophy and concepts that differentiate project management from traditional, non-project management. The first chapter introduces features associated with project management and project management variations. Project management is an application of what has been called the systems approach to management; the second chapter describes the principles, terminology, and methodology of that approach. The two chapters set the stage for more detailed coverage in later sections.

Chapter 1

What is project management?

The projects mentioned in the Introduction—the Great Pyramid of Egypt, the International Space Station, the Chunnel, and the development of “Product J”—have something in common with each other and with every other undertaking of human organizations: they all require, in a word, management. Although the resources, work tasks, and goals of these projects vary greatly, none of them could have happened without management. This chapter contrasts project management and non-project management and looks at the variety of ways and places where project management is used.

1.1 Functions of management¹

The role of management is to plan, organize, and integrate resources and tasks to achieve goals. Although the specific responsibilities of managers vary greatly, all managers—whether corporate presidents, agency directors, line managers, school administrators, movie producers, or project managers—have this same role.

The activities of managers, including project managers, can be classified into the five functions identified in Figure 1.1. First is deciding what has to be done and how it will be done. This is the planning function, which involves setting a goal and establishing the means for achieving it consistent with higher-level organizational goals, resources, and constraints in the environment.

Second and related to planning is arranging for the work to be done; this is the organizing function. This involves (1) hiring, training, and gathering people into a team with specified authority, responsibility, and accountability relationships; (2) acquiring and allocating materials, capital, and other resources; and (3) creating an organization structure with policies, procedures, and communication channels.

Third is directing and motivating people to attain the goal. This is the leadership function.

Fourth is monitoring work performance with respect to the goal and taking necessary action whenever work deviates from the goal; this is the control function.

All four functions are aimed at the goal, which implies a fifth function: assessing how well each of the functions is doing and whether the functions or the goals need to be changed.

On a day-by-day basis, rarely do managers perform all the functions. Although planning logically precedes the others, there is always a need to organize activities, direct people, and evaluate work, regardless of sequence. Managers constantly face change, which means that plans, activities, performance standards, and leadership styles must also change.

Figure 1.1
The functions of management.

Different managers’ jobs carry different responsibilities depending on the functional area and managerial level of the job. Some managers devote most of their time to planning and organizing, others to controlling, and others to directing and motivating. At some time or another, project managers perform all these functions.

1.2 Features of project management

Project management is a systems approach to management. A system is a collection of interrelated components or elements that in combination serve a purpose and work toward a goal. A project can be thought of as a system: it is a collection of elements—work tasks, resources, and stakeholders (individuals, teams, organizations)—aimed at achieving a goal. The focus of the systems approach is to optimize the overall system (not its individual elements) so as to achieve the goal. The approach starts by defining the goal, identifying elements of the system that contribute to or detract from meeting the goal, and then managing the elements to best achieve the goal. It involves all the functions of management—planning, organizing, leadership, and so on.

As described in the Introduction, projects differ from non-projects. Non-project activities such as mass production of products or delivery of routine services are routine and seldom change. They tend to involve the same people doing the same procedures, day-in, day-out. There is little uncertainty or risk involved. In contrast, every project is unique and unfamiliar in some sense and requires people or teams from different functions or organizations. This creates uncertainty and risk and makes it harder to achieve the goal. So the question is: How do you manage such a thing as a project? The answer: Use project management.

The key features of project management are:²

1.A single person, the project manager, heads the project organization and works outside of the normal chain of command. The project organization reflects the cross-functional, goal-oriented, temporary nature of the project.

2.Because each project requires a unique variety of skills and resources, project work is typically performed by people from different functional areas or outside contractors.

3.The project manager is responsible for integrating work done by people from the different functional areas or outside contractors.

4.The project manager works with functional managers or contractors who might be responsible for the individual work tasks and personnel within the project.

5.A project might have two chains of command, one functional and one project, so people working in a project report to both a project manager and a functional manager.

6.Decision-making, accountability, outcomes, and rewards are shared between the project team and supporting functional units and outside contractors.

7.Although the project organization is temporary, usually the functional or subcontracting units from which it is formed are permanent. When a project ends, the project organization is disbanded and people return to their functional or subcontracting units.

Because projects require the coordinated efforts of different individuals and units from within and outside the organization, managers and workers in different units and at different levels work directly with each other. Formal lines of communication and authority are frequently bypassed, and a horizontal hierarchy is created. This horizontal hierarchy enables people in the project organization from different functional areas and outside organizations to work directly with each other as needed.

In non-project organizations, managers tend to be specialized and responsible for a single functional unit or department. A project, however, since it might involve many departments, needs someone from beyond these departments to take responsibility for meeting the project’s goals. That person is the project manager. The emphasis on project goals versus the goals of each functional unit is a key feature that distinguishes project managers from functional managers.

Project managers often direct people who are not “under” them but who are “assigned” to them from different areas of the organization as needed. This makes being a project manager more complicated (and difficult) than being a departmental manager. Project managers must know how to use diplomacy, resolve conflicts, and be able to function without the convenience of always having the same team reporting to them.

1.3 Evolution of project management

Chapters 6 and 7 No single individual or industry can be credited with the idea of project management. It is often associated with the early US missile and space programs of the 1960s, but clearly its origins go back much earlier. Techniques of project management probably were first used in the major construction works of antiquity, such as the Pyramids and the Roman aqueducts, and were later modified for use on other projects such as shipbuilding. Starting in the early twentieth century, managers developed techniques for use in other kinds of projects, such as for designing and testing new products and building and installing specialized machinery. During World War I, a new tool called the Gantt chart for scheduling and tracking project-type work was developed (examples in Chapter 6), followed about 40 years later by the project network diagram (discussed in Chapter 7).

Chapters 7 and 8By the 1950s, the size and complexity of many projects had increased so much that existing management techniques proved inadequate. Repeatedly, large-scale projects for developing aircraft, missiles, communication systems, and naval vessels suffered enormous cost and schedule overruns. To grapple with the problem, two new methods for planning and control were developed, one called PERT, the other called CPM (described in Chapters 7 and 8). A decade later, network-based methods were refined to integrate project cost accounting with project scheduling. These methods came into widespread usage in the 1960s when the US government mandated their usage in projects for the Department of Defense, NASA, and large-scale efforts such as nuclear power plants. In the 1970s, the earned value method of project tracking was developed (see Chapter 13); this led to performance measurement systems that simultaneously track work expenditures and work progress.

Chapter 13 The last 50 years have witnessed the increased computerization of project management. Early project planning and tracking systems cost $10,000 to $100,000, but today relatively low-cost software and freeware make possible the use of a variety of planning, scheduling, costing, and controlling tools for virtually any size project.

Associated with the evolution of project management was the emergence of project forms of organization and the role of project manager. Not until World War II was “the project” recognized as a distinct organizational form. In the urgency to dev...