Project management and how it relates to project management maturity

Project management and how it relates to project management maturity Name: Course: Professor Name: (February, 2013) .  Introduction Today, project management has become a subject of concern in the business world where projects are increasingly becoming important in business operation. Project management is a carefully planned and organized effort to accomplish a specific (and usually) one-time effort, for example, constructing a building or implementing a new computer system. Organizations are now enforcing project management as a way of creating competitive advantage in industries they operate in. However, not many of the projects have performed has planned thus why Perrin has emphasized the role of project management maturity models (PMMMs) as methods of understanding their performances (Perrin, 2008). These models have their origin in the capacity models developed in the year 1986 and 1993 at Carnegie Mellon University. Up to now, we have more than thirty different models each addressing a particular industry context. This approach of the use of PMMMs has contributed to a continuous improvement in many areas of business. Perrin continues to note that project management includes developing a project plan, which includes defining project goals and objectives, specifying tasks or how goals will be achieved, what resources are need, and associating budgets and timelines for completion. It also includes implementing the project plan, along with careful controls to stay on the "correct path", by this we mean that is, to ensure the plan is being managed according to plan. Project management usually follows major phases, including feasibility study, project planning, implementation, evaluation and support/maintenance (Perrin, 2008). The purpose of this paper is to culminate the learning achieved in the course by describing the understanding and application of knowledge in the field of program management strategy in a construction company where I worked as a project team member. Many organizations do not employ full time Project Managers and it is common to pull together a project team to address a specific need as it was in Riverstone Masonry LLC. The scope of project management Kerzner and Belack defines Project management as the science (and art) of organizing the components of a project, whether the project is development of a new product, the launch of a new service, a marketing campaign, or a wedding. They go further to say project is not something that is part of normal business operations. It is typically created once, it is temporary, and it is specific. In addition they claim, "It has a beginning and an end"(Kerzner & Belack, 2010). A project consumes resources and it has funding limits. This concern for the consumption of resources strengthens the need for success in the projects, thus the use of PMMMs. Project management maturity describes how organizations can deliver better performance in projects. The key factors under consideration are time, budget and specification. For instance, a project that has taken more time that was planned, used more than what was budgeted or gone beyond what was specified can not be regarded as a successful project. The process encompasses five stages as outlined by kerzner; he detailed the evolutionary structure of reaching process maturity in “Quality is Free” where he described five stages in adopting quality practices in an organization. These five stages are: 1) the organization is aware of the new practice; 2) the organization learns more about: then 3) it tries it in a pilot testing; 4) it implements it across the organization; and 5) it finally masters its use (kerzner, 2005). Mitra defines PMM as “the extent to which a specific process is explicitly defined, managed, measured, controlled, and effective” (Mitra, 2008). He defines it citing Saures from the Project Management Institute 29th Annual Seminars in Long Beach, CA (October 9-15, 1998). It recognized project management maturity as the organization’s approachability to project management. It went further to recognize it as the degree at which managers are supported and allowed to do everything possible for the success of the projects they lead. They conclusively said project maturity is how healthy an organization can handle their project (Mitra, 2008). Many of the researchers in this field including Mitra use a five-tiered assessment ladder in defining and measuring maturity: maturity level 1 (no established project management practices that exist); maturity level 2 (there is some project management practices in place but not across the whole organization); maturity level 3 (project management practices and standards are instituted and are followed throughout the entire organization using established reporting forms and documents); maturity level 4 (in addition to what is in level 3 the organization uses benchmarking metrics as a means to rate itself against commonly accepted standards) and finally maturity level 5 (continuous improvement through the efficient collection, use, and decimation of data obtained in level 4 is in place) (Mitra, 2008). The essence of project management maturity The whole idea of the use of PMMMs is basically the need to achieve better results; increase productivity according to Perrin. This is made possible as PMMMs helps organizations to successfully, consistently, and predictably bring projects to completion. Managers are able to evaluate their projects management maturity levels and identify specific area that needs to be changed or improved as they search for higher results. The assumption behind the models is that by reaching predetermined goals in specified key areas of project management, an organization will be able to improve project performance on a consistent basis (Perrin, 2008). Productivity is an overall measure of the ability to produce a good or service. More specifically, productivity is the measure of how specified resources are managed to accomplish timely objectives as stated in terms of quantity and quality. Mitra also defines Productivity as an index that measures output (goods and services) relative to the input (labor, materials, energy, and many others, used to produce the output). Therefore, improved productivity means gained success (mitra, 2008). For instance, we measured Productivity in terms of the ratio of output to all or some of the resources used (labor, capital, energy, raw materials and others). To attain this desire in the project it required the team members to be systematic and have consistently effort. Each had to resist the temptation of focusing on too-centric solutions only thus the need to incorporate all the tools and the appropriate process change that ensures attaining the desired maturity. When introducing a new project management toolset, the team had to ensure that these tools would really solve the noted issues in the production process. For instance, introducing a new machine we had to sit and go through the pros and cons of the introduction of the machine. The team leader had to ensure the people and processes concerned are well introduced to the toolset to ensure efficiency. Failure to do this, we noticed that the organization would be at risk, time and money which are very important would be wasted and most probably just sidetrack the attention of expensive and valuable human resources. Therefore, it is crucial to think of the organizations ability to identify and resolve the key pain things and ensure this new technology actually solves the business pain. At the same time, it is good to understand that the right technology dramatically improves project communication and collaboration. For instance, relying on email to manage the projects was inefficient and costly hence having a centralized, collaborative, and web-based project management platform was directly helping the team members. This was so because the team members could easy share project artifacts such as schedules and status. Perrin strongly supports this argument (Perrin, 2008). The Washington DC Department of Transportation project tracking website offers a great example of technology that facilitates centralized project communication. As the new technology was been implemented, a list of probable future improvements was proposed and listed based on feedback from users and the team members own experience. The team leader ensured he engaged the users early in the process to gain buy-in and get their support thus easing adoption. For instance, the leader ensured we had a full week discussion on which kind of technology we opted to use thus as the it was implemented all the team members were for the idea and supported it fully. Organizational strategy Strategies can plainly be referred to as the ways organizations use to achieve their desired objectives. Curlee and Gorgon define strategy as the unique position that an organization aims in the market to gain competitive advantage (Curlee & Gorgon, 2011). These Strategies are derived from the vision and mission of the organization. The strategies must aim at achieving the organizations/projects objectives or desires otherwise the project would not achieve the intended goal. Therefore, to have better and effective strategies organizations have to analyze how it can adapt with the changing market situation. Organization needs to do internal as well as external evaluation which then will guide in the formulation of the strategies. These decisions encompass the whole organization and require a lot of resources. Strategy formulation requires intellectual ability, knowledge, and skills to ensure they work effectively within competitive market conditions (Curlee & Gorgon, 2011). Objectives of organizational strategy The top management has to ensure that the formulated strategies of the project go hand in hand with the overall focus of the organization. This is because strategies aim at achieving the desired objectives and goals of the organization and at the same time provide unique features that guarantee a competitive advantage to the company (Curlee & Gorgon, 2011). For instance, optimum utilization of resources as a strategy in the company ensured maximum output with minimum input, this helped the organization to ensure the projects were completed within the specified budget and in fact most of the times used less of what was budgeted. As a result, the company raised its status within the industry hence growth. According to Curlee and Gorgon (2011) there are several advantages of having strategies in organizations that are linked to the objectives and includes: Strategies that are linked to the objectives help organizations/projects to focus on their strengths in the clear picture of its vision thus ensuring proper utilization of resources. Secondly, strategies give the top management and the team members a clear perspective, ensuring the whole organization matches together towards a common goal. Thirdly, strategies that are linked to objectives aims in giving the organization/project a better view of the future as they are able to anticipate the future needs of the customer and the market. On top of that, strategies give room for modification thus a factor of flexibility which is a very crucial factor in strategy control. Strategies also ensure organizations make better decisions to achieve goals effectively as they focus on future; the upcoming threats and opportunities. Finally, Strategies help in formulation of plans. For instance, after making the strategies the organization can make the plans about what to do on the project, how to do it, when is to do each phase of the project, and ensure they have the right members on ...