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ОглавлениеThough everyone connected with the project has a role to play in bringing it to fruition, it is you, as project manager, who is ultimately responsible for its success. You are uniquely placed to see how the different elements fit together, and to drive your team forward towards completion.
Good project management rests on three fundamentals. It’s about having the right systems in place, inspiring high performance through good leadership, and exercising sound judgement when required. These are some of the key things you need:
• Process selection. It’s important to use the right tools to cover all the areas of managing a project. Before you begin the project, you will need to decide how you are going to approach planning and scheduling, budgeting and resource planning, risk management, progress monitoring and communication, and evaluation. If this sounds like a long list, don’t worry! All these aspects of project management are covered in this book.
• Approaches and methods. You can choose from a number of different approaches to managing projects (Secret 1.6).
“Project managers function as bandleaders who pull together their players, each a specialist with an individual score” L.R. Sayles, business writer
• Software to help you manage your project. Software shouldn’t be too cumbersome: ensure it is appropriate to the size of the project, otherwise you may find yourself working late every evening preparing plans and monitoring reports that nobody reads!
• Leadership skills. In modern project management, leadership involves more than just managing your project team (essential though this is). It’s about communicating effectively with all your stakeholders, to build and gain support for your project. In Project Leadership, Wendy Briner and colleagues describe how project leaders must manage the team, stakeholders and processes in order to be successful. (Project leadership is covered in Chapter 5.)
• Accurate, up-to-date information. Juggling these priorities requires the ability to ‘see the big picture’, so that you can zoom in to where action is required. You’ll need to ensure you have reliable information about the status of your project, so that you can use your judgement to make an informed decision – sometimes quickly. (There’s more on this in Chapter 6.)
• Overview of the stakeholders. From your ‘control tower’, take a little time to reflect on what other stakeholders are doing to help deliver your project, and what they expect from the project. How well do these expectations fit together? If there is a mismatch, these may need resolving – either by discussion (to agree priorities) or by amending the plan.
Juggling priorities requires the ability to see the big picture.
