Stanley E. Portny - Project Management For Dummies

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Projects have been around since ancient times. Noah building the ark, Leonardo da Vinci painting the Mona Lisa, J.R.R. Tolkien writing The Hobbit, Moderna and Pfizer developing their COVID-19 vaccines — all projects. And as you know, these were all masterful successes. Well, the products were a spectacular success, even if schedules and resource budgets were drastically overrun!

Why, then, is the topic of project management of such great interest today? The answer is simple: The audience has changed and the stakes are higher.

Historically, projects were large, complex undertakings. The first project to use modern project management techniques — the Polaris weapons system in the early 1950s — was a technical and administrative nightmare. Teams of specialists planned and tracked the myriad of research, development, and production activities. They produced mountains of paper to document the intricate work. As a result, people started to view project management as a highly technical discipline with confusing charts and graphs; they saw it as inordinately specialist-driven and definitely off-limits for the common person!

Because of the growing array of huge, complex, and technically challenging projects in today’s world, people who want to devote their careers to planning and managing those projects are vital to their successes. Over the past 30 to 35 years, the number of projects in the regular workplace has skyrocketed. Projects of all types and sizes are now the way that organizations accomplish their work.

At the same time, a new breed of project manager has emerged. This new breed may not have set career goals to become project managers — many among them don’t even consider themselves to be project managers, at least not as their primary role. But they do know they must successfully manage projects to move ahead in their careers. Clearly, project management has become a critical skill, not a career choice.

Even though these people realize they need special tools, techniques, and knowledge to handle their new types of assignments, they may not be able to devote large amounts of time to acquiring them without adversely impacting other responsibilities, which is where this book comes into play. This book is devoted to this silent majority of project managers.

This book helps you recognize that the basic tenets of successful project management are simple. The most complex analytical technique takes less than ten minutes to master! In this book, we discuss information that’s necessary to plan and manage projects and provide important guidelines for developing and using this information. Here, you discover that the real challenge to a successful project is dealing with the multitude of people whom the project may affect or need for support. There are plenty of tips, hints, and guidelines for identifying key players and then involving them.

But knowledge alone won’t make you a successful project manager — you need to apply it. This book’s theme is that project management skills and techniques aren’t burdensome tasks you perform because some process requires it. Rather, they’re a way of thinking, communicating, and behaving. They’re an integral part of how we approach all aspects of our work every day.

So this book is intended to be direct and (relatively) easy to understand. But don’t be misled — the simple text still navigates all the critical tools and techniques you’ll need to support your project planning, scheduling, budgeting, organizing, and controlling. So buckle up!

This information is presented in a logical and modular progression. Examples and illustrations are plentiful — so are the tips and hints. And we (attempt to) inject humor from time to time to keep it all in perspective. The goal is that you finish reading this book feeling that good project management is a necessity and that you’re determined to practice it!

Of course, we want you to read every single word in this book, but we understand your life is busy and you may have time to read only what’s immediately relevant to you. In that case, feel free to skip the sidebars. Although the sidebars offer interesting, real-life stories of our own experiences, they’re not vital to grasping the concepts.

When writing this book, we assumed that a widely diverse group of people would read it, including the following:

Senior managers and junior-level staff (who’ll become tomorrow’s senior managers)

Experienced project managers and people who’ve never been on a project team

People who’ve had significant project management training and people who’ve had none whatsoever

People who’ve had years of real-world business and government experience and people who’ve only recently entered the workforce

After reading this book, we hope you wonder (and rightfully so) why all projects aren’t well-managed — because you’ll think these techniques are so logical, straightforward, and easy to use. But we also assume you recognize there’s a big difference between knowing what to do and doing it. We assume you realize you’ll have to work hard to overcome the forces that conspire to prevent you from using these tools and techniques.

Finally, we assume you’ll realize that you can read this book repeatedly and learn something new and different each time. Think of this book as a comfortable resource that has more to share as you experience new situations.

We include small icons in the left margins of the book to alert you to special information in the text. Here’s what they mean:

We use this icon to point out important information you should keep in mind as you apply the techniques and approaches.

This icon highlights techniques or approaches you can use to improve your project management practices.

This icon highlights potential pitfalls and danger spots that you should attempt to avoid or be prepared to address if they come to fruition.

In addition to the material in the print or e-book you’re reading right now, you can access free companion materials online. Simply navigate to www.dummies.com and search for “Project Management For Dummies Cheat Sheet.” From there you’ll be able to read or print several useful articles about confirming your project’s justification, developing meaningful project objectives, developing achievable project schedules, eliciting and sustaining commitment for projects, holding people accountable, and avoiding common project pitfalls.