Project Office

Any activity that has already been given the name of "Project" is likely to involve considerable amounts of resources, whether that is time, people, money or all three. So it is fairly obvious that whoever has authorised the project will want to be certain that it delivers what is expected, that it meets the business requirements and stays within budget and on schedule. A sponsor will also expect that risks are managed and controlled in an effective way.

Project management training is a crucial aspect for the success of projects within an organization. A solid project management training course for your organization's employees will ensure your people possess the right knowledge and skills for efficient management of your organization's business projects.

The knowledge area of project quality management includes the organizational processes that determine quality policies, objectives, and responsibilities. The PMBOK identifies three processes for quality management:

• Quality Planning
• Quality Assurance
• Quality Control

Project Management is the planning and management of a range of tasks, particularly where there are complexities either within the tasks or within the teams working on the project, in order to achieve a deliverable at the end of the project. A deliverable can be many things; it may be a physical thing such as a new product, it may be an intangible thing such as a new process within an organisation or it may be a new software system.

A Project Managers' role in a nutshell is being completely responsible for the successful planning executions, monitoring, control and closure of a project. This title is used in all most all industries. At a higher level, the role of a project manager is quite easy to describe. But it's impossible to apply one job description for all project manager positions as role and responsibilities differ from company to company. Below shows the requirements, roles & responsibility for project manager positions at a higher level:

Hopefully everyone knows the triple constraint - Scope, Cost and Time. Given below is a short synopsis of each and tips for best practices

Scope - This is where you determine clear objectives for the work that needs to be completed. As conversations progress you might have that sixth sense for where the scope creep could happen. Good Project managers usually account for these in their cost, as this will prevent change orders which most sponsors/stakeholders are always reluctant to approve.

Very few project plans are simple and straightforward because there are often so many contributing factors to take into account. What exactly are all the tasks that will be required and how long will each task take? Are there dependencies between tasks? Some tasks or activities may require specialist skills or training and sub-contractors may need to be hired for certain aspects of the project. The initial brief may not be very detailed or, even if the requirements are fully documented, problems or omissions may still be revealed at the planning stage. There may also be an unrealistic fixed deadline to contend with.

Almost all major organisations now have a global presence and it is common for a project manager to have the responsibility of leading projects and teams from different countries and cultures. In order to effectively manage a geographically diverse project the communication and cultural barriers must be addressed at the outset of a project in order to build a successful multi-cultural team with a united common goal.

Congratulations! You've been assigned your first project and your boss wants to see a project schedule at next week's status meeting. Hearing of your new promotion, the PC support team has installed Microsoft Project on your desktop so you're ready to start building a project schedule! Unfortunately, your Introduction to Microsoft Project training class isn't schedule until next month and your boss is expecting a full schedule by next week. Fortunately, if you have a book on Microsoft Project and this article, you'll be able to complete your assigned task.

In order to complete any project on budget and on time there are some quite simple steps to follow. But problems regularly arise because the person in charge of the project either doesn't follow these steps or doesn't know the basics of good project management.