Absolute Beginners Guide to Project Management

429 Pages·2010·9.75 MB·English

Absolute
Beginner’s
Guide
to
Second Edition
Project
Management
Greg Horine
800 East 96th Street,
Indianapolis, Indiana 46240
Absolute Beginner’s Guide to Project Management, Associate Publisher
Greg Wiegand
Second Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Que Publishing Acquisitions Editor
Loretta Yates
All rights reserved. No part of this book shall be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system, or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, Development Editor
recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the publisher. No Todd Brakke
patent liability is assumed with respect to the use of the information contained
Managing Editor
herein. Although every precaution has been taken in the preparation of this
Kristy Hart
book, the publisher and author assume no responsibility for errors or omissions.
Nor is any liability assumed for damages resulting from the use of the informa- Project Editor
tion contained herein. Lori Lyons
ISBN-13: 978-0-7897-3821-0 Copy Editor
ISBN-10: 0-7897-3821-X Editorial Advantage
Senior Indexer
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:
Cheryl Lenser
Horine, Greg.
Absolute beginner’s guide to project management / Greg Horine. — 2nd ed. Proofreader
Jennifer Gallant
p. cm.
Includes index.
Technical Editor
ISBN 978-0-7897-3821-9
Todd Meister
1. Project management. I. Title.
Publishing Coordinator
HD69.P75H67 2009
Cindy Teeters
658.4’04—dc22
2008052475
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Printed in the United States of America
Compositor
First Printing: January 2009
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Contents at a Glance
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Part I Project Management Jumpstart . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
1 Project Management Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
2 The Project Manager . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
3 Essential Elements for Any Successful Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Part II Project Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
4 Defining a Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
5 Planning a Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
6 Developing the Work Breakdown Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
7 Estimating the Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
8 Developing the Project Schedule . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
9 Determining the Project Budget . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
Part III Project Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
10 Controlling a Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .125
11 Managing Project Changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
12 Managing Project Deliverables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159
13 Managing Project Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171
14 Managing Project Risks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
15 Managing Project Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
Part IV Project Execution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209
16 Leading a Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211
17 Managing Project Communications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223
18 Managing Expectations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239
19 Keys to Better Project Team Performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255
20 Managing Differences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267
21 Managing Vendors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279
22 Ending a Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 293
Part V Accelerating the Learning Curve…Even More . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301
23 Making Better Use of Microsoft Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 303
24 When Reality Happens . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 327
25 Intriguing Project Management Concepts and Topics . . . . . . . . . . . . 345
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 363
This page intentionally left blank
Table of Contents
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
About This Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Who Should Read This Book? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
How This Book Is Organized . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Conventions Used in This Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
I Project Management Jumpstart . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
1 Project Management Overview. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
What Is Project Management…Exactly? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
What Is the Value of Project Management?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Why Are Projects Challenging? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Growing Demand for Effective Project Managers? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Trends in Project Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
2 The Project Manager. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
One Title, Many Roles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Key Skills of Project Managers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Qualities of Successful Project Managers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
15 Common Mistakes of Project Managers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
3 Essential Elements for Any Successful Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
What Exactly Is a “Successful” Project? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Learning from Troubled Projects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Learning from Successful Projects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Essential Project Manager Toolkit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
vi ABSOLUTE BEGINNER’S GUIDE TO PROJECT MANAGEMENT
II Project Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
4 Defining a Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Setting the Stage for Success . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
How Does Defining a Project Relate to Project Planning? . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
Project Definition Document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Project Definition Checklist . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
5 Planning a Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Key Project Planning Principles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
Important Questions Project Planning Should Answer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
Building a Project Plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
Summary of Supplemental Project Plan Components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
Project Plan Checklist . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
6 Developing the Work Breakdown Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
What Is a WBS Exactly? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
Why Is the WBS Important?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
The Process of Building a WBS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
7 Estimating the Work. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
Next Step in the Schedule Development Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
Managing the Risk, Managing the Estimates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
Reasons for Estimating Woes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
Powerful Estimating Techniques and Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
Best Practices. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
8 Developing the Project Schedule. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
The Impact of the Project Schedule . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
The Goal of the Schedule Development Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
Key Inputs for Building a Schedule . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
Creating a Schedule . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
CONTENTS vii
9 Determining the Project Budget . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
The Impact of the Project Budget . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
Principles of an Effective Budget. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
Creating a Project Budget . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
Common Budget Challenges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
III Project Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .123
10 Controlling a Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
What Is Project Control? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
Management Fundamentals for Project Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
Powerful Techniques for Project Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130
Performance Reporting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
Variance Responses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
Leveraging Earned Value Management Concepts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136
Common Project Control Challenges. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
Lessons from Project Recoveries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
11 Managing Project Changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
What Exactly Is a Project Change and What’s the
Big Deal Anyway?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146
Fundamentals for Managing Project Change. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
What Causes Unplanned Scope Changes? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
Essential Elements of a Project Change Control System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
Powerful Techniques for Minimizing Project Changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154
Common Project Change Control Challenges. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156
12 Managing Project Deliverables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159
“Managing Project Deliverables” Means What Exactly? . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160
Why Do This? It’s Too Much Work. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
Identify, Protect, and Track: The Principles of Managing
Work Products . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162
viii ABSOLUTE BEGINNER’S GUIDE TO PROJECT MANAGEMENT
Best Practices. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163
Configuration Management Plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
Common Challenges and Pitfalls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
13 Managing Project Issues. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171
The Goals, Objectives, and Principles of Project Issue Management . . . . 172
Key Features of Issue Management System. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173
Options for Issue Log . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175
Best Practices. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176
Some Special Situations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178
14 Managing Project Risks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
Key Risk Management Principles. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
The Essential Process for Managing Project Risks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183
The Common Sources of Project Risk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187
Typical Problems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190
Powerful Risk Control Strategies. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 192
Are You Sure It’s a Risk?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
15 Managing Project Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
What Is “Project Quality”? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198
Unique Aspects of Managing Project Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199
Principles of Managing Project Quality. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199
Powerful Tools and Techniques for Project Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201
Powerful Quality Strategies. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203
Typical Quality-Related Challenges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205
IV Project Execution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209
16 Leading a Project. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211
More Than Managing. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212
Where Is Leadership Needed on a Project? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214
CONTENTS ix
Twelve Keys to Better Project Leadership . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
Power of Servant Leadership Approach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 218
17 Managing Project Communications. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223
What Are Project Communications? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 224
The Importance of Project Communications. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225
Why Communicating Can Be Tough . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226
Seven Powerful Principles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
Best Practices of Effective Project Communicators . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230
18 Managing Expectations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239
Value of Reviewing Stakeholder Expectation Management . . . . . . . . . . 240
Critical Aspects of Expectations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240
Seven Master Principles of Expectation Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245
Essential Elements of Managing Expectations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246
19 Keys to Better Project Team Performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255
High-Performing Teams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 256
Ten Key Principles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 256
Proven Techniques . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 259
Special Situations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 263
20 Managing Differences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267
Five Key Principles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 268
Proven Techniques for Leading Cross-Functional Projects. . . . . . . . . . . . . 271
Proven Techniques for Leading Cross-Cultural Projects. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273
Proven Techniques for Leading Virtual Projects. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 274
21 Managing Vendors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279
First, Let’s Clarify a Few Terms. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280
Ten Proven Principles of Vendor Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280
Twelve Tips for Buyers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283