MASTER THE PRINCIPLE OF PROJECT EXCELLENCE! BY MAXWELL OWOLADE

Project management always comes with its fair share of challenges. That’s why you need to have a carefully prepared project management plan in order to complete the project satisfactorily by meeting and exceeding project expectations. This will pay off immensely, as you strive to keep the project objective and the interest of the stakeholders in perspective.

The best projects are the ones delivered on time and within budget, most of the time, but there might be other realistic criteria that determine project success. From the outset, you want to make sure the project passes the feasibility criteria study. Ensure all the project stakeholders are on board and in agreement with the defined project scope. After all, said and done, when the sponsor has approved the project charter; you need to make sure that you focus on creating an effective project plan as you prepare for the entire process with great success. If the project initiation phase is carefully planned and established, the project is on the right path to success.

Some people believe that project methodology is crucial to a project success, examples like agile, software development life cycle (SDLC) and waterfall methodologies; while others feel differently; that project leadership personality, experience and the project structure as a whole are super important too. The main idea is to keep in mind is that as a project manager, you need to have a good understanding of the enterprise environmental factors (EEF); that is; the business environment and the culture that permeate it. This careful understanding of the EEF will provide you a better tool to adjust or adapt efficiently and retrofit a better mechanism that will yield good results. Sometimes, methodologies may be merged to create a hybrid approach. A good example is merging agile and waterfall. A friend often describes this hybrid approach as “Wagile”! Hopefully one day, one project management evangelist will provide body of knowledge for a productive business environment regarding the careful framework of integrating this accidental methodology.

All these factors are crucial, but they also depend on a multitude of different situations. Ideally, there are 3 main things that you need to focus on as a project manager when it comes to project excellence.

In this situation the 3 things you want to focus on are time, quality and budget. Why are they so important? Time is very crucial because every project has its own scheduled deadline. It is also sometimes proportional to the budget and resources and materials available to you. Most organization set time limit to stay competitive, meet market demand and solve a problem. If time is not of essence, the organization may not be in business for long. This is because time is required to respond to competition. Time is also required to meet market demand and supply.  As a project manager, you need to demonstrate a sharp business acumen and put yourself in the shoes of your clients and stakeholders. A sense of urgency and responsibility will not be over emphasized. So, to state it more clearly, managing project schedule effectively is crucial to achieving project excellence.

Efficiently managing the project budget is also very important because you want your project to stay within the allocated costs. Also, you want to avoid a situation that might lead to your project being shut down because of lack of funds to execute it. The idea is to know exactly what you are getting into and gauge the outcome based on what is available to you. Avoiding situations where you go way above the budget is what you really have to focus on. If you don’t tackle the financials correctly, you might not be able to achieve the desired outcome. This is where experience comes into play. A proficient project manager will have a good command of the earned value management (EVM)*; to stay focused on the proportionality that exists between time and money being dispensed on a project.

The last but not the least is the Quality. This is crucial as well. As a proficient project manager, you do not want to hope the final deliverable will just turn out superb, you want to ensure you stay focused to deliver exactly what the scope statement described. You need to carefully review your quality project plan and make sure all the project resources are on the same page, to ensure consistency and reduce tendency for scope creeping and gold plating. It’s certainly a very good option to consider quality from a standardized point of view, so that you can measure against a baseline. If you endeavor to keep to an industry standard, it does have the potential to pay off immensely in the end, and always set this as your project goal.

In conclusion, project excellence is a bar, every proficient project manager should strive to attain. Initially, it might look like it is never possible, but if you continue to follow the standard project principles one after the next; say from the feasibility to initiation through closing, you are not closer. A good attention to your project schedule, striving to mitigate any risk to it is very important. Applying EVM techniques will help you keep your project cost in perspective and you can even save a lot in the end. Keeping to the project quality management help you sustain the project on a quality path.

Please remember, all projects are unique, if you are successful in one, that success may not spill into the next one. You always want to be ready to adapt and apply the standard because individual project is unique.

As a whole, you really need to focus on working as much as possible on the project. By doing so, you can go above and beyond. Most of the time it’s very hard to stick to a designated budget, but it can be done. As long as you know what you are getting into, the outcome can really shine and that’s exactly what you have to do in order to reach great results. It’s definitely not a simple thing to stick to the budget and also deliver the best quality on time, but then again that’s what makes you different from other project experts.

*Within our Premium Video Library, we have resources that will help you master the EVM as an effective project management tool