2.3Project Management

System development must finish "on time," "within budget," and "at the required quality." Project management is the set of ideas and techniques for managing all three at once and bringing a project to a successful, planned conclusion.

2.3.1PMBOK, and scope/schedule management

• PMBOK is a body of knowledge (guide) that systematizes project management knowledge and is referenced worldwide. It does not mandate one specific method; instead it organizes the discipline into management areas such as scope, schedule, and cost.
• Scope management is the management area that clarifies and maintains what the project will and will not do (the work boundary). A vague scope invites "scope creep," where requests keep expanding without limit.
• WBS (work breakdown structure) is a diagram that hierarchically breaks down a project's work into manageable units. It prevents work from being overlooked and makes it easier to assign owners and durations to each piece of work.
• Arrow diagrams represent the order and dependencies of tasks with arrows; from the duration of each path you can find the critical path (the longest path, which determines the shortest possible completion time for the whole project). If a task on the critical path slips, the whole project's completion slips too.

2.3.2Cost, quality, risk, and stakeholder management

• Cost management estimates and allocates costs, then tracks them against actuals, to complete the project within budget. Quality management plans and checks that deliverables meet the required quality standards.
• Risk management identifies in advance uncertain events that could affect the project (negatively or positively), evaluates their probability and impact, and prepares responses.
• Stakeholder management identifies everyone with an interest in the project—the customer, users, management, partner companies, and so on—and understands their expectations and influence to communicate with them appropriately.

Consider a project to build a new in-house portal site. At project start, stakeholders agree on "which features will be built and which are out of scope this time," documented as scope management. Left vague, this invites scope creep, where "let's also add this feature" requests pile up later, squeezing the deadline and budget. Next, the agreed work is hierarchically broken down, for example into "requirements," "screen design," "implementation," and "testing," to build a WBS, with an owner and estimated duration assigned to each piece. Representing the order and dependencies of tasks (e.g. "implementation cannot start until screen design is done") with an arrow diagram then reveals the critical path, the longest of the several possible routes. If the route "requirements (5 days) -> screen design (10 days) -> implementation (15 days) -> system test (10 days)," totaling 40 days, is longer than any other route, it is the critical path—and if screen design slips by 3 days partway through, the whole project's completion slips by 3 days even if every other task stays on schedule. In parallel, cost management proceeds to prevent budget overruns, and quality management checks that deliverables meet the defined standards. In addition, before the project even starts, risk management identifies uncertain events such as "a key member might be reassigned partway through," evaluates the high-impact ones, and prepares responses in advance, such as securing a backup resource. Finally, things like the timing of progress reports to management and briefings for the using department are also worked into the plan as part of stakeholder management.

2.3.3Section summary

• PMBOK is the project management body of knowledge. Scope management clarifies the work boundary and prevents scope creep
• A WBS hierarchically decomposes the work. An arrow diagram shows dependencies, and the critical path (the longest path) determines the whole project's duration
• Risk management means identifying and preparing in advance. Stakeholder management means understanding every stakeholder's expectations and communicating appropriately