Failure has blighted many an IT project, and the cost can
run to millions of pounds. So, asks Alan Bray, what can enterprises
do to improve their management of IT projects?
Businesses pay lip service to the value of successful IT
project management; but finding the right skill set is a difficult
matter.
While it
is easy to confuse project management with the management of
people, it is not some sort of black art. Reduced to its simplest,
project management is the craft of managing tasks and leading
people. A good project manager must have the ability to lead and
motivate a team of individuals.
Ever been
a parent? Being a parent is an excellent qualification for a
project manager, as you quickly have to learn how to reason with
demanding children - and, if you can successfully negotiate with
your teenage offspring, then I'm sure you can deal with the
complicated dynamics of professional management teams.
Another
analogy is with the conductor of an orchestra, whose skill is to
bring in each new player at the right time, following the rigour of
a score while avoiding disharmony and discord. The truth is that
the IT project manager often has to juggle competing demands but on
occasion, must have the strength and conviction to say, "No, I
believe this is the right way to go."
It's all
very well knowing about project methodologies or boasting an
impressive CV littered with qualifications. Without the intrinsic
skills to cope with the most important of all resource - humans -
in difficult or stressful situations, a project manager will fail
to deliver on time and to specification.
Project
management methodologies offer no panacea. Methodologies such as
Prince (Projects In Controlled Environments), are often similar in
concept, and the basic controls they advocate are frankly common
sense - deciding what you want to achieve, how you are going to do
it, what you need to achieve your objective, what risks may affect
the project, how to control the changes in requirement, etc.
However,
in practice rather than theory, no one size fits all. When the
pyramids or Stonehenge were built, the same key elements applied -
how long, how much, how many resources - all without Prince.
Leading
and motivating a team is one side of the equation. Before any
project starts, it is crucial that its project manager takes the
time to ensure that the customer has fully bought into and is
committed to the project, and has a complete understanding of what
is to be achieved.
The good
project manager asks questions from the outset, because posing the
really fundamental query is the only way of extracting the vital
information necessary to proceed. Project managers must get under
the customer's skin and avoid dodging the obvious issues.
They also
need the ability to work with the customer's resources and to
negotiate around and resolve conflict.
The future
of any project that will make a real difference to the customer,
belongs not to the faint hearted, but to the brave. Above all
project managers have to be passionate about the job they are
doing.
Projects
are vital to the lifeblood of any organisation and they absolutely
depend for their success on the skills and understanding of the
project manager.
The best
project managers are inspirational people, whose authority derives
from a charisma rooted in experience. Indeed, the successful
candidates at interview are often those who can prove their skills
at conflict resolution by relating them to their own personal lives
as well as their work.
The key to
being a good project manager comes down to personality.
But if
anyone can tell me how I can convince my daughter, by negotiation,
she can't borrow my Mercedes, please let me know.
What do you think?
How do you
juggle competing tasks?
Tell us in an e-mail >> CW360.com
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Alan Bray is managing director of Enterprise
Integration Services, part of the CSF Group, an IT services and
solutions provider.