Meet the Project Manager

The Project Manager comes into the picture when she is selected and later on authorise to start the project work. She starts to be functional once the Project Charter is born.

So, who is this person that people rely on to ensure the smooth flowing of a project which leads to satisfactory delivery to the delight of the client? What is she made of?

I personally believe that a Project Manager should have the following attribute:

• A communicator – she is able to communicate with all levels effectively
• A negotiator – she is able to negotiate to get the best deal possible
• A mediator – she becomes the third person to solve conflicts
• A motivator – she creates a positive environment to foster excellence from team members
• A mentor – she trains and coach team members producing results as expected
• A thermostat – she sets the correct state for the working environment
• A time keeper – an essential trait to ensure timely delivery within acceptable expenditure
• A learner – actively improving herself and keeping abreast with the latest information and technology
• A seeker – always looking for better ways to improve the current work situation

A PM should always able to keep her emotion under check. Like any other managers, conflicts should be resolved properly and diplomatically. A PM must be able to give clear directions and expectation to her audience. This will help to avoid miscommunication, worse a conflict.

A PM should be focused and creative at the same time. Detailed yet leave room for team members to give innovative ideas and trying new things.

Most importantly, an excellent PM must be able to keep the goals and project objectives in each team member’s view. It is essential to ensure that every one in the project is heading towards the same direction.

Integration Management: Develop Project Charter

Let’s talk about Integration Management. If you remember Integration Management is the first Knowledge Area in PMBOK Guide (4th Edition). There are 6 Process Groups that goes under Integration Management. The are:

In one of my earlier post, I have explain how Project Charter exists in every project. Only, most of the time, a lot of its contents are scattered across the project network. Today, we are going to look at this first process group in Integration Management knowledge area closely. We are going to see what is needed to get the Project Charter recognised and agreed upon amongst the project members.

According to PMBOK Guide (4th Edition), all process groups will have their own inputs, tools and techniques, and finally; outputs. To develop a charter these are the information required:

Statement of Work (SOW) is a narrative description of the product deliveries. It is developed from the business needs, scope of work and strategic plan of the organisation’s strategic goals. For internal projects, the SOW is prepared by the project initiator, while for external projects, it is received from the customer.

Business Case is merely the justification to proceed with the project. It is influenced by several factors; market demand, organisational need, customer request, technological advance, legal requirement, ecological impact or social need.

Contract can be one of the input especially when the project is external.

EEF is Enterprise Environmental Factors which include but not limited to industry standards or organisation infrastructure. OPA is Organisational Process Assets; this refers to templates or historical documents which already exist in the organisation. OPA also refers to lessons learned from previous projects.

The tools and techniques that is required to produce the project charter is Expert Judgment. The expertise is provided by specific individuals or a group of professionals with the required knowledge of specific areas. This can come from variety of sources, not limited to:

• other unit or department in the organisation
• consultants
• stakeholders
• professional and technical associations
• Industry group
• Subject matter experts
• Project Management Office (PMO), etc.

The output for this process is obviously the Project Charter. It documents the business needs, current understanding of customer’s needs, and the description of the products or services that is intended to be delivered.

A piece of advice

You will not be directed to this blog unless you were looking for PMP exam resources. Or at least the topic project management. And you will only do this search because you’re interested in the topic.

So, let me give you one piece of advice on how to save money on all those project management books.

Be a member of PMI. Yes, the fee might be a little on the high side, but look at the resources that will be available to you. Especially books. Hundreds of books are available on PMI’s eReads & Reference. This exclusive benefit is only available to PMI members.

So, if you haven’t become a member yet, do so now. Just click on this link: Become PMI Member and follow the instructions.

Project Charter – It’s there, but hidden

Every project will have a Charter; we just recognise it with different names. This is the basis of any project in my opinion. It details, amongst others:

• business case,
• project objectives and scope,
• high level requirements in terms of product, budget and schedule,
• list of stakeholders,
• potential risks,
• ROI, etc.

In real life project management, these information are scattered across the project network, some written down, some in emails, some in someone's head. The challenge is to put all this on paper and get everyone to be aware of it (and agree). From PMI perspective, one more important content of the Project Charter, is the recognition of the Project Manager. This document, gives the authority to the assigned project manager to manage the said project.

Throughout the project phase, Project Charter must be the main reference document to ensure that projects are delivered as per required by the customer and/or sponsor. The rest of the project documents are supporting documents for Project Charter; they detailed out what has been stated in the Charter. And Project Management Plan is the main document that compiles the rest of the project plans and project documents.

Ideally this piece of document which contains the high level information about the intended project should be the Holy Grail for all project managers. This is true when we want to control scope creeps, and change requests.

The creation of Project Charter is done very early in the project. It is during the Project Initialization and within the Project Integration Management. Every project manager must ensure that a project charter is in place before any project work starts.