Project Management Cheat Sheet (and in 10 Minutes)
OK, not in 10 minutes but few hours...
Project management requires years of experience and expertise but intention of this article is to use these 9 points as PM cheat sheet so you can reasonably structure your project without missing fundamental key aspects.
You'll tell now, we all know this, but ask yourself how many given tasks have you completed (or have not completed) lately without structure and you could all have managed much better with simple PM framework. So why not applying PM on your daily job (even when they are not called projects?... and off course where it does make sense - don't make your grocery shopping a project)
1. Define your project!
Any given job can be turned into the project! High level definition should include following:
a. What is the objective?
b. Short description of the project
e. and last (but usually most important) – budget
2. Create project charter!
Project charter is used as comprehensive overview of the project and allows all parties to reach agreement and document major project aspects. Project charter might be more or less detailed what depends of your initial needs & project complexity:
a. Reasons for undertaking the project
b. Goals, Objectives and constraints of the project
c. Target project benefits
d. Directions concerning the solution
e. In-scope and out-of-scope items
f. Deliverables
g. Dependences
h. Risks and assumptions
i. Identities of the main stakeholders and their roles
j. Communication plan
k. High level budget, spending authority and source of funding
3. Divide project into smaller pieces (so called work work break structure (WBS)), define deliverables for each WBS and dependences between them.
4. Define milestones (per WBS). Note: for those not familiar with term milestone, it is an completed action marking a significant change or stage in project/WBS development
5. Estimate and document duration of each WBS (note: bar or so called gantt charts are ideal for this purpose)
6. Plan & document required human resources for each WBS during the time of implementation
7. Plan & document communication to stakeholders during project development
8. Plan & document budget for each WBS and during time
9. Plan & document project closure (testing, handover, etc.)
Not a rocket science... Simple framework and you can always refer to it.. it is universal whatever you do.. So start structuring your significant job tasks and start manage them as projects now!
