PROJECT MANAGEMENT 101

You can’t manage what you can’t control.

You can’t control what you can’t measure.

You can’t measure what you can’t define.

This is one of the key principles of ‘management’ captured in three short sentences, and if you pause for a minute and give some thought to it, you will recognize it is a principle that can be applied to many different aspects of work (and life).

I would like to take this opportunity to illustrate how this principle is applied in the field of project management using the County of Riverside Enterprise Solutions for Property Taxation (CREST) project that I managed as an example. Before I jump into it, I want to make clear project management by definition does not mean ‘IT’ related projects. In fact, ‘project’ is defined by Project Management Institute (PMI – pmi.org) as a temporary endeavor that has a defined beginning and an end, undertaken to create a unique product, service, or result. Therefore, any endeavor that fits in the definition is considered a project.

If you have given some thought to these sentences, you will recognize that to apply them, you will have to think backwards. You will see that the principle is telling us to define the variables you can measure; the measures allow us to gauge our control over the variables, and the controls over the variables can be managed collectively within the context of the project undertaken. Fortunately, PMI has already defined the variables and related measures for us through their years of research and study in the project management discipline, and these variables (along with their measures from CREST project) are:

Scope – The sum of the products, services, and results to be provided as a project. With CREST project, this was measured by ~6,800 business requirements that needed to be delivered by the project teams.

Quality – The degree to which a set of inherent characteristics fulfill requirements. With CREST project, this was measured by ~2,000 test cases used to calculate the ratio of how many of the ~6,800 requirements were met to the number of defects uncovered throughout testing phases.

Schedule – The planned dates for performing scheduled activities and the planned dates for meeting scheduled milestones. With CREST project, this was measured by a 10-year project timeline to perform planned phases and activities.

Budget – The approved estimate of finances for the project and/or various defined activities within. Within CREST project, a $98m dollars total budget as allocated for various phases and components of the project.

Resources – Number of skilled human resources (specific disciplines either individually or in teams). With CREST project, this was measured by the number of positions based on subject matter expertise that forms the project team. The number of resources ranged between 40 to over 150 staff members throughout the project life-cycle.

Risk – An uncertain event or condition that, if it occurs, has a degree of positive or negative effect on a project’s objectives (or measures). With CREST project, this was a more subjective measure based on the experience, project history, team dynamics, culture, analysis, and sometimes the plain old gut feelings of the project manager and/or the team members. But this is a variable that warrants the most attention in any project.

I am sure you heard of the phrase triple constraints (time, cost, quality), which represents how changing one variable impacts another. For instance, if you like to spend more time on an activity of a project, the quality of the output from the activity will increase; however, the cost will also increase as a result of the time delay. In project management, the above six variables form the competing constraints. Now with all the controlling variables and how they are defined and measured, you can view each of the variables as a ‘dial’ that you can turn (control) through strategies/decisions and use the measures to see how controlling them positively or negatively impacts the other variables. In a nutshell, this concept of ‘balancing’ competing constraints serves as the foundation of how project managers think and make decisions throughout the project life-cycle.

As you can see, this fundamental concept of define, measure, and control within project management is applicable in managing a multi-million dollar project, a home remodel project, or a more personal endeavor, such as earning a bachelor degree in four years. So, give it a try and practice it.

Kan Wang