Projects are part of every nation’s progress, or even for personal advancement. These usually happen in a collaborative environment wherein a team in charge is composed of different skills and knowledge that are all essential for the specific goals and objectives to be met. Each has a role to assume, and is expected to work according to expertise for the success of the project.
Difference Between Traditional and Modern Project Management
Modern project management has evolved from traditional approaches that people used to adopt in the past. The development was natural and intentional, in order to address the unique needs of people and organizations nowadays.
Traditional project management is an organized system of processes and techniques, which addresses the common needs using a standard workflow. Outcomes are predictable in this case. The methodologies used in traditional project management are varied, but the results are quite predictable, and issues only arise occasionally. Traditional project management usually deal with long term projects with a standard procedure to observe, or anything with such implication.
On the other hand, modern project management is a customizable and flexible approach to the modern needs. Those that are considered “modern projects” are more sophisticated, demanding and feature-specific. A modern project refers to “single purpose”, or short term projects with unique specifications and results. In modern projects, it is inevitable that a variety of uncontrollable factors can change a plan or course almost immediately. That is why a project manager must include a sound contingency planning, or risk management, to address certain situations that are critical if left unattended for a long period of time. This makes things more complicated for modern project managers, because they do not just deal with the present methodologies for a desired outcome, but also to anticipate any future problems that may arise, and readying the team for it.
Modern project management is usually handled by customized teams, using specialized resources and processes. The requirement for flexibility and customization is widely implemented in modern project management, that even the team members should have the right skills to adapt to varying changes in plans or scope within the project onset. Since it involves dealing with a variety of factors that may arrive to different outcomes, certain skill sets and techniques arerequired to be more effective to achieve success.
Ttechnology has the answer for most of the challenges that modern project management systems are facing. The human aspect of management cannot be omitted, as this involves subjective and objective reasoning that no artificial intelligence can match, but the routine parts involved can be handled by a project management software. But in most cases, a project management tool is of big help in complying with the demanding nature of modern projects.
PLOC for Modern Project Management
In modern project management, the shifts and changes are prevalent on the processes such as the PLOC, or the way people or managers Plan, Lead, Organize and Control. According to the website, blog.mavenlink.com, here are the subsequent changes involved in modern project management in terms of PLOC:
- Planning
Project planning become more flexible in dealing with different sets of requirements, such as budget, time frame and outcome. A modern project manager finds the appropriate resources and workforce that best suits the requirements to execute the project and achieve the desired outcome successfully.
- Leading
A modern project manager should have a diversified set of skills in the relationship, communication and technical aspects necessary in dealing with different types and kinds of workforce. Since the nature of the projects coming have different requirements, some large scale work needs extra hand from the cross cultural labor work force in order to get the desired deliverables. This entails that a modern project manager should be able to communicate and relate well with different people, and create a collaborative working environment where everybody can work harmoniously and effectively despite the differing expertise.
- Organization
Organization requires flexibility and scalability as well. Modern project managers rely on technology to support him with the right tools in executing multiple tasks at once without sacrificing quality and efficiency. These tools focus on time-consuming activities, such as communication management, spreadsheet facility, reporting, tracking and monitoring. By automating these repetitive processes, there is a significant conservation and optimization in the use of resources such as time and budget. It also allows projects to have ample leeways for deadlines and outcome deliveries.
- Controlling
Control is essential in risk mitigation and contingency measures. Since technology has brought in flexibility in many aspects involved in managing a project, a manager gains better control how processes are executed, making it adaptable to changes when necessary. This helps an organization by incorporating technology as an aid for leverage in terms of competition in the outside market.
Technology has brought significant benefits for project managers to address the shifting demands of modern projects.
Qualities of Modern Project Management Organization
- Insight driven
Since project managers rely on technology, they can have greater access and understanding of the data they process providing project managers better insight about their decision-making and competitive levels to be more informed and successful, eventually.
- Collaborative
As an aspect of social project management, the skills and expertise that can be utilized within a project can be diversified. This results in better outcomes because of the multifaceted perspective to different issues.
- People-centric
Another advantage in using project management tools is the required skills and experience are properly matched with the right person, who promotes better motivation and ultimately, better performance and maximize contribution for the project.
- Ultra-efficient
Being able to gather consumer grade information, then combining this with mobility instills a high level of efficiency in terms of executing tasks and collaborating with other team members. In addition, through project management tools, communication is enhanced, which is also vital to stay informed and aligned with the goals and tasks to accomplish.
- Better Control
Utilizing project management software centralizes the platform where processes are incorporated in. This provides a level of visibility allowing team members and manager to monitor and track the performance of the project overall, and apply the necessary changes, if called for, immediately to avoid problems or even before they arise.
Project Management Tools and Techniques
In modern project management, the same techniques and tools are utilized, with an addition of an industry specific task management software.
According to a statistics from the website, Wrike.com, the business aspects that were improved through the use of a project management tool are team communication (52%), quality of final outcome (44%), number of projects completed according to budget (44%), number of projects completed on time (44%) and customer satisfaction (38%).
There are various project management tools and techniques to use according to your needs.
- Gantt Chart – A Gantt chart is used to track and monitor activities and processes involved in a project.
- Critical Path Method (CPM) – This determines tasks involved and flow of the project, which can directly affect the progress and completion of the project.
- Program Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT) – This technique uses optimistic, pessimistic and realistic time to execute a task in determining the actual time of project completion.
- Microsoft Project – This is one of the forefront technology-based project management software that remains one of the most commonly used until today.
- Application Service Provider (ASP) software – A web-hosted, project management software
- Industry-specific software – Pertains to project management tools that are specially curated for specific industries and organizations.
The best project management tools are important involved in the success of modern project management. Technology is vital in instilling flexibility and innovation in the execution of the fundamental principles that traditional project management has developed. Get to know more how different project management tools provide benefits to project managers through CrowdReviews.com’s project management tool reviews.
Keith Moore
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