Authors: Philip Baguley
ISBN-13: 9780071599870, ISBN-10: 0071599878
Format: Paperback
Publisher: McGraw-Hill Companies, The
Date Published: July 2008
Edition: (Non-applicable)
Phil Baguley learned about project management in a career that included senior line management roles in several multi-national corporations and consultancy in the U.K. and in Europe. He has also lectured on a number of management topics at the Anglia Business School. His writing has included articles for the technical press and many books.
Take charge of your projects with confidence
Do you need to run projects to schedule and to budget? Are you lacking confidence to tackle big projects? Do you need to create a solid team? Teach Yourself Project Management is a practical introduction to this essential skill. It explains and illustrates the what, why, where, when, and how of project management in an accessible format. Jargon-free and based on sound theory, with diagrams, useful ideas and pointers to appropriate methods and tools, it's THE book for anyone who wants to develop the skills of effective project management.
Introduction | 1 | |
1 | Projects, projects and projects | 3 |
Projects old and new | 3 | |
Projects now | 4 | |
How and why | 4 | |
Big or small | 6 | |
Concrete or ideas | 7 | |
Work and play | 7 | |
The Five Fundamentals | 8 | |
Definitions | 10 | |
The project boundaries | 11 | |
The project life cycle | 13 | |
Project priorities | 15 | |
Projects and people | 15 | |
Summary | 16 | |
2 | Which project? | 17 |
Choice | 17 | |
Uncertainty and risk | 18 | |
Identify the risk | 19 | |
Reducing the risk | 20 | |
Yes or No | 22 | |
Choosing | 22 | |
Choosing without numbers | 23 | |
Choosing by numbers | 26 | |
Summary | 29 | |
3 | Your project organization | 30 |
Organizing | 30 | |
Organizations | 31 | |
Structures, leaders and people | 32 | |
Projects and organizations--the differences | 33 | |
What sort of project organization? | 34 | |
Project aspects | 35 | |
Project organizations | 36 | |
The Integrated project organization | 36 | |
The Stand Alone project organization | 37 | |
The Matrix project organization | 38 | |
Your project organization | 39 | |
Project procedures and specifications | 41 | |
Summary | 45 | |
4 | Plans for your project | 46 |
Planning--now or never | 46 | |
Projects and planning | 47 | |
Interdependency | 50 | |
Bars and charts | 52 | |
Networks | 56 | |
Resources | 61 | |
Activity slack | 61 | |
What did we do last time? | 62 | |
Project planning with computers | 62 | |
Summary | 64 | |
5 | Managing your project | 65 |
Management | 65 | |
Managing projects vs day-to-day management | 66 | |
Projects and managers | 67 | |
Leaders and leadership | 68 | |
Project managers and communication | 71 | |
Project communications | 71 | |
Project managers and negotiation | 72 | |
Negotiating and bargaining | 73 | |
Ways and means | 74 | |
Project managers and motivation | 75 | |
Summary | 77 | |
6 | Your project team | 78 |
Why teams? | 78 | |
What is a team? | 79 | |
Good teams and bad teams | 80 | |
How many | 81 | |
Who--and Why | 82 | |
The Team Charter | 84 | |
Team building | 85 | |
Project teams | 87 | |
Summary | 90 | |
7 | Managing your project money | 92 |
Money, money and money | 92 | |
Cost, cost and more cost | 92 | |
Hunches, guesstimates and estimates | 93 | |
Information, data, facts and figures | 95 | |
Top-down or bottom-up | 97 | |
Top-down | 97 | |
Bottom-up | 99 | |
Below and above the line | 100 | |
Budgets | 101 | |
Summary | 103 | |
8 | Monitoring and controlling your project | 104 |
Full steam ahead | 104 | |
Monitoring | 105 | |
Project monitoring--what and when | 106 | |
The project plan and monitoring | 108 | |
Milestones | 109 | |
Limits | 109 | |
ABC analysis | 110 | |
The project budget and monitoring | 111 | |
Earned value | 112 | |
Monitoring--reports and meetings | 114 | |
Controlling | 115 | |
Summary | 117 | |
9 | Solving your project problems | 119 |
Problems, problems and problems | 119 | |
A perfect world | 120 | |
Frequency and consequence | 120 | |
Logic or intuition | 121 | |
A Nominal Group | 122 | |
Force Field analysis | 123 | |
The Ishikawa diagram | 124 | |
Pareto analysis | 126 | |
CUSUM technique | 130 | |
Summary | 132 | |
10 | Closing your project | 133 |
Endings | 133 | |
Closure and the project manager | 134 | |
The closure process | 135 | |
Closing the team | 136 | |
Closing the project data banks | 137 | |
Activity completion | 138 | |
Project outcomes | 139 | |
Project histories | 140 | |
Project audits | 141 | |
Post-project appraisals | 142 | |
Summary | 143 | |
11 | Key issues for project management | 144 |
Key issues | 144 | |
Conclusion | 149 | |
Glossary | 152 | |
Further information | 157 | |
Books | 157 | |
Professional associations | 159 | |
Some useful web sites | 161 | |
Index | 162 |