PRINCE2 Project Management

Are you familiar with project management?  Think again.  Based on that question, we ask that you answer the following two questions.  Determine the answers to those two questions.  See if you can answer them in the affirmative, and remember that it doesn’t matter whether your answer is one or 100% correct.  You are only looking to correctly answer both of these. As on a PRINCE2 practitioner Course with exams.

Project management itself is a very big subject.  We will keep the following article to the following three main areas: project cost control, project quality control, and project procurement.  Did you answer yes mostly to all three of the above questions or were your answers mixed?  The differences are that a mixed category could be due to a lack of knowledge on how to respond.  You could also be contaminated with the answer that you want to give.

Project cost control is never a core project management function.  As we stated in the opening of this article, it is also the least cutfeature of most project managers.  In fact, project cost control, if one even exists, is purely an internal process that helps a manager control the budget.  The larger projects could benefit from slight changes to the process of managing the budget.

Project quality control follows the same lines.  Once again, it is an internal function.  Most project tools are not designed for quality control.  They are designed to perform other core project management functions.  This means that you will always be managing quality.

Project procurement is a very broad topic.  There are many articles that rate project procurement as being a core project management responsibility.  The reality is that one of the areas most responsible for a successful project isn’t actually an option in most of these articles.  Good luck finding one!  Whatever your opinion of procurement, you will never be able to say that your organization does not have any good or bad tools for it!

If you are still confused, remember that project management itself is a very large subject.  The project that you are most likely to be good at is acquiring the knowledge to be able to perform your core function of bringing projects into reality.  The other three areas will go away every time.  levels of expertise and increase in complexity.  That is not to say that you will never become good at it.  But if that is the case, you are going to have to dedicate so much time to it that it may eventually become demotivating and Standard Operating Procedure for your organization.

Sooner or later it will become part of a job that is no longer a part of something fun, productive, and exciting.  You may find that your company is shrinking.  Most organizations are flat so think this is where projects become activity.  By that time they all drain your energy, if they ever have!

Use Project Management any way you can.  It will lead to improved customer satisfaction.  Statement of work characteristics could be better.  Get your tools ready for times when they are needed.  Use them when necessary.