Characteristics of project management play a vital role throughout the project for the project’s success. So, this article will guide you regarding the seven characteristics of project management, how you manage them, and their benefits.
Table of Contents
What Is Project Management?
Project management is a complex process in the business world. Therefore, project managers play a vital role throughout the project life cycle, including ( According to the PMBOK) initiating, planning, executing, monitoring and controlling, and closing. During these phases, project managers use various tools, techniques, and methodologies to meet the project requirements and achieve acceptable outcomes effectively and efficiently.
As a project manager, you must understand the characteristics of a project because they are crucial to having a successful approach to project management. So, let’s discuss the characteristics of the project management.
7 Characteristics of Project Management
Every project is bound by its own limits, specifications, and characteristics. Therefore, project managers must clearly understand the characteristics of a project because that helps them identify the project objectives. On the other hand, this helps the senior management team to decide the project’s triple constraints, including cost/budget, time/schedule, and scope/activities.
The following are the most crucial characteristics of project management.
- Project Objectives
Before beginning the project, project managers should define project goals and objectives to achieve acceptable project outcomes effectively and efficiently. Simply put, project objectives help managers to define what needs to be achieved and describe desired outcomes.
The project objectives are vital characteristics of project management because they help managers analyze the project’s progress. On the other hand, it provides crucial results to show how much of the project has been accomplished. As a result, you can determine how many resources are required for further activities.
- Project Time
Every project has a specific time-bound. It helps to assign certain deadlines and milestones to achieve acceptable project activities or deliverables within the budget and scope. Before executing the project, project managers plan their tasks and activities according to the project’s timeline based on the available resources and the capacities of the team members. To ensure that everyone works independently on necessary project tasks.
However, project managers should track the project schedule to stay within the budget and scope. As well as they can use project management tools or software to track project schedules efficiently.
- Project Life Cycle
Every project has a life cycle for completion. According to the PMBOK, the project life cycle can be defined as follows,
- Initiating
- Planning
- Executing
- Monitoring and controlling
- Closing
These phases are vital because they provide a great way to guide your project in the right direction, stay on the right track, and end up in the right place. Furthermore, each phase has its own tasks and activities to achieve project deliverables. During these phases, project managers will define the essential requirements and criteria to complete the project. Those are as follows,
- Project goals and objectives
- Identify the budget and resources they will need
Furthermore, project phases keep the project tasks actively moving toward succession. So, this is another vital characteristic of project management.
- Possible Conflicts
Typically, every project may occur conflicts due to various reasons. Therefore, project managers should have conflict management skills to protect project and team members. However, conflicts are uncountable, but you should have a good sense to address them. By using the right information, you can minimize the arising conflicts. Then, you can ensure your team members’ productivity.
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Furthermore, conflict is a vital characteristic of project management because conflicts can negatively impact project triple constraints. Therefore, project managers must have good knowledge of managing conflicts.
- Flexibility
Flexibility is another vital characteristic of project management. While planning project tasks and activities, project managers should ensure the project’s schedule is flexible and determine it has enough time to adapt to changes and completion.
The more flexible project schedules will help project managers acquire better results concerning the changes.
- Team Spirit
This spirit is another required characteristic of getting the project outcomes because every project constitutes different members having various attitudes and skills. Therefore, to achieve common goals, team spirit is vital.
- Risk and Uncertainty
As a project manager, you should analyze the project’s progress because you can address risks and uncertainty. Typically, project managers use various project management tools and software to analyze and forecast project status. So, this is another vital characteristic to identify and mitigate unknown risks of the project.
How Do You Manage Project Characteristics?
Project managers can manage and control the project characteristics of their project by using a variety of tools and techniques. The following are some tools and techniques for effectively managing project characteristics.
- Project Management Software
Project managers can use project management software to manage project characteristics efficiently. Project management software has many features, such as planning and scheduling project tasks. Here are some vital software for managing your project.
- Asana
- Trello
- JIRA
- Monday.com
- Microsoft Project
This software will help project managers to manage their project characteristics effectively and efficiently. However, before introducing new tools to the project team, you should ensure whether they can adapt to it or not.
- Project Management Templates
Project management templates will need you throughout the project life cycle, including project charter, project plans, communication plan, RACI chart, statement of work, and risk assessment templates.
As a project manager, you can use these templates as helpful tools to ensure project characteristics such as objectives and risk analysis and more during the project life cycle.
- Collaboration and Communication Tools
Collaboration and communication tools are vital components of a successful project. These tools help project managers effectively communicate with project team members, senior managers, and stakeholders. For instance,
- Microsoft Teams
- Slack
- Trello
- Zoom
- Skype
- Google Hangouts etc.
What Are the Benefits of Project Characteristics?
Here are some benefits of using project characteristics effectively and efficiently.
- Project characteristics help project managers identify project scope. However, before defining the project scope, they must describe its objectives. Then, managers can identify the project scope and objectives to achieve project acceptable outcomes. Furthermore, it will help them determine the resource requirements for the project.
- Project characteristics will help you manage and control the project’s complexity. To do that, you must understand project objectives because it will help you determine and control the complexity of project tasks.
- By understanding a project’s characteristics, project managers can determine the right approach and most suitable project management strategy. On the other hand, it will help them increase the chances of the project’s success and profitability.
Conclusion
Every project has numerous characteristics that are vital for the project’s success. Before applying these characteristics to your project, you should clearly understand them to achieve desired outcomes effectively and efficiently. As discussed above, the project characteristics play a crucial role throughout the project, including project objectives, project time, project life cycle, possible conflicts, flexibility, team spirit, risks, and uncertainty.
