Project Management for Modern Managers

Today the boss made you the company's official project manager; today was also the first time you'd heard of project management. Now what do you do? Well, don't freak. Project management simply means handling all the components of a given project: assigning people to interrelated tasks, obtaining and parceling out necessary materials, meeting deadlines (or having fall-back plans when deadlines are not met), and keeping an eye on the budget.

To increase your confidence, you can arm yourself with colored pencils and big sheets of paper--or you can let your PC enter the picture. A good PC-based project management package helps you quickly determine whether your plans are feasible, spot potential pitfalls, and track your project to completion. Project management methodology existed long before personal computers, but modern PCs make it easier to wrap your head around some of the more complex concepts.

The first step to getting a project on track (and keeping it there) is determining what sort of project you have; then you can decide what kind of tool you need.

A small project might be a Web site redesign or the development of a marketing campaign. When the time line you're considering is short (six months or fewer) and the number of people and other resources involved is small (a couple dozen or fewer), then maybe a simple schedule of the project is all you need to identify bottlenecks. For small projects, you can plan tasks with software such as FastTrack Schedule 6.03 from AEC Software or Project KickStart 2.0 from Experience in Software. Graphs will help you sort out which tasks are most critical or likely to cause trouble.

Larger projects, such as launching a new product or erecting a building, require more complex tools. If your project is a year-long affair and requires coordinating scores of people or hundreds of materials, you need software that not only creates a schedule but lets you track daily progress. You probably also need to assign workers to tasks, budget and monitor disbursement of funds, and report back to management. For this sort of undertaking, you'll need a full-fledged project management solution like Microsoft Project 98, Primavera's SureTrak 2.0, or Scitor's Project Scheduler 7.6.

To help you decide what you need, I'll begin with a look at the simpler software and then move on to explore the additional features available in the heavy-duty packages. I'll also provide some general project management pointers (software isn't everything, after all), and offer up some tips for the 900-pound gorilla of project managers, Microsoft Project.