Triple Constraints Of project Management

Triple Constraints of Project Management

Research

According to Kathy Schwalbe, Information technology project management (6^th edition), every project can categories according to its scope, time and cost. These sections we referred to triple constraints of project management. For successful project, project manager must care about above constraints.

• ·         Scope – what work will be done in the project?
• ·         Time – how long should it take?
• ·         Cost – what is the project budget?

                                             

Above figure shows the connection of triple constraints. Combination of these 3 it will be made a quality project.  Project manager has to define the project scope before he starts the project. Scope includes all the goals and objectives in the project. He should show a similar project for study and create reports with rough values and a presentation. The important thing is project manager must know how to balance constraints in a 3D table.  Sometimes project team has to change goals or objectives for success project. So sometimes it will increase or decrease the budget. At that time project manager has to know how to manage these three. For example, some projects scope need to get increase because of customer needs. But on other side he needs to concentrate about time and budget. He cannot delay or over budget the project. If he needs to do that he must increase all three simultaneously. Then project quality will high automatically.

(Kathy Schwalbe, 2010)

According to PMBOK 4^th edition, shows project constraints. It did not mention triple constraints straight away.

• ·         Scope
• ·         Quality
• ·         Schedule (time)
• ·         Budget
• ·         Resources
• ·         Risk  

If any constraint changes suddenly project will be unbalanced. As example, sometimes we need to decrease the time because of customer. But we cannot decrease the quality of the project. It is risky for any project. So project manager has to manage risks also. It can be positive or negative but he has to take a risk to balance project constraints. 

Analysis

As human tasks, project needs to be performed and delivered under certain constraints. These constraints referred to “project management triangle” which as triple constraints in triangle sides.  All three sides should be in together. Only one cannot change individually. Quality depends with these three constraints. Straight away we cannot say this method is good or bad. There are several ways of defining constraints. Some resources show this constraints following way.

·         Scope for quality

·         Time for schedule

·         Cost for resources

TAP university website expands it to six like PMBOK. Under resources include human and other all resources.

Conclusion 

Kathy Schwalbe shows the easy way of understanding triple constraints. Inside time project manager has to allocate resources. Without human resources no one can accomplish goals and objectives of the project. In PMBOK 4^th edition has taken resources as a main constraint but Kathy Schwalbe has shown it other way. She has defined only three.

As an example, the chronicles report 2003 showed some major improvement which is based on analysis of 13,522 IT projects. All constraints (triple) estimates had increase from 16% to 34%. Project failure has decreased 31% to 15% and time overruns increased up to 82% of the project. Cost overruns for approximately half of projects decreased from over 180% to 43%. From above points we can say project management helps to improve project quality. It is the easy way to do a project. Everyone knows their tasks. Then they can work according to plan which is created by project manager. 

Reference 

• ·         The Standish Group, 2012, Mendeley [online] Available at: http://www.mendeley.com/research/chaos-chronicles-v30/ [Accessed on 26^th of March 2012]

• ·           Pmstudent, 2012. What Is A Project?  [Online] Available at: http://pmstudent.com/what-is-a-project/  [Accessed on 19 March 2012]

• ·      PMBOK Guide, 2008. A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge, Fourth Edition.

Project Management

Project Management

Project

According to PMBOK a project is a temporary endeavor undertaken to create unique product, service or result. Temporary means it has a beginning and end. There are no of characteristics in the project.

·         Complex and numerous activities.

·         Unique

·         Finite

·         Limited resources and budget

·         Many people involved, usually across several functional areas in the organizations.

o   Under this project can divide into three layers, project environment, external and internal environment. Under these layers all the people include which are connected with the project.

·         Sequenced activities.

·         Goal

·         End product or service must result.

Project management

According to PMBOK project management is the application of knowledge, skills, tools and techniques to project activities to meet the project requirements. Project management is accomplishing according to five processes. There is initiating, planning, executing, monitoring/controlling, closing. A project typically includes requirements, plan, constraints (scope, budget, risk, quality, schedule and resources). All above constraints should balance in the project. Otherwise project manager (Leader of the project team) will not achieve its goals successfully.

Advantages and disadvantages of the project management

·         The project will be done according to the requirements, finished on time and within the allowed budget. (Alex, 2009)

This is the main advantage of project management.

·         Project management learning website says there are three kinds of advantages in the project management. There are overhead, obsession and non creativity.

Conclusion

Project management helps organizations as a tool to execute projects efficiently and effectively. These methods do not give complete successful project. However project management can arrange project events according to customer requirement. For this project managers use tools and techniques to draw a clear plan. Then other team members can work according to manager’s plan. When they start working on a project team will know all the steps of the project.

The important thing is there should be only one project manager. Otherwise team members will be confusing with two project managers. We are planning to go direct way but it is not practical. Risks, cost, budget and other constraints will change while project working. So it is better to have plan for the project. Then only team knows the point that they can change. It reduce risks as well as increase the quality.