Any project manager in any business will tell you that strong project management is key to a project’s success, and it is also necessary that you choose a style of project management- and more importantly the right type, so here is a breakdown of three main methodologies in a nutshell to help you choose.
Traditional
Traditional project management takes a phased approach, with a particular sequence of steps being carried out which lead to the completed project. There are usually five components to a project when this methodology is adopted and they are initiation, design, creation, monitoring and closing, although not every project will go through every stage and many projects will require additional stages, such as pre planning or concept designs. When related to software development traditional project management is often referred to the waterfall mode.
Critical Chain Project Management
Critical Chain Project Management has more emphasis on the required resources to complete a project and the tasks that make up this project, and looks at project management with reference to the Theory of Constraints. The Critical Chain methodology is different from the traditional methodology in the way project uncertainty is managed. When using the Traditional Project Management style uncertainty is managed by starting tasks as soon as possible, multi tasking and other time saving strategies, whereas in the Critical Chain model we manage uncertainty by estimating based on averages, using buffers and scheduling backwards from the required completion date rather than forwards from the start date.
Extreme Project Management
Extreme project management is usually used in projects which have a large number of complexities or have many uncertainties. This method of managing a project differs from the traditional methodology as it is much more humanistic and elastic in its thinking. This approach is more focused on managing the human interactions related to the project, rather than the schedules and formality.
Whichever style of project management you decide to use project management software, can help your project run more smoothly. By adopting software with anissue tracker you can react to issues more efficiently.