The importance of Project Management

Project Management is a means to an end

Project Management is an approach of planning, organizing, and managing resources to bring about the flourishing achievement of specific project goals and objectives. It is the means by which all the many complex pieces of the project puzzle are fit together by applying proactive processes and best practices.

As change becomes a constant, the project management discipline moves to the forefront of organizational capability because change is accomplished through projects. Project Management has emerged as a crucial factor that determines the success of an organization. Whether it is a question of facing an economic crisis or generating large turnover, project management plays a pivotal role in the growth of a firm.

The awesome power of Project Management makes it possible to focus on priorities, track and measure performance, overcome challenges and problems, become flexible enough to adapt to change and achieve higher performance and a higher probability of success in each project.

Effective project management will help: meet or exceed customer expectations, maximize the use of your resources (time, people, money, space, etc.), bring the project to a successful conclusion on time and within budget, document what was done for any need of future reference, and build confidence in your team for future projects.
Project management is applicable to all industries and organizations. All organizations use projects as the way to translate strategies into actions and objectives into realities. Project Management is a competency that leaders can use in their organizations to handle increasing complexity with higher success rates and acceptance, and lower uncertainty and costs.

Project Management also differs from traditional management in that it brings in cross-functional collaboration, governance, execution-discipline, responsiveness, and alignment of organizational elements and procedures with features of end-products of projects. It can help leaders bring in agility in innovation, growth and response to changes in the external environment.

Applying effective Project Management for deployment of strategy and goals can thus provide organizations the following advantages:

• Business advantage through timely achievement of goals, optimal resource utilization and information based decision making
• Competitive advantage through workforce energized by culture of execution and collaboration and customer satisfied by getting the “right” results reliably

Through project management executives get accurate and timely information so that they can make sound business decisions and make corrections quickly so they can maintain a competitive edge.
Project management becomes a very important and powerful tool in the hands of organisations that understand its use and have the competencies to apply it.