The Data-Driven Project Manager (eBook)

A Statistical Battle Against Project Obstacles

Mario Vanhoucke (Autor)

eBook Download: PDF

2018 | 1st ed.
XIII, 158 Seiten
Apress (Verlag)
978-1-4842-3498-3 (ISBN)

Infos

Discover solutions to common obstacles faced by project managers. Written as a business novel, the book is highly interactive, allowing readers to participate and consider options at each stage of a project. The book is based on years of experience, both through the author's research projects as well as his teaching lectures at business schools.

The book tells the story of Emily Reed and her colleagues who are in charge of the management of a new tennis stadium project. The CEO of the company, Jacob Mitchell, is planning to install a new data-driven project management methodology as a decision support tool for all upcoming projects. He challenges Emily and her team to start a journey in exploring project data to fight against unexpected project obstacles.

Data-driven project management is known in the academic literature as 'dynamic scheduling' or 'integrated project management and control.' It is a project management methodology to plan, monitor, and control projects in progress in order to deliver them on time and within budget to the client. Its main focus is on the integration of three crucial aspects, as follows:

• Baseline Scheduling: Plan the project activities to create a project timetable with time and budget restrictions. Determine start and finish times of each project activity within the activity network and resource constraints. Know the expected timing of the work to be done as well as an expected impact on the project's time and budget objectives. 
  
• Schedule Risk Analysis: Analyze the risk of the baseline schedule and its impact on the project's time and budget. Use Monte Carlo simulations to assess the risk of the baseline schedule and to forecast the impact of time and budget deviations on the project objectives. 
  
• Project Control: Measure and analyze the project's performance data and take actions to bring the project on track. Monitor deviations from the expected project progress and control performance in order to facilitate the decision-making process in case corrective actions are needed to bring projects back on track. Both traditional Earned Value Management (EVM) and the novel Earned Schedule (ES) methods are used.
  

What You'll Learn

• Implement a data-driven project management methodology (also known as 'dynamic scheduling') which allows project managers to plan, monitor, and control projects while delivering them on time and within budget
• Study different project management tools and techniques, such as PERT/CPM, schedule risk analysis (SRA), resource buffering, and earned value management (EVM)
• Understand the three aspects of dynamic scheduling: baseline scheduling, schedule risk analysis, and project control

Who This Book Is For

Project managers looking to learn data-driven project management (or 'dynamic scheduling') via a novel, demonstrating real-time simulations of how project managers can solve common project obstacles

Mario Vanhoucke is a professor at Ghent University (Belgium), Vlerick Business School (Belgium), and a senior teaching fellow at UCL School of Management (University College London, UK). He has previously written books about project scheduling, risk analysis, and project control. As a professor and researcher, Mario is constantly looking for better ways to measure, improve, and optimize the performance of projects in progress and their resource efficiency. Mario has a background in operations research and management science, and aims at combining research with practice. As a founder of the 'Operations Research & Scheduling' research group and leader of more than a million euro research projects, Mario sets up collaborations with national and international companies, together with universities in the UK, the USA, and China. He is very active at the Belgian Chapter of the Project Management Institute (PMI) and has been awarded by the International Project Management Association (IPMA). Mario also writes his own project management software tools, both as standalone desktop versions and as integrative tools in company software environments. Mario shares his ideas at various international conferences.

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Discover solutions to common obstacles faced by project managers. Written as a business novel, the book is highly interactive, allowing readers to participate and consider options at each stage of a project. The book is based on years of experience, both through the author's research projects as well as his teaching lectures at business schools.The book tells the story of Emily Reed and her colleagues who are in charge of the management of a new tennis stadium project. The CEO of the company, Jacob Mitchell, is planning to install a new data-driven project management methodology as a decision support tool for all upcoming projects. He challenges Emily and her team to start a journey in exploring project data to fight against unexpected project obstacles.Data-driven project management is known in the academic literature as "e;dynamic scheduling"e; or "e;integrated project management and control."e; It is a project management methodology to plan, monitor, and control projects in progress in order to deliver them on time and within budget to the client. Its main focus is on the integration of three crucial aspects, as follows:Baseline Scheduling: Plan the project activities to create a project timetable with time and budget restrictions. Determine start and finish times of each project activity within the activity network and resource constraints. Know the expected timing of the work to be done as well as an expected impact on the project's time and budget objectives. Schedule Risk Analysis: Analyze the risk of the baseline schedule and its impact on the project's time and budget. Use Monte Carlo simulations to assess the risk of the baseline schedule and to forecast the impact of time and budget deviations on the project objectives. Project Control: Measure and analyze the project's performance data and take actions to bring the project ontrack. Monitor deviations from the expected project progress and control performance in order to facilitate the decision-making process in case corrective actions are needed to bring projects back on track. Both traditional Earned Value Management (EVM) and the novel Earned Schedule (ES) methods are used.What You'll LearnImplement a data-driven project management methodology (also known as "e;dynamic scheduling"e;) which allows project managers to plan, monitor, and control projects while delivering them on time and within budgetStudy different project management tools and techniques, such as PERT/CPM, schedule risk analysis (SRA), resource buffering, and earned value management (EVM)Understand the three aspects of dynamic scheduling: baseline scheduling, schedule risk analysis, and project controlWho This Book Is ForProject managers looking to learn data-driven project management (or "e;dynamic scheduling"e;) via a novel, demonstrating real-time simulations of how project managers can solve common project obstacles

Inhalt

Contents 5
About the Author 6
Acknowledgments 7
Introduction 8
Chapter 1: Background 11
Emily Reed (the Protagonist) 12
GlobalConstruct Ltd. (the Company) 12
Chapter 2: Plan 14
Project Details 14
Next Meeting 17
Assignment 19
Times Change 20
Activity Analysis 22
Network Analysis 27
Project Analysis 31
Critical View 35
Chapter 3: Risk 37
Project Plan 38
Risk Sheet 41
About Statistics 44
Assignment 47
New People 48
Risk Definition 49
Risk Classification 52
Risk Analysis 55
Time Machine 59
Evaluation 66
Chapter 4: Buffer 69
Resource Management 70
Buffer Management 72
Assignment 74
Uncomfortable Entrance 75
Leveling (Mark’s approach) 75
Buffering (Emily’s approach) 78
Review 88
Decision Review 89
Chapter 5: Monitor 91
Project Status 92
Reporting Progress 97
Assignment 99
Expanding Knowledge 100
Collecting Data 103
Planned Data 103
Progress Data 106
Measuring Performance 109
Predicting the Future 114
Evaluation 118
Chapter 6: Control 119
Progress Spreadsheet 120
Assignment 123
Project Control 126
Warning Signals (Alarm) 129
Detect Problems (Focus) 132
Action Time (Shoot) 136
Control Efficiency 138
Experimental Learning 141
A Bright New Future 146
Chapter 7: Exciting Times Ahead 148
Chapter 8: Afterword 151
Chapter 2: PLAN 153
Chapter 3: RISK 153
Chapter 4: BUFFER 154
Chapter 5: MONITOR 154
Chapter 6: CONTROL 155
Before I Leave… 158
Bibliography 159
Index 161

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 27.3.2018
• Zusatzinfo: XIII, 158 p. 25 illus.
• Verlagsort: Berkeley
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Sachbuch/Ratgeber ► Beruf / Finanzen / Recht / Wirtschaft ► Bewerbung / Karriere
• Themenwelt: Wirtschaft ► Betriebswirtschaft / Management ► Marketing / Vertrieb
• Themenwelt: Wirtschaft ► Betriebswirtschaft / Management ► Projektmanagement
• Themenwelt: Wirtschaft ► Betriebswirtschaft / Management ► Unternehmensführung / Management
• Schlagworte: baseline scheduling • buffering • Decision-Making • earned schedule • Earned Value Management • Project Control • Project Management • Resource Management • Schedule Risk Analysis
• ISBN-10: 1-4842-3498-7 / 1484234987
• ISBN-13: 978-1-4842-3498-3 / 9781484234983