Barriers To Effective Project Management

This chapter provides an insight into various studies conducted by researchers in the field of project management, as well as explained terminologies with respect to the effectiveness of project management in the public sector. This section also describes various critical success factors and barriers to effective project management. In addition, the chapter provides a resume of previous studies closely related to the research topic.

2.2 Project

There is no one universal definition for project. Many leading researchers have defined project in different aspects. Tuman (1983) defines a project as “an organisation of people committed to a specific purpose or objective. Projects generally involve large, expensive, unique, or high risk undertakings

Thus, it is very important to apply the project management principles. As per PMI (2013), project management is the application of know-how, skills, tools and techniques to project activities to meet project requirements. Project management is about directing and coordinating human and material resources throughout the life of a project to achieve project objectives within specified constraints. Alike, Kerzner (2003) defines project management as the planning, organizing, directing, and controlling of organisation resources for short term objective that has been established to complete specific goals and objectives.

Project Management is the application of knowledge, skills, tools and techniques to project activities to meet project requirements. Project management is accomplished through the use of the processes such as: initiating, planning, executing, controlling, and closing. It helps to clarify goals and determine problem areas and risk. It also helps to segregates activities for easy monitoring and controlling of project results.

According to PMI (2013), project management know-how is drawn from the following ten knowledge

In other words, time management ensures that the project is completed within predetermine timeframe. It includes the following processes: define activities, sequence activities, estimate activity resources, estimate activity durations, develop and control schedule. The project schedule is developed by using scheduling tools and the outputs from processes to define activities, sequence activities, estimate activity resource and estimate activity durations. The approved project schedule is the baseline that would be used in the control schedule process.

2.3.3 Project Cost Management

Project cost management ensures that the project is completed within approved budget. It includes processes involved in planning, estimating, budgeting, financing, funding, managing and controlling costs. The scope defined at the early stages of the project greatly influence the project cost. Thus, scope definition is critical for proper cost estimation. On some smaller projects, cost estimating and cost budgeting are closely linked and can be viewed as a single process that could be performed over short span of time.

2.3.4 Project Quality