Key Issues Affecting Projects and Project Management Essay Example
Key issues affecting projects and Project Management
1. Introduction
Projects that have in their scope the exploitation of information and information technology as a mean of achieving development, have emerged in the past 50 years becoming one of the most frequent types of projects under development. But often, mistakenly, the developed software is thought to be the only product of such projects, and once they are completed, the project objectives are considered as fulfilled. But especially in large and broad scoped initiatives, the development or acquisition of the IT software and infrastructure is only one subtask which should be driven by and integrated to the broader set of activities that constitute the whole strategic plan. The IT project management methodology is becoming more and more sophisticated and elaborated, and yet there is a very high rate of failures in IT projects.
This paper aims to discuss some key issues which might underpin the success or failure of a project. The above will be discussed in the light of a real case example. It regards a large company, a bank with a very large IT department, with a strategy that foresees in house development for IT applications. The bank expects to have significant cost cutting through in-house developments. At the same time it aims to achieve quality and flexibility through custom tailored, locally supported software.
Recently there have been major changes in the way IT projects are managed. The changes have significantly contributed in a more consolidated methodology of managing projects and in improved efficiency. Nevertheless new weak points have emerged which can probably be a result of process over-engineering. The discussion in this paper is mostly related to internal organization of projects inside a company; however most of the conclusions can also be applicable to a variety of scenarios. Let’s start with a short review of what were the initial process and the changes made to it,
1. Introduction
Projects that have in their scope the exploitation of information and information technology as a mean of achieving development, have emerged in the past 50 years becoming one of the most frequent types of projects under development. But often, mistakenly, the developed software is thought to be the only product of such projects, and once they are completed, the project objectives are considered as fulfilled. But especially in large and broad scoped initiatives, the development or acquisition of the IT software and infrastructure is only one subtask which should be driven by and integrated to the broader set of activities that constitute the whole strategic plan. The IT project management methodology is becoming more and more sophisticated and elaborated, and yet there is a very high rate of failures in IT projects.
This paper aims to discuss some key issues which might underpin the success or failure of a project. The above will be discussed in the light of a real case example. It regards a large company, a bank with a very large IT department, with a strategy that foresees in house development for IT applications. The bank expects to have significant cost cutting through in-house developments. At the same time it aims to achieve quality and flexibility through custom tailored, locally supported software.
Recently there have been major changes in the way IT projects are managed. The changes have significantly contributed in a more consolidated methodology of managing projects and in improved efficiency. Nevertheless new weak points have emerged which can probably be a result of process over-engineering. The discussion in this paper is mostly related to internal organization of projects inside a company; however most of the conclusions can also be applicable to a variety of scenarios. Let’s start with a short review of what were the initial process and the changes made to it,