TABLE OF CONTENTS What makes a project a project?
A project involves using exactly the same skills that you use in everyday routine work planning, working alongside others, managing a variety of resources, reporting and so on.
It isn't defined by its size because this can vary enormously. Furthermore, it would seem that there is little similarity between a project to replace the office furniture, which will take two months, and a project to build a six-lane road bridge across a major river, which will take two years.
However, all projects, as you will explore in this first theme, do share common characteristics and have the same life cycle.
You will:
Identify the differences between a project and routine work
Consider the work of the project manager
Consider the different stages of the project life cycle.
Let's begin with a definition of what a project is:
A project is a temporary endeavour involving a connected sequence of activities and a range of resources, which is designed to achieve a specific and unique outcome, which operates within time, cost and quality constraints and which is often used to introduce change.
Source: Lake (1997)
To take the key points one by one:
It is temporary: it has a clearly defined and agreed start and finish date.
It involves a connected sequence of activities: however short and localised, or long and complex, a project will have a specific set of activities that are linked together and interdependent.
