Project management: analyzing the characteristics and phase of project lifecycle

Author: Iloka Benneth Chiemelie 

Published: 25/1/2014

2. Executive Summary

The subject of project management has gained numerous interests in recent years. The reason for such increase in interest is because of the need for organizations to successfully manage their assigned project as it is positive influencers of increased customer loyalty. Project management has also been associated with quality management because the third phase of project lifecycle in project management involves monitoring and controlling all approaches and process in the project phase. As such, the quality of the project is maintained through standardization.

Thus, this paper will aim to explore the characteristics of project lifecycle and the phases involved in the development of a project. Thus, this paper is basically divided into four sections. The first section is the introduction which provides a background overview of the paper. The second section is the body of the paper which provides theoretical analysis of the topic of discussion. The third section is the conclusion that present a summary of the whole paper. In the final section, recommendations are presented to the respective organizations on how to go about implementing the four phases of project lifecycle.

4. Introduction

Since early 1990s, writers have introduced terms like “modern project management”, “management-by-projects”, “projects cultures” and “beyond the Gantt chart” as a means of distinguishing between the traditional and futuristic form or project management. The common agreement is that project management is transforming into a new paradigm, which incorporate proper regulation or the whole project process in order to ensure high quality of output. The main reason behind such can be the increased pressure on organizations from stakeholders who invest both resources and time in order to ensure that the organization is moving forwards.

As such, it is important to understand the lifecycle of a project in order to ensure that the desired quality is produced throughout all the phases in the project completion and actualization. As such, this paper aims to demonstrate the need of understanding the project management lifecycle by discussing the characteristics and phases of project management. The paper will focus on past theories in relation to the topic of discussion, and adopt these theories in meeting the research objectives by highlighting common characteristics of project lifecycle and the phases involved in project management.

5. Subject background

The field of project management has widened its scope in recent years from the study of a single project to the way organizations can adopt these projects in achieving their set goals (Thiry and Deguire, 2007; Gareis, 1989; 2004; Andersen and Jessen, 2003). Cooke-Davies (2004, p. 1) stated that there is an increasing interest and recognition of project management as involving more than skilful and competent management of individual projects. This is because, project management comprises of set of systems, processes, structures, and capabilities that helps an organization to perform the right project and use it to support the organization.

In recent years, the field of project management has gained increasing interest because organizations now recognize the need for proper management of their project as a tool for increasing brand loyalty by meeting customers demand. When the demands of a customer are meeting, the customers will likely order services from the same organization. Project management has also been linked to benchmarking in competitive environment (Gareis, 2004). Therefore, it can be seen that project management is essentially important and this paper will aim to demonstrate this importance by highlighting the characteristics of project management and the phases involved in successful management of a project.

6.Project lifecycle

Ngoc (2010) defined project management lifecycle as a collection of different phases of a project which are used to designate the purpose of appropriate control, management and operation in a given organization. Project lifecycle are defined in different ways in relation to the projects’ characteristics and the organization in which it is taking place. Notwithstanding the variations, the lifecycles of all projects are designed to link every phases in the project – from its definitive stage to the completion stage. In the project lifecycle, transition between phases are done through some form of transfer technique, handoff or by overlapping phases.

The common outcomes defined through project lifecycle are as listed below (Ngoc, 2010):

1.      What technical work to perform in each phase

2.      When each phase needs to produce the outcome and how they are reviewed, verified and validated

3.      Who should be involved in each phase and what their responsibilities are

4.      Inspection, control and approval

The characteristics of project lifecycle basically depend on the characteristic of the project, but they do share some certain features irrespective of the project. Such features include:

Phases follow defined sequence- transition is made through transfer of technical information or handoff of technical features.

Cost and staffing cycle are at their peak during the intermediate level, and they are generally low during the beginning and ending phase of the project. Figure 1.1 will generally demonstrate the cost and staffing levels throughout the project lifecycle

The level of certainty of completion is ensured when the project is progressing rather than judging from the initial phase.

Stakeholder influence is generally high during the starting phase and will gradually decrease as the project continues to flow. Figure 1.2 is an illustration of stakeholders influence.

Figure 1.Typical project Cost and Staffing level during the project life cycle

Source as adapted from: Ngoc (2010).

Figure 2. Stakeholder’s Influence over time

Source as adapted from: Ngoc (2010).

Four phases of project management lifecycle

Four main elements have been defined by Dr. Walter Shewhart in the American Society for Quality press in 1999: plan, do, check, act (American Society for Quality Handbook, 2nd Edition) which constitutes the phases involved in project management. Although they seem to be different elements, they are actually performed interactively. In any case, all projects are managed and implemented individually as a result of differences of the factors that might impact on the management process and outcome of the projects. These aspects can be related to the project in terms of size or complexity of the project; experience or professional level of the team; access to resources; project management organization structures and other factors.

Figure 3: Four Phase of Project Management Lifecycle

Source as adapted from: The George Washington University (2013)

From the above diagram, it can be seen that while the four phases are different and undertaken individually, they are actually linked together with the controlling and monitory phase which starts from the beginning of a project to the end of a project. Additionally, the whole process involves activities which link the ending of a specific project to the beginning of a new project. For instance after idea generation and proposal of the project which fall under initialization, the next steps is planning how generated ideas will be incorporates into the project and used to meet the overall objectives of the project design. These phases will further be explained in detailed below.

Initialization stage: define the project and project phases

This is the first step in starting a project. It aids the formalization of authorization process to begin a new project (Ngoc, 2010). Before initiating the project, documentation will be undertaken through research in order to decide how the project will be undertaken. This documentation phase also include the basic description of the project scope, the expected outcomes, the duration of the project, the forecast of resources to be uses in the project etc.

This stage also helps to initiate the whole process to be undertaken in the project and group them into phases. The whole process will be reviewed, after which it is decides whether the project is ready to be continued or if there is a need for revision of the process, delay in the start-up date or for the project to be stopped entirely. This stage occurs numerous times sequentially in order to improve the shared ownership, satisfaction and delivery level, customers and stakeholders are usually mostly active during the initiation phase. The outcome of this phase is a definition of the purpose of the project, objectives and authorization towards the start of the project or project phases.

In the initiation phase, there are two main project purpose presented in this stage as:

Development of project charter – this process is used to highlight the business needs and the satisfaction that the project of a new product or services is expected to fulfil. The charter serves as the bridge between the proposed project and the operation that is currently going on the organization. It is also used to authorize the work and the start of the project of project phases.

Development of primary project scope statement–this is the process that precedes the development of project charter process. This development puts into consideration the process and documentation of the projects, deliverable requirements, products/services requirements, boundaries of the project, and methods of acceptance and scope of control. In relation to the new project phase, this process makes available the validation and refining action to the whole project scope.

Planning phase: defines and refines the objectives of the projects, and determines the necessary actions to be taken in order to achieve the goals

This stage involves the development of the project management planning. The main focus of this phase is to identify, define and nature the project scope, project resource investment, and schedule the activities that will take place throughout the project phase. Numerous authors have stated that the planning process doesn’t just occur at the beginning of the project, but can also be revised at any stage during the process of completing the project(see Cleland, 1994; Gareis, 1992; Firth and Krut, 1991; Chaffey, 1997; Maylor, 2001). In order to ensure accurate and effective information about the schedule of activities, resource investments, available resources, risk, technology and a host of other factors that influences the project lifecycle, there is a need for the planning process to be updated in relation to the changes and approvals that might change during the project process. The frequency of interaction in planning process varies in relation to the nature of the project.

Also, the level of influence of the stakeholders might have a huge impact on the project process, and there is a great need for the stakeholders to be fully informed. The project teams should include and encourage the appropriate stakeholders in the planning process as their skills and knowledge may influence their level of contribution in the project planning and management.

The planning phases oversee the following aspects of project management plan (as adapted from Ngoc 2010):

1.      Development of project management plan–definition, preparation, integration and coordination of all subsidiary plans into the project management plan. It is the primary source of information for other processes: executing, monitoring and controlling, and closing phases.

2.      Planning of scope – this involves the creation of scope for the management of the project, which will also document the definition, verification, and controlling of the project scope.

3.      Definition of scope – involves the development of detailed approach for future decision making process in the project’s lifecycle.

4.      Creation of work breakdown structure – involves the subdivision of main deliverables in the project and project tasks into smaller and easy to manage groups.

5.      Activity definition – involves the identification and definition of the specific tasks that need to be undertaken in order to produce the necessary goods and services.

6.      Activity sequencing – involves the identification and documentation of all dependencies among the schedule activities.

7.      Activity resource estimating –projects the time and quantity of necessary resources required to complete the project.

8.      Activity duration estimating – projects the amount of time required to perform individual schedules in the project process.

9.      Schedule development - analyses the amount of work, time and resource necessary for creating the project schedule.

10.  Cost estimating -projects the cost for completing the whole project – including cost of all resources to be used and activities to be undertaken.

11.  Cost budgeting - aggregates cost estimating of every individual activity to produce the cost baseline.

12.  Quality planning –highlights the appropriate standard to maintain quality and identifies the approach to ensure that such standard is maintained.

13.  Human resource planning – identifies the roles and responsibilities of each person in the project management process, and creates approach for the project management.

14.  Communication planning –analyses the information to be communicated to the stakeholders.

15.  Risk management training –determines the method and approach for planning and executing project risk management.

16.  Risk identification – highlights as well as document possible risks that might affect the project process.

17.  Qualitative risk analysis - assesses and combines the possible occurrence of risk and puts this analysis into properly consideration during decision making.

18.  Quantitative risk analysis –identifies and numerically analyses the potential influence of the risk in the project management process.

19.  Risk response planning – develop the approach to reduce the influences of identified risks on the project lifecycle.

20.  Plan purchases and acquisitions –determine the object and options that needs to be purchases as well as the time required for the purchase.

21.  Plan contracting – documents the products, services and required results for attracting potential sellers.

Execution phase – determines the process for assigning staffs specific tasks to carry out the project management plan

The execution phase puts to process the works that have been identified in the planning phase, in order to fulfil the project requirements. According to the project management planning, this phase is designed to coordinate the human resource, integrates and executive the scheduled activities. In this process, the project is designed to identify other subsequent projects. Throughout the entire execution phase, certain revision on the project management planning might occur as a result of numerous changes that can arise in the process such as: change in the duration of activities, resource productivity and availability, risk and so on. Usually, the project base line is changed dramatically during this process.

The execution phase undertakes the following processes (Ngoc, 2010):

1.      Direct and manage project execution – direct the necessary technologies and organization to produce the desired output from a project process. The main contents in this process include information on completion status and it will also appear in the performance reporting system.

2.      Perform quality assurance – involves the performance of quality assurance activities to ensure that the process meets the set standards.

1.      Acquire project team – fulfilling the human resource requirement is important in order to accomplish the project process and this element takes that into view.

2.      Develop project team – involves the improvement of competence and interaction between team members in order to ensure full achievement of the project requirements.

3.      Information distribution – involves all necessary activities designed to make sure that appropriate information are made available to the stakeholders.

4.      Request seller responses – gain information about proposal and bids from potential sellers.

5.      Select sellers - review information from the seller response above and use the information to select the right sellers.

Monitoring and controlling phase – it is a repetitive process used to monitor the progress of the project, identify gat between the process and the original plan, and determine the necessary actions to correct the approach in order to meet set objectives

The monitoring and controlling phase oversees the project execution process, and constantly identifies problems that occur during the execution, drafts the necessary correction measures and control all project management process. This phase is designed to continually monitor the performance of the project, identify differences from the project management planning and project corrections in real time. Additionally, the phase performance the controlling process towards changes and problems, in order to usher in the appropriate preventive actions. Monitoring and controlling process is constant during the whole project lifecycle, and it helps stakeholders and team members to understand how well the project has been doing and what is required of them in reviewing, revising and taking extra actions. The phase monitors and controls the whole project interactively, providing feedback between the project phases.

The functions performed by the monitoring and controlling process are as discussed below (Ngoc, 2010):

1.      Monitor and control project work - It involves the collection, measuring and dissemination of the performance information of a project. The process will look into the project’s scope, schedule, resource investment and quality. One of the most common concerns throughout the project management process is risk. There is a great need for timely identification, measurement and reporting of risk in order to ensure that the project management team is able to meet real time corrective actions or review the project management planning.

2.      Integrated change control – this process involves creating, managing and controlling changes that are designed to ensure that the project objectives are meet. It is usually carried out throughout the project lifecycle from the initiation to the closure phase.

3.      Scope verification–puts the acceptance of project deliverables into a formal form.

4.      Scope control - controls the changes that occur in the project scope.

5.      Schedule control – take care of changes in the project schedule.

6.      Cost control – used to control factors that influence changes in the budget and redefine the budget variance in order to ensure that expenditure doesn’t go beyond projected cost.

7.      Perform quality control–monitors the yielded results in relation to the quality standard adopted and performs necessary action to ensure that the outcomes are always in life with the adopted quality.

8.      Manage project team – manages the performance of project teams, provides feedbacks and resolutions, and help in the coordination or the project process.

9.      Performing reporting – collects performance, progress and feedbacks, and distributes them to the respective stakeholders.

10.  Manage stakeholders – manages communication to meet the requirements of stakeholders and to provide them with the necessary support.

11.  Risk monitoring control – identifies risks, drafts the necessary control measure to ensure that the risk factors are mitigated, and revise the approach in order to eliminate such risks.

12.  Contract administration - manages contracts and relationship with buyers and sellers, and reviews their performance.

Closing phase – finalizes the project’s output, and delivers the products/services to the customers and the closes the project

In this phase, the objective is to finalize the whole projects. The closing phase verifies that the project requirements have been meet and delivers the completed products or services to the customer, and terminates the project. The project include closing project – finalize all activities to close the project, and contract closure – completes and settles all contracts with suppliers and buyers.

Interaction of the four phases in project lifecycle

The project management phases are interconnected through the objectives they are designed to produce. This is because; the output of one phase is the input of another. One of the basic characteristic of project management is the discrete identification of all processes as they overlap and interact closely with each other during certain period in the project phase. If the project is divided into phases, the process group may interact with one of the phases or across phases. As stated earlier, every project is different in relation to the purpose of such projects, characteristics, organization and other factors. Thus, the management process of project lifecycles are operated based on these varying attributes. This level of interaction is as illustrated below.

Figure 4: Process groups interact in a project

Source as adapted from: Ngoc (2010)

7. Conclusions

From the above analysis, it has been demonstrated that understanding the project lifecycle is important in order to ensure that the project meet the set requirements. This is because,the phases in project management are designed to ensure that no external obstacle yields unwanted influence in the process of completing the project.

Theorists have described the new emergence of project management approaches as bridging the gap between areas of applicability experiences in the traditional management approach. This have led to the perception of project management as a tool for managing all forms of changes that take places with an organization, and writers have also described it as having the potential to manage different forms of activities.  Examples include the introduction of new organisation strategies (Turner, 1993; Pelligrinelli and Bowman, 1994), business process re-engineering (Levene and Braganza, 1996), and self-managing production, quality, concurrent engineering, product-process design, new business development and benchmarking (Cleland, 1994).

This paper has been able to demonstrate this importance by discussing the four phases involved in the management of a project’s lifecycle. It was described in this paper that there is a need for the management process in a project lifecycle to follow these phases strictly in order to ensure that the desired outcome are achieved. The first phase is initiating the project process, and it involves understanding the desired outcome and drafting the approaches to be adopted in the project process. The second phase is the planning stage, where all the approaches to be adopted in the project are carefully planned. The third stage is the execution phase was all designed approaches are put into action, in order to achieve the desired outcome of the project process. The final stage is control and monitoring stage. This stage however is repetitive in throughout the whole project phase and it involves controlling measures designed to ensure that the project doesn’t shift from its set objectives.

8. Recommendations

In this paper, numerous insights have been delivered in relation to project management and project lifecycle. The delivered insights are in relation with understanding how the project process can be designed to ensure that customer satisfactions are increased by meeting the demands of customers in timely fashion and without fluctuations in the expected outcome of the projects designed to be undertaken by the organization.

In line with the discussions, it is recommended in this paper that organizations desiring to achieve the objectives of their project should endeavour to adopt the four phases of the project lifecycle. This is because, it is designed to ensure that the organization is working in line with the desired outcome presented by the client and to make sure that the final output is as required by the client. It is also recommended that the organizations adopting the project lifecycle should call to mind the need to closely monitor each process in the project management in order to ensure that they are in line with the project objectives. Additionally, monitoring the project lifecycle will help to provide information for supporting the demands of stakeholders as well as critic the performance of the organization in the whole project process.

However, it must be acknowledged that managing the project lifecycle is not an easy task because, numerous obstacles and challenges are usually encountered in the project management process and there is a need for the organization to develop competent workforce that are capable of meeting such challenges. In any case, the second phase which is the planning of the project puts this factor into consideration and proposes that the organization should ensure that the right workforce is deploy as this is essential for maintaining the overall quality of the project outcome. Therefore, it can also be recommended that there is a need for proper management of the workforce as it will help to ensure that the right people are employed to undertake the task, and that the overall outcomes is inline within the set objective. No matter the case, it must also be understood that the approach adopted depends on the characteristics of the project and this also calls to mind the need to the project managers to read full meaning and understanding into the characteristics of each projects before adopting approaches for undertaking the project.

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