Project Management: The Characteristics Of A Project Management

Introduction "A project is a temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product or service" (Project Management Institute 2008). Certainly, it can be individually or collaboratively performed. Discovery of new products, running a political campaign, enhancement of old products, modifications in the technique of drilling can all be called projects (Heerkens 2002). Yet, for a project to be taken serious, proper management skills are necessary for its completion. Project Management is the set of skills and techniques applied to a project in order to achieve specific ambitions (Project Management Institute 2008). Since a project is limited in time and unique, having the mastery of project management can give satisfaction, lower expenses and more efficiency to companies. This paper will focus on describing and showing the characteristics of a project management life cycle in a broad context, taking the role of a

For this reason, a project life cycle is a known set of phases that a project manager or a project has to go through considering the project's size and complexity (Heerkens 2002). These phases are referred to as Initiation, Plan, Execution and Completion (Newt 2015). Fig.1 gives a depiction of how this life cycle works. Fig.1: The elements of a simple project life cycle in a diagram (Newt 2015). The initiation phase is the starting point of a project and the most challenging part of a project management. In this phase, the important goals and the structure of the team doing the work is identified (Heerkens 2002). In addition, it is fundamental to set the timeframe and acknowledge the people that will gain or lose off this project. Indeed, this is stage where the questions arise from whether it is a project until the point that is asked what options are given before starting to plan the actual