Integrated Project Management and Control System
Modern software development projects are becoming more and more complex year after year. Currently it is quite hard to manage them. That is why the developers have to come up with new project management systems constantly. Integrated project management and control system is one of them. It is now extremely popular among programmers all over the world. That is why it is necessary to discuss it. However, before doing that, we should give the proper definitions for project management and control in software engineering. It is quite hard to understand the principles of integrated project management and control system without doing that.
Project management in software development is an extremely complex process. Its main goals are to create high quality software products and deliver them to the customers in time. The type of project management may differ from one team to another. That is because of the fact that various software development methodologies require different approaches to project management. Some of them are sequential, like traditional Waterfall. Others are rather iterative. This factor has a great impact on the developers when they choose a project management methodology for a certain project. The process of project management is usually subdivided in three sequential stages. They are common for all software development projects regardless of the methodology you decide to use.
The first stage is called project planning. It is extremely important, because all activities of software developers during every project are based on a plan. The plan is usually formulated at the initial stage of project realization. It must be simple and realistic because its main goal is to define the tasks of the team for the period of project realization and forecast the terms of product delivery. Some software development methodologies don’t have strict project plans. It is typical for Agile methods. However, they still have to plan their iterative cycles. That is why the planning stage of project management is important for them.
The next stage of project management is called monitoring. Its main goal is to detect problems with plan implementation. This stage begins when the plan is formulated and lasts till the end of the project.
The third and the last stage of project management process is called project control. At this stage the team members eliminate all problems associated with plan implementation. After that they should test the final software product to make sure that these problems didn’t impact it.
Now, as we know the definitions of project management and control in software engineering, we can discuss integrated project management and control system.
It is called integrated, because it involves all aspects of project realization in the process of its management. It is also used at all stages of project realization. Traditional Waterfall projects usually have 5 or 7 stages. Integrated project management and control technologies are used at all of them, beginning from the first meeting with the customer and ending with the delivery of final product. The same applies to all iterative cycles of certain Agile projects.
Who is an integrated project manager?
An integrated project manager is a highly qualified specialist. He must take into account all factors that may impact the process of project realization. Usually such factors are: customer requirements, budget and finances, complexity of the future software product, and time frames. However, this is not the complete list. Some factors are hard to forecast, but they also can impact the process of plan implementation.
