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Project Management Offices according to PMBOK® Guide – Sixth Edition

The PMBOK Guide defines project management offices as an organizational structure that standardizes the project-related governance processes and facilitates the sharing of resources, methodologies, tools, and techniques.

Simply put, PMOs are in place to help project teams succeed by providing some best practices and unified standards that help to comply with the organization’s needs and by helping to direct and flow project work in a variety of ways that can benefit both the project team and the organization.

Generally speaking, there are three types of PMOs that we most often see. These include supporting, controlling, and directing project management offices.

In the case of supporting project management offices, we see a relatively low level of control at the PMO level; rather, the project teams remain largely autonomous in nature. The project management office in these sorts of organizations supplies best practices, training, information, data, and templates that can help the project team to succeed, and also acts as a repository for project information, which is important, given the fact that our project team will disband once we’ve met our objective successfully or have decided to move on from the project for other reasons.

A controlling project management office, on the other hand, institutes a moderate level of control over the project teams that work through it. This includes required compliance to methodologies, frameworks, or governance styles that might exist within the organization rather than simply providing templates that serve as an option but still leaves management within those boundaries to the project manager.

Third is a directing project management office, which assumes a higher level of control than the other two within each project team. There’s a high degree of direct control over each project’s management.

This could include directly assigning project managers to each individual project as well as controlling the resources available to those project managers and setting the tone and direction for how those project managers should manage their work. Regardless of which type of PMO most closely fits the one you might be familiar with in your organization, project management offices work to facilitate project success.

They may assign project managers to projects directly and certainly serve as a resource for project teams. Among the various functions that project management offices offer include maintaining standards and practices for project teams as well as curating tools and templates that can be used by them, archiving documents are artifacts for future use by either this project team or others in the organization, as well as developing key performance indicators and metrics that can be used to understand project performance and control.

In addition, project management offices can define governance policies for each project team as well as coordinate overall resources within the organization. Project management offices may also establish deliverables, especially if they serve as the project sponsor.

Finally, measuring the aggregate performance of projects is also an important role of PMOs, helping to rank how well projects are doing and to understand where additional attention by the organization might be necessary, either in the form of better leadership or an increased level of resources to help that project team meet their goals.

One thing project management offices don’t do is manage projects directly. That, of course, is the purview of the project manager, who focuses on completing specified objectives, while the project management office is more concerned with major changes in scope and direction that may take place as the result of shifting priorities, different changes in the product environment and so forth.

From a control perspective, the project manager has some level of a direct authority over the resources that have been assigned to their project, while the project management office focuses on dispensation and optimization of these resources between a variety of project teams.

As far as management goes, the project manager focuses on managing their project constraints: time, cost, quality, resources, scope, and so forth, while the project management office, on the other hand, focuses on creating the tools and methodologies that can be used to help project managers achieve those goals, establishing the standards that might be in place for the organization, understanding risks that impact the project and the organization at large, and the interdependencies that we may see between various projects.

Programs and Portfolios according to PMBOK® Guide – Sixth Edition

According to the PMBOK Guide, program management focuses in the interdependencies within a project in order to determine the optimal approach for managing the project. Simply put, programs are bunches of projects that are all together and interrelated in some sort of capacity.

We see them roll into a program for more efficient management and so that resources can be shared between them. Oftentimes, by working in a program management structure, we can obtain benefits that are not available by simply managing projects on an individual basis.

These focus on project interdependencies, areas where resources might be able to be combined or used, areas where scope might interlap between projects and more. Program management finds the optimal combined approach to accomplishing several interrelated projects in the way that’s most efficient for the organization as a whole.

Portfolio management, on the other hand, is defined as the centralized management of one or more portfolios in order to achieve strategic objectives.

These portfolios can consist of both programs and of projects. Oftentimes, we may see a complex program broken down into not only several different projects but also subprograms as well that may have projects of their own.

In other cases, the structure may be more simple in nature with a single program and several projects running underneath it. In other case, we may have projects that are important to the organization but don’t share enough in common with other projects in order to merit a program relationship.

As such, we could consider those projects part of the portfolio, just as much as we do those that roll through a program first.

Let’s take a look at a more real-world example here using our fictitious rocket company, Apogee Ventures. Here, we might see that there are a number of different large-scale programs within our organization.

We’re focusing on manned launches in the future as well as on commercial payloads like satellites that we can take to orbit in addition to shared systems that may be able to help both of these as well as other opportunities that we may have to grow the business in the future.

Further, we may have a separate project that doesn’t roll directly into any of these but instead is focused on building our brand, both with the public at large as well as with the government agencies and corporations that may serve as our customers for launch missions moving forward. Within each of these different programs, we might see a variety of separate projects, as well as a variety of different subprograms.

Here, the capsule, life support system and platform integration might all be considered separate projects under the manned program, while under mission development, a subprogram, we might also see mission training and orbital science listed as separate projects.

As far as commercial payload goes, we may have payload certification, satellite development, and pricing model generation all serving different project teams within this program, while for shared systems, launchpad construction might be its own project, while two different phases of rocket development, both on control systems and propulsion, are interrelated enough that we consider using a program to manage both of them together.

Portfolio management works to maximize the value of projects across both programs and projects for the organization. It helps to align programs and projects to what top-level organizational objectives might exist, and help to set organization-wide policies, procedures, and resource allocations that all different project teams and programs would subscribe to.

As you might guess, there’s no optimal method to the way that we structure projects, programs, and portfolios for every organization. Instead, this will vary based on what the organization’s needs might be, the organization structure at large, and what best fits the strategies and objectives that the organization holds.

Achieving objectives using project frameworks, however, leads to more sustainable performance and results, which is why we often see projects working through these program and portfolio hierarchies in order to better manage our resources and to better meet the larger strategic objectives of organizations.

How to avoid Gold Plating?

The goal behind Gold plating is to achieve the happiness of the customer, something that “the users are just going to love.” it doesn’t lead to reaching your business target.

The solution to this problem is the team manager of the project because he has to track every requirement back to its source. The team project manager has to avoid building elements nobody will use.

To avoid Gold plating, first, the management team should avoid adding anything outside the requirements and the scope baseline. Second, we have to see the scope of the project from an outside view. An outside auditor or inspector can easily discover gold plating by comparing the deliverables with the scope baseline of the project.

The inspector can create several checklists to be sure there is no defect on the deliverable.

What happens if the auditor or inspector discovers gold planting of the project scope in the executive phase of the project? We can deal with the gold plating action as a defect on the product or deliverable.

According to the size and kind of defects, the project managers have to choose either reworking the product to fix the defects or going to reject it to the scrap.

What is scope creep in project management?

Changes in the scope of a project are normal, and there is nothing to worry about if the project manager analyzes the effect on schedule, quality, and budget, and obtains an informal verification to do these change.

Unfortunately, the project failure basically comes from a weak scope definition or changes to elements of the scope without approval. The scope creep also affects the schedule and budget of the project, it gives the perception that the project isout of control. As a result, firms miss customer satisfaction and business needs because of scope creep.

To prevent scope creep, the project management team has to use the Work Break Structure (WBS) dictionary. WBS dictionary shows the link between elements. It produces details for each element of the WBS units.

Scope creep happens for three reasons :

a misunderstanding of the project requirements and the definition of the priorities of these requirements.
adding additional features to the project’s scope when the project is already in progress.
poor communication between project managers and the

Scope Creep is viewed as negative for the undertaking or wellbeing of the company and it must maintain a strategic distance from it in all cases.

Here, you roll out a few improvements with no legitimate survey, and in later stages it might cause numerous issues. Afterward, you will need to actualize numerous different switches just to conceal the progressions made in earlier stages.

Keeping mind that if the degree is changed or calendar, and spending plan are likewise modified to mirror the adjustment in extension, it can’t be called scope creep.

Scope creep happens when the extent of the item is changed, and the tasks’ spending plan and timetable stay unaltered. Results of extension jerk may incorporate postponed timetables and cost invasion.

In the event that you don’t control extension creep, then you may have issues with effectively finishing your undertaking, or in extreme cases, it may be cancelled.

Gold Plating Versus Scope Creep

Scope Creep, mostly will happen as a result of the client, partner’s requests for new things, changes e.g.

In any product venture if the client requests more segments in the report which is really requiring process level differences in database table structures.

This will likewise require changes in the coding, improvement of inquiries for reports. It will likewise prompt changes in the configuration of the report. So Project Manager or Project Team is creating doing uncontrolled changes which are influencing time, expense and asset.

Gold Plating, without Stakeholders or clients requesting anything, is when venture group or Project Managers are accepting changes, however it has not been inquired.

A report has been created according to a particular Project Scope record. In any case, the venture group is doing additional endeavors in giving remarkable visuals for this report which is not planned, not asked for but rather the client maylike or dislike it.

What are the differences between Primavera vs MS-Project

Primavera Oracle and Microsoft Project are the most commonly used softwares packages for Scheduling and Controlling in Construction and Development Projects.

P6 is by far more suited for a multi-user, large corporate project structure, particularly where most projects are part of a larger project, or an ongoing corporate management strategy that integrates projects in a networked system, particularly with a lot of shared resources. The three major downsides to P6 are the sharp learning curve, the need for a system administrator, and the overall and ongoing cost.

MS Project is more suited for independent projects, smaller corporations with less projects, a corporate management strategy that separates projects from the business management system, and projects that are largely dependent on external resources. The downsides to Project are the difficulties in integrating multiple resource-related or otherwise multi-level projects, and creating and integrating resource-dependent scheduling and auto-leveling.

These are the main factors that should be considered when selecting your Project Management software.

Below are listed the 13 main differences between Primavera and MS-Project:

To download Free Project Management Templates you can visit www.managementproject.net

Why Use Project Management Tools And Software

Most of the organizations prefer to have qualified employees in order to finish the work in an effective way. As the technology is advancing, it is evident that people will have various options to perform different kinds of tasks in a quick span of time.

It is evident that the modern technology tools are providing convenient options for people to handle different kinds of projects and tasks in an effective way. It is very much important for people to understand the tools and software, which can help them to perform the tasks in a quick span of time.

Why use online project management software?

It is very much essential or people to look for the best online project management software, as it helps people to perform the tasks in a quick span of time. As saving time plays a crucial role in most of the business organizations, it is important for people to look for alternate ways of finishing the task in an effective way. As most of the online project management software is known to provide quality outputs without compromising on the time, it is obvious that people would look forward to using the tool in an effective way.

Gone are the days, where people used to sit and complete the project manually. It is essential for people to understand the better ways of completing a particular project in a quick span of time. As most of the people would prefer to do it manually because of quality and accuracy, it is widely recommended for people to pick the best online project management software in order to use it in an easy way.

It is widely recommended by most of the experts to make use of the modern technology equipment and software, which helps people to perform the tasks in an effective way. As the tools and software are known to perform the work in a quick span of time, it is evident that people would prefer to depend on any of the best online project management software on a regular basis.

Management software that just works!

The Best Project Management Tips

Getting Started – Initiation

Develop a solid business case for your projects. Where appropriate, ensure you obtain senior managers’ agreement before you start the project. Research points out that too many projects are started without a firm reason or rationale. Developing a business case will identify whether it is worth working on.

Ensure your project fits with the key organisational or departmental agenda or your personal strategy. If not, why do it? Stick to priority projects.

Carry out risk analysis at a high level at the initiation stage. Avoid going into great detail here – more an overview focussing on the key risks.

Identify at this early stage key stakeholders. Consider how much you need to consult or involve them at the business case stage. Seek advice if necessary from senior managers

Where appropriate, involve finance people in putting the business case together. They can be great allies in helping crunch the numbers which should give credibility to your business case.

Defining Your Project

Produce a written project definition statement (sometimes called PID) and use it to inform stakeholders – see point 13. This document is ‘your contract’ to carry out the project and should be circulated to key stakeholders.

Use the project definition statement to prevent creep. Use it to prevent you going beyond the scope of the project through its use in the review process.

Identify in detail what will and will not be included in the project scope. Avoid wasting time by working on those areas which should not be included – identify these in the PID.

Identify who fulfils which roles in your project. Document them on the PID. Include a paragraph to show what each person does.

Identify who has responsibility for what in the project e.g. project communications is the responsibility of AD. This helps reduce doubt early in the life of the project.

Think ‘Team Selection’ – give some thought to who should be in your team. Analyse whether they have the skills required to enable them to carry out their role? If not, ensure they receive the right training. Check they are available for the period of the project. NOTE: this includes any contactors you may need to use

Form a group of Project Managers. The Project Manager role can sometimes be very lonely! Give support to each other by forming a group of Project Managers.

Identify who the stakeholders are for your project – those affected and ‘impacted’ by the project. This should be an in- depth analysis which needs updating regularly.

Recognise early in the life of the project what is driving the project. Is it a drive to improve quality, reduce costs or hit a particular deadline? You can only have 1. Discuss with the sponsor what is driving the project and ensure you stick to this throughout the project. Keep “the driver” in mind especially when you monitor and review.

Hold a kick off meeting (Start up Workshop) with key stakeholders, sponsor, project manager project team. Use the meeting to help develop the PID (see Tip 6). Identify risks and generally plan the project. If appropriate hold new meetings at the start of a new stage.

Ensure you review the project during the Defining Your Project Stage – involve your sponsor or senior manager in this process. Remember to check progress against the business case.

Delivery Planning

Create a work breakdown structure (WBS) for the project. A WBS is a key element you will need to develop your plan. It lists out all of the activities you will need to undertake to deliver the project. Post it notes can be a great help in developing your WBS.

Group tasks under different headings once you have a list. This will enable you to identify the chunks of work that need to be delivered, as well as put together the Gantt chart and milestone chart.

Identify dependencies (or predecessors) of all activities. This will let you put together the Gantt and milestone charts. Ensure you write them down otherwise you are trying to carry potentially hundreds of options in your head.

Estimate how long each activity will take. Be aware that research points out we are notoriously bad at estimating. You estimate a task will take 3 days. Identify how confident you are that you can deliver in 3 days by using %

e.g. I’m only 40% certain I can deliver in 3 days. You should aim for 80%. If you do not believe you can achieve 80% then re-calculate

Identify the critical path for the project. The critical path identifies those activities which have to be completed by the due date in order to complete the project on time.

Communicate, communicate, communicate! Delivering a project effectively means you need to spend time communicating with a wide range of individuals. Build a communication plan and review it regularly and include it in your Gantt chart.

Are you involved in a major change project? If you are, think through the implications of this on key stakeholders and how you may need to influence and communicate with them.

Conduct Risk Assessment – carry out a full risk analysis and document it in a risk register. Regularly review each risk to ensure you are managing them, rather than them managing you. Appoint a person to manage each risk.

Develop a Gantt chart and use it to monitor progress against the plan and to involve key stakeholders in the communications process.

Draw up a milestone plan. These are stages in the project. You can use the milestone dates to check the project is where it should be. Review whether activities have been delivered against the milestone dates and take a look forward at what needs to be achieved to deliver the next milestone.

Project Delivery – Monitoring and Reviewing Your Project (Project Governance)

Have a clear project management monitoring and reviewing process – agreed by senior managers – the project sponsor and the project Board, if you have one.

Ensure your organisation’s corporate governance structure and your project management monitoring and control structure are compatible. If you do not know whether this is the case then seek senior management involvement.

Be aware early in the project what will be monitored, how they will be monitored and the frequency.

Keep accurate records of your project not only for audit purposes but to ensure you have documents which enable you to monitor changes.

Use a Planned v. Actual form. It is easy to create – it allows you to monitor how you are progressing with specific tasks – time and money. Link these forms into milestone reviews.

Identify with your sponsor the type of control that is needed – loose or tight or a variation of these, e.g. tight at the start, loose in the middle, tight at the end. Ensure the system you develop reflects the type of control intended.

Agree a system for project changes – have an agreed system for monitoring and approving changes. Use change control forms and obtain formal sign off (agreement) by the sponsor, before action a change. Look for the impact of the change on the project scope as well as the “key driver” – quality, and cost and time.

Appoint someone to be responsible for project quality especially in larger projects. Review quality formally with the client at agreed milestone dates.

Make certain you have agreed who can sanction changes in the absence of your sponsor. If you haven’t agreed this, what will you do in their absence?

Set a time limit for project meetings to review progress. Have an agenda with times against each item and summarise after each item at the end of the meeting.

Produce action points against each item on the agenda and circulate within 24 hours of the meeting. Use these action points to help in the creation of your next agenda.

Review the items on the critical path checking they are on schedule. Review risks, review yours stakeholders and your communication plans and whether you are still on track to deliver on time, to budget and to the required quality standard.

Set a tolerance figure and monitor e.g. a tolerance figure of ±5% means as long as you are within the 5% limit you do not have to formally report. If exceed the 5% limit (cost or time) then you need to report this to the agreed person – probably your sponsor

Report progress against an end of a stage – are you on schedule? Time, cost or quality? Ensure that if something is off schedule the person responsible for delivering it suggests ways to bring it back on time, within budget or to hit the right quality standard.

Develop an issues log to record items that may be causing concern. Review at your project meetings.

See whether you are still delivering the original project benefits when reviewing your project. If not, consider re-scoping or if appropriate abandoning the project. Do not be afraid of abandoning a project. Better to abandon now rather than waste valuable time, money, and resources working on something no longer required. If you close a project early – hold a project review meeting to identify learning.

Produce one-page reports highlighting key issues. Agree the areas to include with the Sponsor before writing a report.

Use a series of templates to support the monitoring process, e.g. milestone reporting, change control, log, planned v. actual.

Apply traffic lights to illustrate how you are progressing – red, amber and green. Use these in conjunction with milestone reports.

Engender honest reporting against specific deliverables, milestones, or a critical path activity. If you do not have honest reporting imagine the consequences.

Closedown and Review

Agree well in advance a date to hold a post project review meeting. Put this onto the Gantt chart.

Invite key stakeholders, sponsor, and project team to the post project review. If the date is in their diary well in advance it should make it easier for them to attend

Focus your meeting on learning – identifying what you can use on the next project. Share the learning with others in the organisation.

Check whether you have delivered the original project objectives and benefits and not gone out of scope.

Make sure that you have delivered against budget, quality requirements and the end deadline.

Understand how well you managed risks and your key stakeholders. Use questionnaires to obtain feedback.

Prepare a list of unfinished items. Identify who will complete these after the project and circulate to any stakeholders.

Hand over the project formally to another group (it is now their day job) – if appropriate. You may need to build this into the project plan and involve them early in the plan and at different stages throughout the project.

Write an end of project report and circulate. Identify in the report key learning points.

Close the project formally. Inform others you have done this and who is now responsible for dealing with day to day issues.

Celebrate success with your team! Recognise achievement, there is nothing more motivating.

General Tips

But what is a project? Why worry whether something is a project? Why not use some of the project management processes, e.g. stakeholder analysis or use of traffic lights to manage your work? They key principle is to deliver the piece of work using the appropriate tools. We use the term project based working to describe this approach.

Get trained! Research points out that only 61% of people have received any project management training.

Ensure you have the buy-in of senior managers for your project. You will need to work hard to influence upwards and get their support.

What about the day job? Projects get in the way and the day job gets in the way of projects! Many people have found that by applying project based working to day to day activities and by being more rigorous on project work, more is achieved.

Identify early on in the life of the project the priority of your projects. Inevitably there will be a clash with another project or another task. Use your project management skills to deliver and your senior management contacts to check out the real priority of the project.

Discover how project management software can help. But, you will need to develop the business case, produce a project definition alongside planning what will go into the software. Many project managers use simple Excel spreadsheets or charts in word to help deliver their project.

The Best Project Management Tools in 2020

Managing a project involves managing people, deadlines, clients, budgets & deliverables at the same time. Not only does it add pressure on your organization’s resources but it also increases the risk of error.

What if a software could automate mundane tasks, improve team engagement, free up resources, send you timely reports and notifications? This will allow you to focus on more important aspects such as business strategy & customer/client satisfaction.

This is where project management tools can make a difference by revolutionizing the way you work and increasing performance and brand equity.

Project Management Software is an ocean with several options available. Which tool do you choose?

We saved you the trouble of searching! Here are the 10 best project management tools online.

1. Monday.com

Centralized collaboration
Customizable workflows
Easy-to-use templates
Data visualization

2. ClickUp

Customizable & intuitive features
3 views (Board, Box & List)
Simple hierarchy
Smart Search” & “Smart Estimates” features that aid productivity

3.Bitrix24

Employee workload management
Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
Social intranet and Gantt charts
Telephone integration

4. Jira

User Stories & Issues creation
Sprints planning
Centralize communications
Real-time team reporting

5. Zoho Projects

Employee workload management
Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
Social intranet and Gantt charts
Telephone integration

6. Clarizen

Reconfigurable & customizable to any scale
Team collaboration
Automated processes, workflows & alerts
Budget tracking & expense management

7. Paymo

Scheduling & monitoring
Team performance dashboards
Integrated project accounting
Task billing

8.Wrike

Task automation
Team collaboration
Custom workflows
Project templates

9. Freedcamp

Scheduling & monitoring
Team performance dashboards
Integrated project accounting
Task billing

10. Basecamp

User-friendly, social media like interface
Message boards
Project performance dashboard
Email, Desktop notifications

Remember

“How do I choose the right project management tool??”

One size does not fit all. Just because certain software is highly rated doesn’t necessarily mean it will meet your requirements. Make sure you clearly define your goals & then select the appropriate software that has features that will help you get there.

The importance of Resource Allocation and Resource Leveling In Project Management

What Is Resource Allocation?

Resource allocation is to assign the needed resources for all construction activities in the required amount and timing.

Work performed on construction requires the utilization of labor, equipment, and materials resources. Shortages in the availability or quantity of any essential resources can affect the performance and project finish date. Therefore, the resource requirements for each activity should be evaluated before a time schedule is put into action. By allocating the labor, equipment, and materials required to perform each individual task on the time schedule, one is able to pre-plan the anticipated resource needs for each workday of the project before the time schedule is put into action.

This total resource requirement is then compared with the quantity on-hand. If the supply on-hand exceeds the requirement, then the time schedule can be worked as planned. If it is found that the demand exceeds supply, then steps need to be taken to ensure that the proper amount of resource will be on hand on the date needed. It should be noted that the Resource Allocation process only determines whether or not there is a problem when comparing resource demand and supply. It won’t state the course of action needed to correct the problem.

What is Resource Leveling?

Resource leveling is a project management technique in which the project start date and end date are adjusted based on resource constraints with the goal of balancing the demand for resources with the available supply.

When performing construction project planning activities, the project manager will attempt to schedule certain activities simultaneously. When more resources such as people or machines are needed than are available, or perhaps a specific person is needed in both activities, the activities will have to be re-scheduled in a concurrent way or even sequentially to manage the constraint.

Project resource leveling is the process of resolving these conflicts. It can be used to make a balance for the workload of primary resources over the course of the projects, usually at the expense of one of the traditional triple constraints (time, cost, scope). When using specially designed project time schedule software like Primavera P6, leveling typically means resolving conflicts of over allocations in the construction project plan by allowing the software (Primavera P6) to calculate delays and update activities automatically.

Project management software (Primavera P6 or Ms Project) leveling requires delaying activities until resources are available. In a more complex organization, resources could be allocated across multiple, concurrent construction projects thus requiring the process of resource leveling to be performed at the firm level. Resource leveling techniques are closely related critical path method calculations. For that reason, total float, activity sequences, and the network diagram logic affect the required resource quantities per time.

Resource leveling Techniques

The critical path is a common type of technique used by project managers when it comes to resource leveling. The critical path represents for both the longest and shortest time duration paths in the network diagram to finish the project. However, apart from the widely used; critical path method concept, project managers use fast-tracking and crashing if things get out of hand.

Fast tracking:

Fast tracking shortens the schedule by overlapping activities that are normally done in parallel. One way of doing this is changing the network logic by using leads and lags. For example, you can change a finish-to-start relationship to a finish-to-start with a lead.

This causes the successor activity to start before the predecessor is complete. You can also change it to a start-to-start or finish-to-finish with a lag. This performs critical path activities. This buys time. The prominent feature of this technique is that although the work is finished for the moment, the possibility of rework is higher.

Crashing:

Crashing looks for cost/schedule trade-offs. In other words, you look for
ways to shorten the schedule by applying more resources or by spending more. The intent is to get the most schedule compression for the least
amount of money. Some common ways of accomplishing this include

Bringing in more resources: Sometimes, more people working, or using
additional equipment, can speed up progress.

Be careful. Sometimes adding resources actually extends the duration because coordination, communication, and conflict actually take more time than they save!

Working overtime: Many times, you can work longer hours or work weekends. However, this is useful only for a couple of weeks. After that, people burn out and are less productive, so this is but a short-term fix.
You also have to take into consideration any union or labor regulations.

Paying to expedite deliverables: This can include overnight shipping and paying bonuses to contractors for early delivery.
You could crash some activities for the childcare center example. For example, you can bring in an extra carpenter, electrician, plumber, HVAC person, or painter and reduce the duration. You can also ask those resources to work more hours (depending on any labor union restrictions).

Bringing in more resources might even reduce the time without increasing cost because the extra resources will shorten the duration. Overtime is usually billed at time and a half, so that option may cost more.

To download more project management resources please visit www.managementproject.net