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Neha Tikoo, Lovely Professional University Unit 14: Project Management

Unit 14: Project Management Notes

CONTENTS
Objectives
Introduction
14.1 What is Project Management

14.2 Deciding on a Project
14.3 Getting Started
14.4 Tracking the Work and the Resources
14.5 Project Management Software
14.6 Project Management
14.6.1 A Real-life Example

14.7 Summary
14.8 Keywords
14.9 Review Questions
14.10 Further Readings

Objectives

After studying this unit, you will be able to:
Know about the project management;
Understand the deciding on a project;
Know about the tools for developing schedules.

Introduction

To increase the output of your laboratory, you can either increase resources–by getting another
grant and recruiting more people to work with you–or make better use of what you already
have. One tool for achieving the latter is project management. Put simply, project management
means allocating, using, and tracking resources to achieve a goal in a desired time frame. In a
scientific setting, goals may include publishing a paper, obtaining a research grant, completing
a set of experiments, or even achieving tenure. While keeping creativity intact, project
management can help reduce wasted effort, track progress (or lack of it), and respond quickly to
deviations from important aims. This unit highlights some of the techniques of project
management and how you can use them.

14.1 What is Project Management

Project management is a series of flexible and iterative steps through which you identify where
you want to go and a reasonable way to get there, with specifics of who will do what and when.
The steps of project management are similar to the components of a grant proposal with a grant
proposal, the probability of success is proportional to the thought that has gone into each part of
the proposal. The reviewers as well as the funding agency staff want to see that you have

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