1. ITC493 - Information Technology Project Management

2. Question 1. What are your overall responsibilities as an IT project manager?

3. My overall responsibilities are pretty much controlling the project from beginning to end. From meeting with the stakeholders to defining the scope of the project, to getting a handle on what resources from within the client business we have at our disposal, to assigning tasks to the different people at our disposal. Basically it is driving the project bus, making sure we hit all the stops, keep moving on time and on budget, getting the most from the passengers on board and arriving at the pre determined destination.

4. What day to day tasks does an IT project manager carry out? Question 2.

5. The day to day tasks can vary according to the project at hand, but generally speaking once the project gets the go- ahead the day will normally begin with a morning meeting with as many team members as possible to discuss progress, report on issues, and to confirm tasks completed. Things change, and things certainly dont always go to plan despite everyones best intentions so it is at the daily meetings where red flags can be raised to communicate to the team when things have gone off track or are about to. As well as the various meetings, email is an important tool which is used to communicate the day to day of the project. Communication is probably the lynchpin to the project. Communicating what is actually required to the team from the project sponsor and stakeholders and communicating progress or the lack of it within the team as the project develops

6. What project management tools have you used in the past week? Question 3.

7. Pretty much I use Microsofts Project exclusively. I would probably consider email and an iPhone to be project management tools as well to be honest.

8. What framework (methodology) do you generally use and why? Question 4.

9. The framework used would best be described as PMBOK I suppose. It is the one I have trained in and used routinely. I am aware of other methodologies including Prince for example, but once you get your head around PMBOK it is a very logical way of structuring how things should be done.

10. Does choice of framework (methodology) have an impact on project success? Question 5.

11. I think that generally speaking the PMBOK is pretty much the way to go with generalised IT projects. I havent used the prince methodology so I cant say if it would lead to a better success rate, but obviously we arent going to use more appropriate for software development when undertaking a server upgrade.

12. What is the difference between a good (successful) IT project manager and an average IT project manager? Question 6.

13. Obviously completing the scoped project on time and on budget more often than not would help. Sometimes though a project can be completed for a host of reasons and the ability to see that project cancellation is the best or only option is something which needs foresight and bravery. The ability to make that difficult decision and not continue on blindly hoping would separate good project managers from average ones.