Many have attempted to define project management. One example, Oisen, referencing views from the 1950’s, may have been one of the early attempts.
Project Management is the application of a collection of tools and techniques (such as the CPM and matrix organization) to direct the use of diverse resources toward the accomplishment of a unique, complex, one-time task within time, cost and quality constraints. Each task requires a particular mix of these tools and techniques structured to fit the task environment and life cycle (from conception to completion) of the task.
Notice in the definition are included some the success criteria, The Iron Triangle. Those criteria for measuring success included in the description used by Oisen continue to be used to describe project management today. The British Standard for project management BS6079, 1996 defined project management as:
The planning, monitoring and control of all aspects of a project and the motivation of all those involved in it to achieve the project objectives on time and to the specified cost, quality and performance.
The UK Association of Project Management (APM) have produced a UK Body of Knowledge UK (BoK) which also provides a definition for project management as:
The planning, organization, monitoring and control of all aspects of a project and the motivation of all involved to achieve the project objectives safely and within agreed time, cost and performance criteria. The project manager is the single point of responsibility for achieving this.
Other definitions have been offered, Reiss suggests a project is a human activity that achieves a clear objective against a time scale, and to achieve this while pointing out that a simple description is not possible, suggests project management is a combination of management and planning and the management of change. Lock’s view was that project management had evolved in order to plan, co-ordinate and control the complex and diverse activities of modern industrial and commercial projects, while Burke considers project management to be a specialized management technique, to plan and control projects under a strong single point of responsibility.
While some different suggestions about what is project management have been made, the criteria for success, namely cost, time and quality remain and are included in the actual description.
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