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One of my favorite quotations associated with projects and project management is a passage in author James P. Lewis’ book, “Fundamentals of Project Management, Developing Core Competencies to Help Outperform the Competition” in which Lewis refers to quality expert Dr. J. M. Juran’s definition of a project as “a problem scheduled for solution”.  Juran’s definition refers to the temporary nature of a project, but it also touches upon what I believe to be one of the fundamental, underlying strengths of project management:  its ability to solve problems.  We know through popular culture that NASA’s project to save the crew of Apollo 13 began with the fateful words, “Houston, we have a problem”.  Lewis reminds us that “a problem is a gap between where you are and where you want to be, with an obstacle that prevents easy movement to close the gap” (Lewis, 2002).   Project management can be viewed as a methodology that utilizes knowledge, tools, and skills to help avoid the obstacle and a stakeholder as anyone with an interest in the opportunity gap being closed. Indeed, project management utilizes project risk management principles in order to help reduce problems, thereby ensuring a stakeholder’s investment in a project is fully maximized (Kanabar & Warburton, 2008).

Strong leadership is a necessary attribute that a successful Project Manager should possess, and one can demonstrate leadership by being an effective problem-solver, among other things. There are a number of problems, or obstacles, encapsulated within the microcosm of the project that must be effectively handled, whether they be logistical, cost-associated, or interpersonal. Certainly, every manager is faced with these constraints. In order to evaluate a given strength of project management, one must accept that it is a means to an end.  Each stakeholder recognizes that a gap exists between where the organization is at present and where it wants to be (the problem).  Not all problems are bad – was it Bob Maynard who said, “All problems are opportunities in disguise”? So, project management becomes a means to achieve the desired outcome. Like a journey from one destination to another, PM provides a clear and concise road map. It maps out the intended route, the conveyance that will be utilized to make the trip, and a metric for determining when the destination will be achieved and how successful the team was in achieving it. All of this folds back into my very generalized analysis of strength as success factors that help determine whether the gap is closed and the desired outcome is achieved.

Kanabar, V., & Warburton, R. D. H. (2008). Mba fundamentals project management. New York: Kaplan.

Lewis, J. P. (2002). Fundamentals of project management, developing core competencies to help outperform the competition. AMACOM/American Management Association

Project managers and project teams that function globally must develop a sound communication strategy in order to ensure success. Author Jean Carlo Binder, in his book, “Global Project Management: Communication, Collaboration and Management Across Borders”, extols the virtues of developing a good strategy early on in order to “reduce misunderstandings between stakeholders from different country and company cultures communicating over distance. The main interested parties must work together to define this strategy, creating the project communications management plan”(Binder, 2007). Binder lists the three main steps to prepare a global communications strategy as “identifying the types of information to be communicated, gathering the communication requirements from the key stakeholders, and determining how the communication will effectively happen” (Binder, 2007).  Just as organizations have learned that “effective communication among people from the same culture is often difficult; ours and other businesses must accept that it is extremely difficult when attempting to communicate with people from a different culture who do not speak English, and have different attitudes, ideas, assumptions, perceptions, and ways of doing things. One’s chances for miscommunication increase enormously “(Adekola & Sergi, 2007).

Adekola, A., & Sergi, B. (2007). Global business management: a cross-cultural perspective. (p. 173). Ashgate Publishing Group.

Binder, J. C. (2007). Global project management, communication, collaboration and management across borders. (p. 101). Burlington, VT: Gower Publishing, Ltd.