Managing Projects for Ministry

Session 2: The Constraints and Benefits of Project Management 35

anticipated. (“If you have no particular place to go, then neither does it matter what road you take, or when you get there.”)

c. Without defining your specific outcomes you will have no way to coordinate your activities in such a way to hit your targets – you simply never know if you have attained what you were after.

3. How should this constraint affect our efforts to manage projects?

a. Always think about projects in terms of desired outcomes delivered to those for whom it was initiated on time and on budget .

b. Specifications desired will always line up with time necessary to accomplish it, and the resources necessary to do it.

c. Much time must be given in the preparation phase of project management to clearly define precisely what specific conditions are being sought as a result of the project.

d. Use the entire process of project management to achieve the desired outcome according to the specifications agreed upon at its beginning: “Project management is achieving a desired objective on time and on budget.”

4. The bottom line: Project management is oriented around the excellent and faithful execution of an endeavor according to the detailed, exact statement of particulars demanded by the thing to be built, hosted, performed, or produced.