Project Management Information Systems PDF

# Project Management Information Systems The image describes Project Management Information Systems (PMIS). PMIS is a computer-driven system to aid a project manager in the development of the project. ## Elements of a Typical PMIS - WBS creation tools - Calendaring features - Scheduling abilities...

# Project Management Information Systems The image describes Project Management Information Systems (PMIS). PMIS is a computer-driven system to aid a project manager in the development of the project. ## Elements of a Typical PMIS - WBS creation tools - Calendaring features - Scheduling abilities - Work authorization tools - EVM controls - Quality control charts, PERT charts, Gantt charts, and other charting features - Calculations for the critical path, EVM, target dates based on the project schedule, and more - Resource tracking and leveling - Reporting functionality ## Purpose of PMIS - PMIS is a system tool and technique used in project management to deliver information about a project. - Project managers utilize PMIS to collect, combine and distribute information through electronic and manual means. - PMIS is used by upper and lower management to communicate with each other. - PMIS enables the quick creation, management, and streamlining of the project management processes. - PMIS aids in the creation of schedules, estimates, and risk assessments and gathers feedback from stakeholders. ## Configuration Management System - The PMIS also includes a configuration management system. - Configuration management is an approach for tracking all approved changes, versions of project plans, blueprints, software numbering, and sequencing. - A configuration management system aims to manage all of the following: - Functional and physical characteristics of the project deliverables - Control, track, and manage any changes to the project deliverables - Track any changes within the project - Allow the project management team to audit the project deliverables to confirm conformance to defined criteria for acceptance ## Execution of Project Management Goals - Project Management Information System (PMIS) helps plan, execute, and close project management goals. - During the planning process, project managers use PMIS for budget frameworks such as estimating costs. - The project management information system is also used to create a specific schedule and define the scope baseline. - At the execution of the project management goals, the project management team collects information into one database. - The PMIS is used to compare the baseline with the actual accomplishment of each activity, manage materials, collect financial data, and keep a record for reporting purposes. ## Closing the Project - During the close of the project, the Project Management Information System is used to review the goals to check if the tasks were accomplished. - It is then used to create a final report for project close. ## Project Management Information Systems: A Summary - The project management information system (PMIS) is used to plan schedules, budget and execute work to be accomplished in project management. - PMIS is a tool used to document and store the project management plan, subsidiary plans, and other documents/work products relevant for the project. - It can be manual or automated and supports the change control procedures defined in the project. ## Importance of PMIS - The monitoring and control system of a project needs the support of a proper Project Management Information System (PMIS). - The use of PMIS for all information about a project and regularly updating this information based on the actual status helps in successful monitoring and control. - A comprehensive PMIS would cover the complete lifecycle of a project and provide the necessary support for decision making. - The main purpose of PMIS is to receive the actual data about the status of a project at pre-determined intervals, and then use this information to evaluate the impact of these outcomes and project these impacts in terms of an expected date of completion and an expected cost of completion. - This processed information is then made available to the Project Manager and his team who would then use this to decide the necessary corrective actions and execute them. ## Importance of PMIS: Continued - PMISs have capabilities that assist project managers in planning, budgeting, and resource allocation. - Many PMISs additionally perform assorted analyses such as variance, performance, and forecasting for any level of the WBS and project organization. - A good PMIS enables facile control of changes to system configuration and project plans as well. - These PMISs allow for quick review and easy periodic updating; they filter and reduce data to provide information on summary, exception, or "what if" bases. - With an effective PMIS the project manager does not have to wait for days or comb through reams of data to identify problems and determine project status. ## Objectives of PMIS - Record and report relevant information and the status of various components of the project in such a manner as to bring the most critical activities directly to the attention of concerned managers at the appropriate level. - Highlight deviations from the plan, if any, in respect of every component of the project and also to indicate the effects of such deviations on the overall status and completion of the project as a whole. - Form the basis of updating of project schedule wherever necessary. - Identify and report on critical areas relevant to different levels of management and to highlight the corrective action that needs to be taken. - Sift the information and report on an exception basis. In other words, emphasis is focused on those activities that are not going according to the plan. - Provide a basis for the evaluation of the performance of the functions of various managers and departments by regular comparisons with budgets/plans/schedules. ## Typical Features of a PMIS - **Scheduling and Network Planning:** Virtually all project software systems do project scheduling using a network-based procedure. These systems compute early and late schedule times, slack times, and the critical path. - **Resource Management:** Most project systems also perform resource loading, leveling, allocation, or multiple functions, although the analytical sophistication and quality of reports vary between systems. ## Typical Outputs of PMIS: Continued - **Budgeting:** In many project systems, it is possible to associate cost information with each activity, usually by treating costs as resources. The ability of the system to handle cost information and generate budgets is a significant variable in the system's usability for both planning and control. - **Cost Control and Performance Analysis:** Here is where project system capabilities differ the most. The most sophisticated PMIS software "roll up" results and allow aggregation, analysis, and reporting at all levels of the WBS. They also permit modification and updating of existing plans through input of actual start and finish dates and costs. - The most comprehensive PMISs integrate network, budget, and resource information and allow the project manager to ask "what if" questions under various scenarios while the project is underway. - They allow the system user to access, cross-reference, and report information from multiple sites or databases linked via the Internet or an intranet. ## Ease of Use - How easy is it to learn and operate the system? Systems vary greatly in the style of system documentation, thoroughness and clarity of tutorials, ease of information input, clarity of on-screen presentation and report format, helpfulness of error messages, and the training and operating support offered by the developer. ## Benefits of Computer-Based PMIS - The benefits of computer PMISs over manual systems are speed, capacity, efficiency, economy, accuracy, and ability to handle complexity. - The major benefit is speed. Once data have been collected and entered, practically any manipulation can be done more rapidly by computers. - To create or revise printed plans, schedules, and budgets takes days or weeks with a manual system, but seconds or minutes with computers. - This is especially true of Internet and intranet project management systems. - Computer-based PMISs store large amounts of information accessible, prioritized, and summarized. ## Benefits of Computer-Based PMIS: Continued - Manual systems for large projects are tedious to maintain, difficult to access, and provoke people to try to work around them or avoid them. They require the efforts of numerous support personnel to maintain and use their outputs for analysis. - In contrast, computer-based PMISs can perform much of this analysis, reduce the requirement for clerical personnel, and relieve managers and support personnel from having to do computations. This frees them to use analysis results for making decisions. - The speed, capacity, and efficiency of computers afford another benefit: economy. In most cases, computers offer a significant cost advantage over manual systems for storing and processing information. Assuming input data are correct, computers produce fewer computational errors and reduce the cost of correcting mistakes. ## Benefits of Computer-Based PMIS: Continued - Computer-based PMISs are much better at handling and integrating complex data relationships. - Large projects with thousands of work tasks, hundreds of organizations, and tens of thousands of workers cannot be managed efficiently without computers. - For managing large projects, a computer-based PMIS is a virtual necessity; but even in small projects, it simply makes the work easier to manage. - Simpler PMISs have limited capability; but they are usually good at what they can do and can be of tremendous benefit. Also, once mastered, it is easy to upgrade to more sophisticated systems. ## Examples of Computer-Based PMIS ### Microsoft Project (MS Project) - Microsoft Project (MS Project) dominates project management software systems. - It carries its own database and is compatible with SQL Server or Oracle databases. - Although it requires installation on every user's computer, it is fully compatible with Microsoft Office so team members can easily save to the database documents created in any Office application. - In addition, because it has the same toolbars as MS Office applications, most users become quickly familiarized with it. - MS Project provides the ability to publish to the Internet or the company intranet. - There are no limits to the number of tasks or projects the software can handle. ### Project Scheduler - Project Scheduler works with an SQL database and is MS Office compatible. - Information from multiple projects or subprojects can be merged or consolidated to reveal company-wide resource utilization. - The report writer enables a wide range of standard and customized reports, which can be output in HTML format. - Data can be located on shared disk drives and accessed only by users with the appropriate password. ### Welcom - Welcom has three software products: Open Plan, Cobra, and Spider. - Open Plan has advanced scheduling and modeling tools for resource management. - It integrates company-wide information and enables information sharing across multiple projects. - Team members can work on pieces of the project, then roll-up information for composite reporting. - Cobra is a cost-management tool designed to manage and analyze budgets, earned value, and forecasts. - Spider is a multiuser, multi-project web-based tool for viewing and updating project data from Open Plan user Web browsers. ### Trakker - Trakker offers a variety of interesting products, including tools for risk management activity-based costing, earned value management as well as the usual planning, budgeting, and tracking tools. - These tools interface with commercial accounting systems and can be Web-enabled for use on the Internet or intranet with browsers. ### Primavera - Primavera offers four software products. - **Sure Trak Project Manager.** - This software enables modeling and scheduling of simultaneous projects of up to 10,000 activities per project. - Activities can be inserted or rearranged on Gantt charts and PERT charts with a mouse click. - Actual completion dates and costs can be compared with targets, progress estimated for each activity or for the entire project, and forecasts produced of resources necessary to get a project back on track. - If resources exceed supply, Sure Trak can reassign them from low-priority activities. Assignments, deadlines, and status can be shared with project participants at all levels and locations using the Web publisher. - **Primavera Project Planner®, (P3®).** - This program provides for unlimited projects, up to 100,000 activities per project, concurrent, multiuser accessibility, and scheduling options similar to SureTrak. - It can create fragments of networks to store for later use as templates or building blocks for creating other project plans. - It supports cost accounts and allows tracking of costs and exchange of information with cost accounting systems. - E-mail addresses can be embedded into the project to automatically route status information to individuals who need to know. - A Web publisher enables team members with Web browsers to review, update, and return project activity status data. - **Primavera Expedition® Contract Control Software.** - This software assists in change management and tracking of contracts and purchase orders. - It enables users to view the latest submittals and schedule changes from P3 or SureTrak in real time. - It ensures that everyone who needs drawing revisions gets them. - It also has a change management feature to assess the impact of changes on costs and schedules, and to identify where additional equipment is needed and the contractors affected. - It automatically distributes requisitions and RFPs. - **Webster for Primavera®** - This software provides access to the project database, timecard activities, and project information from SureTrak and P3. - Team members can see assignments and report accomplishments and time needed to complete assignments. ## Web-Based PMIS - A project Web site and Web-based project software are especially helpful in situations where project team members are located at different sites. - Putting project information on the Internet or other networks utilizing Internet standards expedites projects that might ordinarily be delayed because team members are dispersed. ## Benefits of Web-Based PMIS - Benefits of Web-based project management include immediate availability of project information, efficiency, and accessibility for communicating with workers, ease of learning and usage, and reliability and currency of information because it is entered and communicated in real time. - Web-based project management fills the information needs of project stakeholders at all levels; from individual teams, team members, and project managers working on a particular project; to high-level managers who want information about every project in the organization. - With Web-browser integrated project management software, each team member can have her own individual web page on which to report progress and retrieve assignments. - Web pages for team members at scattered worksites enable everyone to easily send information to the project manager, and vice versa. - The project manager can then aggregate the provided information to create an overview of the entire project. ## Web-based PMIS: Continued - Web-based tools are easy to learn, understand, and use. Because the training and learning required for Web-based tools are minimal, team members can concentrate on their job rather than spend time in training, or in trying to figure out the software. - In most cases, the necessary tools are already at hand. Web-based software requires one thing: access to a Web browser, such as Internet Explorer or Netscape, which is available on any computer with Internet access. - Internet and intranet networks are easy to use and learn; therefore team members are likely to use them more frequently for status reporting. - Special Web site administration is unnecessary when team members, who enter up-to-date information, maintain their own sites. - Web-based communication not only provides management with a current view of projects, but it demands low overhead and frees management from worry associated with system updates and maintenance. ## Critical Deciding Factors - In designing project management information systems, the following have to be spelt out clearly: - The objective of each format or report in brief. - The distribution chart. - The periodicity of the reports. - The persons responsible for preparation of the reports. - The timing of the reports. - The sources from which information has to be gathered in the preparation of reports. ## Integrated Project Management Information System - The structure of a typical integrated project management information system is depicted in the image. - It allows total project information to be structured into a number of data sets which are integrated by the software. Some of the relevant datasets for a large project are: - Network dataset - Drawing data set - Cost dataset - Material dataset - Vendor dataset - Job card dataset - Rates dataset - Resources dataset - History dataset, etc. ### Integration of These Independent Datasets: - Integration of these independent datasets through various processing modules enables high control of projects. It permits: - Horizontal integration between disciplines, e.g., cost/schedule integration, or, cost estimates, cost accounts, and project schedule integration via Work Breakdown Structure: - Vertical integration. Data can be aggregated (`'rolled up'`) to any required level to produce desired summary reports. The image then shows a diagram of the Integrated Project Management Information System. The diagram illustrates the integration of various data sets and processing modules. It depicts how information flows through the system, from data collection to report generation and analysis.