A Project can be defined as a set of interconnected activities or tasks, which are to be executed by a particular group of individuals, over a limited period of time with limited and pre-defined resources of men, money and materials. A project could be an individual or a company endeavour that is required to be planned in such a way that a particular set of objectives could be achieved.
Project Management can be considered as a set of activities, including conceptualization, planning, execution, monitoring & controlling and completion, to meet pre-determined goals in a specific time period and under different types of performance constraints.
A Project Management System contains a description of cost estimations, task schedules, cost control & budget management, resource allocation, quality assurance, risk assessment and provisioning and MIS (Management Information System) for decision-making and planning.
A good PMS software enables the project managers to schedule tasks, risk analysis, track and compare the project progress in expected and real terms and take corrective maneuvers for the required changes. It also helps team members to stay in contact during different phases of the project and provide updates, real-time challenges and opportunities and to get to know better the other team members
A customer is advised to consider the following factors while selecting a PMS technology:
- Environmental: The physical environment, wherein the business activity is to be executed, should be considered before selecting a technology. A technology may work in cold European countries but the same may be useless in the hot & humid tropical climate of India.
- Ethical and Cultural: Selected technology should not violate the ethical or cultural practices of the region. Technology using the skin of cattle or the fats of pigs would be never acceptable in conservative India.
- Social: Technology which requires highly qualified workers for its operations may not be successful in states with very low literacy rates.
- Economical: This is one of the most important parameters for the selection of technology. Countries like India have lower manpower costs and high unemployment but very high costs of capital. So, the selected technology should be more labor-intensive rather than power or capital-intensive, for Indian Businesses.