Need a 125 word response to each discussion.

Replies require short essays and must contain a minimum of 100 words each. Replies must be constructive which means they do not simply state agreement or disagreement re-highlighting points already made in prior posts (those words do NOT count). Replies must offer additional information or input to the discussion of the current event and lesson concepts. All statements using points that are not general knowledge should be properly cited to their source in the contents of this essay with a reference listing at the bottom.

Discussion 1

A project is a service or goal to meet a need for a company or person. Major characteristics of a project is an established objective. It also as a defined life span with a beginning and an end. The people usually involved are people in departments, professionals, or colleagues. A project is normally something that has never been done before. Most projects cost, are time specific, and has certain performance recommendations. Daily operations are tasks that need to be completed daily. They are routine tasks that don't require much cost and that can be completed by regular employees with little to no supervision because daily status is repetitive work. Planning projects is extremely important and it normally goes through a project cycle of life. A project manager is the person in charge of implementation of the project and responsible for seeing the project through to the end. The four stages consistent of defining stage, planning stage, executing stage, and closing stage. During the defining stage projects are defined, objectives and goals are set, and responsibilities are assigned. The planning stage is when schedules are set, what the cost/budget is for the project, and most importantly what this project overall entails. The executing stage is where the project manager needs to be extremely hands on to make sure that know changes or revisions need to be made to the project and that the overall project remains on track. Finally, during the closing stage, you are preparing to deliver the project this is also known as the post-delivery. You are following up to see if any training may need to be done so that the project is completely understood. At the end of the projects you hand in all materials, equipment, and information need and wait for the next project to be assigned to the team.

Larson, E. W. (2013). Project management: the managerial process with MS Project (6th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.

Discussion 2

A project is where a group gets together and collaborates to achieve an end goal. That goal can be to reduce waste from a process that is already in place or to create an entirely new process. It could be a new product that a company wants to develop or improvements to an old product. The five characteristics that differentiate projects from other functions are that they are of a deeper scale then every day duties. They have a defined life span, meaning they are not something that you are going to do day in and day out of your job. There is a well-defined objective, you are pursuing that end result instead of just getting the work done. It is usually not the people that you work with every day, it involves different people in different areas of the company that would be affected by the project and have valuable input to put in. There are specific costs and time that are involved which means it must meet a specific performance objective, which also happens in daily work but not to the higher level of a project. The project is going to end, whereas daily duties are always going to be there.

Projects are linked to a strategic plan of an organization because the organization always wants to be changing and growing and to do that they must have projects running that are going to achieve those objectives. Right now, in the company that I work for we are replacing all our technology, updating computers and changing our processes. This project is fast paced and is on a strict timeline of two months to be completed when it hits our department. Even though it seems unattainable I can see where it is needed as we have been running on antiquated systems for so long that the band aids are falling off left and right and we are having trouble keeping up with our company goals.