PROJECT MANAGEMENT QUICKSTART GUIDE

Project management trainer Croft offers a manual for beginners that also provides a wealth of advice for those with experience.

This clear, accessible guide promises to enable readers who aren’t project management specialists to “manage any project, of any size, with any budget” by using a practical 12-step process for planning, monitoring, adjusting, and reviewing them. The process requires no unusual tools or software expertise—just sticky notes and spreadsheets. The explanation is organized into five main sections: “Project Management Overview,” “Mapping Out the Ideal Plan,” “Adjusting the Plan for Reality,” “Managing the Implementation of Your Project,” and “Supercharge Your Project Management Skills.” A final section offers brief discussions of related topics for further exploration. Croft begins by defining a project as “a structured way of facilitating the delivery of change,” then takes readers through every stage from initial brainstorming to final review after completion. Along the way, he offers step-by-step methods and useful tips for getting stakeholders onboard, defining the project’s “critical path” (the series of tasks that determines how long it will take), creating and using Gantt charts, managing expectations and people, assessing and mitigating risk, planning for contingencies, and more. The prose is crisp and readable, the examples effective, and the tone matter-of-fact with touches of humor. The author demystifies intimidating terms of art such as PMBOK and cost-performance index and lists pros and cons of various project management methods. Croft is frank about inevitable difficulties and thoughtful about how best to address them. In fact, many key principles and a lot of the advice here could be usefully applied in many other aspects of business and life. Charts and tables illustrate important topics, and each chapter ends with a bullet-pointed recap of key ideas. The guide includes links to short video clips and other downloadable assets, such as document templates, and is attractively designed; it also features a glossary, references, and an index.

A thorough, confidence-inspiring guide that provides much more than a quick start.