3 Universal Principles of Project Management

29 Mar 3 Universal Principles of Project Management

Official project manager or an accidental project manager, nearly everyone who works in a professional setting is being called upon to understand and apply project management principles.

1. What
First universal principle: know what Done looks like.
What are we trying to accomplish? What is the end result of the project supposed to look like? What is it supposed to do? Or to put it another way, what does “Done” look like?
This is a universal principle with all methodologies of project management.

2. Why
Second universal principle: know why you’re trying to get to Done.
Why are we doing this project? What are the expected benefits, or as Agile asks, what value is this producing?
Every project needs to have a “why,” a reason for being. If it doesn’t, then there’s no need for the project.

3. How

Third universal’ principle: know how you’re going to get to Done. How are we going to manage this project? What methodology will we use? The “how” is about more than a specific methodology (actually the methodology comes last).

(Author Trevor K. Nelson 2018)