Capturing Project Management Best Practices

By Dr. Harold Kerzner and Dr. Al Zeitoun

Abstract

The strategic goal of all companies is sustainable and profitable growth which includes improving the firm’s competitive position, achieving efficient utilization of resources, and maximizing the return on investments in product development. Unfortunately, many companies take a relatively passive view of how strategic goals can be achieved and believe that doing business the same old way will continue to be successful in the future.
As stated by Albert Einstein,

“Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

Companies must understand how project management best practices can elevate their levels of business success and recognize the need for continuous improvements supported by an investment in the discovery of best practices.

Most organizations today realize they are managing their business by projects. Project management is no longer restricted to a few functional domains but is now utilized throughout the organization. Today, project management is viewed as a strategic competency needed for corporate growth rather than a career path. Project management is becoming the vehicle required to capture, evaluate, and implement best practices to continuously improve the firm’s performance.

Unfortunately, many companies have a relatively poor understanding of the steps to capture and employ best practices effectively. The intent of this paper is to provide a roadmap for how project management can maximize continuous improvement efforts utilizing best practices and strengthen the value and relevance that project management brings to the organization’s future.

About the Authors:

Dr. kerzner - Picture

Dr. Harold Kerzner
Harold Kerzner, M.S., Ph.D., Engineering, and M.B.A, is IIL’s Senior Executive Director for Project Management and a globally recognized expert on project management and strategic planning. He is the author of many best-selling textbooks including Project Management 2.0 and Project Management Best Practices: Achieving Global Excellence.

Dr. Kerzner has previously taught project management and business administration at Baldwin-Wallace University, engineering at the University of Illinois and business administration at Utah State University. He obtained his industrial experience at Thiokol Corporation where he held both program management and project engineering responsibilities on a variety of NASA, Air Force, Army, Navy, and internal R&D programs.

Al Zeitoun - Picture

Dr. Al Zeitoun
Dr. Al Zeitoun is a Future of Work, business optimization, and operational performance excellence thought leader with global experiences in strategy execution. His experiences encompass leading organizations; delivering their Enterprise Digital and Business Transformation; guiding fitting frameworks implementations; and using his empathy, engineering insights, and collaboration strengths to successfully envision new business models and execute complex missions across diverse cultures globally.