Which Project Management Methodology Is The Right One

Starting on project management? Then you have come to the right place. You will find a lot of tips, best practices, project management tools reviews and much more in our blog. Now, the first thing you need to do is to sign up for a account. Next, without any doubt, you need to some theoretical background. I am not going to tell what project management is and what it is not, soon you will find that out by yourself. In this post I would like to introduce you to the main project management methodologies. Please keep in mind that my focus is on IT projects management.

It is important to distinguish that different methodologies are focusing on different elements:
• CMMI (Capability Maturity Model Integration) - management is built around PROCESS (i.e. Transformation is the core and entities it uses are secondary)
• PMBOK (provides the fundamentals of project management as they apply to a wide range of projects) - is also built mostly around processes (i.e. its 9 bodies of knowledge are organized around 9 major processes, although usually each process is dedicated to management of 1 important object like “Management of cost”, “Communication management”, ”Risk Management” etc. )
• RUP - actually in the middle - i.e. entities (RUP: artefacts) and transformations (RUP: Activities organized into disciplines) are balanced. And roles are pretty well refined and described.
• XP - management is built mostly around entities (i.e. focus on Time, Cost, Scope, Quality). Processes are incremental and iterative, we can also say it’s “every-day-work”.

You can see the main focus points of every methodology in the table provided below:

Aspect	CMMI	PMBOK	RUP	XP
LIFECYLE(activity)	PLAN: Estimate Build Plan (formal paper) Obtain Commitments (Human-related) CONTROL Monitoring against Plan Corrective Actions when required	Initiating processes Planning Executing Controlling Finalizing	Project Start Manage Iteration/Project Plan next Iteration Project Closure	Manage Iteration Plan (partial) next Iteration (moving works further, descopings etc.)
ENTITIES	Like in RUP but more heavier (for example "Life-cycle model" etc.)	Manage 4 parameters: Expense: Cost and Time Result: Scope and Quality Manage other issues: People and communication Freelancers (subcontractors) Risk	Work orders Issues Risks Plan Assessment	4 Parameters: Cost Time Scope Quality

As you can see they all have a lot in common, but at the same time they are very different, so choose carefully, because when something will go wrong in the project, or not the way you planned (and I can assure you that it is very likely to happen), it will not be the best time to think about your management methods, so do your homework and come back for more!