Custom Fit: SMEs Can Benefit From Project Management Best Practices

  Organizational Project Management   PM Network  

Big organizations worldwide understand the value that project management best practices bring to the bottom line and have created formal methodologies and career tracks.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), on the other hand, often lag behind, dismissing project management practices as too complex and requiring too much overhead for their leaner operations.

And that puts them at a disadvantage,says Philip R. Diab, PMP, CEO of Leadership Formation, a management consultancy in Amman, Jordan, and author of Sidestep Complexity: Project Management for Small- and Medium- Sized Organizations [PMI, April 2011].

“SMEs have this idea that in order to be successful in practicing project management, you have to be able to deal with all of these complex concepts, tools and methodologies,” says Mr. Diab, a former PMI chair. “This misconception scares them away from project management.”

Such fears are unfounded, though, he adds, because project management is not simply about tools but an approach to management. Smaller organizations can reap huge benefits from implementing even the basics of project management.

Developing simple processes for scoping projects, identifying risks, and keeping project teams and stakeholders focused on common goals can enable small businesses to cut time and waste from the project development process by …

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