HBR Guide to Project Management

You’ve been asked to lead a project. You appreciate the vote of confidence, but are you panicking because you haven’t a clue where to begin? Do you worry that stakeholders will tug you in a million directions, making it impossible to set clear goals, let alone deliver the goods on time and on budget? How will you know when to stick to your original plan and when to be flexible? And how will you keep all your team members excited about this project–when they have so many other pressures on them? This guide will give you the confidence and tools you need to manage projects effectively. You’ll learn how to: choose the right team and keep it humming, avoid “scope creep”, zero in on critical tasks and map out a logical sequence, make heads or tails of Gantt and PERT charts, get disruptive team members on board, keep stakeholders in the loop, gauge your project’s success, stop throwing good money after bad, and capture–and use–lessons learned.

This collection includes: “The Four Phases of Project Management,” ” The Cast of Characters,” “A Written Charter,” “Dealing with a Project’s Fuzzy Front End,” “Performing a Project Premortem,” “Will Project Creep Cost You–or Create Value?” “Setting Priorities Before Starting Your Project,” “Boost Productivity with Time-Boxing,” “Scheduling the Work,” “A Rush to Failure?” “Getting Your Project Off on the Right Foot,” “The Discipline of Teams,” “Effective Project Meetings,” “The Adaptive Approach to Project Management,” “Why Good Projects Fail Anyway,” and more.

Harvard Business Review Guides are for busy professionals looking for quick answers to common challenges. They’re packed with useful tips and practical advice in a brief, easy-to-read format. Whether you’re looking to expand your skills or refresh your existing ones, these guides offer reliable answers to your most pressing problems.