Project management. Evolution and characteristics Essay

Kotler (2004) defined project management as the art through which the basic requirements of a project are met such as the different tools and techniques, skills and the application of knowledge to meet the actual requirements of a project. In case of a traditional project management, there is more focus on the capabilities, instead of the tasks to be achieved. On the other hand, modern project management deals with all the essentials which are required to fulfil the project requirement and to create new projects for the future perspective. Virtual project management has been observed by Vaddavalli and Poosarla (2004), according to them, there has been a change in the traditional project management which is that the modern project management is more focused on virtual reality which is the management of projects on a variety of sites while reducing the communication gaps and with more effective and efficient timeframes (Acedo, 2005).
Vaddavalli and Poosarla (2004) suggested three levels through which the project management has been revolutionized. According to them, those three generations are the first generation which is basically a traditional project management in which all the activities are analyzed or conducted on a single site the second generation includes virtual projects in which there is one main site and the other 'off site', in which all the activities takes place the last generation is the third generation in which there are multi-site virtual projects under which there are a number of different sites depending on the level of project management. This pyramid in which they explored these three generations was named as the 'Reverse pyramid for evolution of project management' (Banerjee, 2001).
In any project, the main thing that is to be achieved are the positive results, and to get those positive results the need of a good leadership is essential, this was observed by Kevin (2007) in his research work that a good leadership can have a positive influence on the results of any type of project and if the leadership is not as efficient, then the results of that project can suffer significantly. There are various characteristics of a leader which makes them either good or a bad leader. These characteristics are directly related to the success of a project and were identified by Dr. Alexander Laufer in his research work that the modern employees of today's society don't want to be treated like workforce which is guided and is working under more restrictions because those employees which have good knowledge about the project are willing to prove their own interpersonal skills to achieve the desired results. Further, he observed that the structure of the organization also impacts the orientation of getting the desired results. In order to get the desired results, there should be provided a supportive work environment in which they will be given enough space to complete a project. This solely depends upon the leadership and the style they have adopted in order to make the organization look more competitive in the marketplace (Bartlett, 1989).