Essay - Project Management History of Project Management Project Management as the...

Project Management

History of Project Management

Project management as the application of pre-established techniques with the help ***** suitable knowledge, skills, and tools exists from ancient times if we consider ***** pyramids, the Great Wall of China, and other important projects. The real development ***** the discipline of project management began in the 20th century, when *****dustrial revolution provided the means and ***** necessities for well-established project ***** techniques (Kozak-Holland, 2008).

The beginning ***** the 20th century was characterized by the second industrial *****, responsible for emerging mechanisms like telephones, electrical machines, internal combustion engine, and the ***** of all types of transportation. All these factors led to increased production of consumer goods ***** ***** the mechanization of manufacture, requiring developments in project management.

World War I required different plann*****g and supplying techniques, because the repartition ***** resources was different than normal. The post war period developed the general discipline of business ***** and specific disciplines derived from it. ***** this affected project engineers that were forced to report ***** *****ir managers, determining changes coordination techniques ***** ***** project management. However, specialists in that time considered ***** ********** work, no matter their field of activity, did not *****ow for process control because of insufficient routine.

Since then, changes became more frequent, installed faster, and were ***** significant. The third industrial revolution coincided with the Cold ***** ***** its needs of numerous planes and rockets projects.

***** management in ***** 1950s was ********** by the development of CPM and PERT methods. This changed the configuration ***** project management ***** ***** managers gained the control they lacked. This was extremely helpful in large projects.

***** 1960's were also characterized by project management development. The discipl*****e ***** practice of project ***** were influenced by a series ***** new techniques and tools like earned value, or work breakdown structures.

***** management's importance became even more obvious in the 1970s ***** it became a permanent function for companies working with projects. This is the time when a series of institutes ********** organizations designed for project management started to develop and to implement a series of techniques ***** ***** facilitate the work ***** engineers and to reduce ***** and costs for any project.

***** 1980s is the period when project management as a d*****cipline reached its maturity and started ***** consider ***** to include other ***** like risk management, total quality management, partnering, and the definition of ***** success (*****, 2008). During the 1990s, the discipline of project management w***** characterized by a series of *****.

The most important contributors to the *****ment of project management as a discipline are Frederick Taylor, Henry Gantt, Richard Johnson, Fremont Kast, and James Rosenzweig. Frederick ***** is responsible for applying scientific reasoning to work, and for analyzing work **********. Henry ***** continued Taylor's involvement in project management (Bista, 2006).

Henry Gantt developed a series ***** pl*****nn*****g and organizing ***** by using bar charts as a project ***** tool, le*****ding the way for the development of modern project management techniques.