Project Management

 Five Stages of Project Management: Project management process is usually

broken down into separate phases that take the project from the beginning to
the end. These stages include:
 Project Initiation Phase: The main goal of the Initiation phase is to
ensure that the project meets business needs, and that stakeholders and
project teams are aligned on the project success criteria throughout the
project life cycle. The entire project team defines the project idea, and the
project sponsor evaluates it and authorizes the project to proceed. The
project manager starts the documentation process, which includes the
justification, deliverables, risks, estimated cost, and resource requirements.
 Project Planning Phase: The next focuses on planning each task the
team needs to perform to cover the scope, achieve the deliverables, and
meet the overall goal. The project team builds the resource plan, the
communications plan, and the initial project schedule. The project manager
also establishes the roles and responsibilities of the team and stakeholders.
The project scope is finalized depending on approved available resources
and client priorities.
 Project Execution Phase: This is where the project team executes and
follows through on tasks based on the Project Plan. At this stage, the team
spends most of its time coordinating with people, helping to ensure quality
work, keeping track of resources, and updating stakeholders. This is the
phase when the project manager tries to manage every task and aspect of
project delivery to keep the project on track for the remaining duration of
the project life cycle.
 Project Monitoring & Control Phase: the project team carefully tracks
the progress of the project based on the Project Plan established earlier.
Tracking the performance of the project through various metrics is crucial to
ensure the project stays on schedule, within budget, and within scope. The
project team keeps track of change management documents, spending
records, QA checklists, and team time tracking. They can measure where
efforts and resources go throughout the project life cycle, crosschecking it
with the Project Plan.
 Project Closure Phase: All the activities related to its completion are
concluded. These may involve the submission of a final deliverable, fulfilling
contractual obligations, terminating relevant agreements, and releasing
project resources. The causes of a project closure can be completion,
cancellation, termination, or transfer to a new organization. The
documentation required to complete Project Closure will differ depending on
the situation. the project manager communicates the final project
disposition and status to all stakeholders.
 Work Breakdown Structure (WBS): In project management, this is a method
for completing a complex, multi-step project. It's a way to divide and conquer
large projects to get things done faster and more efficiently.
 Cost Breakdown Structure (CBS) is used to track, manage, and report costs
related to a project or program. The CBS standardizes costs into categories that
represent manageable cost sources for an organization and a standard cost
classification system.
 Critical Path Method (CPM) is a technique where you identify tasks that are
necessary for project completion and determine scheduling flexibilities. A
critical path in project management is the longest sequence of activities that
must be finished on time in order for the entire project to be complete.
Activities on the critical path have zero slack time.

 Crashing a Project: It is a method used to speed up a project's timeline by

adding additional resources without changing the scope of the project. Crashing
an activity means reducing its normal time.
 Crash Time is a method for shortening project duration by reducing the time of
one or more critical project activities.
 Program Evaluation Review Technique (PERT) is a project management
planning tool used to calculate the amount of time it will take to realistically
finish a project. PERT is similar to critical path in that they are both used to
visualize the timeline and the work that must be done for a project. However,
with PERT, you create three different time estimates for the project:

 Optimistic time - the shortest possible amount of time each task will take
 The most probable amount of time
 Pessimistic time - The longest amount of time tasks might take if things
don't go as planned
 Matrix Organization is a work structure where team members report to
multiple leaders. In a matrix organization, team members (whether remote or
in-house) report to a project manager as well as their department head.

Lean Operating Systems

 Lean Operations is a business strategy driven by the principle of doing more
with less. It is a minimalist approach to running a business and improving day-
to-day operations.
 Principles of Lean Operating Systems: These include –
 Define value from the customer's perspective
 Map the value stream and eliminate waste
 Create flow by minimizing interruptions and delays
 Establish pull by producing only what is needed when it is needed
 Pursue perfection by continuously improving and striving for excellence
These principles are designed to create a streamlined and efficient operating
system that maximizes value for the customer while minimizing waste and
improving quality.

 5S’s: The 5S pillars, Sort (Seiri), Set in Order (Seiton), Shine (Seiso),
Standardize (Seiketsu), and Sustain (Shitsuke), provide a methodology for
organizing, cleaning, developing, and sustaining a productive work
environment.
 Seiri: To separate needed tools, parts, and instructions from unneeded
materials and to remove the unneeded ones.
 Seiton: To neatly arrange and identify parts and tools for ease of use.
 Seiso: To conduct a cleanup campaign.
 Seiketsu: To conduct seiri, seiton, and seiso daily to maintain a workplace in
perfect condition.
  Shitsuke: To form the habit of always following the first four S’s – to keep the
process going.
 Visual Controls are a subset of the larger concept of visual management.
 SMED (Single-Minute Exchange of Die) is a system for dramatically
reducing the time it takes to complete equipment changeovers. It provides a
rapid and efficient way of converting a manufacturing process from running the
current product to running the next product. This rapid changeover is key to
reducing production lot sizes, and thereby reducing uneven flow.
 Total Productive Maintenance (TPM) is the process of using machines,
equipment, employees and supporting processes to maintain and improve the
integrity of production and the quality of systems. It has a zero-breakdown
philosophy. It is a comprehensive approach to facility maintenance that aims
to achieve perfect production and eliminate unplanned breakdowns. TPM
maintains and improves equipment reliability, production output, and product
quality.
 Lean Six Sigma is the fusion of two popular business principles -- lean and Six
Sigma -- into one methodology, to improve organizational performance and
eliminate waste processes. It

Lean focuses on analyzing workflow to reduce cycle time and eliminate waste.
Lean strives to maximize value to the customer while using a few resources as
possible. Six Sigma strives for near perfect results that will reduce costs and
achieve higher levels of customer satisfaction.
To summarize the main difference between Lean vs Six Sigma, lean looks at
ways to increase flow while Six Sigma focuses on achieving consistent
results.
 Just-in-time, or JIT, is an inventory management method in which goods are
received from suppliers only as they are needed. The main objective of this
method is to reduce inventory holding costs and increase inventory turnover.
JIT systems are based on ‘pull’ rather than ‘push’.

 Kanban is a popular Lean workflow management method for defining,

managing, and improving services that deliver knowledge work. It helps you
visualize work, maximize efficiency, and improve continuously. Work is
represented on Kanban boards, allowing you to optimize work delivery across
multiple teams and handle even the most complex projects in a single
environment.
Process and Layout
 Discrete Manufacturing is the production of distinct items. Cars, furniture,
electronics and airplanes are examples of discrete manufacturing products. This
type of manufacturing is usually characterized by strategies such as: Make-to-
stock, either highly repetitive or based on work orders.
 Flow indicates the nature and intensity of activities involved in conversion of
components and material from raw material stage to finished goods stage
 Continuous Flow System: High volume, low variety. Characterized by a
streamlined flow of products in the operating system. Conversion process
begins with input of raw material at one end, progresses through the system in
an orderly fashion to finally become finished goods at the final stage.
Production process is sequential, and the required resources are organized in
stages. E.g., Amul Products
 Intermittent Flow System: Characterized by mid-volume, mid-variety
products/services. Increases the flow complexities. Flow and capacity balancing
are difficult but important. Process industries use batch production methods and
discrete industries use alternative methods of designing layout issues. Capacity
Estimation is hard. Production Planning & Control is complex.
 Jumbled Flow System: Occurs on account of non-standard and complex flow
patterns characteristic in certain systems. Highly customized items, customer
orders for one or a few. Examples include turnkey project executor such as
BHEL or L&T, customized manufacturing systems such as PCB fabricators, sheet
metal fabricators, tool room operators and printing and publishing. Operational
complexity arising out of jumbled flow is high. Discrete manufacturing with
 Jumbled flow uses a Job Shop structure. Considerable time is lost due to
repeated setup of processes.
 Facility Layouts, or plant layout, is the operations plan used to arrange workers,
equipment, and machines in a way that increases efficiency in the production
process. There are four main types of facility layouts: process, fixed position, cellular
and product layouts

 Types of Layouts:

Product Layout: Order in which the

resources are placed follow exactly the
sequence of operations that is performed
during the manufacturing of a good or
delivery of a service. Follows a smooth
and logical flow, where each good or
services flow in a continuous path.
Reduces WIP inventories , less material
handling, higher labor, and equipment utilization. Breakdowns can bring the whole
process to a halt.

Process Layout: Arrangement of resources based on the functional grouping of

equipment or activities that do similar work.
Depending on the process, tasks may move
in different sequences. Job shops, shoe
manufacturing, and hospitals etc. use this
layout. This layout provides more flexibility
than product layout, since machine failures
don’t affect the entire process. However,
planning and control becomes complex,
inventory buildup is high, equipment utilization is low, and workers need to be highly
skilled.

Group Technology (GT)/ Cellular

Layout: Seeks to exploit commonality in
manufacturing and uses this as the basis
for grouping components and resources.
This layout was developed by Toyota and
is characterized by a U-shaped
arrangement of machines. This layout
operates differently from a product layout
but operates differently. The cell is
designed to operate with 1 – 3 employees.
Working in parallel, this process facilitates the processing of family parts with similar
processing requirements (group technology).

Fixed Position Layout: Emphasis is not so much on optimum position of resources

required for the process, since the product itself largely dictates this; the focus is on
gaining better control of material flow and reducing delays. This method is largely
used in the production of large items such as heavy machinery, airplanes, buildings,
 locomotives, etc.

 Line Balancing is the optimization of the assignment of operations to workstations

in an assembly line to minimize idle time and the number of workstations required.
Key decision variables are production rate, cycle time and the number of
workstations, which are inter-related.
 Cycle Time is the ratio of the available time to the actual (desired) production rate.
It’s the interval between successive outputs coming off the assembly line.

 Flexible Manufacturing System (FMS) is a production method that is designed to

easily adapt to changes in the type and quantity of the product being manufactured.
Machines and computerized systems can be configured to manufacture a variety of
parts and handle changing levels of production.