The document provides guidance on initiating projects through a 6-step process: 1) Define goals, 2) Identify team members, 3) Define work, 4) Develop a plan, 5) Delegate tasks, and 6) Execute and monitor progress. It emphasizes setting clear goals, assembling the right team to achieve those goals, breaking the work into specific tasks, creating a timeline and assigning responsibilities, and continuously tracking performance. Additional sections cover strategies for improving projects, criteria for selecting projects, and key project management terminology.

1. Initiating Projects

2. How to start a Project?
1. Define Your Goals
2. Identify Your Team Members
3. Define Your Work
4. Develop Your Plan
5. Delegate (smartly)
6. Execute and Monitor

3. 1. Define Your Goals
First things decide what you want to achieve.
Put thought into the goals of the project.
I suggest having one main goal and a number of smaller goals that will ultimately
lead you to project success.
Document your goals and objectives in a project charter or project statement.

4. 2. Identify Your Team Members
The second step on the ladder to beginning any project is the identification of
the various team members to be involved.
This step must be considered from two viewpoints:
∙ Who do you already have? Identify their strengths and weaknesses relative to the
objectives of the project.
∙ Who do you need? Look for gaps in your team based on your goals and fill them
in with the necessary skill sets.

5. 3. Define Your Work
What is the actual work you will need to do in order to achieve your goals?
Look at each individual goal you have decided upon and agree with your team on what
needs to be done in order to achieve it.
Define the tasks as clearly as possible and ensure there is no misunderstanding between
the various members of the group.

6. 4. Develop Your Plan
Create an actionable, systematic, and logical plan that you know you can achieve.
Ensure you create an overall project completion date and assign deadlines to the
sub-tasks created in step three.

7. 5. Delegate (smartly)
Delegating work will not only allow you to work faster but it will also develop the
skills of the rest of the team… so everyone wins!

8. 6. Execute and Monitor
The final step is to get working on your project and monitor it continuously throughout
the process using a project management tool.
Keep open communication throughout, which will ensure you and your teammates that
speed of the work is up to the expectation around you.
Meet regularly to go over your progress and make any necessary changes due to
unexpected bumps in the road!

9. Project Strategy
• Strategy means what organization does the best
• Strategy is plan to provide something customers can’t get from the
competitors.

10. Strategic Tips to Improve Project
• Begin with the End in Mind
• Build a High Performing Team
• Monitor Progress and Performance through Accountability
• Listen to Lead
• Be Open and Flexible
• Celebrate Incremental Achievements Along the Way
• There Is No “I” in Team

11. Criteria for Project Selection
• Ease of Use
-Easy to understand
-Easy to execute
-It should be convenient
• Cost: Data gathering n modeling cost should be relatively low as compare
to cost of the project.
• Easy Computerization: must be easy n convenient to gather, store and
model.
• Capability: able to simulate different scenario & optimize the decision

12. Some Important Terminologies used in Project Management
1) BUSINESS CASE
2) MILESTONES
3) DELIVERABLES
4) PROJECT PLAN
5) MOV
6) PROJECT CHARTER
7) FEASIBLITY STUDY
8) PROJECT SCOPE

13. Important Terminologies
Business Case:
It is first deliverable in the IT Project Life Cycle.
Definition :
Business Case provides an analysis of the organizational value, feasibility,
costs, benefits and risks of several proposed alternatives.

14. Important Terminologies
Milestones
A milestone is a specific point in time within a project lifecycle used to
measure the progress of a project toward its ultimate goal.
Simply, it's a reference point that marks a major event.
These points may signal anchors such as a project start and end date, or a
need for external review or input and budget checks.
In many instances, milestones do not impact project duration. Instead, they
focus on major progress points that must be reached to achieve success.

15. IMP. TERMINOLOGIES
Deliverables:
Deliverables is a project management term for the quantifiable goods or services
that will be provided upon the completion of a project. Deliverables can be
tangible or intangible parts of the development process, and they often are
specified functions or characteristics of the project

16. Important Terminologies
Project Planning:
Project planning is part of project management, which relates to the use of
schedules such as Gantt charts to plan and subsequently report progress within
the project environment. Then the necessary resources can be estimated and
costs for each activity can be allocated to each resource, giving the total project
cost.

17. Important Terminologies
MOV(Measurable Organizational Value)
The Project’s overall goal and measure of success is referred as the
Project’s overall Measurable Organizational Value.

18. Important Terminologies
Project Charter:
It provides a preliminary delineation of roles and responsibilities, outlines the
project objectives, identifies the main stakeholders, and defines the authority
of the project manager. It serves as a reference of authority for the future of the
project. The terms of reference are usually part of the project charter.

19. Important Terminologies
Feasibility Study:
Focuses on whether a particular alternative is doable and worth doing.
Types:
Economic feasibility: Cost/Benefit Analysis of alternatives
Technical feasibility:Focuses on existing technical infrastructure
Organizational feasibility:Considers the impact on the organization
Other feasibilities:Issues like operational,legal and ethical feasibility.

20. Important Terminologies
Project Scope:
"The work that needs to be accomplished to deliver a product,
service, or result with the specified features and functions".

21. Project Selection Model
Basic type of Project Selection Model
• Numeric Model/Scoring Model
• Non-numeric Model
Two Critical Facts:
1) Models do not make decisions-people do!
2) All models, however sophisticated, are only partial representation of the
reality.

22. Numeric Project Selection Models
(Profit/Profitability)
The profitability is used as the only measure of acceptability by the majority
of organizations using different types of project selection models. The
following are some of the numeric models for project selection.
• Payback Period
• Average Rate of Return(ARR)
• Net Present Value(NPV) or Discounted Cash Flow
• Profitability Index

23. Payback Period
• This method determines how long it will take to recover the initial
investment.
• The initial fixed investment in the project divided by the forecasted
annual net cash inflows from the project is referred to as the payback
period for the project. The number of years needed by the project to
refund its initial fixed investment is reflected in the ratio of these
quantities.
• For example, suppose a project costs INR 2L to operate and has annual
net cash inflows of INR 40K. Then
• Payback Period = Initial Investment
Net Cash Flow
Payback Period = 200,000 / 40,000 = 5 Years
• Any cash inflows outside the payback period are ignored. The company
faces less risk when it recovers the initial investment fast.

24. Average Rate of Return(ARR)
• The ratio of the average annual profit to the initial investment in the
project is referred as average rate of return.
• In the previously mentioned example, suppose the average annual profits
are INR 30K
• Average Rate of Return = Average Annual Profit/Initial Investment
=30,000 / 200,000 = 0.15%
• These two models have a major advantage in the shape of simplicity, but
none of them cover the important concept of the time value of money.

25. Example of ARR (with a salvage value )
Let us take the example of real estate investment that is likely to generate returns of
$25K in Year 1, $30K in Year 2, and $35K in Year 3. The initial investment is $3.5L
with a salvage value of $50K and estimated life of 3 years. Do the Calculation the Avg
rate of return of the investment based on the given information.
• Salvage value is the estimated book value of an asset after depreciation is
complete, based on what a company expects to receive in exchange for the
asset at the end of its useful life.

26. • Average annual return = Sum of earnings in Year 1, 2 and 3 / Estimated life
= ($25K + $30K+ $35K)/3= $30K
Average annual return (ARR) = $30K / ($3.5L – $50K) * 100% = 10%

27. Example #2(without a salvage value )
Let us take an example of an investor who is considering two securities of a comparable
risk level to include one of them in your portfolio. Determine which security should be
selected based on the following information:

28. Average annual earnings for security A can be calculated as:
• Average annual earnings A = Sum of earnings in Year 1,2 and 3/ Estimated life
= ($5k + $10k + $12k) / 3= $9k
The calculation of ARR of Stock A can be done as follows,
Avg return A = $9k / $50k * 100% =18%

29. Average annual earnings for security B can be calculated as:
• Average annual earnings B = ($7k + $12k + $14k) /3= $11k
• Average return B = $11k / $65k* 100%
• Average return for security B = 16.92%

30. Net Present Value (NPV) or Discounted Cash Flow: Net Present
value (NPV) is the difference between the present value of cash inflows and
the present value of cash outflows over a period of time. NPV is used in
capital budgeting and investment planning to analyze the profitability of a
projected investment or project.
NPV = -I0 + Σ (Net Cash Flow / (1 + r)
t)
Where:
I = Total Cost or Investment of the Project
r = discount rate
t = time period

31. Example of NPV
Imagine a project that costs $1,000 and will provide three net cash flows
of $500, $300, and $800 over the next three years. Assume there is no
salvage value at the end of the project and the required rate of return is
8%. The NPV of the project is calculated as follows

32. Examples 2 of NPV
• Suppose a project has an initial investment of $1L. It has a net cash inflow
of $25K per year for a period of eight years. The required rate of return
for the project is 15% with an inflation rate of 3% p.a. Now the NPV of
this project is calculated as below

33. Profitability Index Models
• The net present value of all future expected cash flows divided by the
initial investment is referred as the profitability index.
• The profitability index is also called the benefit-cost ratio.
The project may be accepted if this ratio is higher than 1.0.

34. Example of Profitability Index Models

35. Scoring model
• The scoring model is an objective technique.
• Steps followed by Project selection committee:
1) Lists relevant criteria
2) Weighs them according to their importance and their priorities
3) Adds the weighted values.
Once the scoring of these projects is completed, the project with the highest score is chosen.
⮚The weights must sum up to 100%.
n
Total score: ∑ Wi * Ci
i=1
Where:
W i= Criterion Weight
Ci = Criterion Score

38. Non numeric model
• Non – Numeric project selection models have further 6 types, which
we need to discuss in detail.
• The Sacred Cow
• The Operating Necessity
• The Competitive Necessity
• The Product Line Extension
• Comparative Benefit Model
• Q-Sort Model

39. The Sacred Cow
• The senior and the powerful official in the company suggest the
project in this case.
• Investigating whatever the boss has proposed. The sacredness of the
project reflects the fact that it will be continued until ended or until the
boss himself announces the failure of the idea & ends it.

40. The Operating Necessity
•If a organization is threatened by the lets say flood
then it needs to be moved to a different location to
prevent frequent flooding.

41. The Competitive Necessity
• The management of the company need some modernization in its
existing setup in order to keep the current competitive position in the
market.
• Undergraduate and Master in Business Administration (MBA)
programs are restructured for many universities to keep their competitive
position in the academic market.

42. The Product Line Extension
• A product line extension is when an existing brand launches
new products in a product category they already offer products.
• For example, when a soft drink company offers a new flavor of soda.
Sometimes a line extension is called a product extension.
• Fortify a weak line, fills a gap, or enhanced the line in a new &
desirable direction.
• Modifying existing versions of S/W in order to lunch new version in
open market.

43. Comparative Benefit Model
• According to this selection model, there are several projects that are being
considered by the organization.
• Projects are selected by the senior management of the organization and they
can provide the most benefits to the company. But comparing various
projects is not an easy task.
• There is no formal method of selection of projects in the organization but
it is the perception of the selection committee members that certain projects
will benefit the company more than the others even they lack the suitable
way to specify or measure the proposed benefit.

44. Q-Sort Model
• The Q-Sort model is one of the most straightforward techniques. According to
their relative merits, the projects are first divided into three groups which
are Good, Fair and Poor. The main group is further subdivided into the two
types of fair-minus and fair-plus if any group has more than eight members.
• The projects within each type are ranked from best to worst when all types have
eight or fewer members. Again relative merit provides the basis for determining
the order. The specific criterion is used by the project charter to rank each
project.
• Projects are selected on the different models, though they are generally
assessed on a financial basis before final selection