Phases of the Project Management Lifecycle

In this article, we will discuss the overview of project management Also, we will discuss the phases of project management and then finally conclude with the description of each phase in detail. Let’s discuss it one by one.

What is Project management ? 

Project management is the application of methodology, tools, and processes to effectively design and execute projects. Project management utilizes groups and assets to finish project exercises within the limits of time, cost, and extension. The undertaking objective is characterized by the customer or partner, and a venture administrator utilizes the strategies of tasking the executives to make an arrangement that characterizes the asset allotment, assignments, achievements, and expectations important to meet the partners’ prerequisites. The arrangement should acclimate to the triple requirement, or project management triangle, which alludes to the time, cost, and degree limits that apply to each project. This idea is a foundation of Project management and thus supervisors should give exceptional consideration to the timetable, financial plan, and work breakdown structure during the arranging stage.

Five phases of project management life cycle : 

There are five phases given below as follows.

Five phases of project management life cycle

1. Project Initiation
2. Project Planning
3. Project Execution
4. Project Monitoring and Control
5. Project Closure

Let’s discuss it one by one.

Phase-1:Project Initiation :

This is the starting period of your project when you should demonstrate the undertaking has value and is feasible. This stage incorporates making a business case, to legitimize the requirement for the undertaking, and an achievable study to show that it very well may be executed within a sensible time and cost. This is likewise an opportunity to make a task contract, a record that sets out precisely the thing the venture will convey.

• Documentation: Each project has documentation that should be finished before the undertaking can start vigorously. For instance, there’s a business case, which records the reasons why the undertaking is required and what the profit from speculation will be. There’s likewise an attainability study to decide whether the undertaking is even conceivable with thought to an association’s assets.  The venture sanction gives an overall outline of the task by characterizing the undertaking’s goals, benefits, partners, imperatives, and suspicions, among different angles.
• Undertaking a feasibility study: Identify the essential issue your task will tackle and whether your venture will convey an answer for that issue
• Recognizing extension :Define the profundity and broadness of the undertaking.
• Assemble of the team: You need resources to execute any project. Before you can make a project schedule, you need to create a project team with the skill sets and experience that the project demands. 
• Recognizing expectations: Define the product or administration to provide.  
• Recognizing project partners: Figure out whom the venture influences and what their requirements might be. 
• Building up a business case: Use the above standards to think about the possible expenses and advantages of the task to decide whether it pushes ahead.
• Building up an explanation of work: Document the undertaking’s goals, extensions, and expectations that you have distinguished already as a working understanding between the venture proprietor and those chipping away at the task.

Phase-2: Project planning :

The second stage is project planning, which happens after the venture has been endorsed. The deliverable of this stage is the undertaking plan, which will be the guide for the execution and control stages. The task plan should incorporate each segment related to the execution of the venture including the expenses, dangers, assets, and timetables. During this stage, the work needed to finish the task, which is known as the undertaking extension, is characterized by utilizing a work breakdown structure (WBS). The WBS partitions the undertaking into exercises, achievements, and expectations. This permits project chiefs to make plans and dole out errands to their colleagues. Undertaking directors regularly picture their venture plan utilizing a Gantt graph, which addresses the request for errands and how they are reliant. This gives you a guide for the work until the venture arrives at its decision.

• Make Task List: Undertakings are the more modest exercises that develop to the last deliverable in a venture. They are minuscule undertakings. You build up an errand list by putting your last venture deliverable on the highest point of a work breakdown structure, which is a tree outline causing you to map the way to finishing the task without missing any essential stride en route.  
• Make a Budget: Undertakings cost cash. They require colleagues to execute different assets, which can incorporate materials, instruments, and so on The financial plan is an approach to appraise the expense of the task. When you have an arranged spending plan, you can add that to ProjectManager.com and you would then be able to contrast it with the genuine expense of your assets as you execute the venture. That information strings to reports and a constant dashboard, so you’re never found napping if costs spike.  
• Risk Management Plan: If solitary the venture would adjust to your arrangement. Be that as it may, things occur, and there are consistent changes, some inside your control and others outside it. Before beginning an undertaking you need to attempt to recognize chances and have a danger the board intends to screen and react rapidly to them.  
• Interchanges Plan
  Great interchanges imply a fruitful undertaking. To have a reasonable correspondence plan set up implies you have focused on individuals who should be kept educated, what level of data they require, the recurrence, and how they will get it.  
• Make a Project Schedule :The Gantt graph is the favored strategy utilized by project directors to plan their undertakings as a result of the way it’s spread out. Gantt graphs resemble accounting pages with the special reward of a timetable. They list every one of your assignments, however, those errands are additionally graphed across a course of events, so you can see the whole task initially.  
• Appoint Tasks: Undertakings are only thoughts until they are given to a colleague to finish. All the readiness you’ve placed into arranging is subject to getting that task out to the group, so they can do what they were employed to do.

Phase-3: Project execution :

The third stage is project execution, which is the place where most of the work occurs. This is the stage where you complete the task exercises and achievements to create the expectations for the customer’s or partner’s fulfillment by following the arrangement made in the past stage. En route, the undertaking administrator will redistribute assets depending on the situation to keep the group working. They will likewise attempt to recognize and relieve hazards, manage issues, and fuse any changes.  

• Assignment Management :To ensure an errand is done well, it must be dealt with each progression in transit, from wanting to consummation. This includes observing and answering to ensure the assignment is being executed within the period of the arranged timetable. Venture directors and colleagues need to deal with their undertakings. Assignment records and kanban sheets are two mainstream apparatuses for the task of the board.  
• Timetable Management: Whenever you’ve arranged a timetable, you need to screen it through the task execution to ensure it stays on target. A viable Schedule for the executives implies more prominent efficiency. You’ve to define objectives, needs, and cutoff times, presently as the undertaking errands are being executed, you must ensure those dates are coordinated with your timetable.
• Cost Management: Similarly, as you arranged your timetable, you arranged a financial plan. Yet, that doesn’t mean your task is finished. As anybody with a wallet knows, cash tends to vanish. You need to control the venture expenses and keep them inside the concurred spending plan.  
• Quality Management : You can create your expectations on schedule and inside the financial plan, yet if the quality is inadequate, the undertaking isn’t effective. In this way, you need to ensure that you’re meeting whatever quality prerequisites have been set by your partners.  
• Change Management: Extensively, changing the board is an interaction for improving business measures, spending designation, and activities in an association. In any case, when applied to protect the board, the center is limited to the actual undertaking and controlling changes in scope during the execution stage.  
• Acquirement Management: Few is the undertaking that should be possible without buying, leasing, or agreement with outside assets. This interaction is called acquisition. Dealing with the different associations with merchants and providers is what is the issue here.

Phase-4: Task Monitoring and Control :  

The fourth stage is project monitoring and control, which happens simultaneously with the execution period of the venture. It includes observing the advancement and execution of the undertaking to guarantee that it stays on time and inside the spending plan. Quality control systems are applied to ensure quality affirmation. The greatest issues in an undertaking are commonly identified with three things—time, cost, and degree, which by and large are alluded to as the triple limitation. The principle objective of this stage is to set firm controls on the venture to guarantee that those zones don’t go off course.

• Reporting: Reporting twofold affects the undertaking. One is that it permits project directors to follow progress, and two, it gives information to partners during introductions that keep them on the up and up. Undertaking reports can differ from task progress to fluctuation and cost.

Phase-5: Project Closure :  

The fifth stage is project conclusion, in which the last expectations are introduced to the customer or partner. When affirmed, assets are delivered, documentation is finished and everything is approved. Now the venture supervisor and group can lead a posthumous to assess the exercises gained from the project and gain from the experience. Contingent upon the venture, the conclusion stage may likewise incorporate giving over control to an alternate group, for example, the tasks supervisory crew. In this situation, it is the work of the venture supervisor to guarantee that such a change happens easily.  

• Move Deliverables: Your venture is tied in with creating a deliverable. That denotes the finish of the venture execution and the start of the task close. Subsequently, ensure you have all expectations recognized, total, and given off to the legitimate party.
• Affirm Completion: An undertaking isn’t over until everybody sings. You need to get affirmation from all partners, customers, and even the group. That implies sign-offs so that there is no disarray and a minute ago change demands. Those close-down archives can be added to ProjectManager.com, either in the segment of the document or joined to the applicable assignment. Presently you have an advanced paper trail to settle on sure that everybody is in the arrangement.  
• Audit Documentation: Typically, the venture supervisor is answerable for going over all agreements and documentation to ensure that all have been great and approved. Now and then in bigger associations, there is a devoted administrator for this work. Whoever does it, the significance of ensuring each I is spotted and t crossed couldn’t possibly be more significant.  
• Delivery Resources: Before a task is truly done, you need to authoritatively deliver the group, any contractors, rentals, and so forth Have an interaction set up to advise and ensure everybody is settled up.  
• Do a Post-Mortem: A posthumous is the point at which you take a gander at the completed undertaking and dissect the cycle to note what worked and what didn’t. This is an extraordinary method to rehash triumphs and fix botches for the following undertaking. Likewise, remember to celebrate with your group. They merit it.

Conclusion: Phases of the Project Management Lifecycle

The project management lifecycle consists of initiation, planning, execution, monitoring and controlling, and closing phases. Initiation involves defining project goals and stakeholders. Planning entails creating a detailed roadmap, including tasks, timelines, resources, and budgets. Execution is the implementation phase where tasks are completed according to plan. Monitoring and controlling ensure progress aligns with the plan, making adjustments as needed. Finally, the closing phase involves wrapping up loose ends, documenting lessons learned, and formally concluding the project.

FAQs: Phases of the Project Management Lifecycle

1. What are the 5 phases of the project life cycle?

The five phases of the project life cycle are initiation, planning, execution, monitoring and controlling, and closing. They represent the sequential steps from project conception to completion, each essential for successful project management.

2. What is the project life cycle?

The project life cycle is the sequence of phases a project goes through from initiation to closure, including planning, execution, and evaluation, guiding its management and control. It encompasses all the stages from conception to completion, ensuring organized and systematic progress towards achieving project goals.

3. What are the seven 7 stages of project cycle?

The seven stages of the project cycle typically include identification, preparation, appraisal, financing, implementation, monitoring and evaluation, and completion. These stages encompass the entire lifespan of a project, from conception to post-completion analysis, ensuring effective project management and delivery.