What is Project Management Methodology ?
Question:
is it "how to conduct project management" or how to produce the product or service of the project and does project life cycle describe the stages of production/construction / building etc or the stages / phases of management applied to get the production/construction / building done ?
Answer:
I believe in this context the phrase is referring to the iterative activity of Project Management - including the methods and tools Project Managers use to discharge their duties.
So, my interpretation here is 'how to conduct Project Management'
There are many answers to that question. I will give you my take on project management methodology. It is the process used to accomplish some particular end result - consisting of multiple deliverables in most cases. Many people get hung up on the process, losing sight of the end result of the project. Too bad for them! It can be kept simple, but many people like to complicate it. Good Luck!
Academically, you are going to struggle to find a clean definition for this. The reason is that the concept of a project management methodology assumes to first know what the definition of project management is, and also the definition of a methodology. When we combine the two, the definition should read: a PM Methodology is an approach, supported by tools, methods and techniques, to deliver projects with.
The lifecycle questions you have is a specialist arena within project management. In theory, there are only 3 main gates/stages/phases of a project. These are - Plan, Build, Deliver. Within these 3 lifecycle phases, one may add further phases such as Initiate, Execute, Conclude, Terminate and so forth. If a project is only supposed to Build a product, one should still remember that these 3 phases (Plan, Build, and Deliver) would, nearly always, be included as elementary lifecycle phases within a pure "Build" context.
I hope you can see the complex and fractal nature of projects in this lifecycle view.
A project management methodology is supposed to help the effective management of lifecycle(s), but it rarely does.
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