The Genesis of Project Management

The traditional project management approach has been in place to some extent for a long, long, long time. As far back as 5,000 years ago, when the Egyptian pyramids were being built, there were unskilled day laborers doing the physical construction work who needed to be managed. Actually, most were farmers who owed annual taxes to the Pharaoh. The tangible items of value or agricultural products used as payment were of some interest to the crown. But that payment form really did not work to fulfill the Pharaoh's main vision: an elaborate and impressive tomb to ensure that his spirit would be safely transported to the next world.

A better solution to the tax issue was to have the farmers pay their obligation in the form of a certain number of days of labor, giving the Pharaoh the workforce needed for his construction projects. They probably had architectural drawings back then, and you have to imagine that someone smart had figured out the sequence in which tasks should be done, planned the materials, and then listed the jobs to be done on a daily basis. There were also the challenges of managing a large, uneducated, unmotivated, and disengaged workforce.
If we really knew what happened with project managers in ancient Egypt, we might wonder if the pyramids originally started out to be a rectangular tower, just like the architect's drawings showed on the papyrus scroll, accompanied by his technical and functional requirements written in colorful hieroglyphics. Like on our projects today, constraints and resource problems probably came up some-where around the mid-point of the endeavor.

You can easily imagine the Egyptian project manager ranting to his construction foreman, "I knew we didn't have enough stones for this project, but the Pharaoh just wouldn't listen." So, instead of building a tower like the architect planned on the original drawings, he ended up working with what they had and redesigned the project "on the fly" to end up with a pyramid-shaped deliver-able. The results have lasted until the present time, so this project management approach cannot be called a failure. But still today many modern projects are not completed to match the original vision.

Unfortunately, in some organizations, today's project management practices have not changed that much from historic times, although the situations and type of employees whom we work with are very different. It is those differences that further motivate us to evolve our practices. At first, Agile and Waterfall may seem like an odd mix to consider, but combining the two is becoming more prevalent. It is important to consider your own current project culture, and your own personal project management practices, to decide how they will need to change to prepare for the future.

If you are not a Star Trek fan, the long-running TV show and series of movies based on space travel and exploring new galaxies, you might not recognize the name of the Borg. The Borg was a fictional race of powerful cybernetic organisms. Individual Borg rarely spoke. Instead, they sent a collective audio message to their targets stating, "Resistance is futile," followed by a declaration that the human target in question would be assimilated, and its biological and technological distinctiveness would be added to their own, collective Borg presence. Similarly, we can say to project managers, "Resistance to Agile is futile. You will be assimilated!"

Projects right now are being managed with hybrid processes, and the project managers who step up and learn how to do this will be in great demand. Companies are already on the search and offering high salaries for people with an understanding of both approaches and how these skill sets can be merged for competitive, corporate advantage.
However, the reality is that current project management practices are well-ingrained into our culture. Your organization no doubt has many layers of protocols, templates, and regulations around how projects are authorized, assigned, staffed, completed, reported, archived, and evaluated. They may have internal training classes to prepare you in their proprietary methodology, or have invested large dollar amounts to send masses of employees to external training.

Perhaps, the organization funds the cost of certifications, certification testing, training to maintain the designations, and memberships in local and national project management related organizations. Project management offices (PMOs) may have been created and staffed with the mandate to coordinate and govern a single approach to projects, companywide. Suggesting that this should all be tossed away overnight to embrace a new philosophy will be futile.

Taken from : Agile Practices for Waterfall Projects: Shifting Processes for Competitive Advantage