Project Management from Simple to Complex
The book starts in chapter one, paragraph one citing the Project Management Institute's Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK) definition of a project. It continues to include all process groups and knowledge areas. However, the authors have used the 4th edition of the PMBOK,--not the latest available. So the Stakeholders knowledge area is not specifically included except within chapter 5 "Working with People on Projects".
The book has no TOC or index so sequentially scrolling through the PDF I downloaded, was cumbersome to say the least.
There is a lot of time spent on the author's tool to assess project complexity and it is referred to throughout the text. Its a useful concept to frame the degree of rigor to apply to a project.
There were some topics that should've been left out. Chapter 6 on communication technologies is significantly out of date, referring to Word 2003 and 2007. References to technologies is a no-win since they change so fast.
The text as a whole seemed to value breadth of coverage over depth. So there was mention of DISC, MBTI, EQ and others but the authors didn't pick one to really delve into. Same with brief mentions of quality tools even though there was a very long discussion of the history of quality management.
I found no inaccuracies in terms of formulas or calculations but I did not do a comprehensive check. There were tables and graphs on the Earned Value (chapter 9) that were very difficult to read, even magnified, so they couldn't be checked.
The treatment of work breakdown structures was not so much about deliverables as about outlining activities to estimate. I find this is a common problem in project management textbooks.
The chapter on risk did not address opportunities at all.
Very good discussion of contract types in chapter 12.
The text used an old version of the Project Management Body of Knowledge which limits its usefulness. The essential project management concepts are still valid but the latest research and trends aren't evident here. When it gets into .time management in chapter 8 it cites the PMI processes associated with time management but since its coming from an old version of the PMBOK, it is not correct any longer. This is a serious reason that would prevent me from using this book.
It also cites very old technology tools extensively.
Easy to read and understand with numerous examples and stories to highlight the points being made. The stories engage the reader and drive home the concepts in a tangible and memorable way. Often the examples are used multiple times to show how various aspect of an issue impacted the same project. That was well done.
The terminology is defined when used and typically relates back to the PMBOK. The style of writing is very simple and accessible to high school or college students in general studies.
The examples were predominately about construction projects or small example of an individual moving to a new home. This could be off-putting to students who know little about construction of chemical and steel plants, or mines. I believe the exercises are somewhat simplistic for a college course.
The terminology is defined when used and typically relates back to the PMBOK. So by the definition of being "internally consistent in terms of terminology and framework", the textbook was good on terminology but the framework was difficult to determine without some study. The PMBOK knowledge areas were all present in chapters 4-12 but without titles/introductions and a clear and consistent mapping to the PMBOK, it wasn't always apparent. That detracts from reinforcing the linkage with the student reader.
The chapters and sections were of reasonable size. A concept or premise was usually introduced, then broken down into its component parts to be discussed. These lowest level sections had descriptive headings as you'd expect but seemed to be fairly short. This relates back to my comment that the authors favored breadth of topic coverage over depth.
There was a definite top-down approach to the topics which I tend to appreciate. The first chapter is a great overview of project management, people and challenges. The logic of the remaining chapter order was not obvious to me. It was made less obvious by the lack of a table of contents. The chapter order is:
1-Introduction to project management
2-NO TITLE but about the project profiling tool
3- Project phases and organization
4-Understanding and meeting client expectations
5-Working with people
6-Communication technologies
7-Starting a project
8-Project time management
9-Estimating and managing cost
10-NO TITLE but about quality
11-Managing risk
12-Project procurement and closure
I reviewed the PDF of the text and noticed occasional formatting oddities such as a line break in the middle of a line on the page and mid-sentence. I was surprised that there were chapters without headings, titles or introductions, and that simply started in the middle of a page in a couple cases (see chapter 2 as an example). I didn't like that section or figure headings would be positioned at the very bottom of a page with the remainder of the section at the top of the next page. There were occasional gaps of white space around figures. It seemed that formatting was not adjusted in any way. This was distracting to me.
The resolution of the diagrams, tables and figures was quite low so even if I magnified them, many were unreadable or very difficult to read at best.
I saw no grammatical errors.
Several mentions of different cultures and how they impacted the project metrics, team interactions and outcomes. This was well integrated into the material throughout, as well as specific in the communications sections. I saw no stereotypes of other cultures and their habits/methods. Examples from Argentina and India stand out in my mind as frequent mentions.
I wanted to like this book and there were many things about it to appreciate: the focus on the PMI framework; the great overview in chapter 1; the simple, readable writing; the focus on dealing with projects differently depending on their complexity; the cultural awareness; and others. It didn't go into much depth but the breadth was good for an introductory project management class at the college level, which I regularly teach. I could supplement from my own materials and library resources where I wanted to emphasize select topics.
The biggest drawbacks for me were:
1. not being updated to the latest version of the PMBOK
2. the poor formatting of the text with missing chapter titles and introductions, and poor quality graphics
3. the lack of robust exercises
4. the out of date technology reference and examples