Routine work covers the normal things you do as an ongoing part of your job. In many organizations, this is called support work. For IT development people, support work consists of answering questions, going to regularly scheduled meetings, fixing problems in the production systems, etc. For sales people, this could be making daily sales calls, moving contracts through an approval process, updating call logs, etc. For an accounts receivable clerk this could be checking reports, balancing accounts, posting journal entries, closing out the system, etc. The key criteria is that the work is an ongoing, and routine, part of your job. This is the work you do today, tomorrow and a month from now.

On the other hand, projects are not routine. The biggest difference is that projects, by their definition, have a defined start and end-date. There is a point in time when the work did not exist (before the project), when it does exist (the project), and when it does not exist again (after the project). This is the key determinant of whether a piece of work is a project. However, other characteristics of a project include a defined scope, finite budget, specific end result (or deliverables) and assigned resources. Another characteristic of a project is that the work is unique. Even if a project is similar to another one, it is not exactly the same because circumstances change and because things are always different when you are dealing with people.

Every methodology has its own way of laying out the processes, procedures, best practices and templates required to successfully manage projects. If you look at them in more detail, you start to see many similarities. Differences are also present, not so much because of major disagreements, as much as differences in emphasis. For instance, there are some methodologies that include the gathering of business requirements as a project management process. Sysgenic Sourcing is a company that uses such methodologies.

Sysgenic Sourcing recognizes the value of gathering business requirements, but considers it part of the project itself, not a part of the project management umbrella. For instance, if a large body of work is broken down into multiple phases, one entire project might be the Analysis Phase, and another project might be the Design and Construction Phase. In the second project, there would be no need to gather business requirements at all.

One of the recognized standard project management methodologies is the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK), which is the standard put forward by the Project Management Institute (PMI). PMBOK provides a basic foundation for understanding how to manage work as a project, but is not necessarily a methodology that you can take to manage a project directly. For instance, there is information, but no procedures. There are definitions, but not necessarily best practices or techniques. There are outputs, but no deliverable templates. Beside these principles, Sysgenic Sourcing is an adept of RAD and DSDM methodologies.

"Iterative and incremental development is necessary to coverage on an accurate business solution" - this is the key principle of Sysgenic Sourcing.

DSDM
Quality controls into the process
Testing from very early on

TQM
Internal/External clients
"Sterile" Environment

Test Center
Own test center
Black Box Testing
Document driven (client control)

Version Control (MS SS, PVCS) White Box Testing
Detecting Hot Spots

Keeping normal working hours sometimes may mean that the project will take an extra week or two, which no one wants. Project leaders at Sysgenic Sourcing constantly make effort to improve morale if possible without increasing the hours. Here is a list of common practices at Sysgenic Sourcing:
Give team members a day off work to get them temporarily recharged.
Allow them to take their spouse/family to dinner on the company.
Provide donuts/pastries in the morning and cookies in the afternoon.
Arrange for personal notes of thanks from the sponsor or high-level management.
Arrange an afternoon movie for the project team.
Arrange for bonus pay after the project is completed.
Lastly, if gifts are given, look for something personal, if possible. For example, a book on horses to a horse lover etc.

On the surface, the role of a Project Manager should be easy to describe. In fact, from a textbook perspective it probably is. But the challenge to understanding roles and responsibilities is that they are different from company to company.

At Sysgenic Sourcing, the Project Manager is responsible for the overall success of the project. Other job titles might include a Project Coordinator, or a Team Leader, but if Sysgenic Sourcing calls you a Project Manager, the chances are that they expect you to be responsible for ensuring the success of the project.

The project manager "job" at Sysgenic Sourcing includes defining the project objectives, scope, risk, approach, budget, etc. It also includes defining, or adopting, the specific project management procedures that will be used to manage the project. Once the project starts, the Sysgenic Sourcing Project Manager must successfully manage and control the work, including:
Identifying, tracking managing and resolving project issues;
Proactively disseminating project information to all stakeholders;
Identifying, managing and mitigating project risk;
Ensuring that the solution is of acceptable quality;
Proactively managing scope to ensure that only what was agreed to is delivered, unless changes are approved through scope management;
Defining and collecting metrics to give a sense for how the project is progressing and whether the deliverables produced are acceptable;
Managing the overall workplan to ensure work is assigned and completed on time and within budget.

In addition to process skills, a Project Manager must have good people management abilities. This includes:
General management skills needed to establish processes and make sure that people follow them;
Leadership skills to get the team to willingly follow your direction. Leadership is about communicating a vision and getting the team to accept it and strive to get there with you;
Setting reasonable, challenging and clear expectation of people, and holding them accountable for meeting the expectations;
The larger your team and the longer the project, the more important it is to have good team-building skills, so that the people work together well, and feel motivated to work hard for the sake of the project and their other team members;
Proactive verbal and written communicator skills, including good, active listening skills;
Able to give good quality performance feedback to team members.

The most prevalent organizational structure today is some form of matrix organization. The matrix organization usually allows the most efficient use of people resources for a company. However, one of the challenges of the matrix organization is that the team members are assigned to the project for work (full time or part time), but the resources report to someone else from a people management standpoint. This can mean that it is harder to get the resources to do the things you need to have done, and there is sometimes a sense that team members would rather do what their functional managers request, rather than what the Project Manager needs. This type of a structure is what Sysgenic Sourcing has adopted and project managers has a number of proactive things they can do.