Project Management: Tools and Trade-offs

If you want to bring a project to completion effectively and efficiently, project management software will only take you so far. To truly succeed, you'll need to understand the difficult problems and difficult trade-offs that project managers often face in the real world.

With Ted Klastorin's  PROJECAT MANAGEMENT: TOOLS AND TRADE-OFFS, you'll have the practical and conceptual foundation you need to effectively address complex project management issues. The text describes the tools and methodologies that have been developed to assist project managers using spreadsheet models and templates, and shows how these tools and methodologies can be extended to deal with realistic problems.

• Excel spreadsheets make analysis more realistic and intuitive.
• Takes an analytical and applied approach that shows how real managers work.
• Relates the material in the text to business and engineering.
• Presents a unique balance of theory and practice, with an emphasis on the Uncertain, risky projects that managers have to manage in the real world.
• Includes a new product development game and numerous short case studies that illustrate the complex issues faced by project managers.
• Presents current research that is relevant to PM practitioners and managers.
• An accompanying CD-ROM includes a student version of Microsoft Project, a student version of the @RISK add-on to Microsoft Project, spreadsheet templates described in the text, and a PowerPoint presentation for the text.

Professor Klastorin is a senior research fellow at the IC² Institute, the University of Texas-Austin. He previously taught at the Babcock Graduate School of Management,  Wake Forest University (Winston-Salem, North Carolina), as well as the University of Washington and the University of Texas. At the UW, he was the founding chair of the Management Science Department and a co-founder of the PEMM Program (Program in Engineering and Manufacturing Management)-a joint program of the College of Engineering and the School of Business.

Professor Klastorin's research interests include project management and supply chain management issues in manufacturing and service organizations. His current research projects include the study of uncertain disruptive events (e.g., strikes) on project planning and coordination issues in decentralized supply chains. His recent articles have appeared in IIE Transactions, Journal of Applied Psychology, Management Science and the Wisconsin Law Review.

Professor Klastorin has consulted with numerous organizations, including Boeing, Starbucks, Fluke Corp, and Microsoft (where he has assisted with the design of Microsoft Project).He is a member of INFORMS (Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences), IIE (Institute of Industrial Engineers), and POMS (Production and Operations Management Society), and serves on the editorial boards of Manufacturing &service Operations Management (M&SOM) and IIE Transactions.