What Is a Business Project?

A project is a set of tasks. In business planning speak that’s just another way of saying it’s a process or system. However, unlike most business systems one of its key characteristics is that it has a specific beginning and end. Most business systems are permanent. Or at least have some level of permanency to them. A project, on the other hand, is conceived as a temporary [login to view URL] second key characteristic of a project is that of uniqueness. The product is always unique. The specific set of tasks that make up the project, are almost always unique. The tasks may follow a pattern. The tasks may be individually common. However, the arrangement of tasks and something in the tasks will be unique to this project. So projects can include such things as building an office building. Or building a house. Or building a bridge. But they can also include such things as designing a rocket ship or a satellite. Or it might include the development of a new drug. There are three basic types of business project. The first is the strategic project. This type of project is focused on achieving objectives determined during the business planning or strategic process. A second type is the operational project. These are projects which are initiated for business reasons other than achieving a strategic objective. For example, a general ledger may have become obsolete. So a business project is initiated in order to implement a new release of the general ledger. The third type is the repeating or operationalized project. These projects run so frequently that much of the regular project planning can be repeated.