Futuristic evolution of project management with AI

Artificial intelligence is a set of a computer system, a process that can perform some complex task or activities which may need human intelligence to complete. The systems and machines are made so intelligent so that they can handle those complex operations.

When it comes to project management, PM (project manager) needs to consider a wide set of process, activity, plan, risks for making a project successful. The decision-making process plays a vital part in project management. For making projects successful various factors are to be considered with large volumes of data. So AI marks an impact on making decisions on a large volume of data.

First of all, AI will help in removing the blind spots. This will help in predicting the future of the project by reducing risks. It will show the exact future, based on the data available to all. This means the analysis of the data will be more and faster. When PMs Stop for thinking of a decision the decision engines of AI will help to decide it faster based on the data available to them. This prediction will be completely based on mathematics, data and statistics which will lead to a good prediction on the project status.

Due to AI impact, most of the tasks for the project managers will be automated.E.g: some organizations have already started automating the scrum processes by using automating the meetings and prioritizing stories. This will be very quick and the status of the stories can be tracked easily. It will also create scalable and predictable results for the team.

AI will help PMs in doing day to day project monitoring activities and based on the analysis it will provide recommendations. Ultimately it will do most of the simple human activities which will save a lot of time.

While handling multiple projects together, AI will help the PMs to make smoother processes to create reliable outcomes. AI systems help to schedule the meetings, communications, and go-live dates and decrease human interaction. These systems are now integrated with popular tools like JIRA to get the status of the tickets. It will be generating patterns that will guide the PMs to take the necessary actions. 

Another task that AI can help in managing, is resource management. Nowadays AI is used to create assistants like catboats. Due to the massive use of natural language processing techniques, the spoken language or written language can be converted into intents which the virtual assistants can be able to handle or answer. Also, the monitoring activities can be planned using AI. The virtual assistants monitor the activities, status and send warning messages when required. Chabot’s started helping in agile methods by using task selection and user assignments. They can generate reports based on status, progress at the end of projects or sprints.

AI can help in reducing errors by making a regular pattern on statistical data. The data can be prepared and analyzed. Once it's completed it will be shared with all the stakeholders. This will help the team is getting the statistical data on the quality of the delivery. Based on the status of the past defect the team will be alerted on the next steps. It can give a report on the time taken for the errors to be resolved and the risks for the planned schedule. For humans, it will take more time to analyze the error report and to predict on this schedule. Based on the alerts PMs can plan about the next steps to keep the project on track.

As per some research studies, in IT industries only 30-40 percent of projects will be delivered on time and schedule. It is due to different reasons like planning, estimation, people, resources and all. This leads to increasing costs. The predictive analysis part of the AI helps us getting reports in time management, product management, coding and validating, etc. This will help to understand where the project is right now and what next steps to be taken to go live.

By using AI, simpler tasks can be delegated and it will save a lot of time on that activity. This will save time for PMs to do other high priority tasks. This can be used by PMs to get new ideas and improvements for projects. Deciding on a large volume of data is very difficult and time-consuming. The main difficulty is to find a proper solution to any challenges. AI will help in making the best complex decision making.

Let's take some examples which can be considered for project planning. As changes are unavoidable for any project, PMs will have to use some knowledge-based systems with a conditional programming approach. Based on that data fed on the system and the conditions applied, the system will predict the accurate new date of go-live. Artificial neural networks can automate project activity and its flow based on functional requirements.

AI can help us doing risk estimation. Based on the cost, budget, and schedule and remaining work, it can decide on the estimation of risk. PMs can also use the past data for the start date, end date, and duration of the project. It can also highlight if any delays happened during the execution of the project. For the project to be on track, PMs have to ensure the right people and the right resources (computers, software) to be available. If PMs can get some past data on resource utilization they will be able to find out how many people, machines can be deployed to complete the work.

So far as the people skills are concerned, I will help people in learning new technologies with real-situation based training material which will increase their skills. This will help the PMs in acquiring them in projects with less time and enhance the delivery of the projects with clarity.

Sometimes its felt that many people in the projects are underutilized. AI systems will help PMs to allocate the tasks equally (based on experience) to use the people utilization optimum. This will create a healthy environment as well as an optimized workplace. If it’s found few tasks are repetitive, they can be automated and people can take other activities during that time to complete.

We have reached a phase where AI is involved in many industries for decision making. In project management side AI can be integrated for almost everything starting from decision making to project delivery.

The key to project success will be on the implementations of AI, by project managers.