subject: Do We Need More Projects ? [print this page] Do We Need More Projects ? Do We Need More Projects ?
Having spent significant time in the Industry we all have got used to working in Project Mode. I mean everything in the world typically runs around Projects, applies to pretty much every Industry: Technology, Manufacturing, Healthcare, Finance they all run through projects. In fact we could even map a lot of the aspects in our personal life to projects, like planning for your child's education or your new home is a project, trying to learn a new language is a project as well. In fact I feel that you could map this entire world and all its activities into one giant project with a number of smaller projects, albeit many of them sometimes running out of control but all the same they could be thought of as projects. I think there is a significant value in treating various activities in life as a project because of some immensely powerful aspects of projects.
What's so great about Projects?
Just the thought of doing a Project immediately brings into mind a structured, definite, time bound piece of work which is so great because of the accountability that it brings to the table. Some great things about Projects: You need a well defined Problem Statement, you need a start date and end date, you need to plan for your resources, you need to plan for and work within a timeline, you need to track and report your progress and slippages, finally you need to deliver and also review how well you have done.
We need more Projects in Education
While we have been working with Students on a community initiative where we have really seen a lot of value in Projects. We notice that students are far more excited about doing their projects as against their day to day classroom lectures and learning about subjects. Now why is that? I do feel that students equally see the benefits of executing a well defined project as against standard classroom lectures which don't necessarily have a quantifiable output. I do not wish to suggest that all classroom lectures are redundant but i do feel that we need a far greater number of projects to be included into our educational system and this at all levels. Ideally i would go far as to say that there should be no classroom lecture without an associated project. I know this is a debatable topic but is worth the discussion. I think as part of our community initiative this is a key approach that we are taking, Projects are truly the center of the universe for us and we will wait and watch if that transforms the way people learn!
