Benefits And Planning Of An Identified Event Or Project

Task 1

1. Write a report on the benefits of carrying out an identified event or project within an agreed time scale in order to meet the need of the project

2. List all the documents that are required for such an event using your experience as an event planner to evaluate and analyse the importance of these documents

3. In your report you must ensure that resources that are required for this event are listed and their benefits to the project/event are discussed and documented within your report

4. The final part of your report should give a critical analysis of how reviews and evaluations including the methods and resources were carried out

1. In your report you will document how you will Set up the Project, choose the completion date and allocate responsibilities

2. Detail within your report what leadership, effective time management skills will be necessary to pull such an event /project off

3. Assess and document the significance of stakeholder analysis when formulating new strategy

4. Take corrective action if necessary to keep the project on schedule and document this in your report

1. Choose the Appropriate size team and document each person’s role writing down what skills this person has in adding value to the project, and hence why you choose that person to play that role

2. Document within your report what types of team building and conflict management skills are required when diffusing anger

3. Detail methods of co-ordination and communication used, and why you believe they were the most appropriate methods. Do not forget to include documents i.e. minutes of meeting, emails, telephone call logs etc.

4. What, why and how are resources going to be used in order to ensure the project is a success?

1. Create clear records of communication both internally, externally and of team meetings.

2. Document where use of information technology has been used

3. Produce information clearly, regularly and on time documenting when and what was produced.

1. A project has its own benefits to the company. Some of the project benefits are given below

• All the projects are based on some specific objectives which in return delivers benefits to the taxpayers, companies, the general public, the government of the nation in which the country is situated, the sponsoring of the organisation and also the stakeholders and the delivery partners.
• It will cause the business to operate in a different technique in order to carry out the operations.
• It will help to create new form of outputs and deliverables that will enable the benefits to be realised.
• They also help to create a specific, temporary management for the organisation which carries out the governance arrangements setup for the duration of the project.
• The risk they are susceptible to can be found during these projects or events which are usually absent in the day to day operational work of the organisation.
• The involvement of the organisations stakeholders from different parts of the organisations increase the involvement of the stakeholders in the organisation.
• The use of new and unfamiliar methods of operations in the organisations are carried out which might be more efficient than the previously used methods.

2. The purpose of the project initiation document is to provide the information required by senior management and stakeholders to enable them to commit to the resources and timelines proposed. It is a form of contract between the Project Manager and Project Board that defines how the project will be run. The PID provides a detailed proposition against which success can be measured. To do this the PID builds on the approved Project Brief by defining in detail how the project will be developed and when it will be delivered.

The PID is presented to the project board in order to get a clear information about the views of the key stakeholders and therefore can be considered as valid. This is an essential stage in the process to ensure commitment and buy-in from all interested parties to the proposed outcomes. The detailed analysis undertaken for the PID will uncover increased costs or risks such that the project is cancelled. This is a strength of the staged project process as it avoids significant resources being expended on the wrong project. The development of the project initiation document takes place by the following methods

• Accountabilities, roles and responsibilities of the project team and inclusion of the part time team members also should be accountable.
• An activity plan like the Gantt chart should be used on which each deliverable should be completed. This will also include dependencies and milestone.
• An updated assessment of Risks, including their probability and impact, as well as some mitigation plans and contingency arrangements.
• The updated cost and benefit analysis, particularly a detailed resource and timing plan
• Governance plan that details how the project will be monitored and controlled in terms of decision points, reports and reporting cycles, including whether updates will be on an exception or ongoing basis.
• Communications Plan that will start to determine how the project will be communicated to the different audiences, including the press.

Task 2

3. The following resources are to be utilized when planning an entire project

• The purpose of the plan has to be clear in order to gain commitment and approval of the project for the day to day management and control, in order to establish feasibility or the viability in order to define the contingency arrangements.
• The scope of the plan has to be clear within the viable resources.
• The objectives have to be planned according to the plan of the project.
• Any presence of the constraints like that of the resource availability and the mandated delivery dates should be included in the high structure understanding of the plan.
• The identification of the interim and the final deliverables required from the project should be specified. The contents of the deliverables, the organisation responsible for them, the dependency of the deliverables, the quality characteristics that can be built onto it, the types of the quality checks required, the skills and resources required and also the quality checks should be specified for each of the deliverables.
• The involvement of experts in the projects who will understand the detail of the development are also valuable resources.
• The breakdown of the large activities into smaller segments and the skills required to carry out each of the objectives are also resources for the project.
• The recruitment, procurement, training and the induction activities are the important resources for the project (Wright, 2002).

4. The process of evaluation and review of the projects can be carried out by the technique of PERT (project evaluation and review techniques) that helps to give better time estimation for any project, by keeping records for the uncertainty when the predictions of the duration of the task was carried out. As a project manager anyone can predict the task durations and also the best, worst and the most probable duration of time for each activity and determine the average completion time. This ca be done by taking the probabilities of the three estimates and then calculating the estimating the expected value.

The critical path analysis has some advantages and disadvantages alike. It makes possible to identify the relationship between the different task and activities. The resources can be planned and allocated from using it like in case of staff planning, it would also act as good communication and planning tool for the time management. Though it has its own disadvantages too like the assumption of trade-off between time and money but most of the staff cost could be non-variable cost, the complexity of the diagram will also increase on including more activities and also the uncertainty pertaining to the duration of the activities and can be poor prediction for the elapsed time (Wateridge, 2001).

1. Without the careful planning of the project it will be very likely to fail and achieve its objectives. In case of smaller project it is possible that one plan may be used to define the entire scope of work and all the resources needed to carry out that work. For larger projects, planning will be carried out at different levels of detail at different times. In all types and sizes of project one must be prepared to re-plan in the light of experience

The project PID might contain the following the things in its first version

• The description of the plan like in form of narrative of the plans purpose
• Pre-requisites or the things that must be in place for the plan to succeed
• External dependencies like commitments required from outside agencies
• Planning Assumptions like availability of resources
• Gantt or Bar chart showing the stages or activities involved n the project.
• Financial budget or the planned expenditure
• Resource requirements for e.g. in a table produced using a spreadsheet or project planning.

The steps of the planning are

• the manager has to make sure that everyone understands the project’s desired outcome, scope, objectives, constraints, assumptions and the purpose and level of detail of the plan one must produce.
• The deliverables are to be created according to the result of the plans.
• The activities are to be specified clearly that are necessary to develop deliverables.
• The activities are to be put in a logical sequence taking into account interdependencies.
• Estimate resource requirements for the people, skills, effort, money and other things that will be needed to carry out each activity.
• Estimate the timescale for each activity like for elapsed duration.
• To schedule the work from the target start date onwards
• To define the project management progress controls and decision points clearly.
• To identify the risks and the uncertainties clearly (Ward and Chapman, 2003).

2. The sooner the project board gives the permission to start the project the role of the project manager becomes vital and is responsible as the leader in the whole operation, it’s his duty to run the project as close as possible to the approved plan and to do so the leadership roles carried out by him are

• Allocation of the work to the project teams in accordance with the plan.
• To monitor progress during development of the deliverables products by the team.
• To ensure that the deliverables meet specified levels of quality
• To ensure that the delivery of completed deliverables is made to the required destination.
• To monitor costs and use of resources
• To report progress and exceptions to the Project Board via highlight reports (Rodney Turner, 2004).

3. In order to manage stakeholder relationships one must carry out the following activities

• The identification of the stakeholders is very important.
• The analysis of their attitudes to, and potential need for involvement in, the project.
• To establish the stakeholder management strategy to ensure a consistent, appropriate and cost-effective approach is adopted across the project.
• Identification of the potential approaches to engage, manage relationships and communicate.
• Select the approaches that are likely to be effective cost-effective proportionate and affordable and formalised as a Communications Plan in order to build them in to the Project Plan as appropriately resourced and scheduled activities.
• Execute the plan, monitor its effectiveness and revise as necessary (Randolph, 2014).

4. In order to achieve the scheduled management plan by exception the project manager has to be provided with the authority to deal with the inevitable small deviations from the plan. For the larger deviations such as those which occurs due to request for change, poor estimation or by delays in deliveries by the external agencies which requires the following steps to be taken

Setting delegated limits or tolerances which the Project Board should set limits to the allowable deviations from planned cost and schedule so that the Project Manager knows how much delegated authority is available to manage deviations from plan.

Task 3

The Project Manager may use an exceptional Highlight Report to notify the Project Board of any forecast or actual deviations from plan beyond delegated limits. Positive sorts of exception should also be reported to the authority.

The exception planning and decision making by the Project manager should be allowed by the Project Board to replace the current plan which is no longer viable (Ponnappa, 2014).

1. Staffing of the project with the right skills and at the right place is the sole responsibility of the project management team and yet it is the most important responsibility in the project management. There are generally two types of members in the project team known as the functional managers and the process managers. Being a training project the functional managers and their team focus on the technology of the project and they would include the engineers and the construction superintendents, professional trainers, software development manager’s etc. the process managers are the people who have expertise in cost estimation, cost tracking, and scheduling. The need of the both the functional and process manager.

The staffing plan for a project typically reflects both the long-term goals of skilled team members needed for the project and short-term commitment that reflects the nature of the project. Exact start and end dates for team members are often negotiated to best meet the needs of individuals and the project. The staffing plan is also determined by the different phases of the project. Team members needed in the early or conceptual phases of the project are often not needed during the end phases or project closeout phases. Team members needed during the execution phase are often not needed during the conceptual or closeout phases. A core management team is the team which is the most important as they are involved in the project from the starting to the close out. The core team would include members of the project management team which includes the project manager, project controls, project procurement, and key members of the function management or experts in the technology of the project. Although longer projects may experience more team turnover than shorter projects, it is important on all projects to have team members who can provide continuity through the project phases. The organization that charters the project can assign talented managers and staff from functional units within the organization, contract with individuals or agencies to staff positions on the project, temporarily hire staff for the project, or use any combination of these staffing options. This staffing approach allows the project manager to create the project organizational culture which is determined by the project manager and determines the roles of the members working in the project (Kerzner, 2001).

2. A risk or conflict is an area of uncertainty that forms a threat or a opportunity to the project. Most of the attention to risk will be to avoid or reduce the likelihood of events that might be the cause of the project to be thrown off course. To manage and mitigate risks, the first task is to identify them, assess the likelihood of them happening and estimate the impact they might have on the project. The identification and consideration of risk is an integral part of project management. The aversion of conflicts and risk requires to take the following steps

• To keep a clear understanding of the achievement of the aims and the goals of the project.
• Focus on the matters that can be achieved even with a small bit of a conflict rather than totally avoiding the path, because sometimes a little conflict is important to the success of a project.
• The management of averting risks is based on subjective and qualitative judgements.
• Risk or conflict is not just about finance but it applies to all decisions regarding the business at all levels that includes operational, regulatory and reputational factors.
• To support the decisions in a bureaucratic process by supporting them with proper documentation (Index of 2013 Project Management Journal Papers and Authors, 2014).

3. For the completion of a complex project successfully communication is required which is provided by team work and communication among them. Though if they are in the same building, it is not a problem but most of the teams are globally separated in today’s economy and the type of meetings in the same building are not possible. These teams are therefore called virtual teams as they use electronics method of communicating. The communications can be done by two methods, synchronous and asynchronous, where synchronous means that all the members are taking part in the exchange of communication at the same time. In asynchronous the participants are not taking part in the meeting at the same time. To carry on the communications a various technologies require a number of compatible devices, software, and service providers, and communication with a global virtual team can involve many different time zones (Hyväri, 2006).

4.

• During the start-up phase, the project leader develops the project infrastructure used to design and execute the project. A team is formed to create agreement among project stakeholders on the goals, cost, and completion date. Plans for executing the project, managing the schedule and quality, and controlling the budget are created.
• The scope statement establishes project parameters that define what will be done.
• Project quality begins with the specifications of materials and labour. A quality plan creates a process for assuring the requirements and specifications of the project. Quality improvement tools can be applied to projects if the company has several similar projects.
• Team members are selected to manage functions and processes. The staffing plan assigns people as needed.
• The risk on a project reflects the number of things that can possibly happen that will have a negative effect on the project and the probability of those events happening.
• The communication methods are implemented in order to make everyone stay connected to the team (Hearkens, 2002).

1. In order to create clear records of communication between the internal, external communications it is important to develop some skills which will be effective in communication. They are as following

• Writing skills are very important for the implementation of a project as it is the best medium to get the right messages across to a specific audience. It is important to make sure that one’s text harmonise with the overall communication strategy. Messages can be explicit or clearly stated as information, implicit or intended for subliminal or emotional impact and can work better when one is explaining the theme of a message to their team members.
• Research of the main statements of the project and also of the recent statistics and official information give credibility to the arguments one keeps in the meetings.
• The organisation of the statements and the information systematically is very important to make point in the meetings as well as to encourage the team members (Eric Kirkland, 2014).

2. The following implementations can be brought in the project management by the help of information technology

• Information technology can help create an integrated toolbox for the companies that consistently struggle to succeed in managing projects clearly define what needs to be done. They use an integrated toolbox, including project management tools, methods, and techniques. They carefully select tools, align them with project and business goals, link them to metrics, and provide them to project managers to deliver positive result.
• IT can develop a streamlined project delivery process where the winning companies have examined every step in the project delivery process, analysed fluctuations in workloads, searched for ways to reduce variation, and eliminated bottlenecks to create a repeatable delivery process. All projects go through clear stages and clearly define key milestones. All project leaders use a shared road map, focusing on key business aspects of their projects while integrating goals across all parts of the organization.
• IT can help to measure project health using metrics. Companies that excel in project delivery use performance metrics to quantify progress. They focus on a handful of important measurements and apply them to all projects. Metrics often include customer satisfaction, return on investment, and percentage of schedule buffer consumed (Deeprose, 2002).

3. It can be recorded successfully by creating a project closure checklist which should include the following queries

Check that whether the work was completed according to the PID.

To check whether the project deliverables have been created, quality controlled, accepted and handed over to those who will operate and maintain them.

To check the person who is responsible for ongoing operation, training and maintenance of the deliverables been accepted by appropriate parts of the organisation

To check the persons who provided resources have been informed of impending project closure.

To check that whether all risks that might affect the achievement of benefits been communicated to an appropriate owner in the organisation.

Whether the project management documentation been archived for future reference (Davidson Frame, 2014).

References

Davidson Frame, J. (2014). Reconstructing Project Management. Project Management Journal, 45(1), pp.e2-e2.

Deeprose, D. (2002). Project management. Oxford, U.K.: Capstone Pub.

Eric Kirkland, C. (2014). Project Management: A Problem-Based Approach. Project Management Journal, 45(1), pp.e3-e3.

Heerkens, G. (2002). Project management. New York: McGraw-Hill.

Hyväri, I. (2006). Project management effectiveness in project-oriented business organizations.International Journal of Project Management, 24(3), pp.216-225.

Index of 2013 Project Management Journal Papers and Authors. (2014). Project Management Journal, 45(1), pp.88-89.

Kerzner, H. (2001). Project management. New York: John Wiley.

Ponnappa, G. (2014). Project Stakeholder Management. Project Management Journal, 45(2), pp.e3-e3.

Randolph, S. (2014). Maximizing Project Value: A Project Manager’s Guide. Project Management Journal, 45(2), pp.e2-e2.

Rodney Turner, J. (2004). Viennese Project Management-Days Project and Emotions. International Journal of Project Management, 22(4), pp.271-272.

Ward, S. and Chapman, C. (2003). Transforming project risk management into project uncertainty management. International Journal of Project Management, 21(2), pp.97-105.

Wateridge, J. (2001). Successful Project Management. International Journal of Project Management, 19(3), p.191.

Wright, J. (2002). Effective Project Management. International Journal of Project Management, 20(8), p.633.