Discusa About The Guide Project Management Body Of Knowledge.
Topic and reading samples. Your personal learning outcomes from this unit. Learnings from your experience. Supporting documentation including your prior learnings.
Kerzner Chapter 1.14 Project management domains include multiple knowledge areas including project scope, time, cost, risk, quality, procurement, and integration. Each of these domains have to be considered while making a project plan. Non-project driven organizations are more difficult because of differences in project requirements, lack of understanding of projects, lack of time for managing projects, dependence on contractors and delays in approvals (Kerzner, 2017). In my past, I have worked on projects that involved development of a new software for a company and projects that involved organizing a corporate event for customers. As the chapter suggests the differences between products and projects, I can relate it with my experience and say that it is right. For instance, the company might have a product that is manufactured and is tangible. I had been a part of the planning process and had prepared a schedule for the project delivery which involved identification of major project tasks and the milestones date for completion of the same.
Kerzner Chapter 1.15 Projects are different from products because of certain characteristics like use of systematic efforts, need for a custom design of project, project life cycle approach to management, associated risks, and criticality of technical capabilities (Ahmad, et al., 2013). For a product, the company needs to keep doing continuous work while project outcomes are definite such that once a product is created, there is no need to work again for reproduction.
Kerzner Chapter 1.16 Projects are usually classified based on industries or type of projects. Types of projects include in-house R&D, MIS, engineering, small construction, large construction, and aerospace or defence (USAF, 2007). The software development project would have the outcome as the software product but it would be developed only once.
Topic and reading samples. Your personal learning outcomes from this unit. Learnings from your experience. Supporting documentation including your prior learnings.
Kerzner Chapter 1.8-1.10, Projects work with coordination between project managers, top management executives and line managers. Executives of an organization interface with projects at different points including defining of objectives, planning project, resolving conflicts, setting priorities, or sponsoring project. Line managers share responsibility, authority, and accountability with project managers. They are considered as equal to project managers and thus, are involved in providing advice or guidance to project managers (HM Treasury, 2007). As the chapter suggest that projects require coordination between project managers, executives and line managers. I could relate it with one of the projects I did in my previous company that involved development of a customized software for the company needs. While project manager got all requirements documented and deliverables planned, the resources were provided by line managers from each of their functional teams. Project planning helped me understand different aspects of project management including budget, resource allocation, project constraints, scheduling, risk management, and stakeholder management
Kerzner Chapter 10 Decisions are initially taken by top executives at the time of adoption of project. manager but as companies start to understand project management better, the authority to take decisions can be handled at middle levels of management. Among the top managers, the project manager acts as a companion who helps project manager unless project requirements are in pressure. Pressure is high in chaotic environments where companies accept higher risks, consumers demand high quality low volume products, project life cycles are compressed, enterprise environment affects project execution, and competition is high. These challenges can cause a slow down in projects as project manager has to take decisions with limited knowledge (Morris, 2010).
For resolving problems and taking effective decisions, a governance structure is needed. The structure of governance can be locally dispersed, geographical dispersed, collocated or projectized. Project governance is different from corporate governance. If the project organization is unable to understand this, it can lead to the failure of a project. Even if they lack an understanding of program or project management, failure can occur. Project planning involves development of schedule and budget, conflict management , project administration, choice of leadership style, and development of a responsibility chart (PMI, 2013). Executives help establish control over projects as they had authority to take major decisions about the project and add to project scope or allow changes. Because of their authority, there were also able to resolve major issues that were not in the control of the project manager. Project Proposal was something like the project charter which acted as a mini plan that was prepared to justify project and get approval for execution.
Kerzner Chapter 11.25 The responsibility chart defines authority and responsibilities of resources that are affected by project size, its maturity level, nature, and life cycle of project (Bredillet, 2005). Business Requirement Document was prepared to understand the project requirements for the software development project. It involved inclusion of all the functional requirements of the software. These requirements were converted into technical specifications for the developers.
Topic and reading samples. Your personal learning outcomes from this unit. Learnings from your experience. Supporting documentation including your prior learnings.
Kerzner Chapter 11.0-11.2 Project planning involves selection of project methodologies, objectives of the project and establishment of policies and procedures to achieve those objectives. Planning process is systematic, disciplined, flexible, multi-functional, and iterative. Plans are made based on certain assumptions and if they are fault, then the outcome would not satisfy stakeholders and thus, assumptions must be validated using a checklist and recorded in a project charter for approval (Nassif, 2017).
These assumptions can include environmental factors and process assets of the company. Environmental factors include market demand, customer requirements, and market conditions and process assets include procurement costs, technology, skills, risks, product acceptance, and political environment. Planning phase of a project has nine key phases that include objectives, program, schedule, budget, forecast, organizational structure, policy, procedure, and standard. The life cycle phases of the project include conceptualization, feasibility, planning, execution, testing, and commissioning. For checking feasibility, a project manager prepares a proposal either on his own or with assistance of a proposal manager (BIS, 2010).
I had taken part in the event planning. The book suggests that project planning process is very systematic and disciplined but in reality what I found was that planning process was more of a chaos and there was nothing streamlined. The company professionals were actually not familiar with the project planning processes. The project manager gathered whoever was available in the office for discussion to come up with the requirements and then an email was sent to all other stakeholders who were asked to share their views. After collecting their views, another round of meeting was conduced for finalizing the requirements and the work was started. It was challenging as the scope kept on modifying and there were lot of changes from the initial specifications in the project.
Kerzner Chapter 11.3-11.5 Kick-off meetings are conducted between project managers, subject matter experts, and functional managers for discussing wages, spreading information, discussing scope, defining success, identifying assumptions and constraints, creating organisational chart, and assigning roles and responsibilities to team. Key roles include project manager, line manager, and top management. Project manager defines goals, milestones, requirements, assumptions, ground rules, constraints, policy and reporting requirements. Line manager identifies schedules, task descriptions, manpower allocation, risks, and conflicts. Senior managers clarify issues, negotiate agreements, and provide communicating links for the team (Fernandes, et al., 2015).
The chapter illustrates the importance of identification and documentation of assumptions and constraints which was not done on the project and thus, costs escalated and the schedule had to be modified.
Kerzner Chapter 11.6-11.8 While developing objectives, project manager can face certain challenges such as lack of agreement, change priorities, insufficient time, inadequate quantification of objectives, lack of coordination, and high personal turnover. Once objectives are developed, line managers have to assume to responsibility of accomplishing them. For smooth execution, it is important that information is recorded in statements during planning and these include Statement of Work (SoW), Milestones Schedule, WBS, and Project specifications (PMI, 2013). A statement of work was prepared with schedule, product description, stakeholder description, allocations, and risks identification. However, it still lacked a number of features that are suggested in the chapter. These included communication plan and WBS. I believe if the professional project management processes were used, these major challenges could have been avoided. Statement of Work was prepared
Topic and reading samples. Your personal learning outcomes from this unit. Learnings from your experience. Supporting documentation including your prior learnings.
Kerzner Chapter 11.9 Statement of Work records project scope, deliverables, description of end results or outputs, and change management process. For preparing SoW, a project manager needs to review documents, obtain WBS copy, establish a team for preparation, communicate structure to team, assign tasks, prepare checklist, estimate costs, and establish schedules. Specifications should be prepared in detail so that no requirements are left out. Schedules record project start date, end date, deliverables, and major milestones. WBS divides project small workable components that must be manageable, independent, measurable, and integratable (Kerzner & Saladis, 2013).
A WBS is the project planning output which is delivery oriented, hierarchical, and defines full project scope. It has at least two level decomposition into work packages that define tasks, milestones, and activities. Project schedule preparation is done following certain guidelines that suggest identification of all major events and their dates, building exact sequence for work completion, relation to WBS, and identification of time constraints (ITRM, 2006).
I learnt about WBS and could relate the concept with my experience of event planning in past. Although, the WBS was not exactly prepared in depth as suggested in the course, but it did involve similar process taking the top down approach in which the major tasks were identified and then were decomposed into sub-tasks. For each major deliverables, delivery dates were identified. With the use of this approach, the project progress could be tracked and the event could be executed on time without fail. What I discovered from this exercise and the earlier experience of the software development project, is that projects that have specific deadlines are taken more formally and the team works with higher discipline as the project cannot be delayed. However, projects that have defined delivery dates that can be deviated, the teams become a little relaxed and are ok with delays. As long as the project is completed, the people do not care if it was completed on time and without deviating from the budgeted amount. Most projects actually face delays and cost variations.
The project WBS was prepared for the even plan and a milestone table was also prepared defining the project schedule
Kerzner Chapter 11.14 A master production schedule is usually prepared for manufacturing units that gives an opportunity to top management to approve and control manpower, inventory, and cash flow. It helps in coordinating marketing, finance, engineering, and marketing activities.
A project plan verifies customer objectives and requirements, eliminates conflicts, and provides a means to identify problems and inconsistencies. A plan can be made for budget, configuration management, facilities management, logistics, manufacturing, procurement, QA, research, scheduling, training, tooling, or transportation in a manufacturing organization.
Total project planning involves schedule development, budgeting, project administration, leadership styles identification, and conflict management planning (PMI, 2000).
I also had an experience of working in a manufacturing organization in which I was working in head office and was sent to the manufacturing plan to understand how TQM was implemented in the department. The company used to create a master production schedule that was posted in the plan in the office of the supervisor. All the plans were made according to this major plan. However, I could never see similar concept of total project planning implemented in the company but the company had a plan to adopt this. However, what I could understand from my experience is that it is not an easy task unless coordination is received from all project team members.
Kerzner Chapter 11.22-11.29 A project charter is first prepared for approval and only after it is approved, a detailed plan follows. The charter contains business purpose, project summary, project description, objectives, constraints, scope, key stakeholders, risks, and stakeholder management. Once charter is approved, project management baselines(PMB) are identified that help in establishing, approving, documenting, and controlling project progress. PMB is developed using logical steps that include business case review, requirements identification, WBS formation, logical networking of activities, pricing, cost baselining, finalization, requirements tracing, and KPI identification. Baselines can be functional, allocated, developmental, product, resources, fixed, revisable, project-specific or multi-project (PMI, 2008).
Verification & validation of requirements is done as per PMB on the basis of which the project plan gets acceptance. Acceptance criteria include target dates, performance levels, functionality, capacity, ease of use, availability, maintainability, security, reliability, and costs.
Traceability matrix correlates baseline documents to determine if the requirements are met in all baselines even when there are changes in one of the baselines (PM4Dev, 2007). The project involved creation of baselines for functional tasks and schedule. These baselined helped project manager keep track of the project progress and understand if the outcome deviated from the original baselines that served as benchmarks. This exercise has been already been useful. However, the book suggests multiple types of baselines that can be used on the project for better planning and execution of the project. The requirements that are defined in the PMB form a basis for validation of the requirement through defining acceptance criteria. Schedule Baseline.
References
Ahmad, S. R., Mallick, D. N. & Schroeder, R. G., 2013. New Product Development: Impact of Project Characteristics and Development Practices on Performance, s.l.: St. Cloud State University.
BIS, 2010. How to organise, plan and control Projects, s.l.: BIS.
Bredillet, C. N., 2005. Making Project Management Indespensible for Business Results. Project Management Journal, 36(2), pp. 5-15.
Fernandes, E., Fiore, J. & Knowles, K., 2015. Eileen Fernandes, s.l.: Deloitte Consulting LLP.
HM Treasury, 2007. Project Governance: a guidance note for public sector projects, s.l.: HM Treasury.
ITRM, 2006. PROJECT MANAGEMENT GUIDELINE , s.l.: ITRM.
Kerzner, H., 2017. Project Management: A Systems Approach to Planning, Scheduling, and Controlling, s.l.: John Wiley & Sons.
Kerzner, H. & Saladis, F. P., 2013. Project Management Workbook, s.l.: John Wiley & Sons.
Morris, P. W. G., 2010. Managing Project Interfaces Key Points for Project Success, s.l.: Oxford University.
Nassif, J., 2017. The Role of Project Leadership in Global Multicultural Project Success, s.l.: Walden University.
PM4Dev, 2007. Project Management Organizational Structures, s.l.: PM4Dev.
PMI, 2000. Guide to Project Management Body of Knowledge. s.l.:Project Management Institute.
PMI, 2008. Project Management Institute. Guide to the project management body of knowledge. s.l.:Newtown Square: Project Management Institute.
PMI, 2013. A GUIDE TO THE PROJECT MANAGEMENT BODY OF KNOWLEDGE, s.l.: PMI.
SPM, 2001. Software Development Projects and Stakeholders, s.l.: SPM.
USAF, 2007. United States Air Force Project Managers’ Guide for Design and Construction , s.l.: Air Force.
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