A majority of the project managers think that they are conversant with the project requirements that their stakeholders want, the truth is that in most cases project managers could only be partially right or incomplete. As a result, such cases lead to cascading effects which in most cases degrades service delivery, marketing communication as well as the objectives of customer experience. Consequently, Voice of the Customer (VOC) is a program that has become a strategic tool towards the forward-thinking and customer-centered project managers, specifically in a context where there are indirect customers like the FIFA World Cup project where the sponsor to the project is FIFA and the customers are the general public. Therefore, such programs play a significant role in enhancing client dialogue and tabulating the main things that shareholders expect from the project.
In the case of this project, in order to be in the position to deliver a successful project as a project manager I will have to consider the following factors:
Assess the project culture: Research has shown that a majority of the project managers are project-centered and not customer-centric. In order to attain the success of the voice of the customer, as the project manager I will have to be customer-centered. Through assessing the project culture, the voice of the customer is employed to define the needs as well as requirements of the customer. According to Mahr, Lievens, & Blazevic, (2014) these scholars have noted that voice of the customer is a process that is used in capturing all the requirements and needs of a project in accordance to what the customer says about the expected service or product. Accordingly, the voice of the customer is imperative for project operations such as product development and operations, in addition to customer success. The impact of Voice of the Customer to FIFA Project will enable a project manager to engage and communicate with clients at all touch points of the project journey.
Setting up measurable objectives: The project manager makes use of the voice of the customer to classify and give priority to the expectations as well as preferences of the stakeholders. In so doing, the project will be in a better position to organise the right culture mix, individuals’ technology as well as processes in a coordinated effort that will satisfy the customer. Through the cat of prioritising customer preferences, it helps in organising preferences in a hierarchical way that is related to linked preferences. Thus, this allows the project manager to use cases in a manner that the achievement of one client’s preference adds the value of can jump-start others.
Designing project processes: The project manager can either use the voice of the customers in a manual way of with the help of technology through inbound or outbound approaches. In the essence of the manual approach, the project manager can use focus groups, reference programs, and customer interviews. The use of this method helps to deliver qualitative analysis although it does not scale well. Therefore, as the FIFA World Cup project manager it is important to leverage technology to realise voice of the customer automation in a manner that keeps on collecting the customer of input and dynamically stages that provides feedback. As a result, it becomes easier for the project manager to analyse the project.
Involving customers in developing the project: Through engaging of customers and stakeholder, the project manager comes into terms with objectives, visions, preferences as well as their frustrations in identifying the needs and requirements of the project.
Since FIFA World Cup is an international event that involves individuals from all corners of the world, as a project manager to gather customer needs can be challenging, and thus it calls for a well-thought out method (Kerzner, & Kerzner, 2017). Some of the most effective methods used to collect customer needs and requirements include customer interviews, on-site customer survey, live chat, social media, website behaviour, and online customer reviews.
Customer interviews: Traditionally customer interviews is a technique used to collect voice of the customer data, which is used to help the project manager to understand specific customer views regarding the project product, and performance measures.
On-site customer survey: This methodology plays a great role in aiding the project manager in understanding its customers’ expectations. After understanding the need and requirements of the customer, the project manager will be able to address issues facing customers in the most appropriate manner (Tyagi, Cai, Yang, & Chambers, 2015). Nonetheless, this approach demands that as a project manager one has to ask the right questions regarding the project with the help of the right platform in order to get the most reliable answers. Therefore, as a project manager for the FIFA World Cup project, it demands a lot of thinking while designing the project survey.
Live chat: An on-site chat is an incredible approach used for real-time collection of customer feedback since it declines the chances of the feeling of satisfaction from customers. Therefore, the live chat strategy allows the project manager to not only listen to clients’ complaints but also offer them the opportunity to measure different ways that customers suggest to resolve the matter.
Social media: Since the FIFA World Cup project is an event that involves the entire world; the project manager can use social media which a potential ingredient of the feedback cocktail. Social media offers the project manager the chance to have two-way communication with the project customers. Social media is indeed an effective way of getting to know the project requirements because it provides a more direct as well as real-time conversation between the clients and the project manager.
Defines quality as the loyalty to requirements and appropriateness for utility. Accordingly, these two conditions have to be attained to attain quality. Ultimately, fitness for use is determined by the project customer (Joslin, & Müller, 2015). On the other hand, the project sponsor has a duty to determine things that will satisfy the project through commissioning an appropriate project manager the chance to create the project. Although a project can be accomplished on budget and on time and delivers exactly what it was requested that is adherence to requirements, it is considered a failure if it does not perceive value in the product that is produced by the project (fitness for use). Therefore, the project must adhere to a project’s requirements which are referred to as validation. Validation is completed through measurement and observation of the project. Hence when project requirements are defined in the right way, it aids in realising validation irrespective of the individual who conducts validation activities (Parmenter, 2015). Nonetheless, failure to define the requirements of a project, it can lead to misalignment of a project’s expectations, arguments, inconsistent test outcomes and dissatisfied stakeholders.
Quality planning is tasked with the responsibility to see to it that a project’s requirements are defined correctly to enable for the validation of objectives of a project (Smith, 2018). Requirements which are defined in a reliable way share the features of being specific, measurable, in agreement with each other, realistic and bound by time.
The primary target of lean project management is to see to it that a project takes a shorter time to get completed. Therefore, the project manager can achieve this by grouping the project into classes such as value-added tasks, and task-enabler. Value-added tasks include activities which generate value for customers. Enabler task though it is a non-value-added it is necessary for project planning and quality testing (Prashar, 2014). As a result, the application of lean project management helps to decline the time needed to accomplish each project tasks through scraping of wasteful activities and to increase the time used for value-added tasks. Thus, in so doing, this creates more value for customers at a reduced cost, which also makes the project become realised soon. Some of the methods used to implement lean project management include:
The most primary thing that a project manager is supposed to understand is that client’s value competition of a project and not initiation of a project (Kirkham, Garza-Reyes, Kumar, & Antony, 2014). Prioritisation of a project enables the competition of all project tasks within the shortest time possible. Therefore, as a project manager’s one is supposed to properly prioritise a project’s activities, which should begin with strict project selection direction in order to yield the desired returns. Project selection and prioritisation considers both a project strategic returns and finances
After a project has been selected and prioritised, the project manager moves to the planning stage. While a big number of project managers know how to create robust project plans, in most cases they fail to account for other projects tasks shall be competing for resources. It is, therefore, important for the project managers to plan on the resources that will be used on each task. Through the project planning phase, it enables the project manager to identify the budget, timeframe and the project quality (Serra, & Kunc, 2015). At the same time during the planning phase, the project managers get to understand things that are likely to go wrong by determining the likeliness of occurrence of such things. Therefore, such cases place the project manager and the team in the better position of identifying the corrective actions that can be done to mitigate the impact should such things happen.
Accordingly, most of the value of a project happens during the time of execution. Thus, the project manager is supposed to concentrate on reducing waste as much as possible. Through eliminating of wasteful tasks, it enables the project team to spend more time creating value for the customer. The process of execution entails coordinating resources and people in addition to integrating and performing project activities in line with the project plan. The key results of executing a project are projected deliverables. Hence it is the role of the project team to work on the project plan.
The ability to measure performance is a key aspect for optimising performance. During this phase, the project manager assesses the progress of the project using key performance indicators, which tells if the project being delivered is moving in the right direction as anticipated or not.
During the time of project closure, the project owner confirms that the work has been carried out according to the initial requirements. On the other hand, the project manager works to ensure that they have documented the process for each project phase. Therefore, before signing off on the project the project owner checks if the project product match with the project plan checklist and if it is found to be matching the project is signed-off as complete.
PMBOK
Project management body of knowledge (PMBOK) is a set of standard terms and directions plied in project management. This body comprises the best practices, directives, guidelines, and processes which are acceptable within the project management sector. Therefore PMBOK offers project managers excellent practices, guidelines, and directives that describe the entire project lifecycle. The PMBOK consists of five project management processes which connect to each other throughout the project lifecycle. These processes include initiation, planning, execution, control, and closure. Initiation process entails identifying project stakeholders, developing a project charter and regulating the engagement of stakeholders. Planning deals with creating work breakdown structure, budget and defining the scope. The execution process includes managing project teams, managing communication and carrying out the procurement process. The control process is whereby the project manager tracks and oversee the progress of the project which includes quality control, cost, and scope. Project closing involves assessing the project product against the planned project requirements.
PRINCE2
Prince2 describes a project as a temporary organisation which is established with the aim of delivering a business product. Prince2 project methodology allows for a common vocabulary for all the project teams which helps to ensure effective communication (Turner, 2016). Asa result, the project provides an extensive acknowledgment of the project responsibilities to help project team to understand their roles. Therefore, the Prince2 methodology has a range of benefits such as
It is a predictable approach which splits the project into stages that can be monitored closely through a systematic approach starting from initiation to project closing. Thus, in this manner, Prince2 helps to reduce probabilities of a project spiraling out of control and revision of the project help to keep it on track.
Standardisation. The prince2 methodology can standardise every project aspect making sure that there is no room for miscommunication. Accordingly, this has been made possible through the use of Prince2 common language which has a standardised filling procedure to standardised documentation. Therefore, this guarantee that each project member involved in the project understand what to do and the right time of doing any task in the project.
OPM provides the project manager with a framework on how to move through a change based on regular, accepted practices that offer a repeatable way to undertake business based on constant learning and development through learned lessons. Therefore this process can translate into better customer satisfaction from advanced quality and faster delivery time. Hence, this framework is fixed on executing unlike creating a strategy. It contains the project mission, strategic objectives, vision, and its portfolio programs.
Agile is a methodology that makes use of iterative and incremental work sequences often referred to as sprints. The process starts with the voice of the customer at its heart whereby it provides a picture of the customer, the values to be addressed and the strategy used to address user requirements.
Six Sigma ideas are utilised to enhance project effectiveness and performance. The main objective of Six Sigma is to process improvement by declining variations in the project. Six Sigma is driven by the DMAIC approach which measures, identifies; analyses improve as well as sustains the project process (Noori, & Latifi, 2018). The purpose of DMAIC is to register constant improvements to an existing project through the problem-solving objective. Therefore DMAIC is a focal point approach in FIFA World Cup project because it seeks to enhance the quality of the service by focusing on both the process used to create the product and the outcome. By exclusively focussing on the project process it results in effective and permanent solutions. Therefore, DMAIC is utilised by the project team in attempts to advance the existing process, which gives the project a well-organized structure. DMAIC works to ensure that every project phase comprises necessary tools that should lead the project team to realise a final solution (Boakye et al., 2017).
DMAIC Phases
DMAIC is s systematic, fact-centric and objective system for solving a problem which takes some phases:
Define: the project starts with establishing a project team charter which is tasked with identifying the members of the project and selecting the project team which is intended to define and improve the project objectives (Prashar, 2014). After that, the project team then identify the quality to critical (QTC) to aid in measuring the impact that the customer is facing about the FIFA World Cup. This process comes to completion when the project team establishes a map which includes the project inputs and outputs.
Measure: This stage involves creating and executing a plan for data collection which offers reliable and important information. Therefore, the data helps to indicate the way in which a process is being conducted to determine the risks in the Six Sigma approach. After this level, the project focusses on declining or eliminating project risks.
Analysis: The analysis phase aid in unmasking the probable causes of a project’s problems. Project managers make use of sub-processes such regression analysis and ANOVA to identify problems related to the project. As a result, it enables the project team to quantify the financial benefit that comes with solving the problem.
Improvement: When the cause of the project problems is unmasked, the improvement stage centers on looking for a lasting solution to the problem. In this case, the project team is supposed to apply creativity so that to get a solution to the long-term problems that have been in existence. Afterward, the project team conducts a pilot test program to test and find out if the solution is financially feasible and effective.
Control: During this phase, the project team is tasked with documenting a novel solution that has been developed for purposes of enabling the project to be signed off as complete (Garza-Reyes, 2015). The project manager then implements the solution in accordance with the project’s major deliverables, and timeline. After the project is implanted, the project team is tasked with monitoring the project for a specific period to find out if it agrees with the customer performance expectations. Once it is ascertained that indeed the project satisfies the client’s needs the project manager turns it to the owner.
References
Boakye, K., Hanna, M. D., Apenteng, B. A., Kimsey, L. G., Mase, W. A., Opoku, S. T., … & Tedders, S. H. (2017). Adopting Lean Six Sigma Operational Improvement Principles in Critical Access Hospitals: Lessons Learned from an Academic-Practice Partnership.
Garza-Reyes, J. A. (2015). Green lean and the need for Six Sigma. International Journal of Lean Six Sigma, 6(3), 226-248.
Joslin, R., & Müller, R. (2015). Relationships between a project management methodology and project success in different project governance contexts. International Journal of Project Management, 33(6), 1377-1392.
Kerzner, H., & Kerzner, H. R. (2017). Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and controlling. John Wiley & Sons.
Kirkham, L., Garza-Reyes, J. A., Kumar, V., & Antony, J. (2014). Prioritisation of operations improvement projects in the European manufacturing industry. International Journal of Production Research, 52(18), 5323-5345.
Mahr, D., Lievens, A., & Blazevic, V. (2014). The value of customer cocreated knowledge during the innovation process. Journal of Product Innovation Management, 31(3), 599-615.
Noori, B., & Latifi, M. (2018). Development of Six Sigma methodology to improve grinding processes: A change management approach. International Journal of Lean Six Sigma, 9(1), 50-63.
Parmenter, D. (2015). Key performance indicators: developing, implementing, and using winning KPIs. John Wiley & Sons.
Prashar, A. (2014). Adoption of Six Sigma DMAIC to reduce the cost of poor quality. International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management, 63(1), 103-126.
Serra, C. E. M., & Kunc, M. (2015). Benefits realisation management and its influence on project success and the execution of business strategies. International Journal of Project Management, 33(1), 53-66.
Smith, E. (2018). The Critical Link between Requirements and Project Quality. Retrieved from https://www.amanet.org/training/articles/the-critical-link-between-requirements-and-project-quality.aspx
Turner, R. (2016). Gower handbook of project management. Routledge.
Tyagi, S., Cai, X., Yang, K., & Chambers, T. (2015). Lean tools and methods to support efficient knowledge creation. International Journal of Information Management, 35(2), 204-214
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