Project Management Plan Critical Analysis

This report provides a critical analysis of a project management plan developed for the Hilton Hotel, focusing on the implementation of an automated system for various electronic appliances. The analysis identifies missing aspects such as risk mitigation, detailed procurement planning, and the need for a more agile approach instead of the waterfall methodology. The report also highlights the importance of communication and feedback mechanisms, suggesting improvements to ensure effective project completion. The project aims to integrate existing appliances with Android and iOS systems, allowing customers to manage their rooms via smartphones. The report concludes with recommendations for enhancing the project plan, emphasizing the need for a more comprehensive and adaptable approach.

Assignment 2: Critical Analysis of a Project Management Plan
(PMP)
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Executive Summary
The current report is the critical analysis of the project management plan developed for the
Hilton Hotel. The project plan of the hotel is to implement automated mechanism to operate
the various electronic appliances within the hotel such as television, water geyser, doors,
windows, curtains, and others such electronic elements. Moreover, the taste and preferences
of the customer will be recorded during booking such as preferred room temperature, food
choice, and others. The goal is to completely customise the room as per customer
preferences. The new automation will be done by integrating the existing (or new compatible)
appliances with the android and iOS operating system. This will allow the customers to
manage the system through their smartphones. It will increase the ease of staying at the hotel.
This is being done to counter the increasing market competition and to attract more
customers. Initially, the project will be implemented in one of the hotels, and after
considerable success, it will be furthered in other hotels of the organization. The findings
from the project plan assessment are that there are many important aspects that are missing in
the plan such as proper risk mitigation, detailed procurement planning and others. The
emphasis has been given on increasing the communication and feedback mechanism by
introducing agile method of plan instead of waterfall. Along with that, the project
management components have been suggested to be filled to ensure effective project
completion.

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Table of Contents
Executive Summary...................................................................................................................1
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
Project Background....................................................................................................................4
Audience and Structure of Project Management Plan...............................................................4
Intended audience to PM Plan................................................................................................5
Alternatives for PM Plan........................................................................................................6
Project Management Plan..........................................................................................................7
Conclusions..............................................................................................................................11
Recommendations....................................................................................................................12
List of references......................................................................................................................14
Appendices...............................................................................................................................15
Appendix I: Project Management Plan................................................................................15
Appendix II: Gantt chart......................................................................................................16
Appendix III: Project Human Resource...............................................................................18
Appendix IV: Project Communications...............................................................................19
Appendix V: Project Risk....................................................................................................20

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Introduction
The paper is concerned with the assessment of the project management plan that has been
selected for the Hilton Hotels. The project management plan for the hotel has been developed
and is expected to be implemented in the days to come. This paper will analyse the developed
plan and the elements that were considered along with the improvement areas. The analysis
has been done in considering the theories that have been developed in relation to the project
management plan.
Hilton Hotels and Restaurants is a big chain of hotels started by Conrad Hotel in 1919. The
purpose of the project management plan developed for this hotel is to implement the system
that would be fully automated such as automated room lighting system, auto-temperature
adjustment, alarm system, automated television, and other things. The expectation is to install
a system that is fully integrated and can be managed through the smartphones of the
customers and also from the central control room of the individual hotels. The appendix I
shows the activities that were defined for this project along with the deadline for each of the
activities. The use of MS Project Software was facilitated to develop the plan and schedule
the activities.
The second chapter of this report gives brief introduction of the project considered for the
assessment. The third chapter discusses the audience and the structure of the project plan and
whether there exists any alternatives for the existing plan. The fourth chapter analyses the
contents of the project management plan such as scope, schedules, etc. The fifth and sixth
chapter concludes the paper and recommends appropriate elements for the plan respectively.

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Project Background
The project management plan has been developed for the Hilton Hotels chain. The
competition in the market is gradually increasing and it has become important for this hotel to
constantly upgrade to stay ahead of the competition (Holjevac, 2003). Therefore, the
organization has planned to upgrade the facilities within the hotels by considering the
technologically advanced equipment. The plan is to install fully automatic system within the
hotels that will take care of the ac, television, doors, windows, heater, water geyser, and
booking system that considers customer’s preference prior to their arrival. The integration of
these elements will be done for the android and iOS based smartphones, and for windows.
These operating systems are prevalently used by the masses and can capture large part of the
customer base.
The project will be implemented in one of the hotels prior to beginning the phased
implementation to the other hotels around the world. The plan that has been developed is for
the one hotel initially. The investment in the project is from the hotel owner Conrad. There
are various aspects of plan considered for the effective implementation, namely, project
integration (to ensure effective integration of all aspects of the project), scope management
(to define the premise of the project), time management (to define time for each activity to
effective tracking), cost and quality management, human resource management,
communication management, risk and procurement management (Dick et al, 1996).
Audience and Structure of Project Management Plan
This chapter analyses the audience of the plan developed for the hotel chain and whether
there is any alternatives for this plan.

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Intended audience to PM Plan
The audience or the individuals for whom the project is to be developed are an integral part
of any project management plan (Guide, 2004). If the audience of the plan is considered and
not the actual implemented project, then it can be stated that the target audience is wide. It
includes hotel management, the individuals who are working on the project (project manager
and project team), and board of directors. The final users of the project will be the employees
and the customers of the hotels who will be actually using the system on daily basis. The
audience is expected to know whether the developed plan will be successfully implemented
within the defined budget and timeframe. The major concern can be expected from the
audience who is going to invest in the project, which is the board of directors. Another
important audience is the investor group whose money will be invested in the development of
this project (Cleland, 1986). The main concern would be to know that whether the plan will
bring any return as expected. Apart from that, they would like to know whether the elements
considered in the project are sufficient enough for the effective implementation of the project.
The plan should provide the timeline within which the project will be completed (Guide,
2004). This will ensure that the stakeholders prepare themselves accordingly for the expected
results from the new implementation. Another aspect is the presence of the budget within the
plan. The concerned audience would like to know the amount that is to be invested in the
project and whether they are willing to invest that much amount. The budget and timeline is
followed by the activities that are to be conducted in the project. The upper management and
the board of directors will be concerned with the macro view of the project plan only such as
things to be implemented (automated appliances accessible through the smartphones and
computers). On the other hand, the project team will be concerned with the specific details of
the activities along with who will be working on each activity and when. As visible from the
Appendix I, all these information are present in the table derived from the MS Project.

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Moreover, they would like to know about the tasks that need to be completed in early phase
of the project and the tasks that are to be completed in the latter phases. The project plan
(Appendix I) shows the predecessors depicting the same.
The plan should also contain the provision for the periodic reporting to the management,
board of directors, and the shareholders as they would be interested in the progress of the
project during its implementation phase (Guide, 2004). The presence of this aspect in the
project plan is important. As visible from the Gantt chart in the Appendix II, the plan is based
on waterfall methodology that allows little to no room for the audience to give feedback to
the project team. This concern does not seem to be resolving without bringing in some basic
structural changes in the project plan.
Alternatives for PM Plan
There are two concerns whose alternatives can be brought into picture here. Firstly, the
budget should have been in accordance to the bottom-up approach, instead of top-down
approach. Secondly, the activities should be developed as per the agile methodology instead
of the waterfall technique that has been used. This will better serve the need of the audience.
The agile methodology allows periodic feedback to and fro mechanism which is very helpful
and contrary to the waterfall method.
The project management plan that has been developed for the hotel is based on the waterfall
methodology. The waterfall methodology is a conventional form of project management plan
in which the project activities are conducted one after another (Royce, 1999). The activities in
such plan have no going back and the entire project moves forwards without looking
backward. As visible from the Gantt chart shown in the Appendix II, all the project activities
is being completed one after another and is similar to stair case model. There are several
disadvantages in this model, particularly concerning the audience of the project. The first

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challenge is that the project manager has to develop appropriate plan that requires no
deviation from the beginning to the end (which is practically very challenging). Moreover,
the audiences for the project will be mere spectators who will be receiving periodic report
with no provision for their feedback.
On the other hand, the consideration of agile methodology could have provided the audience
with the opportunity to provide feedback as and when required (Schwaber, 2004). The
feedback, then, could be used to implement necessary changes in the project activities. Agile
methodology are considered best for the project that has some chances of iteration of the
particular activities if the project does not implements as required. This can occur if the views
of the audience differ and changes regarding implementation at different stages. Moreover, as
stated earlier, the major concern is the provision for feedback. Therefore, the sprint format in
the agile methodology allows the audience to give periodic feedback on the reports presented
to them or the implementation activities they observe. Therefore, it can be stated from here
that the alternative can be utilizing the agile methodology.
Project Management Plan
This chapter is concerned with the critical analysis of the major aspects of the project
management plan that has been developed for the Hilton Hotel. The assessment focuses on
theoretical aspects of these aspects and identifies whether the steps considered for the plan
development is appropriate. There are numerous subsections under each of aspects mentioned
below, but only the important ones are covered and particularly those that were considered
for the project plan of Hilton Hotel.
Project Integration Management

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The project plan considered this aspect by including the project charter and overview of the
major project areas such as execution, plan, monitoring and control, change management, and
project closure (Guide, 2004). These are the major areas that are important to be considered
under the project integration management and the same is visible from the project plan given
in the Appendix I. The project charter is an important document as it covers the objectives,
responsibilities, goals, and the associated stakeholders of the project. The project charter also
helps project manager understand the level of authority utilized by that person. The project
integration was expected to be developed by PM with the top management, who are the right
individual to handle this responsibility.
Project Scope Management
The project scope management was developed by Project Manager with Analyst. Project
scope is the most important aspect of a plan as it helps understand what exactly to be done in
the project and the activities that are to be undertaken to complete the project. Moreover, it
helps in verifying and controlling the project activities during the implementation process.
This project plan has included the major project scope element which can be stated as
appreciable step. Moreover, the project scope has been prepared in consultation with top
management after thorough analysis of its usability and need by Project Analyst.
Project Time Management
The project time management ensures that the project activities are scheduled appropriately.
The time management focuses on dividing the entire project duration of the project to each of
the activities in accordance to the resources allocated and importance of the activities. The
areas that are covered in this are defining and sequencing the project activities, estimating the
activity resources and durations, developing and controlling schedule (Guide, 2004). In the
current project plan, activities have been sequenced along with the duration and resources.

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This is important to complete the project within given budget. It can be stated that the project
time is effectively managed.
Project Cost Management
The project cost management covers three major areas, namely, cost estimation, budget
determination, and cost control. The effective cost management ensures that the project is
completes within the expected budget defined by the management. In this project, two
elements have been considered that is cost estimation (based on the past experiences of the
project manager and the budget available from the management), and the budget
determination (Guide, 2004). However, the current plan lacks cost control mechanism to
control the cost deviation. The project manager should have given the responsibility to an
individual to handle the cost for the project to meet budget expectation of the management.
Project Quality Management
The project quality management ensures that the project activities conducted are of highest
quality or at least at the expected level of the associated stakeholders of the project. There are
three areas that are necessary to be considered in the project quality management, namely,
quality plan, quality assurance, and quality control (Guide, 2004). The current project
management plan covers quality control (as one individual has been assigned who will assess
and report the project quality periodically). However, there is no evidence of project
assurance. The project quality management is the most ignored element in the project
activities that are of average length. This mostly leads to the failure of the project result (in
accordance to the stakeholder expectation).
Project Human Resource Management

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The human resource management of the plan is a necessary aspect as the entire project
success and failure depends on the way people are managed within the project. The human
resource management covers four areas that are planning, acquiring, developing, and
managing project team (Guide, 2004). The current plan has provision for developing the
project team and allocation of the individuals show effective management. However, there is
no evidence of the methods that will be adopted to acquire the project team which should
have been there for more clarity for the audience. The Appendix III shows the human
resources assigned for the project.
Project Communications Management
The project communications management ensures that the communication among the project
stakeholders are effective and everyone stays on the same page throughout the project. There
are few important aspects of project communication management, namely, stakeholder
identification, communication planning, distributing information, managing stakeholder
expectation, and reporting the performance (Guide, 2004). The current project lacks all the
major areas except the stakeholder identification and the channel to be used in distributing the
information. These two have been shown in the Appendix IV.
Project Risk Management
The management of risk is important to ensure that the project completes without any hurdle.
The risk management is important for small and big project to ward off any chance of failure.
The few important areas are identifying and managing risk, analysing the risk and preparing
response plan, and then monitoring and controlling the risk (Guide, 2004). The current
project risk aspect been shown in the Appendix V. The current risk plan covers the major
risks but the mitigation of the risk is not efficient and it needs thorough analysis.

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Project Procurement Management
The project procurement management plan ensures that the project resources are effectively
procured and within the defined budget. The aspects concerned with the procurement
management are planning, conducting, administering, and closing the procurements. The
current project lacks detailed procurement planning that should be there (Guide, 2004). The
project manager believes the resources can be procured when required which can be
dangerous in case of cost fluctuation or later delivery. These show that the procurement
planning is necessary. The current plans shows that an individual – procurement manager –
has been assigned for the project, but lacks further detail.
Conclusions
The project plan developed for the Hilton Hotel project has been developed appreciable well,
but there were various aspects that were either missing from the project, or were not
sufficiently written. Some of the major areas that were missing from the project plan were
detailed procurement management plan, appropriate identification of risk mitigation plan,
identifying the expectation of the stakeholder as per the project communication is concerned,
methods to acquire the individuals who will be working on the project, project quality
assurance, efficient bottom-up approach budgeting (this was used despite the limited
experience of management in implementing such technological projects), and limited
involvement of senior management (evident from little to no assigned activities to the
individuals from the top management). One interesting aspect that should have been
improved (or transformed) was the use of waterfall method to conduct the project instead of
agile methodology (it could have facilitated better stakeholder communication and project
feedback management).