Table of Contents INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3 TASK 1............................................................................................................................................3 1. Characteristics of a project and their importance...............................................................3 2. Five key phases in Project Life Cycle (PLC).....................................................................4 3. Intent of Project Initiation Document (PID) and the documented items in PID...............4 4. Knowledge areas in Project Management (PM) and their significance.............................4 5. Feasibility study and its significance in Project Management...........................................5 6a. Network diagram..............................................................................................................5 6b. Calculation of critical Path...............................................................................................5 TASK 2............................................................................................................................................6 Activities needed to manage the project successfully............................................................6 Needed Skills and competencies by Project Manager............................................................6 Project administration process and Project Life Cycle stages................................................7 Control problems associated with managing the life cycle of major project.......................10 CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................10 REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11
INTRODUCTION Project Management refers to the act of initiating, planning, implementing, controlling and finishing the work to attain predetermined goals and meet success criteria within specified time frame. It mainly aims to develop an entire project that complies with the objectives of clients (Aloini, Dulmin and Mininno, 2012). This report is based on ABC PLC which is one of the large food and drinks retailer ofUK. The company has successfully done some mergers and acquisitions and owns and control numerous well known brands of UK. This report covers characteristics of project, stages of PLC,intent of project initiation document,some project management's knowledge area, feasibility studyand its significance and network diagram in first part. The second task of report includes activities needed tomanage a project effectively, competencies and skillsneeded byproject administrator and processes of project administration to make surethe successful management of project. TASK 1 1. Characteristics of a project and their importance A project refers to a specific finite activity that develops measurable and observable results under definite predetermined requirements. There are numerous characteristics of project some of which are mentioned below: It is temporary in nature as it has a specific starting and end point. Project develops a capability to execute a service. It creates specific deliverables, which are products and services or results. It is always developed in phases and carrying on by increments – forward-looking elaboration. The project is often be cross functional(Castro-Nova, Gad and Gransberg, 2017). Project involves uncertainty and unfamiliarity. Unique deliverables are created by project which are significant in improving profit ratios and revenues of an organisation. Progressive elaboration of project is important as it results in creation of more effective solutions for progression and development of projects.
2. Five key phases in Project Life Cycle (PLC) PLC is theprocess that includes series of steps which starts from the initiation and ends to the closure of project. It includes five stages including initiation, planning, implementation, control and closure. The initiation step states about the project at broad level. Itincludes processes that are needed to initiate a project (Basu, 2017). The second phase aims at preparing a roadmap that defines scope, goals, objectives and strategies to make the project successful. The execution phase focuses on performing the actual work of project by implementing all the strategiesthat are developed in planning phase. This is the stage in which the plan is put into action. The control stage is associated with measuring the performance and progression of project and ensuring that all the activities are carrying out as per the plan. The last phase represents the closure of project in which all the documents and deliverables are collected and store in single place. 3. Intent of Project Initiation Document (PID) and the documented items in PID PIDisthecrucialelementofprojectadministrationthatformsthebasisforan organisation's project. This is the document on the basis of which decisions are taken and mandate is implemented.The main intent of PIDis to acquire andrecord all the basic informations that are required to accurately define aswellasplan a project. The three items that are documented in PIDincludes business case, project plan and communication plan. PID depicts a elaborated version ofinitiation document with proper justification of project (da Rocha, Kemmer and Meneses, 2016). 4. Knowledge areas in Project Management (PM) and their significance The study areas in PMare the areas that aproject administratorrequires to know for the effective management of project. These knowledge areas includes: Project Integration Management Project Cost Administration Project Scope Management Project Communications Administration Project Schedule Management Risk Management of project Project Quality Management Project Procurement Management
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Project Resource Management Project Stakeholder Administration The knowledge area ofproject HRMis important as the success of entire project is depend on personnels (Dehdasht and et. al., 2017).The project administratorrequires to have knowledge about how to manage resource effectively by identifying their individual weaknesses and strengths and their synergy with team members. Moreover, knowledge regarding project communication management is important as it helps in improving internal communications and ensure effective exchange of information. 5. Feasibility study and its significance in Project Management Feasibility study can be defined as the assessmentof proposed project or system's practicality. It is utilized to ascertain the viability of a concept or an idea like ensuring that a projectistechnicallyaswellaslegallyfeasibleandeconomicallyjustifiable.Inproject management, the feasibility study is important as it helps in identifying that whether a is profitable or not or is worth the investment. It supports in evaluating the potential of project for success and helps in decision making on project. 6a. Network diagram 6b. Calculation of critical Path As per the above pasted network diagram,there are 2 critical pathsA and B, that are: 1- 2-3-4 and 1-2-4-6. The most suitable path is B, i.e., 1-2-4-6.
TASK 2 Activities needed to manage the project successfully ABC PLC is oneamong the food and drink retailerof UK and has a history of making mergers and acquisitions successfully.The business entityis now considering theacquiring of DEF limited which is a frozen food retailer. For completing this project, the firm is considering to utilize in-house expertise to minimize the overall cost of merger. Management of ABC approached Roxanne for performing the role of project manager who is currently a functional manager within organisation. In order to successfully manage the acquisition project, the activities required to consider by project manager includes clearly defining theobjectives and scopeof acquisition project along with its deliverables. After defining these,administrator of ABC PLC requiresto do proper planning in whichdecisions are taken on budget, people and resources that are required to complete the project. The activities needed to develop the deliverables by utilizing techniques like WBC are define by project manager along with estimated time and efforts needed for each activity, their dependencies and the realistic schedule to finish them (Ehrler and et. al., 2012). Apart from this, milestones are set which shows critical dates at the time of project. All these are included in the project plan and show it to key stakeholders fortheir review in order to get approval on the plan. After getting approval on acquisition plan, it will becommunicated to the project team in an effective way and roles and responsibilities are assign to each team member in order to carry out the activities appropriately. After that, the progress of project will track and monitor and the actual progress is compared with the standard one. If any deviations found, then corrective actions are taken in order to ensure the success of acquisition project. In the success of any project, some risks are associated that can adversely impact the outcome of acquisition project. These risks may includes lack of skills in staff, high cost etc. In this, continuous review of risks helps project manager in overcoming those andmake sure successful and effective completion of project.For successful acquisition of DEF limited, seven months are required by ABC PLC. Needed Skills and competencies by Project Manager Skills: Leadership:it is defined as the ability to lead a team. Leadership skill is very necessary for a project manager as it helps in guiding the team members and completing all the
activities a project on time(Görög, 2016). In context of ABC PLC, having leadership skill is crucial for project manager as it enables him to set vision, inspire others and lead the team effectively. This skill also helps the manager in completing the acquisition project in successful manner. Risk management:there is some kind of risk associated with any project which needs to be determined byproject administratorin order to reduce the chances of project failure. Proper management of risk is very necessary as this will help in reading the project towards success. In case of ABC PLC, timely identification and management of risk assist in completing the acquisition project in successful manner. so it is very essential for project manager to have good risk management skills. Communication:inorder tomakesurethatthesuccessof anyproject,effective communication is very necessary. Having good communication skills helps project manager in communicating all the information about project to team members in an effective way which in turn increases the chances of success of acquisition project. Competencies: Technical competence:for managing a project successfully, technical competencies are required in a project manager. This enables them to utilize technology in more better manner and accomplish the project objectives in an effective and efficient way. Cost control:One of the most critical component that requires to be considered by project manager is cost management (Franks, 2012). They requires to show that they have the ability to deliver the acquisition project within cost constraints and by administering the finances of project intelligently.The competency of cost management and control is very necessary in project manager of of ABC PLC inorder to finish the projectwithin the assigned cost. Project administration processand Project Life Cycle stages Project managementprocess can be defined as a administration process of planning and controlling of execution of a project.It needs specific configuration that includes documentation related to project management, plans, methods, information exchange, resources for planning and implementation of project. In context of theacquiring of DEF limited, project manager requires to effectively manage all the phases of PLC in significant manner (Illiashenko and
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Strielkowski, 2016). Thus, the entireprocedure of managingtheacquisitionproject isseparate into 5 phaseswhich are mentioned below: Initiation Phase-This stage is associated with discussing all the processes that are needed to start a project. Its main aim is to ascertain what the project must attain. During this phase, theproject administrator of ABC PLCis required to develop project charter and determine stakeholders. Feasibility study is conducted in order to determine that whether the project undertaken will be profitable or not. All the aspects of project are considered for starting activities including defining the project goal, its scope, constraints, stakeholder list, budget and schedule, milestones as well as approvals. The project manager is also responsible to find out the potential risk associated with acquisition project such as inadequate resources, lack of skilled personnel etc. in order to address them timely so that project can be completed successfully(Javani and Rwelamila, 2016). Planning Phase-This phase is associated with preparing the overall plan which includes informationaboutastrategies,budget,people,resources,milestonesetc.sothat acquisition project can be carry out in effective way. This phase acts as blue print and provides directions to entire project team from initiation to completion of acquisition project. This phase is crucial forproject administrator of ABC PLCas in this, key decisions are taken by manager regarding the time required, costs, strategies etc. For instance: time required for completing the acquisition project is 7 months. In this manager is require to divide the work into small tasks so that all the activities related to acquisition can be done in proper way. A plan is prepared in which all the activities are define and specific actions are identifying so asto produce project deliverables. Apart from this, manager estimates the resources and time durations required for performing each activity. Proper communication strategy isdevelop to ensure that necessary information are provided to stakeholder. The overall plan is presented to stakeholders in order to gain their approval on it so that the plan can be implemented (Kendrick, 2015). Project execution phase:In this phase, the plan which is prepared in planning phase is implemented. This stageputs the ideas into actions.It involves execution of all the activitiesthat are definedin plan. It consists ofmanaging the expectationsof stakeholders, coordinating with available resources and people and performing activities associated with project deliverables (Noble, Liu and Hackett, 2017). In this, project
manager of ABC PLC plays crucial role in communicating the overall plan to team members and assign responsibility to each member for a particular task. Here, the project manager will apply his leadership skills and assign responsibilities as per the expertise and skills of each member in order to ensure that all the activities can be perform in proper way. For successful completion of acquisition project, manger is responsible to effectively manage project team, communication, stakeholdersengagement. At last, a proper review of execution phase is done by manager. (Source:Project Management Processes,2019) Monitoring and Control-This phase is associated with tracking and monitoring all the activities in order to ensure that these are carry out as per the plan (Rose and Schlichter, 2013). The responsibility of manager of ABC PLC during this phase is to monitor the project performance in a effective manner and if any deviations found then make necessary changes to ensure successful completion of project. Therefore, planning as well as monitoring are proximally related. This phase helps project manager in ensuring that the projectis on track and all the activities are performed asper the plan. The actual Illustration1: Project Management Processes
outcomes are compared with the standard one so that effective actions will to taken if any kind of deviation found. Closing phase-This is the final phase ofproject administrationprocess which depicts the closing down of project activities and thus accomplish the outcomes in effective way. This phase is associated with the gathering all the documents and deliverables and stored them in a place. This stage happens when the project provides effective deliverables, i.e., successfulacquisitionofDEFlimitedandtherefore,administersatisfactionto stakeholders. Apart from this, project manager of ABC PLC is responsible to closed downthecontractwithexternalvendors,suppliersandconsultants.Allthese informations will recorded and documented and final report will prepare to be presented to stakeholders (Sachdeva, Kapur and Singh, 2016). Moreover, it involves some set of processes like scope to insure that project deliverables have been accomplished as planned and also requires to check all the administration work and outstanding contracts to ensure proper closure of project. Control problems associated with managing the life cycle of major project Ineffective communication process:effective communication within the team is a big issue that may hamper the performance of employees which in turn leads to delay in completion of project. In order to overcome this issue,project administrator of ABC PLC is required to use effective communication tools so that proper communication when takes place within the team and the goals and objectives can be accomplish effectively. Poorly defined goals:unclear goals is also one of the issue associated with project lifecycle management. If the goals are not clear, then team members are not able to attain the goals(Tsai and et. al., 2014). For overcoming this issue, project manager of ABC PLC is required to frame clear goals so that employees are able to to attain those effectively. Lack of skills:lack of knowledge and skills makes the team ineffective and reduced their potential to attain objectives of project. This is the another issue that is associated with management of project life cycle. In order to overcome this issue,project manager requires to provide training to the team members so that their skills and competencies can be enhanced and they are able to attain the goal of acquisition of DEF limited.
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Ineffective management of resources:improper resource Management leads to create various hurdles in the path of project succession(Wang and Yang,2012). Having adequate resources and their proper management is very necessary for the success of any project. For overcoming this issue, ABC PLC's project manager requires to ensure optimum utilization of resources so that project can be completed in proper way and the objective of acquisition can be accomplish successfully. CONCLUSION From the above report,it has been concluded that a project is designed to develop a specific product, service or outcome with a defined initiation and end undertaken to mitigate particular goals and objectives in order to bring out added value or beneficial change. A project manager requires to consider various aspects of as this helps them in successfully completing it. There are several competencies and skillsthat areneeded by administratorto possess such as leadership, communication, risk management, cost control, technical competency etc. which assists in managing the project activities appropriately. Project life cycle consist of five phases includinginitiation,designing,executing,observanceandcontrolandprojectclosure. Following these stages in systematic way will helps manager in accomplish project objective effectively. There aresome problems associated with project life cycle including ineffective communication, lack of resources and skills, poorly defined goals etc. that needs to be consider by manager to make sure successful finish of project.
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