LCBB5005 Project Management: High Speed 2 Project Plan Analysis

This report offers a comprehensive analysis of the High Speed 2 project plan, focusing on its objectives, scope, budget, and critical success factors. It delves into budget assumptions, known and unknown factors, and constraints identified through a risk register. The analysis includes a detailed stakeholder analysis, categorizing stakeholders by power and interest levels, and examines the project's hierarchical organizational structure, outlining the roles and responsibilities of various panels and committees. Furthermore, the report discusses project control mechanisms, specifically cybernetic control, and the reporting framework employed, highlighting the use of top-down communication. The project's planning with milestones is mentioned, providing a holistic view of the High Speed 2 project's management approach. Desklib offers access to similar project management reports and resources for students.

Project management

Contents
Contents...........................................................................................................................................2
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY..................................................................................................................................1
Project management plan and critical analysis of each element..................................................1
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Managing a project is key activity which includes planning, organising and administering
resources required for completing a project in successful manner (Msulwa, 2018). It brings
leadership addition to leadership to projects. It also ensures that there is proper planning to
implement strategic goals. For the project, considered project is High Speed 2 which is new high
speed railway network linking up London, the North, Scotland and the Midlands serving nearby
to 25 stations, comprising eight of 10 largest cities of Britain and connects around 30 million of
population.
The assessment highlights core details of the project, comprising discussion of
methodological approaches that are adopted to execute the project.
MAIN BODY
Project management plan and critical analysis of each element
Introduction of project
High Speed 2 is a project with objective of delivering a shift to low carbon vehicle as
well as provide opportunities for enhancing quality of living of community that are mostly in
need.
Goals of High Speed 2 is to create a world class rail network of high speed for supporting
economic growth in cities it connects addition to for United Kingdom. The ambition of the
project is to make improvisation in journeys for people through shortening journey durations,
giving passengers a favourable environment of travelling with ease accessibility and making
travel more reliable (Collings, 2020).
In context to High Speed 2, critical success factors are as follows:
 People: In a project, people or human resources or competent staff contributes in success
as they carry out practices from start to end of project. In the project of High Speed 2,
people are places at right place and at right time for performing right things.
 Executive support: The success factor ties back for agreeing on clear goals of the
project. Management of High Speed 2 agree that the project is crucial and adds value to
business. Proper support from executives reflects project success.
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 Effective communication: For project of High Speed 2, use of effective communication
channel is success factor as with this all the relevant stakeholders are informed about
project progress.
Project scope
Objectives of the project that is High Speed 2 is to deliver a shift towards low carbon
transport along with providing opportunities to communities to improve life quality most in
requirement. The parameters for scope of project that is High Speed 2 are as follows:
Expected quality: The quality expected from High Speed 2 is train speed that is
approximate of 225 miles per hour and with maximum capacity of around 800000 travellers
journeys a day.
Cost: In 2009, when the project of High Speed 2 was mooted it was expected to cost
around £37.5billion (Finch, 2021). Delivery of scheme reflects that 2019 prices see total cost for
the project as between £80.7 Billion to £87.7 Billion, against budget equal to £62.4 Billion.
Time: It takes around 20 years to complete as well as create approximate of 22000 jobs
in construction for the completing project of High Speed 2 that creates high speed linkage for
Leeds, Birmingham, London and Manchester.
Benefits: High Speed 2 enable more local commuter services, more freight services and
more trains which assist taking lorries off the road and deliver environmental benefits.
Investments in the provide provides jobs for local residents to engage in building and running
HS2. It benefits in mitigating environmental impacts through green tunnels as well as planting of
trees. It takes travel away from short distance ait travel and leaves lower carbon footprint
(Pettinger, 2021).
Budget assumptions
Latest reports of High Speed 2 reveals that total cost of the project could be approximate
£ 98 Billion. The estimated budget required for completion of the project phase 1 is approximate
of £ 44.6 Billion. The projected budget of phase 1 of High Speed 2 is as follows:
Particulars Amount (In £ Billion )
Material 20
Research and development 5.6
Staff salaries 6
Promotions 7
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Total 44.6
Assumptions
What is known
High Speed 2 is most expensive addition to ambitious project of individual transport that
is ever attempted in UK. It is a planned Y-shaped rail network that will operates at speed up to
400 kilometres an hour that is around 250 miles per hour. Through building a new railway line,
High Speed 2 takes fast trains off the current railways as well as places them on own dedicated
tracks so to better connect major cities and towns. One operational, the project is assumed to
serve around 25 stations that connects more than 30 million populations. It is also assumed that
the project will significantly improve connectivity among Midlands and the North along with
integrate current network serving stations (Rotherham, 2022). Companies involved in the project
are assumed to use EDGE model as well as PDFH uses around 14 different demand drivers that
feed into future years’ forecasts of rail demand. It is known that the project will be most
environmentally sustainable railways that is ever built in UK, developing green corridors of huge
number of trees along with new wildlife habitats.
What is unknown
Other than High Speed 2, other alternatives are available that includes increasing train
length on current routes. Millions of residents are not happy or satisfied with impacts on home
value and living standards of the project. There are cheaper as well as more cost effective ways
for enhancement of capacity, comprising digital signalling and investment in local community
routes. Management issues addition to unrealistic land valuations might cause cost of the project
to spiral. Phase one of the project is assumed to boost more than 40000 jobs and will boost the
economy of North and UK as whole.
Constraints
Purpose of High Speed 2 is to deliver enhanced rail potentials along with connectivity
among major conurbations of Britain. It is one of largest investment in transport infrastructure
within United Kingdom for the generation. It supports UK to make transition at net zero carbon
economy and will minimise carbon emission as build and cuts carbon emission from various
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transportation forms. To identify the risk and other constraints which impacted project of High
Speed 2, risk register is created. Risk register in aspect to High Speed 2 is as follows:
Risk or
constraints
Likelihood Impacts Responsible Actions to mitigate
Population
protests
High High Human
resource
manager
 Proactive environmental
media campaign along with
liaison with local
stakeholders (Flyvbjerg,
2017).
 Monitoring protester
practices as well as security
threats.
 Incident management plans
along with briefing protester
situations.
Supply chain
capacity
High High Supply chain
manager
 Increasing emphasis on
financials and capacity of
supply chain deliverables.
 Taking regular assessment
of status of key suppliers as
well as implementing
contingency plans.
 Implementation of
Employment and Education
Strategy emphasises
towards securing factors to
build railways.
Catastrophic
incident
Medium High Incident
commander
 Promoting culture that
prioritises security, health,
safety together with
environmental management.
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 Peer review assurance to
oversee integrated
geographic works as well as
periodic intervals to
undertake forward look
towards high risk events.
Losing talents
in teams
Low Medium Team leader  Implementing People
Strategy- Skilled for success
(Zeinali and Thompson,
2018).
 Establishing addition to
embedding recruitment
process addition to
development programmes.
Stakeholders and their involvement
Project stakeholders are people that have interest on outcomes of the project. Internal
stakeholders are said to people whose interest in project comes with direct relations, whereas,
external stakeholders are people who do not directly involve in project but are influenced or
affected through actions of project. For identification, prioritisation and management of
stakeholders in project of High Speed 2, stakeholder analysis is effective. Stakeholder analysis
for High Speed 2 is as follows:
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Figure 1: Self-Created Stakeholder analysis for High Speed 2. 2021
(Source: Self-Created Stakeholder analysis for High Speed 2. 2021)
High power and low interest: In High Speed 2 project, stakeholders with high power
and low interest are government and local authorities. These are external stakeholders on which
project administrators put enough work for keeping them satisfied through providing them
information or status of project.
High power and high interest: Top managers, resource manager and project investor
involved in High Speed 2 are stakeholders with high power along with high interest. All these
are internal stakeholders who manage working closely with great efforts (Yousefi, Guo and
Birouk, 2019).
Low power and high interest: Employees and suppliers are stakeholders of High Speed
2 with low power as well as high interest. These are adequately informed as they play major role
in completing of project with success.
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Low power and low interest: General public and Trade Unions are stakeholders of High
Speed 2. These are external stakeholders who are least interested in working of project.
Project organisational structure along with roles and responsibilities
In High Speed 2 project, hierarchical organisational structure is followed. It is a pyramid
like structure in which one person is in charge of whole working with one or various
subordinates that are subsequent under each other. Within this structure, there is proper chain of
command that is subsequent under each other. The hierarchical structure of High Speed 2 is as
follows:
Figure 2: Hierarchical structure of High Speed 2. 2021
(Source: Hierarchical structure of High Speed 2. 2021)
Roles and responsibilities of project board involved in High Speed 2 are as follows:
HS2 Executive committee: In High Speed 2, key roles and responsibilities of executive
Committee are below:
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 Overseeing day to day execution of board policies as well as ensuring that good
governance practices are established and maintained.
 Manages high level issues at workplace of project.
 Effectively communicate with board, staff as well as committees.
 Demonstrate objectivity, openness, leadership, accountability and selflessness.
Programme panel: Within High Speed 2, roles and responsibilities of programme panel
are below:
 Supporting Senior Responsible Owner to devise decisions.
 Providing challenge together with approval on issues and challenges impacting progress
of project.
People panel: In High Speed 2, roles and responsibilities of people panel are underneath:
 Setting agenda and establishing group rules for personnel.
 Balancing panellist participations.
 Providing feedback to employees about performances.
Commercial and investment panel: Roles and responsibilities are as follows:
 Conducting strategic research along with due diligence investigations.
 Discover addition to close potential investors (Li, Liu and Zhou, 2018).
 Analyse risks together with offer financial advices.
Project control mechanisms
It is said to methods which keeps a project working on schedule at the time of planning
and implementation and keeping costs in budget. In context to High Speed 2, Cybernetic
control is used in which project managers plays key role. It is a control mechanism for project
having input and outputs. High Speed 2 is a project whose outcome are in form of milestones
which needs to be met. With this mechanisms, project managers emphasise on outputs. When
these milestones do not measure up to desired standards, situation is investigated by project
managers so that cybernetic control is used for seeing sufficient cause to change activities. Usage
of the mechanism in project of High Speed 2 reduces deviations from standards.
Reporting framework
It is an approach to communicate and transfer information with other involved parties in
the project. In the project of High Speed 2, involved people communicate through top-down
approach. It is a method of communication wherein information, views and instructions are
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exchanged among top managers and employees that are lower level management. Moreover,
information or instructions from highest ranking officials within the project filter down to staff
members or employees through managerial structure used in High Speed 2. Within the project,
channels or mediums of communication used are verbal, non-verbal and written mediums (Saleh
and Watson, 2017). Other communication mediums used in the project are face to face
communication, text messages, Emails, video conferencing, online messaging platforms and
phone calls.
Project planning with milestones
In aspect to High Speed 2 project, project planning with milestones are elaborated
through project life cycle that includes following phases:
Initiation: In this stage, objectives and requirement of the project is identified. High
Speed 2 is most important rail infrastructure project in generation having wider planning,
logistics, construction addition to delivery objectives. With approval of the objectives, project is
initiated for delivering solutions. The milestone at initiation phase of High Speed 2 is high
priority tasks and decisions that are crucial for completion.
Planning: It is next stage after initiation wherein project solution is developed in
much detail aspects and possible steps essential for meeting objectives are planned (Turner,
2017). In aspect to High Speed 2, project managers plan and coordinates project budget through
providing estimates of costs for labour, materials and equipment costs. In this stage, deliverables
which meet deadlines is a milestone for High Speed 2. Managers involved in High Speed 2 plans
key benchmarks for meeting tendering and preparatory works for outstanding deliverables.
Implementation: It is execution phase wherein project plan is put into motion as well as
project work is performed. In implementation stage, people involved in High Speed 2 carry out
tasks as well as progress information which is reported with the help of regular team meetings. In
this, milestone of project is usage of resources as well as time. It includes particular number of
hours and materials that are allotted to the project.
Closure: Herein, key focus is on releasing end deliverables to customers, terminating
supplier contracts, handling project documentation and communicating closure of project to all
involved stakeholders (Prinsloo, 2020). Within High Speed 2, experience of high rail transport to
customers or population of UK is closure stage.
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CONCLUSION
From the discussion, it is concluded that project management is significant as it ensures
things to be delivered is right, as well as will deliver real valuable against available
opportunities. Risk register is termed to a document which records all of identified risks and
constraints, the likelihood as well as consequences of occurring, actions undertaken for reducing
the risks and responsible person for managing them. Stakeholder analysis is a framework that
identify, prioritise and manage stakeholders on the basis of power and interest.
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