Project Management Report: Hong Kong Jockey Club Case Study Analysis

This report examines the application of project management principles within the context of the Hong Kong Jockey Club (HKJC), focusing on its change management project. It begins by highlighting how Earned Value Management (EVM) can assist in tracking and evaluating project progress, crucial for the HKJC's efforts to renovate and adapt to market competition. The report then addresses the inherent challenges of project management, particularly within the HKJC's environment, including team coordination, technological advancements, and the rise of competing casinos. A significant portion of the report is dedicated to explaining the phenomenon of "escalation of commitment" and its impact on organizational culture, illustrated by the HKJC's experiences. The report also outlines two essential rules for project selection approaches: benefit measurement and constrained optimization, and their relevance to the HKJC’s change management project. The report underscores the importance of proactive project management strategies to ensure the HKJC's long-term sustainability in a competitive market.

PROJECT
MANAGEMENT –
ASSESSMENT 2E

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................1
Earned Value Management can assist project tracking and evaluation......................................1
Project management challenging................................................................................................2
Describe the phenomenon called "escalation of commitment" and where it fits in the lore of
organizational culture. ................................................................................................................3
Two simple rules should be followed when choosing a project selection approach..................4
"Successful project managers must operate on the boundaries."................................................5
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................7

INTRODUCTION
Project management is refers to the art of managing and directing all the aspects of a
project from its inception to the closure of activities using a structured methodology. It is
basically a process that involve planning and organising of resources that are helpful in
completion of specific task, events or activities toward the accomplishment of goal behind the
conduction of particular project. This report is based on a the Hong Kong Jockey Club which is
a professional horse racing institution that operates a unique non-profit business model by
providing sports entertainment related services to local residents as well as overseas visitors.
Currently, Jockey Club is facing tough competition from other casinos present in similar area
and to deal with this it is working over a project of change management that involve renovation
of hall as well as services it offering for satisfying the need and expectation of customers
(Kerzner, 2017). This report provides a detailed description regarding manner in which Earned
Value Management support in project tracking along with reason of project management remains
challenging. It further includes description regarding “escalation of commitment” and its
influence over organisational culture along with statement “"Successful project managers must
operate on the boundaries”. It also explains about the rules followed while considering project
selection approach.
MAIN BODY
Earned Value Management can assist project tracking and evaluation
The Hong Kong Jockey club get established in year 1884 as a non-profit organisation that
aims toward entertaining the visitors and local residents by offering games facilities such as
lottery activities, horse racing with football betting etc. It managed its operation from around
135 years and to maintain this position it leads several changes in club for offering services as
per customers demand. For this club is working over a project of change management and for
this it is renovating the venue by bringing innovative and technological development. This will
support the Jockey Club to attract the youngster toward their club for availing services and as a
result of which it would be able to achieve long term sustainability in marketplace (Meredith,
Mantel and Shafer, 2017). But to bring changes club requires better understanding of
government legislators and wider community etc. as it operations become difficult due to
increase in casino operators. Despite of this for getting staff indulge into changes several staff
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programs has been organised by improving their work and getting them more connected with
Club's customers so that more customer centric services can be provided.
Hence, this is a broad project and to achieve success in this it is very essential to track
each and every activities performed within the project so that efforts can be put forward in right
direction through regular evaluation. This is very crucial as project involve several other areas of
improvement such as learning government legislations, renovation of club for customers
satisfaction, changes in employees performance, improving the services and technological up-
gradation (Fleming and Koppelman, 2016). So the project can be tracked and evaluated much
effectively using Earned value management as it support a project manager in measuring the
performance. It refers to the systematic project management process that work toward
identifying the variances in project by performing a comparison between planned and performed
work. This EVM system support in answering the three major questions such as Where have we
been, Where we are now and Where we are going?. These all support in identifying whether the
project activities are going in right direction or require some improvement.
By using this Earned Value management, The Hong Kong Jockey Club be able to track
its project of bringing change and be able to direct it in right direction so that objectives can be
achieved. This model support in forecasting the result of curriculum activities performed toward
the accomplishment of project objectives. For instance, Jockey club is planning to launch the
digital products for meeting customers demand regarding speed, connectivity and convenience
that includes Mobile Live Centre App through which customers can enjoy football match at fast
speed (Heagney, 2016). So in order to forecast its result and viability of this technological
change idea, Jockey club can implement EVM system to track the project that support in
evaluating several aspects of work in this regard by identifying the customer reactions over it by
evaluating three major aspects Where have we been, Where we are now and Where we are
going? Through this the success of this change can be predicted effectively along with the
changes that are required to made to reach up to planned performance.
Project management challenging
Project management plays a crucial role in the growth and success of every project as it
help in ensuring the systematic flow of activities toward the accomplishment of research project.
But the project management is challenging task as it involve the team work and its success is
totally depends over the kind of coordination or bond team members share. Hence it become
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very difficult for the project manager to develop proper coordination among its team members
and avoiding the conflicts that may arise between them. Apart from this project manager is also
responsible for ensuring that work must be performed in manner in which it has been instructed
and time that has been provided (Mir and Pinnington, 2014). As all these things may results into
failure of project objectives and because of which project management is consider as a
challenging task.
The Hong Kong Jockey Club is working over a project of change management in order to
improve its current practices and maintain its market position for long term sustainability. This
requires a number of changes in the club, its practices and manner in which operations
performed by the employees. Hence it is one of the most challenging task as it involve several
challenges which includes changing customer expectation toward club as well as their choice of
entertainment. In addition to this technological up-gradations in market is another major
challenges as the change management project of Jockey club is required to cope up with this
market demand. Despite of all this the biggest challenge in front of Hong Kong Jockey Club is
increasing number of casinos in the area that has been reduces the number of visitors for the club
by providing it tough competition. Hence the management of this project is challenging as it
include thorough planning, resources, buy-in, communication and constant evaluation for the
effective accomplishment of project. Therefore its is essential to manage these challenges in
order to achieve success in this project (Too and Weaver, 2014). For this, the Hong Kong Jockey
club is working toward bring digital up-gradation in term of its services such as by offering
innovative application like Mobile Live Centre App that present a live webcast in front of
customer regarding the selected football match which can be access using their smart tablets or
smartphones. In addition to this employees mindset is also improving by the Jockey club by
arranging connect program for staff in order to keep them connected with customers and by
arranging several workshop or training programs staff are being educated regarding legislations
to be followed. These all are support in dealing with the challenges that are involved in project
management so that objectives can be accomplished effectively.
Describe the phenomenon called "escalation of commitment" and where it fits in the lore of
organizational culture.
The “escalation of commitment” is basically refers to the type of human behaviour where
an individual or a group continuously faces negative outcome from the actions, investments or
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decisions that nevertheless continues that particular behaviour instead of altering the course. This
escalation of commitment situation is explained under three elements which includes firstly a
situation that involves the costly amount of resources that includes money, time and people that
are invested within the project. The next element includes the past behaviour which leads to apex
in time where the particular project not met with the expectation or could be in a cautious state of
getting decline. Final stage, these problems start forcing the decision maker to make choices
which includes options of continuous pursuing the project until it get completed by adding cost
or cancelling of project (Kerzner, 2018). This situation has been experienced by The Hong Kong
Jockey Club which is facing a continuous decline in its customer visit even after adding some
much facilities in its operations. The main reason behind increasing the number of casinos within
the same area which are capturing the market share of Jockey club by attracting more and more
people to visit that for fulfilling their entertainment needs. For dealing with this the Jockey Club
decided to work over its project of Change Management by renovating the club as well as its
operation by investing some additional cost. By investing the addition cost over renovating the
hall in term of innovative and technological advanced facilities the Jockey Club is expecting to
over come this issue of decline customer base. But the situation of “escalation of commitment ”
where club is facing regularly negative outcomes of its effort toward attracting customers
directly affect the working culture of organisation. Here the thoughts of staff members are
moving toward negativity as they are not getting any positive outcome out of efforts which leads
to lack of employees involvement in organisational efforts toward this project of renovation. But
to deal with such issue Jockey club is organising staff programs for keeping them involve in
practices by motivating them toward these changes.
Two simple rules should be followed when choosing a project selection approach
Project selection approach is consider as one of the major task for a project manager as
the success of it is depend upon the approach that has been used to accomplish the tasks. Project
selection methods work toward providing the set of time-tested technique that are based on
sound logical reasoning for choosing project and filter out the undesirable project that have low
chances of getting succeed (Joslin and Müller, 2015). Hence it can be said that project selection
method are essential concept for project manager practising. But the current project of change
management is very challenging task as it involve several improvement in current practices of
Jockey club. This includes technological change, management changes, cultural improvement
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and renovation of halls as well as clubs. Hence there are basically two rules that must be
consider by project manager while working over this change management project. These rules
are mentioned below:
 Benefit Measurement :- This section support in determining the benefits that the project
manager get by conduction of this project. The project manager firstly evaluate the
benefit by performing its feasibility evaluation that whether this project would be
successful and be able to provide benefits that have been planned. This change
management project of Hong Kong Jockey Club is working toward improving its
services by aligning it as per the need and expectation of customer so that it would be
able to fight with the competition which is arising in market from casinos (Hornstein,
2015). By working over this project and renovating the club halls the Jockey club would
be benefited with approaching larger number of customer specially the young people. So
Jockey club would be able to achieve sustainability in market for longer period of time.
 Constrained Optimization :- Another rule for selecting the project approach is
determining the number of constraints that may be faced by the project manager while
working over a particular project. This will also support in predicting the final outcome
of project by considering the number of risk that are involved in it. The current project of
change management also involve certain type of constraints that are related with
technology development as it involve huge cost (Sánchez, 2015). But this cost would be
recovered with the reopening of club after renovation of hall as it help in attracting larger
number of young customers as they like more techno-driven services.
"Successful project managers must operate on the boundaries."
The statement “Successful project manager must operates on the boundaries” specifies
that a project manager is bound to perform their project as per the instruction that has been
provided to them. This means a project manager only proves to be successful in their work when
it would be able to operate the work as well as team member in the direction that has been
specified by the project dealer. In addition to this some of the limits are also being provided to
the project manager in term of cost, time and resources that are required to be consider by them
in order to get succeed in particular project (Kerzner, 2019). These limits or instructions are
considered as boundaries under which a project manager has to perform their work for successful
execution of work toward the goals and objectives which are being specified by the project
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dealer. While performing operations by considering these boundaries the project manager has to
face several constraints but it totally depends over the skills as well as capabilities of the project
manager regarding the manner in which they deal with such issues that support in achieving
greater success.
Therefore in order to achieve success in a project and make it more beneficial the project
manager must focuses toward working within the boundaries. For instance, the current project of
change management involve implementation of essential legislations that are required to perform
each and every activity ethically and legally. On the other side it has also been specified that hall
must be renovate by considering several technological factors that are in demand and are being
expected by customer while availing such kind of services (Fewings and Henjewele, 2019).
These are the two boundaries under which the project manager has to work in order to get
succeed in the project. As by following all the legislation requirement the Jockey Club will be
able to survive for longer period of time as by providing services legally it be able to deal with
competition in market from Casino. On the other side by implementing technological facilities in
Jockey hall that includes new digital products for satisfying the need of speed, connectivity and
convenience. For it is planning to launch a Mobile Live Centre App which is a betting
application that allow customers to access football match live at their smartphone or tablets.
CONCLUSION
From the above presented information it can be said that project management is
considered as most crucial but complicated part of a project over which the success or failure
depends. As project would be successful only when team work with full coordination and within
the boundaries that are being specified by the project dealer. Despite of all this a project must be
selected by considering two major rule of selection that are Benefit Measurement and
Constrained Optimization these two will support in identifying the feasibility of project. Apart
from all this the project manager must use Earned value management technique in order to assist
and track the project to predict the future outcome of project.
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REFERENCES
Books & Journals
Fewings, P. and Henjewele, C., 2019. Construction project management: an integrated
approach. Routledge.
Fleming, Q. W. and Koppelman, J. M., 2016, December. Earned value project management.
Project Management Institute.
Heagney, J., 2016. Fundamentals of project management. Amacom.
Hornstein, H. A., 2015. The integration of project management and organizational change
management is now a necessity. International Journal of Project Management. 33(2).
pp.291-298.
Joslin, R. and Müller, R., 2015. Relationships between a project management methodology and
project success in different project governance contexts. International Journal of
Project Management. 33(6). pp.1377-1392.
Kerzner, H., 2017. Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and
controlling. John Wiley & Sons.
Kerzner, H., 2018. Project management best practices: Achieving global excellence. John Wiley
& Sons.
Kerzner, H., 2019. Using the project management maturity model: strategic planning for project
management. Wiley.
Meredith, J. R., Mantel Jr, S. J. and Shafer, S. M., 2017. Project management: a managerial
approach. John Wiley & Sons.
Mir, F. A. and Pinnington, A. H., 2014. Exploring the value of project management: linking
project management performance and project success. International journal of project
management. 32(2). pp.202-217.
Sánchez, M. A., 2015. Integrating sustainability issues into project management. Journal of
Cleaner Production. 96. pp.319-330.
Too, E .G. and Weaver, P., 2014. The management of project management: A conceptual
framework for project governance. International Journal of Project
Management. 32(8). pp.1382-1394.
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