INF30029 - IT Project Management: Communication Literature Review

This literature review examines the crucial role of communication in IT project management, emphasizing its impact on project success. It highlights the necessity of effective communication channels for relaying information, receiving data, and managing stakeholder expectations. The review discusses how a well-defined communication plan ensures that project teams and stakeholders are adequately informed about their roles, responsibilities, and project objectives. It also addresses the potential pitfalls of insufficient or excessive information, underscoring the importance of accurate and timely communication to mitigate risks and improve project outcomes. The assignment further explores various communication approaches, such as one-on-one interactions and encouraging two-way feedback, to keep teams engaged and informed. Ultimately, the review concludes that effective communication is not just a deliverable but a vital component of successful project management, contributing significantly to project success and overall organizational performance. This assignment is available on Desklib, a platform offering a range of study tools and resources for students.

Running head: INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY PROJECT MANAGEMENT
INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY PROJECT MANAGEMENT
Name of Student
Name of University
Author’s Note

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Introduction
Effective communication process usually relies on verbal as well as non-verbal body
language which helps in transmitting a specific message at the time of relying on cues for the
purpose of feedback. Communication plays a vital role in a specific project that is carried out
within an organization (Schwalbe 2015). There are numerous reasons for which
communication is necessary within a project. Some of the factors include relaying
information, while carrying of a particular project, it is important to ensure that the team
members as well as the stakeholders are properly informed regarding what has been expected
from them, their responsibilities and roles and the time constraints which tend to prevent
them from accomplishing the project in time (Lientz and Rea 2016). One ore factor for which
communication is required includes receiving data. There might be stakeholders as well as
members who require data regarding the project like objectives, planning, risks, and needs of
customers as well as time constraints. Similarly there are many more factors for which
communication is required within a project (Nicholas and Steyn 2017). This assignment
presents a literature review on the roles of communication in a particular project, it further
discusses regarding the ways by which communication can be managed.
Discussion
Role of communication in managing projects
As per Fuller, Valacich and George (2017), Communication is a specific process
which is supposed to be circulated through an entire project management team as well as
external stakeholders for the purpose of maintaining the health as well as viability of the
overall project. The presence of a specific documented communication plan guarantees a
good communication process in the entire process of managing project. Attention must be
provided to the type of data that is needed at every level of the project and hence keep various

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steps for ensuring that data is transmitted freely. Besides this Peltier (2016), discusses that
insufficient data might lead to various assumptions that are faulty in nature, similarly more
information that actually required would have the chances to overload the stakeholders, hence
causing then to go out of track of the further attempts of communication. To this Kerzner and
Kerzner (2017), had stated that the data that is available to managers would be able to
determine the quality of the project plan. Therefore any data that would have the chance to
impact the quality, scope, time, expectations and risk of a project should be communicated to
the stakeholders for the purpose of improving the accuracy of the managing process. In a
similar manner, communication from the stakeholders should flow in a free manner so that
any sort of problem with specifications or capacity could be addressed at the time of the
managing a project. To this discussion Binder (2016), had presented a scenario as an
example, this scenario says that if a particular project staff does not have any idea regarding
what they are supposed to do or how they must be accomplished, then the complete project
would grind to halt. If a specific project managers has no idea regarding what the project
staffs are actually doing, then he would not be able to monitor the progress of the project. If
he is uncertain of what the customers actually expects from the project then the project would
not be able to proceed further (Sharp, Peters and Howard 2017). Communication tends to
play a vital role in project for the purpose of its success. Communication is important for
managing projects in order to keep a track of its success especially in big projects.Hornstein
(2015), had stated that the bigger, complex and large projects are the more important is
communication for that project. The communication process of the projects are usually
differentiated by performance report, forecast, requested changes, updates and organisational
process.

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Diagram 1: the price of poor communication
How can communication be managed
As per Sirisomboonsuk, Gu and Cao 2018), communication is considered as an
important part in managing a specific project. It goes deeper than just informing team
members and inform them what has to be done. Communication is also regarding
disseminating data using most effective channels in order to ensure that a particular receiver
understand a specific message. Besides this, communication also deals with collecting
feedback from various recipients. Success of a project depends on the way a specific project
managers tend to manage the communication. Managing communication can be defined as a
particular process that deals with creating, disseminating, storing as well as retrieving and
gathering of based on project management on the established plan of communication
management. It further involves repository of certain set of data. Besides this, Wang, Wood
and Abdul-Rahman (2016), states that communication can be managed with the help of a
communication management plan. In the process of project management, project managers
usually spend more than around 60 percent of time in communication with group members.
Hence it is viral for project managers to have a good skills of communication. Having a good

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as well as effective communication plan make sure that effective communication is carried
out throughout the lifecycle of the project. The communication management plan acts as an
integral component of project, program, as well as portfolio management plan. It describes
the data regarding the project which would be distributed to various stakeholders. It further
describes how the communication must be planned, structured, monitored as well as
controlled. There are various data that are monitored by communication management plan
and this include requirements of stakeholders’ communication along with the data which
needs to be conveyed to the stakeholders. It is vital to include the individuals who are
responsible communicating the data as well as the ones who have been responsible for the
purpose of releasing confidential data. It includes guidelines as well for meetings of project
status, emails, project team meetings, correspondence and many more. Binder (2016), states
that communication management plan looks in the different aspects that are communication
related, it also manages it for efficient flow of the communication in the particular
organization.
What communication approaches are required to keep a team engaged and
informed?
Various communication approaches can be undertaken for the purpose of keeping
team engaged as well as informed. These approaches are as follows
1. Having one on one interaction: one on one interactions is very important with all the
individuals that they hire for ensuring that employee engagement does not become
less in the workplace. At these interactions, the individual must set his needs and
expectations. They should be informed regarding the demands of the projects from
them. Inform them regarding the norms of the company for various employees and
hence provide them adequate preparation time for maximizing their potential.

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2. Encourage two way feedback: for having smooth working environment, and have a
two way communication, feedback seems to be very important for generating results,
where main objectives are u to strengthen progress and achieve the goals of the
company. A very common mistake that is carried out by leaders is turning into a one
way dialogue or feedback. They do not provide opportunity to various employees for
presenting their own opinions and views. Encouraging two way communication
would help the employees to open up and sharing their thoughts without any fear.
This would be a sign of good communication within the workplace, this would
provide a team a specific chance of self-evaluation. Providing detailed feedback in
increasing communication among team and coach their team members. Employees
can keep a specific record that is written in format.
3. Show appreciation: organizations must tell their workers regarding how much they
care about them. This proves to be a good way for dealing with low employee’s
morale and hence make the team members with the help of congratulating them for
the idea provided by employees.
Conclusion
From the above discussion, it could be stated that communication is an important
deliverable of any successful project management process. Communication might not be
considered as a project deliverable but it is a vital part that must be concentrated on in order
to carry out effective project management. Project communication is a particular deliverable
of which people are personally responsible for and it is one which has a huge influence over
the success or failure of the project. According to various researchers, it has been found out
that a specific project might have everything in place including skilled professionals, budget,
deadline, resources and many more but still it might fail if it has poor communication
between the members, this is because carrying out a project is not an individual task, it is a

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huge task that has to be divided among various professionals and which needs to be carried
out with proper cooperation. Hence communication plays an important role in this aspect.
This assignment discusses regarding how communication in managed in a particular project
and approaches that can be used for the purpose of carrying out effective communication
within a team.

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References
Binder, J., 2016. Global project management: communication, collaboration and
management across borders. Routledge.
Fuller, M.A., Valacich, J.S., George, J.F. and Schneider, C., 2017. Information Systems
Project Management: A Process and Team Approach, Edition 1.1. Prospect Press.
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.
Kerzner, H. and Kerzner, H.R., 2017. Project management: a systems approach to planning,
scheduling, and controlling. John Wiley & Sons.
Lientz, B. and Rea, K., 2016. Breakthrough technology project management. Routledge.
Nicholas, J.M. and Steyn, H., 2017. Project management for engineering, business and
technology. Routledge.
Peltier, T.R., 2016. Information Security Policies, Procedures, and Standards: guidelines for
effective information security management. Auerbach Publications.
Schwalbe, K., 2015. Information technology project management. Cengage Learning.
Sharp, J.A., Peters, J. and Howard, K., 2017. The management of a student research project.
Routledge.
Sirisomboonsuk, P., Gu, V.C., Cao, R.Q. and Burns, J.R., 2018. Relationships between
project governance and information technology governance and their impact on project
performance. International journal of project management, 36(2), pp.287-300.

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Wang, C., Wood, L.C., Abdul-Rahman, H. and Lee, Y.T., 2016. When traditional
information technology project managers encounter the cloud: Opportunities and dilemmas in
the transition to cloud services. International Journal of Project Management, 34(3), pp.371-
388.