IT Project Management: Challenges, Solutions, and Impact on Business

This report delves into the critical aspects of IT project management, emphasizing its role in enhancing business efficiency. It identifies three prevalent challenges that often hinder IT project success: poor communication skills, lack of user input, and inadequate planning. The report elaborates on each problem, explaining how they impact project outcomes. Furthermore, it provides practical solutions for each challenge, such as assigning clear roles and duties, conducting thorough business requirement analyses, involving employees in project design, and developing comprehensive project plans with risk assessments. The conclusion reinforces the significance of addressing these issues to achieve business goals effectively. The report references various books, journals, and online resources to support its findings.

IT PROJECT
MANAGEMENT

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
PART 1............................................................................................................................................1
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................3
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................4

INTRODUCTION
Information technology (IT) plays a huge role in improving the efficiency of business. An
effective IT system integrates all the processes and procedures within an organisation. Systems
increase the overall working of employees and provide ease in business. This is useful for every
organisation that wants to implement the change. IT improves the quality as well as quantity of
employees in company (Sears, and et..al., 2015). Implementing IT projects requires major
changes to be done in the business. Also, it takes time to adopt the changes. But, sometimes
these projects get failed due to various reasons and thus, it becomes difficult to implement
another project. However, projects can be improved by taking appropriate measures. IT projects
are implemented with specific goals and objectives. This enables company to increase their
productivity. This report will throw light on the common problems that can affect the success of
IT project and techniques that can be used to solve those problems.
PART 1
Information technology projects are implemented with goal and objective of improving
company’s efficiency. These projects give direction to company to grow and expand. Also, if
projects are successfully implemented then it becomes easy for the organisation to achieve its
goals and objectives (Dybå, Dingsøyr,. and Moe,. 2014). Along with this, IT projects face
several problems while implementing. So problems have to be solved to make the project
successful. Besides this, strategies must be developed on how to deal with the critical situations.
For this, tasks and duties are assigned to experts.
The three common problems that impact the success of a typical IT projects are:
Poor communication skills: - It is the most common problem that arises in IT project
management. As per this, communication in between the employees and various departments is
not proper (4 common IT projects management challenges, 2014). A project team must work
together to achieve the set goals and objectives. This problem occurs because of lack of role and
responsibilities are assigned to each other. Also, there is poor coordination between and IT. It is
because; business and data speaks different language. This decreases the success of project and
hampers business performance (Kerzner, 2015). This lead to entire project falling apart. It is
significant because it helps in working together and communicating change made in project.
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Solution: - For solving this problem, project manager must assign roles and duties to
everyone. They must describe what tasks have to be performed. Also, regular feedback should be
taken or interacting with employees will helpful in establishing effective communication system.
Moreover, manager should develop an appropriate structure that will be useful in this. Before
implementing project, all details regarding project must be
No user input- It is related to user who will use system (Fleming,. and Koppelman,
2016,). It means that managers must define the requirements of business and accordingly,
projects must be developed. It not then it will create gaps between what employees will use and
what business wants. Moreover, many projects transform the business processes by making
changes in it. If user will not be able to understand the system then there will be no input given
by them. This will result in project failure. Also, the gaps created in between project and
business will result in non-achievement of goals and objectives. User suggestions and opinions
must be taken while planning the project (Kuster and et..al., 2016.). It is important because
project success is dependent on the user’s input. Also, it is significant in analyse the user input as
project on based on this. What data will be entered by user in the IT project.
Solution: - To solve this, research must be done to analyse the requirements of business.
This will give an insight on what needs are there. Also, by involving employee in designing IT
project will provide information on what changes are required. Employees will be able to share
their views and ideas about this project (Cross, and et..al 2015). With this, it will be easy to
design or improve the it. This will create higher chances of getting it successful.
Poor planning- It is the most important art that must be considered while developing a
project. Otherwise, it may lead to failure of entire project. The manager is having the
responsibility of planning. Manager analyses the needs of business and plans the structure of
project. If it is not properly planned then it can lead to failure of project. Planning is done on the
basis of business requirements and resources available. It also involves defining roles and
responsibilities of employees and managers. How a project will be implemented and what
actions will be taken in case of circumstances. Also, goal must be set in such a way that it can be
achieved with the help of IT project (Flouris, and Lock, , 2016). A project’s success is based on
effective and proper planning of the manager. Planning is significant as it helps in providing
brief idea about what project will be based on and benefits obtained from it.
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Solution: - It can be solved by making or designing proper plans. For this, project
manager can discuss with employees and top management on how to develop a plan. Also,
before implementing project, its pros and cons must be briefly analysed. This will help them to
overview the entire project plan. Furthermore, project can be run on trial basis to identify its
effectiveness. Apart from this, highly experienced experts can be called to develop a plan.
CONCLUSION
From this report, it can be concluded that information technology projects are
implemented with goals and objectives of improving company’s efficiency. While implementing
IT projects, the three common problems faced are poor communication skills, no user input and
improper planning. These problems impact the success of IT project in business. However, in
order to solve these problems, various techniques are followed that help in solving them and
ensuring the success of project. With this, it will be easy for the manager to achieve business
goals and objectives effectually.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Cross, and et..al 2015. Ambient project management. U.S. Patent 9.135,594.
Dybå, T., Dingsøyr, T. and Moe, N.B., 2014. Agile project management. In Software project
management in a changing world (pp. 277-300). Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg.
Fleming, Q.W. and Koppelman, J.M., 2016, December. Earned value project management.
Project Management Institute.
Flouris, T.G. and Lock, D., 2016. Aviation project management. Routledge.
Holmes, and et..al 2015. Project management tool. U.S. Patent Application 14/081,959.
Kerzner, H. and Kerzner, H.R., 2017. Project management: a systems approach to planning,
scheduling, and controlling. John Wiley & Sons.
Kerzner, H., 2015. R&D project management. Project Management 2.0. pp.199-228.
Kuster and et..al., 2016. Project management handbook. Springer.
Pinto, J.K., 2015. Project management: achieving competitive advantage. Prentice Hall.
Schwalbe, K., 2015. Information technology project management. Cengage Learning.
Sears, and et..al., 2015. Construction project management. John Wiley & Sons.
Online:
4 common IT projects management challenges, 2014. [Online] Available Through:
<https://www.liquidplanner.com/blog/4-common-it-project-management-challenges-and-4-
solutions/>
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