Project Plan: Revitalizing Levi's Jeans - MBA642 Report

This report presents a comprehensive project management plan designed to address the market failure of Levi's Jeans, offering a strategic roadmap for revitalization. The plan leverages the IPECC (Initiation, Planning, Execution, Controlling, Closing) model, providing a structured approach to project management. The report begins with an introduction to the project management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK) and the specific application of the IPECC model. It then analyzes the reasons behind the failure of Levi's Jeans, focusing on issues such as ineffective marketing campaigns, product diversification, and pricing strategies. The core of the report details the application of each stage of the IPECC model to the Levi's Jeans project, including creating a project charter, developing a project management plan, executing the plan, controlling the project's progress, and closing the project. Specific recommendations are made for each phase, such as defining project objectives, resource allocation, risk management, and stakeholder communication. The report also justifies the selection of Microsoft Project as the software of choice for managing the project, highlighting its features and benefits in terms of scheduling, budgeting, and task management. The report concludes by summarizing the key strategies for project success, emphasizing the importance of proper planning, marketing, and staying current with market trends. The aim is to provide a practical and actionable plan for the successful relaunch of Levi's Jeans in the market.

Running head: PROJECT INITIATION, PLANNING AND EXECUTION
PROJECT INITIATION, PLANNING AND EXECUTION
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................2
Research about Levi’s Jeans......................................................................................................2
Project Management Planning for the Success of Project.........................................................3
Success Criteria and the Software Used.....................................................................................6
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................7
References..................................................................................................................................9

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Introduction
The Project management Body of Knowledge is a sequence of guidelines and
terminologies for the management of project. The PMBOK is a technique for the
management of projects. The PMBOK has several process groups that will be used in order to
manage the Levi’s jeans for the success of the jeans. The process groups include initiation,
planning, execution, controlling and closing of the project.
The report discusses about the failure of the Levi’s jeans due to proper planning. In
this report, the process groups are to be applied in order to make the Levis jeans a success
with the help of the software that is Microsoft Project.
Research about Levi’s Jeans
Levi’s is a garment company that manufactures jeans, however, recently the jeans
those are produced by them have been a failure due to proper execution and planning. The
proper planning and execution of the jeans project need to be done so that the jeans will be a
success and they will gain the market as it was before. The Levi’s jeans have been facing
many problems due to which the jeans have been a failure in the market. The issues of Levis
have been numerous and it needs to be solved in order to make the jeans a success once again
(Meredith, Mantel Jr and Shafer 2017). The advertisement campaigns of the Levi’s jeans
were one of the most hated, this campaign was very insulting, and it lacked branding. In the
year 2002, the advertisements that were used in order to promote the low-rise jeans
accomplished much negative type of receptions among the critics. Various external factors
lead to the failure of the Levis jeans and the most important factors was that the threat to the
brand is generated from the Levi’s itself only that is the Levi’s is responsible for the failure of
the jeans (Samuel et al 2018). The expense of market for the jean is growing continuously
and the value of the brand is diminishing day by day.

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The cost of the Levi’s jeans is much higher than the jeans of other brands and this is
one such factor that led to the failure of the jeans of Levis.
The mistake of Levi’s company was that it multiplies the products instead of
accentuating its brand values and it has confused its buyers with various jeans in various
styles and it is known that the expanding the brand will lessen the power and it will weaken
the image.
The company did not focus on its strengths that are the jeans that they used to produce
but they focused on the various styles of jeans and it lead to the failure of the jeans.
Another problem that led to the failure of the jeans was that they launched the range
of silver tab jeans in place of the red label and the customer was not satisfied with this range
of jeans. They fell in the same trap as Coca Cola when the company launched their new coke.
Project Management Planning for the Success of Project
The model of IPECC is an approach of management of project that include five
stages. The phases consist of initiation, planning, execution, controlling and closing of the
project. The IPECC model is required in order to manage the project properly so that the
Levi’s jeans will succeed.
Initiation
During this phase of the project, the manager of the project of Levis Company should
create a project charter and a statement of scope (Kerzner 2017). The project charter is an
agreement between project manager and the project sponsor. The company should keep the
sponsor of the project happy so that they sponsor for the jeans. The company should sign the
project charter so that they can move to the next phase that is planning. The project charter
consists of the following information:

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 Objectives
 Resources required for the project
 Project description
 Responsibilities and roles
The manager of the project of the company must outline a communication plan and he
should assign various roles and responsibilities to the members of his team. There are various
roles in the project charter (Heldman 2018). These include sponsors, manager of the project,
stakeholders and the customers for whom the jeans are to be made. The stage of initiation is
the starting stage of the project and it should be done properly so that the product is made
properly.
Planning
The planning phase is the most important phase for the Levi’s company and it should
be done properly so that it does not face failure again. The team of the project for Levis
Company should create a plan of project management to finish the project and it should meet
the requirements and is within the budget of the company. The project team should work on
the plan of project management and should create a work break down structure about how
they should work, find out the risks of the project and make an appropriate plan of risk
management so that they can minimise the risk that ruined the Levis jeans earlier. The project
manager must use some software so that they can create the schedules for the project that is
finish and start dates of the project (Poole 2019). The team member should also devise the
budget that will be required in order to produce the jeans that would be sold in the market.
The project manager must devise a staffing plan that will include the staffs required in order
to manufacture the jeans and the number of hours the staffs need to work. The procurement
planning is most important as the project manager need to identify the suppliers from where

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the Levis Company will buy their raw materials. The company should use proper materials
and the advertisement campaigns should be done properly so that it does fail like the previous
times.
Execution
In this stage, the team of project should properly implement the project according to
the plan that is devised in the stage of planning by project team of the Levis Company. The
project manager should handle the implementation of the project with the help of the team
members. The manager of project should ensure that the same mistake is not made twice
(Heagney 2016). The project manager should make sure that the members of the team know
their roles and responsibilities and they have the required skills and the assets to meet them.
The project manager should check all the deliverables before they are executed in this phase
as the cloth used for making the jeans, the advertisement campaigns and many more.
Controlling
After the project manager does the project execution, then he should control the
project so that it does not go out of hand of project manager. The manager of the project
should gather all the relevant information about the project from the members of the project.
The manager of the project should monitor the scope of the project, the monitoring of the
schedule should be done so that the project completes on time and it is finished within the
budget that is provided by the project sponsor (Kliem and Ludin 2019). The risks are an
important part of the project, the manager of the project should properly observe it, and the
risks must be mitigated in order to make the project a success.
Closing
The closing is an important stage in the project and the manager of the project himself
must do the closing of the project. The manager of project must make sure that the jeans must

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meet the expectation of the customers and the jeans will be supplied to the market for the
customers to purchase it (Wen and Qiang 2019).
The company must maintain the quality of the jeans and they should focuses on the
brand rather than on the various styles of the jeans. The marketing campaigns must be done
by an expert and should be hired by the company so that the campaigns are appealing to the
customers and the purchase the jeans of Levis.
Success Criteria and the Software Used
The success criteria of the project refers to the terms those are measurable of what
should be the result of the project and is acceptable to the user and the customers
The company should focus on the problems that led to the failure of the Levis Jeans.
The marketing of the jeans should be made proper and the campaigns should be appealing so
that it catches the eye of the customers (Osei-Kyei et al 2017).
The company should do proper planning before they start with the project so that the
project is implemented properly and it does not lead to the project failure.
There should be proper communication among the manager of project and the
members so that issues in the project can be communicated and the issues can be solved and
it will lead to the accomplishment of project (Bassi et al 2017).
The company should manufacture those jeans that go with the trends, the customers
will purchase the jeans that are going with the trends, and the company will earn maximum
profit from selling these jeans.
The software that should be used by manager of project for the initiating, planning
and executing the project is Microsoft project (Bayiley and Teklu 2016). The project manager

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for this project can use software. This software will help the manager of project in various
ways:
The Microsoft project can be used for the management of project. This software
comes with templates those are built in. It will provide the features to the project manager
like scheduling of the tasks, and budgeting of the project and the work breakdown structure
that will be used by the project manager in order to manage the projects (Biafore and Riopel
2017). The Microsoft projects permits the project manager to view all the activities and the
tasks that are planned for the project. The project managers can use this software for the
management of the finances of the project (Lewis, Chatfield and Johnson 2019). The project
manager can use this software in order to estimate the budget of the project in order to avoid
overspending of the money and being underfinanced. The software provides interactive gantt
charts that are useful for the scheduling and the planning of the project. It will help the
project manager of the company to examine the time that is required in order to finish the
project, determine the assets those are needed for the project and then plan the order of the
tasks. The gantt charts also help to manage the dependencies those are between the tasks
(Deshmukh, Sagale, and Bais 2019). Therefore, the project manager in order to plan and
execute the project for the Levis jeans must use this software and it will be a success.
Conclusion
The report concludes with the accomplishment of the project of the Levis jeans. As a
project manager, in this project the main task is to make the Levis jeans successful in the
market as they are facing problems in the market due to several reasons such as the marketing
and many more. The project manager must properly manage the project so that they do not
face failure in the market. The project manager must follow the model of IPECC so that the
project is planned and executed well. The report deals with the success factors of the

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company that will be important for the company in order to be successful in the market. The
success factors include marketing, planning, recent trends and many more. The project
manager of this project must use Microsoft Project so that it is easier for the project to use
scheduling and the budgeting features of the software and use the features of gantt charts to
make the project successful.

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References
Bassi, A., Arrigoni, A., Demma, B., Galli, M. and Gallera, R., 2017. Criteria and Factors in
the Succes of Projects and their Management–Survey by Swiss Companies. In Management
Challenges in a Network Economy: Proceedings of the MakeLearn and TIIM International
Conference 2017 (pp. 119-134). ToKnowPress.
Bayiley, Y.T. and Teklu, G.K., 2016. Success factors and criteria in the management of
international development projects. International Journal of Managing Projects in Business.
Biafore, B. and Riopel, J., 2017. Practical Project Management with Microsoft Project 2016.
Cold Press.
Deshmukh, S.P., Sagale, A.V. and Bais, M.M., 2019. Study of Scheduling In Microsoft
Project Software.
Heagney, J., 2016. Fundamentals of project management. Amacom.
Heldman, K., 2018. Project management jumpstart. John Wiley & Sons.
Kerzner, H., 2017. Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and
controlling. John Wiley & Sons.
Kliem, R.L. and Ludin, I.S., 2019. Reducing project risk. Routledge.
Lewis, C., Chatfield, C.S. and Johnson, T.D., 2019. Microsoft Project 2019 Step by Step.
Pearson Education.
Meredith, J.R., Mantel Jr, S.J. and Shafer, S.M., 2017. Project management: a managerial
approach. John Wiley & Sons.
Osei-Kyei, R., Chan, A.P., Javed, A.A. and Ameyaw, E.E., 2017. Critical success criteria for
public-private partnership projects: international experts’.

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Poole, C.D.M., 2019. IT outsourcing, knowledge transfer and project transition phases. VINE
Journal of Information and Knowledge Management Systems.
Samuel, A., Taylor, D., White, G.R. and Norris, M., 2018. Unpacking the authenticity gap in
corporate social responsibility: lessons learned from Levi’s ‘Go Forth
Braddock’campaign. Journal of Brand Management, 25(1), pp.53-67.
Wen, Q. and Qiang, M., 2019. Project managers’ competences in managing project
closing. Project Management Journal, 50(3), pp.361-375.