MK7248: Project & Programme Management - Ensoft Systems SME Report

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of project management within Ensoft Systems, a UK-based Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) specializing in software development for the construction industry. It covers key aspects such as project objectives, characteristics, planning, lifecycle, metrics, leadership, risk management, and critical success factors. The report includes a literature review comparing and contrasting SME project management with strategic management, highlighting Ensoft's success in achieving project deliverables and minimizing risks. It details the project planning process for Ensoft's 'Builder Master' software, including requirement analysis, architecture design, software development, testing, and deployment, utilizing the Waterfall method. The report also features a Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) and Gantt chart to illustrate project timelines and task assignments. Ultimately, it offers insights into how SMEs can effectively manage projects to achieve organizational goals.

Running head: PROJECT MANAGEMENT REPORT
Project Management Report
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1PROJECT MANAGEMENT REPORT
Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Academic Literature Review.......................................................................................................3
Project Planning, Metric, and Tools............................................................................................5
Project Leadership.....................................................................................................................10
Project Risk and Failure.............................................................................................................11
Critical Success Factors.............................................................................................................13
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................14
References......................................................................................................................................16

2PROJECT MANAGEMENT REPORT
Introduction
Small and medium sized Enterprises or SMEs in the country of United Kingdom or UK
are independent organizations in which the numbers of employees are less than usual. The
limitation of employees for a standard SME differs in different countries. SMEs are defined
normally by financial assets the organization holds and the yearly turnover of the companies.
The projects handles in these SMEs are limited in number but they are capable of churning out a
huge amount of yearly returns (Uhl and Gollenia 2016). Managing a project in an SME
established in UK and the processes behind it would be described in details in this assessment
that would reflect on the understanding on project and programme management theory. The
organization that has been chosen for this report on the SME project management is the Small
and Medium Sized organization based in the country of United Kingdom, called the Ensoft
Systems. The Ensoft Systems generally are specialized in the development of ready-to-use
software products for the Applications used in the Construction Industry. The company is known
to be developing softwares called Ensoft Build master, BarBeQue Software, Road-master and
many more. Mostly these are used by reputed contractors and engineers over 250 cities. The
organization’s project management skills would be thus thoroughly analyzed in this assessment,
with clear review of the academic journals that have been published so far about the above
mentioned topics. This will further be followed by the project planning, metric and tools required
for the development of a software project that the organization follows as a standard. This will
further be followed a project leadership structure, that would clearly define the critical
appreciation of the roles of a project manager in contributing to the organizational
implementation. Next, the project risk and failures would be analyzed to support the appropriate

3PROJECT MANAGEMENT REPORT
framework to ascertain the risk analysis of the project developed for Ensoft. The final section
will evaluate the literature review on project success criteria and apply the relevant success
factors to the organization of Ensoft.
Academic Literature Review
According to the journals that have been reviewed on this purpose focuses on the project
management methodologies used by SMEs in and the critical evaluation, recognition,
comparison and contrasts the objectives and the characteristics of the project management and
strategic management through the view point of an SME.
Critical Evaluation: A small and medium sized enterprise is essential to the economy as
it contributes to employment and addition to the national wealth (Turner and Ledwith 2018). The
papers state that the Small and medium enterprises are making a significant economical changes
where it concerns the employment structure of the country and adding more to the National
wealth. These kinds of organisations also work as an innovation for the future growth of
economy. This function of small to medium enterprises is further boosted up buy a project
management. It is found that the companies that do not depend upon sizes and have built a much
bigger company than the small to medium enterprises have roughly spent the same proportion of
turnover over the projects. Although, it can be seen that however small the project maybe over
250 countries all over the world uses services from the software Ensoft develops.
According to Svejvig and Andersen (2015), Ensoft is an SME as well, but it has seen an
increasing amount of fair growth in achieving its project deliverables and has satisfied the
strategic objectives, finally minimising the impending risk along with the budget. Ensoft has also
been using this project management methods which is made them one of the most inspirational

4PROJECT MANAGEMENT REPORT
small and medium sized Enterprise in the United Kingdom. The development that Ensoft uses
has been analysed through a well-developed questionnaire as per the journals to examine the
extent of this organisation in how projects are being carried out in how employees are being
researched for which they would lead to a successful project. The percentage of turnover that this
organisation have spent on project are very little in different and their almost one third of the
entire company budget. It is been found that less than 20 per cent of the entire turnover every
project has is being utilised for other purposes and 80 per cent is being utilised in developing a
new project.
Therefore, it can be seen that some of the journals are suggesting that SMEs do not
achieve much in their projects due to budgetary and market reach issues; however, Ensoft have
proven them wrong in this regard, with increasing amount of popularity in the United Kingdom
with their achievements. Ensoft has completed their software development projects in time with
proper deliverables, thus making major organizations ask for their services more and more.
Comparison and Contrasting of the findings: The organization uses the project
methodologies to maintain the project planning, the teams allocated for the project, and control
measures adopted for the project and also the project management tools. They have meant
seemingly utilising the project teams for the planning of their projects prior to the project
commencement (Seethamraju 2015). The service companies and software companies like Ensoft
who are also small and medium-sized do not invest much time on project management tools and
planning in comparison. The journals suggest that this is another reason that Ensoft has made it
to the 100 most influential small and medium-sized enterprises in the entire of United Kingdom.
From the perspective of a small and medium sized Enterprise it can be said that Ensoft utilizes
strategic management skills and proper operational management to proceed with their projects.

5PROJECT MANAGEMENT REPORT
Since this happens to be a small and medium scale organisation without proper systematic
operation and strategic management it would be problematic since handling of a project entirely
involves a huge budget. Since the budget for these Enterprises are limited they cannot indulge
into too much of spending the capital budget.
However, the papers suggest that SMEs do not go beyond the usual aspects of reaching a
major economic and service levels of a large organization in comparison, but Ensoft has proven
to be different than most of these organizations. The products and services developed by Ensoft
have been widely used by major companies all around the world and this has proven the journals
wrong at some point of comparison.
Project Planning, Metric, and Tools
There is a way that project management software jobs down the key capabilities that
every small scale organisation considered while reaching out to a project management system. In
this case, the organisation has been developing the software called builder master which is
currently being used by major companies all over the world. Building any software needs a
considerable amount of time and the development goes through a process that is usually termed
as Software Development Life Cycle or SDLC. It is required that before developing the software
at random, a proper Project Plan and Project Life-Cycle is developed for assessing the amount of
time the software development would take. Following would be the detailed Project Plan and
Life-Cycle described in accordance to the development of Builder Master.
Project Plan: The process of developing Builder Master goes through the same software
development life cycle before it becomes available to the customers for use. The process goes
through several internal procedures to finally become available to the customers (Uhl and

6PROJECT MANAGEMENT REPORT
Gollenia 2016). Through all these processes, the designing of the software, developing and
testing of the software aims into producing software that is of a supreme quality that has the
ability meet and exceed the expectations of the customer. Due to this development process, the
project has been a success and even being developed by a Small and Medium Sized Enterprise or
an SME, the software is being used by major countries all around the world (Olechowski et al.
2016). This is because; Ensoft has invested considerable time on the organization of the entire
development plan of the software project which has a detailed description of how the software is
to be developed. In addition to this, it was also kept in mind that the software should be
developed in such a way that it would have the ability of replacing all the existing software used
for similar purposes. On the other hand, the development process should also abide by the ethical
and legal laws for software development in United Kingdom, that is, it should follow the
international standard of software development, which is ISO/IEC 12207 (Bassi 2015). The
following processes are included in the planning and development of the software Builder
Master for the SME of Ensoft:
 Planning Analysis
 Requirement Analysis
 Project Architecture Designing
 Developing the software
 Software testing
 Product testing
 Market deployment and Maintenance
In this particular case, out of the different software development models, Waterfall
Method has been used, which is an irreversible process.

7PROJECT MANAGEMENT REPORT
Project Life Cycle: This process of development of a Project Life-Cycle goes through 4
stages, namely, Project Initiation, Project Planning, Project Execution and Project Closure. In the
above section Project Planning has been described. The primary deliverables of the work
performed by an entire team is further described via a Work Breakdown Structure of WBS as
below. It generally is defined as a decomposition of the entire process according to hierarchy that
is to be delivered by a project team (Fleming and Koppelman 2016). The Work Breakdown
Structure or the WBS thus entirely depends on the project development method and schedule of
the entire process as per the Gantt chart and the project charter. The WBS has been created in
accordance to the major deliverables and further breaking them down into smaller systems and
their sub-deliverables. The decomposition of these structures is further done until a single person
can be assigned with a deliverable (Harrison and Lock 2017). This WBS structure for Builder
Master contains the to-do list of the specific units of work. From the perspective of the costing
for the entire project, specific departments have been assigned with a grouped set of tasks for the
final project progression. By integrating all these aspects including the cost accounts, it has been
easier for an SME like Ensoft to track the final work progress according to the performance of
the project.

8PROJECT MANAGEMENT REPORT
Following is the Project Planning time and schedule as well as the Work Breakdown
Structure for development of the software called Builder-Master for the SME called Ensoft. This
will provide the thorough insight about the complete Project Planning along with the Life Cycle
of the Project with the Gantt chart attached with the propagation of the project:
Figure 1: Project Planning Chart with Project Life-Cycle
(Source: Created by Author)
ID Task
Mode
Task Name Duration Start Finish Predecessors Resource Names
0 Software
Development
95.75 days Wed
01-08-18
Wed
12-12-18
81 Post
Implementation
Review
3 days Fri 07-12-18 Wed
12-12-18
85 Post
implementation
review
complete
0 days Wed
12-12-18
Wed
12-12-18
84
84 Create
software
maintenance
1 day Tue
11-12-18
Wed
12-12-18
83 Project
Manager
83 Distribute to
team
members
1 day Mon
10-12-18
Tue
11-12-18
82 Project
Manager
82 Document
lessons
learned
1 day Fri 07-12-18 Mon
10-12-18
80 Project
Manager
74 Deployment 5 days Fri 30-11-18 Fri 07-12-18
67 Pilot 70.25 days Fri 24-08-18 Fri 30-11-18
57 Documentation 30.5 days Fri 14-09-18 Fri 26-10-18
48 Training 45.75 days Fri 14-09-18 Fri 16-11-18
56 Training
materials
complete
0 days Fri 16-11-18 Fri 16-11-18 55
55 Develop
training
delivery
mechanism
2 days Wed
14-11-18
Fri 16-11-18 54 Trainers
54 Finalize
training
materials
3 days Fri 09-11-18 Wed
14-11-18
53 Trainers
53 Conduct
training
usability study
4 days Mon
05-11-18
Fri 09-11-18 52 Trainers
52 Develop
training
materials
3 wks Mon
15-10-18
Mon
05-11-18
49,31,50,51 Trainers
51 Identify
training
delivery
methodology
(computer
based
training,
2 days Fri 14-09-18 Mon
17-09-18
24 Trainers
50 Develop
training
specifications
for helpdesk
support staff
3 days Fri 14-09-18 Tue
18-09-18
24 Trainers
49 Develop
training
specifications
for end users
3 days Fri 14-09-18 Tue
18-09-18
24 Trainers
32 Testing 48.75 days Fri 14-09-18 Wed 21-11-18
42 Integration
Testing
12 days Mon
05-11-18
Wed
21-11-18
35 Unit Testing 15 days Mon 15-10-18Mon 05-11-18
34 Develop
integration
test plans
using product
specifications
4 days Fri 14-09-18 Wed
19-09-18
24 Testers
33 Develop unit
test plans
using product
specifications
4 days Fri 14-09-18 Wed
19-09-18
24 Testers
25 Development 21.75 days Fri 14-09-18 Mon 15-10-18
17 Design 14.5 days Fri 24-08-18 Thu 13-09-18
7 Analysis/Software
Requirements
14 days Mon
06-08-18
Fri 24-08-18
1 Scope 3.5 days Wed 01-08-18Mon 06-08-18
6 Scope complete0 days Mon 06-08-18Mon 06-08-185
5 Secure core
resources
1 day Fri 03-08-18 Mon
06-08-18
4 Project
Manager
4 Define
preliminary
resources
1 day Thu
02-08-18
Fri 03-08-18 3 Project
Manager
3 Secure project
sponsorship
1 day Wed
01-08-18
Thu
02-08-18
2 Management
2 Determine
project scope
4 hrs Wed
01-08-18
Wed
01-08-18
Management
86 Software
Go-Live
0 days Wed
12-12-18
Wed
12-12-18
85
12-12
Project Manager
Project Manager
Project Manager
16-11
Trainers
Trainers
Trainers
Trainers
Trainers
Trainers
Trainers
Testers
Testers
06-08
Project Manager
Project Manager
Management
Management
12-12
29-07 12-08 26-08 09-09 23-09 07-10 21-10 04-11 18-11 02-12 16-12 30-12
01 July 01 August 01 September 01 October 01 November 01 December

9PROJECT MANAGEMENT REPORT
Figure 2: WBS of the Project
(Source: Created by Author)
Software Development
Scope
Determine project
scope
Secure project
sponsorship
Define preliminary
resources
Secure core
resources
Scope complete
Analysis/Software
Requirements
Conduct needs
analysis
Draft preliminary
software
specifications
Develop preliminary
budget
Review software
specifications/budget
with team
Incorporate
feedback on
software
specifications
Develop delivery
timeline
Obtain approvals to
proceed (concept,
timeline, budget)
Secure required
resources
Analysis complete
Design
Review preliminary
software
specifications
Develop functional
specifications
Develop prototype
based on functional
specifications
Review functional
specifications
Incorporate
feedback into
functional
specifications
Obtain approval to
proceed
Design complete
Development
Review functional
specifications
Identify
modular/tiered
design parameters
Assign development
staff
Develop code
Developer testing
(primary debugging)
Development
complete
Testing
Develop unit test
plans using product
specifications
Develop integration
test plans using
product specifications
Unit Testing
Review modular
code
Test component
modules to product
specifications
Identify anomalies to
product specifications
Modify code
Re-test modified
code
Unit testing
complete
Integration Testing
Test module
integration
Identify anomalies to
specifications
Modify code
Re-test modified
code
Integration testing
complete
Training
Develop training
specifications for
end users
Develop training
specifications for
helpdesk support
staff
Identify training
delivery methodology
(computer based
training, classroom,
etc.)
Develop training
materials
Conduct training
usability study
Finalize training
materials
Develop training
delivery mechanism
Training materials
complete
Documentation
Develop Help
specification
Develop Help
system
Review Help
documentation
Incorporate Help
documentation
feedback
Develop user
manuals
specifications
Develop user
manuals
Review all user
documentation
Incorporate user
documentation
feedback
Documentation
complete
Pilot
Identify test group
Develop software
delivery mechanism
Install/deploy
software
Obtain user
feedback
Evaluate testing
information
Pilot complete
Deployment
Determine final
deployment strategy
Develop deployment
methodology
Secure deployment
resources
Train support staff
Deploy software
Deployment
complete
Post Implementation
Review
Document lessons
learned
Distribute to team
members
Create software
maintenance team
Post implementation
review complete
Software Go-Live

10PROJECT MANAGEMENT REPORT
Project Leadership
Although an SME like Ensoft is not a huge enterprise, but this those not imply the fact
that the Project Manager should regard as the leadership quality to be low to guide the business
in a successful manner. Ensoft uses these promising ideas and professional qualities over
delivering leadership qualities that it converts to successful projects for even a small business
organisation (Olechowski et al. 2016).
The company uses the visionary prospect in their projects. It is a justified fact that any
leader should have a visionary quality to foresee the valuable prospects of a project at large and
end up with the significant following. It is a significant combination of personal and professional
qualities that helps in making a project manager much stronger with creating a team that would
protect the deliverables of the company on time for the clients. The organisation also has
intelligent and motivated person who works for the lookout of the next project opportunity while
working on the current one (Fleming and Koppelman 2016). This quality makes other
organisation be interested in the products that the company manufactures or provide services for.
It utilizes talent as much as a raw material and with the right kind of leadership quality it
institutionalize people who do not correctly perform the task while given a particular job.
However it has been worried that choosing the best for a project might intermediate a highly
talented or motivated individual involved in the project but actually unsolicited suggestions may
cause harm to a project which will in turn work as a disadvantage for the organisation.
Ensoft has been criticized so much yet the project managers have channelized is criticism
into boosting up of the project management techniques through effective communication.
Maintaining of communication with employee and workforce in the organisation and makes the

11PROJECT MANAGEMENT REPORT
employees to act on the feedback (Harris 2016). Successful executives in this organisation has
kept a casual type of connection within the company and write on the particular time and build a
team that has high motivation and achievement skills producing good results like the successful
software development for builder master and produced effective results.
Project Risk and Failure
It can be found that when a new process is applied on any organization by replacing the
old ones it can bring about positive changes but it may also have some perilous repercussions
that have the potential of bringing about further risks in the organization. Carrying out a risk
management process is not a difficult task. This process follows a specific Risk Assessment
Framework or RAF that strategizes the prioritizing of risks associated with the project (Binder
2016). Therefore, the process that would be included in managing the risk should have the ability
to process the information about the risks and use it in order to generate a feasible decision while
addressing to it following their priority (Rosemann and Brocke 2015).. The ways that the risk in
the project of developing Build Master for Ensoft has been developed in several steps by the
RAF is as follows:
Identified Risk Description Severity
Estimation and scheduling Time and budget estimation may
go wrong in the Project Planning
which may further hamper the
software development process
High
Sudden and immediate
requirements
The client may ask sudden
change in requirements or total
elimination of a previous
High