Project Management for Entrepreneurial Ventures: IoT Healthcare

This project analyzes the development of an IoT-based healthcare application within the context of entrepreneurial ventures. It begins with an opportunity analysis, identifying business problems like increasing patient numbers and the need for improved healthcare access. The project proposes an IoT-based telehealth application to address these issues, enabling remote health monitoring and communication between patients and medical professionals. The document explores the healthcare industry, target customers (seniors and middle-aged professionals), and potential revenue models. It also covers market competition, strategies for opportunity exploitation, including validation of the idea, and the crucial role of project management in planning, scheduling, cost management, and risk mitigation. The project emphasizes the importance of project management methodologies in ensuring the successful implementation and sustainability of the IoT healthcare application.

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Project Management for Entrepreneurial Ventures
IoT-based Healthcare Application
4/15/2019

Project Management for Entrepreneurial Ventures
Table of Contents
Introduction...........................................................................................................................................2
Opportunity Analysis.............................................................................................................................2
Business Problem/Challenges............................................................................................................2
Ideas to Address the Problem............................................................................................................2
Industry/Sector of the Economy........................................................................................................3
Target Customer & Revenue Scheme................................................................................................4
Market Shares of Competitors and Future Competition.....................................................................4
Opportunity Exploitation.......................................................................................................................5
Validation of Idea..............................................................................................................................5
Role of Project Management.............................................................................................................5
Project Management Approach..........................................................................................................7
Conclusion.............................................................................................................................................9
References...........................................................................................................................................10
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Project Management for Entrepreneurial Ventures
Introduction
There are numerous industries and sectors that have been set-up and are witnessing change.
These changes are in terms of the change in the business operations, technology involved,
customer expectations, organization policies, and external environment. It is necessary for the
business firms to maintain the element of innovation in the business processes at all times.
With the innovation of the business processes and applications, the involvement and
satisfaction levels of the customers are maintained at all times. The document covers
opportunity analysis and exploitation for the IoT-based healthcare application for the
healthcare industry.
Opportunity Analysis
Business Problem/Challenges
The business problem that has been identified is from the healthcare sector. The present-day
lifestyle has introduced various health conditions and the number of patients has also
increased in the recent years. For instance, obesity has emerged as one of the primary health
conditions due to the changes in the lifestyle. Due to the increase in the pollution levels,
respiratory problems are also on a rise. Apart from these conditions, there are various other
existing and new health conditions that have emerged and have impacted the patients (Harsh,
2017).
The increase in the number of patients has introduced various problems. The number of
medical professionals has not increased in the same proportion as that of the patients. It has
led to the issues of longer waiting queues to receive health care and services. The medical
professionals also face numerous issues due to the increase in the patient count. There is a lot
of burden on the medical professionals which has led to the reduction in the efficiency levels.
The inability to maintain work-life balance is also one of the outcomes for the medical
professionals that have a negative impact on their productivity levels.
Ideas to Address the Problem
The use of technology has been proposed to address the problem that is identified. Internet of
Things (IoT) is a technology that can be used to address the issues. IoT is a technology that
provides inter-connection of different components and elements to achieve specific goals. In
this case, the use of IoT technology can be done to develop tele-health application for the
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healthcare organizations. The application shall be customizable as per the healthcare
organization. For example, the application features for a cardiac health centre will be
different from that of an orthopaedic clinic, and likewise. The main aim of the application
shall be to allow the patients and medical professionals to interact with each other using the
tele-health services (Lee, 2015).
The application that is proposed with integrate and inter-connect different components and
equipment, such as healthcare equipment, sensors, mobile phones, computer systems, data
analytics tools, databases, etc. The integration of these tools and components will allow the
patients to record their health signs and data. The data recorded will be shared with the
concerned medical professional through the application. The medical professional will
analyse the data and will provide the medical comments and feedback to the patient in the
form of a medical report. The patient will be able to monitor the health condition from any
location and it will not be required to visit the healthcare centre for check-ups. The
application will also include the tele-conferencing facilities which will allow the patients and
the medical professionals to connect over the audio/video channels. There will also be certain
alerts included in the application so that the patients record their health signs as per the
requirement (Abinaya, Kumar and Swathika, 2015).
Industry/Sector of the Economy
Healthcare industry of the economy is targeted through the selected application. Healthcare is
one of the core sectors for any economy. It is necessary to build up advanced healthcare tools
and concepts to make sure that the healthcare services are streamlined.
The selected application will allow the healthcare organizations to resolve the issues that
currently exist. IoT technology will make sure that the solutions that are developed and
implemented are as per the latest technology. In this manner, the overall profits and revenues
will increase (Park, Chang and Lee, 2018).
The market is attractive as healthcare is one such sector that is essential for every country.
The number of patients may remain the same or may increase over the years. The healthcare
services and care will be needed to treat the patients and enhance their health conditions and
well-being. Also, there are healthcare tools and equipment that will be needed for this
purpose facilitating the expectations of the associated vendors and suppliers. Thus, the market
has a potential for growth and with the advancement in technology, the latest tools and
applications can be used for the purpose.
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Target Customer & Revenue Scheme
The target customers for the IoT-based healthcare application proposed include the senior
citizens and retired professionals along with the middle-aged professionals. These are the
people that may face difficulty in visiting the healthcare centres and may find it difficult to
wait in the long queues. The senior citizens and retired professionals may face issued while
commuting to the health centre. The middle-aged professionals on the other hand may have
to compromise on their business commitments to receive health services.
Thus, the development and deployment of the IoT-based healthcare application will provide
these customers with the ability to avail the health care and services from the remote location.
They may contact the medical professional and get the medications without visiting the
healthcare centre unless absolutely necessary (Poojitha, 2018).
The revenue scheme that shall be followed in the application shall be monthly or yearly
subscription for the patients. They may choose to pay the subscription amount at once or in
the form of monthly instalments for the timeframe selected. The subscription amount applied
on the application will provide the development firm and the healthcare organization with the
enhanced revenues. The revenues will increase with the increase in the number of patients.
Market Shares of Competitors and Future Competition
In order to capture the market shares of the competitors and deal with the future competition,
there will be a planned approach that will be used.
The use of data analytics tools will be made to determine the activities carried out by the
competitors and the specific trends and patterns associated with them. There are certain
unique features and services offered by the business organization that attract certain sections
of the customers. The identification of such preferences and patterns will be made to make
sure that the in-depth analysis of the competitors is made. There will also be market analysis
made to forecast the future trends and patterns involved. The use of social media tools and
analysis will also be done to determine the preferences of the customers (Alamri, 2018).
All of these data sets and the associated results will be compiled and the design of the
application will be made on the basis of the outcomes. IoT is one of the emerging
technologies and the use of this technology will provide competitive edge in the market. This
is because there is handful of IoT applications currently available in the market and the
patients & medical professionals will have innovative solutions to meet their needs. The
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amalgamation of latest technologies will be done in the application so that it does not become
obsolete in terms of the technical features.
Opportunity Exploitation
Validation of Idea
The validation of the idea will be done by using a combination of the measures. The
feasibility analysis of the application will be done in the initial stages of the project to make
sure that the idea that is proposed can be practically carried out or not. The feasibility
analysis will be done on the basis of the parameters, such as technical, operational, economic,
and social. The success of this step will provide the details of the process that shall be
followed further.
The collection of the requirements and data sets will be done on the basis of the elicitation
techniques. There will be interviews conducted with the potential users as patients and
medical professionals to understand their expectations from the system and the issues in the
existing system. The use of the techniques as surveys and questionnaire will also be done to
collect the response of increased number of entities. The collection of these data sets will
provide an insight to the requirements and specifications to incorporate in the application
(Nandyala and Kim, 2016).
The market analysis will also be conducted to determine the success or failure rate of the
application proposed. The preferences of the customers and the market trends will be
obtained in these processes. The customer validation will be obtained during the elicitation
and requirements analysis phase. There will be a feedback process that will be involved
during the development of the application. The development will be done in an iterative
manner and the customer feedback will be obtained at the end of iteration. The comments and
feedback provided by the customer will be incorporated in the next iteration. In this manner,
the developed application will be as per the customer comments and feedback.
There will be a user acceptance testing phase that will also be involved. It will dedicatedly
include the customer response and their validation on the application developed.
Role of Project Management
Project management has a great role to play in exploiting the opportunity. The role of project
management is explained in the points below.
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Project Management for Entrepreneurial Ventures
 Planning is one of the essential activities that are involved in any activity. The use of
project management methodologies and guidelines will be done to correctly plan the
project tasks and processes. The opportunity that is identified must be feasible and
practical in nature. Also, the planning on the associated aspects, such as risks,
schedule, costs, etc. need to be done to understand the success rate. The planning of
the entire process will be done as per the project methodologies (Joslin and Muller,
2015).
 There will be several activities involved in the IoT-based application that is proposed
in terms of the designing of the application, development of the application, testing,
and so on. There will be certain timeframe needed for each of these activities. The
estimation of the timeframe will be done utilizing the schedule management as the
knowledge area under project management and its associated guidelines. The
estimates will be made and the tracking of the actual values will also be made to
understand the gaps (Steinfort, 2017).
 There will be several activities involved in the IoT-based application that is proposed
in terms of the designing of the application, development of the application, testing,
and so on. There will be certain costs needed for each of these activities. The
estimation of the costs will be done utilizing the cost management as the knowledge
area under project management and its associated guidelines. The estimates will be
made and the tracking of the actual values will also be made to understand the gaps.
 IoT-based healthcare application will be composed of IoT as the prime technology
that will inter-connect numerous components and technologies. The amalgamation of
all of these different units may lead to the presence of certain vulnerabilities in the
application. These vulnerabilities may be utilized by the attackers to give shape to the
information security threats and attacks. There may also be numerous other risks that
may emerge in the project. The management and resolution of these risks will be done
using risk management as the knowledge areas under project management (Dey and
Kinch, 2008).
 Communication is one of the necessary mechanisms that will be involved in
exploiting the opportunity. The communication will be necessary to be developed and
maintained with the end-users of the application. The internal communications within
the members of the project team will be essential for streamlining the project tasks
and activities. The project management knowledge area as communication
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Project Management for Entrepreneurial Ventures
management will be utilized to manage the communications involved (Reed and
Knight, 2010).
 Scope of the project will be essential to be defined and managed. There may be
certain items that will be executed by the members of the project team while there be
some of the activities that will not come under the scope. The definition of the scope
will be essential so that the resources have the clarity on the tasks to perform. The
management will be done as per the guidelines under scope management aspect of
project management.
 There will be numerous resources involved in various phases of the project and the
management of these resources will be essential to make sure that the project tasks
and activities are effectively managed. These resources may have different demands
from the project. The handling of these human and non-human resources will require
certain guidelines and policies. The use of project management approaches and
guidelines will be significant in this area.
 Changes will be a part of the project all throughout and the handling of these changes
will be essential. There are project management guidelines that are defined for change
handling and management. These will make sure that the change planning and
organization is correctly done at all times (Lehmann, 2017).
 Quality of the entire process will also be extremely significant. The management of
the quality will be done using project management guidelines. The adherence to the
quality standards and processes will be maintained.
Project Management Approach
The combination of two project management approaches will be done to manage the project
challenges and ensure successful execution of the project.
The primary approach that will be used will be agile methodology for project management. It
is the methodology in which the project tasks and activities will be handled using an ad-hoc
scheme. The methodology is adaptive in nature and therefore, there are no fixed steps or
phases involved in this methodology. The management of the project activities will be done
in such a manner that the product being developed is scalable and flexible in nature. The use
of agile methodology for project management will make sure that the end-users are involved
in the project at all times (Juricek, 2014). There will be customer feedback exercises included
along with project reviews and audits to determine the perspective and response of the
customer on the application being developed. There may also be certain changes that may be
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requested by the customers and the project sponsors. The incorporation of these changes will
be done with ease with the aid of agile methodology for project management. The use of
iterative methodology will be done for managing the project scope and its resources. Quality
is one of the significant areas that will be given a lot of significance under the agile
methodology for project management.
The development of the project will be done in an incremental and iterative manner. There
will be a number of iterations that will be involved in the development phase. The
amalgamation of the development approach will be done with the agile methodology to make
sure that the streamlining of all the processes is achieved. The involvement of the customer
response and feedback along with the development of the scalable and flexible solution will
make sure that the application developed is high on quality at all times. Also, the levels of
customer engagement and satisfaction will also increase as an outcome. There will be daily
stand up meetings included during the project timeline that will enhance the frequency and
effectiveness of the communication processes (Indelicato, 2016). The clarity on the roles and
activities to be performed will be maintained for all the resources involved in the project
team. As a result, the overall management of the project will be simplified with the aid of the
agile methodology for project management.
Another methodology that will be used for managing the project tasks and activities will be
lean methodology for project management. Lean methodology is based on the lean concepts
that include the processes for enhanced customer collaboration and satisfaction, focus on the
overall project quality, and minimization of waste (Ballard and Howell, 2013). The use of
lean methodology along with agile methods will enhance the overall project management
quality and flexibility. There may be numerous wastes that may come up in the project. These
wastes could be in terms of the unwanted risks or changes in the project. There may be
certain activities included in the scope that may not be desired or required. The elimination of
such processes and activities will be done from the project to enhance the overall
effectiveness (Kim and Hochstatter, 2016). The quality of the project will also be improved
with the inclusion of lean concepts in the project. This is because customer collaboration will
be enhanced and the changes will be made as per the customer response and feedback.
The two methodologies will be easily amalgamated with each other as there are certain
similarities in the two. The adaptive nature of the agile methodology along with the focus on
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Project Management for Entrepreneurial Ventures
customer collaboration and feedback will fall in line with the lean concepts. As a result, the
project management activities will be improved and easily carried out.
Conclusion
The increase in the number of patients has introduced various problems. The number of
medical professionals has not increased in the same proportion as that of the patients. It has
led to the issues of longer waiting queues to receive health care and services. There is use of
technology that can be done to address the problem. In this case, the use of IoT technology
can be done to develop tele-health application for the healthcare organizations. The
application shall be customizable as per the healthcare organization. The target customers for
the IoT-based healthcare application proposed include the senior citizens and retired
professionals along with the middle-aged professionals. The revenue scheme that shall be
followed in the application shall be monthly or yearly subscription for the patients. Project
management has a great role to play in exploiting the opportunity. The primary approach that
shall be used will be agile methodology for project management. It is the methodology in
which the project tasks and activities will be handled using an ad-hoc scheme. The
methodology is adaptive in nature and therefore, there are no fixed steps or phases involved
in this methodology. Another methodology that will be used for managing the project tasks
and activities will be lean methodology for project management. Lean methodology is based
on the lean concepts that include the processes for enhanced customer collaboration and
satisfaction, focus on the overall project quality, and minimization of waste.
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Project Management for Entrepreneurial Ventures
References
Abinaya, Kumar, V. and Swathika (2015). Ontology Based Public Healthcare System in
Internet of Things (IoT). Procedia Computer Science, 50, pp.99-102.
Alamri, A. (2018). Ontology Middleware for Integration of IoT Healthcare Information
Systems in EHR Systems. Computers, 7(4), p.51.
Ballard, G. and Howell, G. (2013). Lean project management. Building Research &
Information, 31(2), pp.119-133.
Dey, P. and Kinch, J. (2008). Risk management in information technology projects.
International Journal of Risk Assessment and Management, 9(3), p.311.
Harsh, K. (2017). IOT Based Calorie Calculator For Healthcare System. International
Journal Of Engineering And Computer Science.
Indelicato, G. (2016). Agile for Project Managers. Project Management Journal, 47(1),
pp.e4-e4.
Joslin, R. and Muller, 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.
Juricek, J. (2014). Agile Project Management Principles. Lecture Notes on Software
Engineering, pp.172-175.
Kim, Y. and Hochstatter, K. (2016). Transformational Leadership and its impact on Lean
Implementation. Journal of Construction Engineering and Project Management, 6(1), pp.20-
25.
Lee, B. (2015). Dynamic Data Binding Protocol between IoT Medical Device and IoT
Medical Service for Mobile Healthcare. International Journal of Smart Home, 9(6), pp.141-
150.
Lehmann, S. (2017). Bridging Strategies and Action: Towards a Method for Change
Management in Danish Emergency Management Organizations. Journal of Change
Management, 17(2), pp.138-154.
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Nandyala, C. and Kim, H. (2016). From Cloud to Fog and IoT-Based Real-Time U-
Healthcare Monitoring for Smart Homes and Hospitals. International Journal of Smart
Home, 10(2), pp.187-196.
Park, A., Chang, H. and Lee, K. (2018). How to Sustain Smart Connected Hospital Services:
An Experience from a Pilot Project on IoT-Based Healthcare Services. Healthcare
Informatics Research, 24(4), p.387.
Poojitha, M. (2018). IOT based Advanced Smart Healthcare Monitoring System.
International Journal for Research in Applied Science and Engineering Technology, 6(3),
pp.2473-2476.
Reed, A. and Knight, L. (2010). Effect of a virtual project team environment on
communication-related project risk. International Journal of Project Management, 28(5),
pp.422-427.
Steinfort, P. (2017). Community and post-disaster Program Management Methodology.
International Journal of Project Management, 35(5), pp.788-801.
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