Project Management Strategies: A Comparative Study of Two Case Studies

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MANAGING PROJECT
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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Task 1...............................................................................................................................................4
Task 2...............................................................................................................................................9
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................16
Reference list.................................................................................................................................17
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Introduction
Project management is a guide that helps in meeting the expectations of the project by delivering
it within the stipulated time. For this purpose, effective project managers and staffs are assigned
with different roles so that the aim of the project is met effectively. In this case, the specific
skills, criteria and efficient resources aids in completing the project successfully. This study will
discuss about the benefits and challenges of various approaches that are used in project for
proper planning and controlling the project. In task 1, different stages of project management
along with types of stakeholders will be discussed by using an example of JB consultancy that
has recently develop cloud storage services for managing their business operations. On the
contrary, in task 2, key stages of project life cycle for developing IT system for London Skills
Concern will be discussed.
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Task 1
1) Define the key characteristics of any project.
The main characteristics of the project are quality, scope, time, risk, and resources. As mentioned
by Stark (2015), scope is defined as the primary needs of projects. Besides this, resources contain
elements that are required for project such as technology, people, and budget. Moreover, quality
signifies the efficiency of the project. In project of JB Consultancy, some risks were faced with
the budget and work force. The main characteristics of cloud storage project are as follows:
 The project has delivered unique deliverables like effective service, database system,
record of all functions
 The project has created a scope of managing every data
 The project has helped in mitigating the technical issues from the consultancy
2) List and briefly explain the five (5) key stages in Project Management?
Project management is found to include five key stages that are mentioned below:
Figure 1: Stages of Project management
(Source: Kerzner, 2018)
 Project conception and initiation: In this stage, values and feasibility are measured.
Usually, in the project of Cloud storage service, it has been found that project manager
has use business case document for evaluating the effectiveness of project. Business case
of project is helpful for analyzing the financial benefits that are gained from the project.
In this stage, cost, goal and timeline is set for the project (Conforto et al. 2016).
 Project planning: When the project is approved, the next phase is to develop the project
plan for guiding the team in allocating the resources and budget. In the mentioned
project, project plan has been prepared that has helped in handling risks like errors in
coding language and communication issues.
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 Project execution: In this stage, all the deliverables of project are developed for
satisfying the needs of the stakeholders. Project team leaders are motivated for
accomplishing the objectives of project. This stage completely depends on the previous
stage (Andersen, 2016). In the mentioned project, project managers and staffs have given
all efforts for executing the project successfully.
 Performance and control: This stage consists of controlling the activities of project for
measuring the costs and other errors that can occur in project. In this project of JB
consultancy, senior executive manager and project manager has monitored the services of
cloud storage for bringing best results at the end.
 Project closure: This is the last stage, where the entire project finishes and is
communicated to the relevant stakeholder. This stage helps the team members to
document the project. In JB consultancy, the project has been communicated to the
stakeholders by conducting meetings in seminar hall.
3) What is the Purpose of Project Initiation Document (PID). List three (items) that could
be found in the PID.
Project Initiation document is developed for different purposes such as for planning and
implementing the project properly. The primary purpose of PID is to document the information,
which is required for planning the project.
Items that are found in PID of JB consultancy project are as follows:
 Project definition and documents: It has defined the importance of project by
depicting the objectives, scope, expected outcomes, and constraints.
 Quality management strategy: It describes the quality techniques and standards for
achieving effective results. The project manager has described the management strategy
such as managing project criteria using IT tools and others.
 Team structure: In this structure, the total number of members involved in the project
is shown.
4) List the nine (9) knowledge areas in Project Management and briefly explain the
importance of any two of them.
Knowledge areas of project management are followed below:
 Scope management
 Cost management
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 Time management
 Integration management
 Quality management
 Human resource management
 Procurement management
 Communication management
 Risk management
Among these knowledge areas, two of them are discussed below that are mostly used in the
project of JB consultancy:
Time management: This knowledge area is required for managing the finishing the project on
time. Project managers and staffs of the project tried to manage time by developing Gantt chart
and WBS. In this, all the details about the activities along with start data and finish date are
provided which helped project to complete on time.
Communication management: This knowledge area has been applied in the cloud service
project in order to gain project benefits. For example, all the project details and specifications of
the project are communicated both in verbal and non-verbal manner.
5) List five attributes or characteristics of a project Manager and briefly discuss or explain
the importance of any two of them.
Main attributes of a project manager are mentioned below:
 Problem-solving skill
 Effective communication skill
 Team-building skill
 Technical skill
 Strong leadership skill
The main characteristics that are used by the project manager of JB consultancy are mentioned
below:
Problem-solving skills: As mentioned by Chen et al. (2017), this skill is needed for solving the
challenges associated with the project. This skill of the project manager has helped in reaching
the primary cause of the problem and helped in developing an appropriate solution.
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Technical skills: Project management software and other coding languages are used in this
project. Hence, it can be said that technical knowledge of project manager has helped in
understanding the mechanism of the IT project.
6) Who is a stakeholder? Briefly explain the purpose of stakeholder analysis and why it is
important in Project Management
Stakeholder is the group of person that are directly linked with the project. Purpose of
stakeholder analysis is to identify the primary stakeholders and analyse their needs. It helps in
managing the stakeholders along with help in developing significant relationships among them.
As opined by Fleming and Koppelman (2016), stakeholder analysis is done in initial phase of
project for evaluating the attitude and interests of them in project. In the project of cloud storage
service, proper stakeholder analysis has helped in deciding the potential personnel that can add
benefits and provide support such as funds and resources. The main stakeholders such as project
manager, project executives, workers and project associates has helped in determining the
remedies for reducing negative influences.
7. Draw the corresponding network diagram and show the critical path
Activities Preceding activities Duration
Project definition
(a)
- 8
Initiation (b) a 18
Quality, Scope, and
budget allocation (c)
b 3
Risk identification
(d)
c 8
Project planning (e) g, h 18
Implementation or
execution (f)
a 13
Performance and
control (g)
c, f 3
Project closure (h) a 13
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Start 5/13/19
Finish 6/5/19,
dur 18 days
Start 4/9/19
Finish 4/15/19,
dur 13 days
Start 4/9/19
Finish 4/25/19,
dur 13 days
Start 5/8/19
Finish 5/10/19,
dur 3 days
Dur 3 days
Start 5/8/19
Finish 5/7/19,
dur 8 days
Start 5/3/19
Finish 5/7/19,
dur 3 days
Start 4/9/19
Finish 5/2/19,
dur 18 days
A D
E
E
G
H
CB
Start 3/28/19
Finish 4/8/19,
dur 8 days
Table 1: Project activities
(Created by author)
Figure 2: Network diagram
(Source: Created by learner)
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Task 2
Introduction
The effective conduction of any project is associated with the extensive management across all
domains. For the execution of this task, the case of London Skill Concern (LSC) would be taken
into consideration. As a project manager, for the project named “Development of information
system using Eclips” associated with the organization, this task would be characterized by the
analysis of the application of the stages of project life cycle coupled with identification of the
scope of the product in the form of E-clips.
Application of five stages of project life cycle
Five stages in a project life cycle are in the order of the following:
 Project initiation
 Project planning
 Project execution
 Project monitoring and control
 Project closure
Project initiation and conception
Initiation for an information system includes the development of the parameters that would be
associated for the creation of the project and the potential needs associated with maintenance of
the product so developed (Aga et al., 2018).
The need of the project would be in the increase of the reach and efficiency of the organization.
This would be because, the main segments of the information system includes conversion from
face to face conversation method to a more digital sort of communication.
Major goals would be associated with the project would be the identification of the target market
in the social segment and developing a paid relationship with multiple social networking sites for
the acquisition of data.
One of the influential aspects in the project initialization is the stakeholders as well as the
economies that would be associated with the overall project (Banica et al., 2017). Hence, major
stakeholders for the project currently are the team members, the UK government as well the local
government. However, in the near future, stakeholders would be the customers of the
organizations as well as patrons associated with the organization. This would be due to the
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gradual reduction of the finances provided by the local government coupled with the increase in
the involvement of the patrons in terms of labour and finances.
In the segment of the estimate resources, project planning for the mentioned information system
would be associated with the extensive use of cloud-based storages and using cloud based
modules that would enable real time data entry and effective analytical frameworks.
Additionally, a sponsored social networking site would have to be developed during the initial
phases that would be used for providing the service as mentioned in the case study. A simple
segment of the potential resources would include the following:
 Human resources
 Computer hardwires
 Cloud based storage system
 Telecommunication and extensive data driven packages
 Relevant operating system and social media accounts
 Data warehousing and data analysis frameworks and software like SAS, SPSS, Microsoft
Excel and others
Scope and budget
The scope associated with the development of the project includes creating a provision of
effective career guidance for students with EClips as well as social media. It additionally
includes the incorporation of the games based learning mechanism for disadvantaged
schoolchildren and those youths in the NEET segment.
For the execution of the mentioned project, the organization essentially has a total budget of 8
million GBP. However, this total budget would be segmented for effective execution and
management of the project.
Segment Approximate budget (in million GBP)
Human resources 2
Computer hardware and software 4
Cloud storage and operational expenses 1.5
Miscellaneous .5
Total 8
Table 2: Budget
(Source: Develop by author)
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Information Receiver Method of
delivery
Time frame Person
responsible
General
information
about the project
All team
members
Handouts and
meetings
On a need to
know basis
Project manager
Project status Human resource
department
Internal team
meetings and
emails
Monthly updates,
one in each of 18
month
Project manager
Cost control Account
department
Balance sheets
and ledger
Weekly Accountant
Risks and
alternate actions
Project team Weekly meetings
and risk analysis
Post the
development of
beta version of
the information
system
Project manager
Table 3: Communication plan
(Source: Developed by author)
Development
Development and planning is associated with the second segment of project management life
cycle (Kuhrmann et al., 2017). This segment is associated with the development of the actual
methods that would be taken into consideration for the development of the project. This includes
the aspect of adhering to the mentioned segments of the budgets with a target of reducing the
cost of management and system development.
One of the first planning segments includes the development of the key team members that
would be a part of the information system development (Chong and Wang, 2016). A five-
member unit would be developed to cater to the project. This would include the following:
 Project manager
 Software developer-2
 Content control expert
 Debugger and tester
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For the execution of the task, a two-phased study would be conducted. This would be in the
order of understanding the requirement of the project for the organization and the specifications
that would be required by the organization and incorporation of project management techniques
like Six sigma, Prince2, PMBOK and others (Brioso, 2015).
In the segment of quality and resources, moderate quality would be maintained, as the system
required is more of an information system and not an analytical system. The resources includes
Activity Tenure (month)
Development of aims, objectives and project initialization 1
Project planning 1
Resources acquisition 2
Beta development 3
Testing 1
Software development 5
Debugging 2
Final monitoring 2
Information system handover and closing of project` 1
Table 4: WBS of IS project development
(Source: Developed by author)
Execution and implementation
Set-up organization
At the time of execution of project, writing the code of IT system is required. This code is
important for designing the IS of the system. The set up of the communication has been
developed in the following manner:
 Project manager is responsible for organizing weekly meeting with the team members for
discussing the strategies with team members
 Team members of the project will be shown all the presentations and lectures notes of
project of IT system so that they can gain idea about the project.
 Every team members will provided with the guidelines and manuals related to database
management and cloud technology software in written documents
Team motivation
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