Unit 6 Managing a Successful Business Project Assignment

Program	Diploma in Business
Unit Number and Title	Unit 6 Managing a Successful Business Project
QFC Level	Level 4

Introduction

The Managing a successful business project is the key for obtain the desired outcome from the project. A project generally involves huge amount of the resources and its failure very much affect the functioning of the business. So it is the responsibility of the project manager to effectively conduct the project and attain the desired outcome. The business project manager effectively conduct planning, organizing staffing, and controlling the activity to attain a desired objective.
The primary objective of the project manager is to obtain all the project goals within the allocated resources. The project manager is responsible in effective handling the risk which are associated with the project and helps in timely prevention of such risk. The project manager breaks down the project into different activity to attain the desire outcome of the project. The manger creates effective coordination between the various activities of the project and facilitate effective communication between those who are related to the project.

Task 1

1.1 Describe the Background and Principles of Project Management

Project management is the application of various process such as planning, organizing staffing, and controlling the activity to attain a desired objective. The project manager helps in delivering unique outcome of the work and within the allocated time and budget. The project is generally of the temporary nature to obtain a unique product, service or result. The project management used his skills and competency to achieve the desired outcome in the planned way. The primary objective of the project manager is to obtain all the project goals within the pre-determined allocated resources. The constraints which the project manager is required to consider during the project are scope, time Quality and budget. For the success of the project the project manager needs to apply following principle-

Project structure

The project manager needs to emphasize on three parameter which are quality, resource and time. The project manager needs to set the desired goals while designing the project structure. For effective handling of the task the project manager needs to distribute the project into various parts and set the starting point and end point of each task. For the success of the project the manager needs to set the milestone and the corresponding cost and result (Banal, 2012).

Defining phase

Many of the project faces problem in the defining stage because it is disorganized due to involvement of the too many stakeholder. The successful defining is needs to communicate to entire team at every step to attain the desired outcome from the project.  

Goal setting

The project manager needs to set the goals which are to be attained from the project and should communicate it to the various level of the organization. The goal setting of the project is the complex task and needs to be set after the detail analyze. While framing the goals of the project the manager needs to consider that the goals are specific, measurable and ambitious. The project manager needs to check the goal should be realistic and time- bound.

Transparency

The project manage needs to make use of various tools to stay on track. For this the project manager needs to review and report at each stage of the project. The manager needs to regularly check that the work is completed within the allocated resources and as per the set milestone (Banal, 2012).

Risk recognition

The manager needs to determine in advance the risk which may be associated with the project and built an appropriate strategy to overcome and avoid such risk. The early recognition of the risk helps the manger to avoid losses so the manger needs to regularly analyze the risk which are associated with the work.

Managing project

It is difficult for the manager to identify the small risk which are associated with the project. The manager needs to concentrate on the big risk and build a strategy to avoid it to prevent failure of the project. The manger needs to regularly focus on the key areas of the project and check that nothing goes wrong.

Responsibility of the project manager

It is the responsibility of the project manager to communicate the goals and objective of the project among all the team and individual which are associated with the project. The manager needs to regularly obtain the status of the various task and needs to check that they are accomplished in the desired way. It is the responsibility of the manager to handle the issue within the team and examine both internal as well external factor which affect the project (Stewart, 2015).

Project success

The success of the project is obtained when the outcome of the project matches with the pre determine desired outcome. The success is obtained when the project the deliverable is complete and as per the standard and within the allocated time and budget.

1.2 Appraise the Viability of Projects, developing Success/Fail Criteria

Payback period

The payback period will help the manager in determining the time within which the business will recover the cost of the investment. This helps the manager in determining when the investment will attain the break-even point and provide the positive result. The investment which is having the longer payback period is not desired for the business. This major drawback of this method is that it doesn’t consider the rate of interest. For calculating the payback period the investment is divide by the annual cash saving.

Year	Cash inflow in £	Cumulative
1	110000	110000
2	110000	220000
3	110000	330000
4	150000	480000
5	150000	630000
6	150000	780000
total	780000	780000

Payback of project A- The payback period of the first project is 3.46 years
Payback of project B- The payback period of the second project is 4.13 years

So from the above study it may be conclude that the project A is more feasible as it has the shorter payback period as compared to the second project.  The company can recover its investment much faster in the project A as compared to project B. But this method has certain limitation that it doesn’t consider the rate of the interest while calculating the cash flow (Lippi, & vim, 2016).

Net present value

The net present value is the difference between present value of inflow and the present value of the outflow. This method is more appropriate because it consider the rate of interest on investment while deciding the project. This method consider that the time of cash flow affects the decision of investing in the project. The NPV value needs to be positive in order to attain good return from investment. The NPV can be calculated by using the following formula-

Where-
C₀ = initial investment
C = cash flow
r= discount rate
T = time

Year	Net flow (£)	Discount	NPV (£)
1	110000	0.961	105710
2	110000	0.924	101640
3	110000	0.888	97680
4	150000	0.854	128100
5	150000	0.821	123150
6	150000	0.790	118500
total	780000		674780

The both the project are having positive NPV so the company can choose any of the project. But the investment is quickly recovered in the first project as compared to second project so the management needs to consider the first project as per the cost (Demeulemeester, Kolisch & Salo, 2013).

1.3 Explain the Principles behind Project Management Systems and Procedures

Managing the project is the complex activity and involves many aspects and many things to attain the outcome of the project. The manger needs to create the system which facilitate in determining the project task, create a schedule, assign resources, and identify the issues related to the project. The project management system helps the manager in planning, organizing and managing different activity of the project. The project management system moves through various phases which are-

Initiating the project

The first step of the manager is to plan the activity of the project by understanding the size, scope and complexity of the process and the procedure to be followed during the project. The project manager needs to determine the resources which are required during the project and build effective coordination between them (Kolesnikova, 2015).

Project planning

The planning of the project helps the manager to distribute the task and assigning the financial resources to each activity. During the planning of the project the manager needs to determine scope and feasibility of the research and break down the work in smaller task. This will help the manager in building effective control over the research. The manager in his plan needs to set the standards of the outcome of the research and build effective communication with all the unit.

Project execution

The manger after planning the process needs to emphasize on executing the project. While execution the manager faces many issue so the manger needs to handle all these issues to attain the objective of the research. The project manager needs to check that each of the activity is executed as per the plan and there is no deviation from the set standards. The manger needs to maintain the manager workbook and regularly communicate the project status (Morris, 2013).

Closing down

The final phase of the project is to bring project to end and attain the desired result. The project can be conclude with natural or unnatural termination. The natural termination is when the objective of the project is met on the other hand unnatural termination occur when the work is stopped due to certain reason (Ziek & Anderson, 2015).

1.4 Explain the Key Elements involved in terminating projects and conducting Post Project Appraisals.

The final phase of the project is to terminate the project and starts after the project is completed and involves action which are required for termination of the project. The proper termination helps in identifying the experienced gain on the project and helps in future improvement of the performance. The termination generally includes filling project document and conducting post project evaluation to identify the efficiency by which the project is executed. The data collected from the project will also help the manger in future handling of the similar projects.

The post project appraisal helps in determining the extent to which the project meets the budget, time table, and the key outcome of the project. The project appraisal involves comparing the cost of the budget with the predetermined set budget. The manger also check that all the task are attained within the allocated time and if not than the reason of the variance. The appraisal procedure also include the level to which the deliverable has met the expectation of the management. It also includes the lesson learned from the current project and how it can be used in the future project (Argirova & Ivanov, 2015).

Task 2

2.1 Identify the most appropriate organizational structure, roles and responsibilities of participants within a project.

The manager needs to build the organizational structure where there is effective coordination between various activity and good communication within the organization. The organizational structure provides the ways to accomplish different goals and can also hinder or help in accomplishing these goals. The Manger can be chose both formal and informal structure as per the requirement of the business. The A2Z Company is indulged in construction business environment and the most suitable organizational structure for it is project organization structure. In this type of structure the project manager has the sole authority can control the unit. This helps in building effective communication within the organization and facilitate the top level manager in decision making in relation to the business.  The A2Z Company can choose this structure as it facilitate the creation of the project management experts which effectively handle there part of the work. This structure also facilitate quick response from the various unit of the business and is less complex as compared to other structure (Robichaud & Anantatmula, 2011).

The project manager is responsible for executing task and check that the work is completed in time. The manager plan the project with the team and manages the team in performing the project activity. The executor sponsor is the manager who demonstrate interest in the outcome of the project and is responsible for spending authority and resources for the project. The projct sponsor is the top level manager for the project and will examine that the project goals are being accomplished and is the ultimate decision maker of the project. The projcet sponsor helps the manger in handling various issues, problems and helps in removing conflict.

2.2 Control and Coordinate a Project

The manager uses the control to compare the progress and helps in identifying the deviation from the set standard and also provide measures to control the deviation. The manager of A2Z needs to regularly check the outcome of the research and check that the work is being conducted as per the set standard. For effective execution of the work the manger needs to build coordination between various activities of the project.  This can be attained by creating effective communication between the various units of A2Z Company. If the manager of the A2Z company timely ascertain the risk than it can prevent the company from future loss. The manager can use various measure to build control over the project such as configuration control, design control, trend monitor, document control acquisition control and specification control. The manager of A2Z Company has used trend monitoring to control the project. The project manager is regularly monitoring the process of the task with cost, schedules and resources needed against those planned. This help in identifying the deviation from the any of the set standards and helps in timely handling the risk which are associated with the project (Mir & Pinnington, 2014).

2.3 Assess Project Leadership requirements and qualities

The effective leadership plays a key role in the success of the project. The manager of the A2Z Company will appoint a project leader who will lead his team in accomplishing work and guide them in relation to the work. They helps to provide effective communication between employees and the manger and helps in avoiding conflicts. They helps in guiding employee towards attaining organizational goals and objective. A good leader helps in motivating the employee towards the work and maintain the good relationship with them. The leaders also guide the employee in their work and help in improving the outcome of their work (Mir & Pinnington, 2014).

2.4 Plan and Specify Human resources and requirements for a project

The project manager of the A2Z Company needs to hire more resources for constructing the extra floor as the current capacity of the company is not enough to meet the increase in the workload of the company.  For the project the manger will hire new architecture who will help in designing the layout of the building and a resource manager who will be responsible for the availability of the resources at the workplace. The manager will breakdown the project in different activity and allocate the task to various team. The company needs to hire engineer, architecture, interior designer and various other unit to handle the increased demand.

The manager of the A2Z company needs to effectively handle all the human resources which are required for the project. As the company doesn’t has the employee which are required for the new project so the manager needs to plan the human resources which will be required for the new project. On the basis of the requirement the company needs to hire the appropriate resources. The company also require to provide aqequate training to the workforce in relation to the work. The Manager is then required to manage the employee by allocating the task on the basis of skills and compitiency of the employees (Lloyd , French & Crawford,  2016).

The manager has break dowm the activity of the project in various part for programming , cost planning, and monitoring or controling the project. This the complete representative of the detail project scope statement that specify the work to be accomplished by the project. This helps in assesting the stakeholder in viewing the end product of the project and helps in estimating, scheduling and tracking the lowest level of the activity of the WBS.

Task 3

3.1 Prepare Project Plans and establish the Project Organization

Project Plan

Description	activity	Preceding activity	Days
Arrange materials	A	-	2
Build walls (prepare skeleton)	B	A	10
Roof filling (Concrete filling)	C	B	10
Fixing windows	D	C	4
Flooring	E	C	3
Wiring	F	E	4
Plaster	G	F	5
Fixing doors	H	F	4
Paint	I	G	5
Furniture	J	I	8

Gantt chart

Network Diagram

Critical path

  A + B + C + E + F + G + I + J
= 2 + 10 + 10 + 3 + 4 + 5 + 5 + 8 =
47 Days

3.2 Apply Project Scheduling, Estimating and Cost Control techniques

The project manager while framing the plan for the project need to schedule the work based on the project development life cycle. The scheduling involves the allocation of the resources to various activity of the project in the planned way. While preparing the schedule the manager needs to decide the beginning, ending and the duration for the each activity of the project. The manager needs to ascertain the available resources with the company and based on it should allocate the resources to each work. While scheduling the activity the manager needs to allocate time to various activity on the basis of the available time. The manager in his schedule will also determine the critical path and its duration and decide the slack time for all non- critical activity and the whole project (Olofsdotter .et. al, 2015).

The Project scheduling involves defining the activity and task based on the objective and goal of the project. The manager while deciding the schedule needs to consider the complexity of the activity and their dependence on the other activity. The schedule should also include the time allocated to each task. The schedule should include effective reallocation of the resources if the necessity arises. It should also facilitate the actual performance with the laid standards.

The project manager can also make the use of Gantt chart to provide graphical schedule of the planning and controlling the work and recording progress towards the activity of the project. This help the manager in building relationship between project activities and time. The Gantt chart provides simple and easy understanding of the project scheduling and representing project activity against time.

The use of the PERT Analyze also help the manger in showing the time required in completion of the each activity and the next activity which is to be conducted. It has the potential for reducing both time and cost required in completion of the project.

3.3 Analyze the methods used to measure project performance

The performance of the project is generally measured by the effectiveness with which it has obtained the desired outcome of the project. The performance is evaluated by comparing it with the pre- determined standard and identifying the deviation from the standard. Measuring the project performance during the project will help in providing the ways to improve your process and procedure in the future project. The performance of the project can be measured by the following ways-

Planned value

The manger can measure the performance of the project by comparing the actual cost with the panned cost and find the deviation. The completion of the project is not the only measure of the success. The success of the project is determined if the desired outcome is achieved within the allocated resources. The comparison can be made by comparing you’re spending on the project with the percentage of the work completed. It helps in early identification that the work is not attained within the allocated resources and there is certain problem with the process.

Cost performance and cost variance

The performance of the project can be made by comparing what was your spent with the planned cost. The actual cost is subtracted from the planned value to identify the variance in the performance. This help the manager in timely identifying the problem and take the appropriate measures to control it. The manager needs to consider the reason for such variance while planning the future activity of the business.

3.4 Explain Project Change Control Procedures, evaluate the completed project

The role of the project board is to support the senior responsibility owner in providing overall direction and management for the project and make key decision in relation to the project. The role of the board is to appoint the project manager and delegating the authority. They generally approves the project brief and project initiation documents and aggress to all major plans. They provide the authorization of the various deviation from the plan during the project and also communicate information about the project to organization and stakeholder. They also check the availability of the required resources and resolves conflict within the project team, client supplier etc. The board also provide advice and direction to the project manager and also approves the end project report. They also check that the post –project review are planned and scheduled in the proper way and resolves deviation from the plan or escalation if necessary (Jiang & Klein, 2014).

Conclusion

So it may be concluded from the above study that the project management is the key for the success of the project. The proper planning of the work helps the manger to avoid the risk which are associated with the project. They helps in timely identifying the risk and provide appropriate measures to avoid such risk. The breaking of the project into various task help in building coordination between the various activities and attain the desire outcome from the project.

References

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