Project Management & Change Management
Project Management & Change Management
Projects can be found in many aspects of the daily operation of a business. It covers major activities such as road building and construction, integrating an acquisition, rolling out new software or system, introducing organization restructuring, passing legislation, and other minor activities such as marketing and advertising campaign, design and development of new products, and more. It is no surprise that almost every person in an organization is or has been involved in some sort of project on a daily basis.
A project deviates from other daily operation activities as it primarily introduces change. A CEO who attempts to increase the sale of his/ her business shall attempt to introduce multiple sales increase projects, such as increasing its distribution channels, venturing into new regions, introducing new products and/ or services, setting up new manufacturing facilities, adopting new sales and marketing campaign and networks, and more. Each of these activities can be treated as an individual project which supports the main project of increasing sales. Furthermore, on some occasions, a project is initiated as a result of reacting to a situation. A common example would be key competitors introducing lower-cost products. The company reacts to this market threat by introducing similar products in the shortest timeframe. In short, for a company to remain competitive and prosper in the long term, project management is a capability that a company must not overlook.
A company needs to understand the difference between a project and a daily operational activity. The project comprises a series of tasks that are scheduled to complete within a specified timeframe in the course of meeting the objective of this project. A project deviates from daily business activity primarily attributable to the characteristic of a project being a one-time event, it starts and stops at the specified timeline, it requires a specific dedication of resources such as capital and personnel support, and only limited resources are available for the project. For instance, designing a new car or a prototype of the car is a project. However, operating the assembly line for the newly developed car is not a project but a daily operational activity. Creating a new advertisement for the product and/or service is classified as a project. Executing the advertisement, on the other hand, is not a project but a daily operational activity. Thus, it is logical to define a project as an activity to create something new that is subsequently converted into daily operational activity.
Managing a project or project management involves a broad array of activities including a person’s skills, tools, and techniques to achieve the expected result of the project. Our project management team could assist with guiding activities associated with project management, specifically outlined as follow.
Project Initiation
When a company is considering starting a project, the decision is a very serious one since it involves the dedication of significant resources for a long duration, and without surety of the project outcome is a favorable one. Furthermore, most companies have a limited amount of capital and qualified personnel to participate in multiple projects at the same time. Therefore, one must decide which project should continue once it is started, and which project should be terminated. In other words, project planning and decision-making are required throughout the different project phases, not just at the beginning of the project phase. Our team could assist the project team of the company by guiding specific conditions that could trigger a project, the nature, and content of a project proposal, and relevant factors to be considered in deciding whether to initiate a project.
Project Selection
In most circumstances per our experience, a project is typically initiated by the employee. Once the project is initiated, the next step is the project selection process, which involves finding out and evaluating the reasons causing the suggestion of projection initiation, and how to turn the suggestions into an approved project. Our expert team could advise several financial assessment techniques in determining the suggestions selection, and in addition to that, our advisory scope also covers several qualitative measures that are recommended to be adopted in the project selection process.
Developing Project Phases
Project phasis is critical in ensuring a project is organized in a manner of completion within a stipulated timeline. Dividing a project into different phases from project initiation to project completion adopts the “Divide-and-Conquer algorithm”, which divides a project into different phases to ensure the project is properly organized. Each phase encompasses its own unique set of tasks and activities, and the project manager or project team manager is responsible to manage these tasks and activities throughout different phases of the project. Although there is no fixed set of rules on the number of phases and the tasks in each phase required for a certain project, breaking down a project into different phases provides a series of benefits, such as the organization can closely monitor relevant tasks in each phase to determine how well the project is progressing, making alterations or improvements at a certain area in each phase to improve upon the results of each phase, conduct a review point at the end of each project phase to optimize the success result in each phase, or to terminate the project if the result fails to meet the expected outcome of the project or project is deemed not viable. Our team could assist the project team of the company with the process, via identifying characteristics of each project phase, creating actionable checklists, especially for a company with a large number of ongoing projects, and more. The underlying checklist is intended to be used as the best practice for managing the different project phases.
Project Planning
After an initiated project has been selected, the next phase is project planning. Project planning is necessary to minimize the complex element of the project activities. Without proper planning for the project to manage these complexities, it will inherently increase the project uncertainties and the eventual risk of project failure. Our team could assist by sharing several methods for planning and controlling a project, and the project manager of the company could use these methods as a tool to closely track the project status, assign jobs to the project team, monitor project timing to the target completion dates, and gathering of information to assess how the collected information could affect the project as a whole. Furthermore, we could assist with developing a detailed plan to facilitate proper analysis. The results of the analysis could improve the project efficiencies by tweaking certain aspects of the project. In addition, a series of measurements can be built into the project plan, and these measurements are used as a baseline to measure performance. Variances to the performance baseline will be generated with corrective actions taken to rectify these variances. In short, our scope of service covers all major aspects of project planning and analysis, which shall not only assist with improving the eventual success of the project but also enables the project manager and his/ her team to tightly control the project which maximizes resource usage whilst minimizing the costs, and the time required to complete the project.
Estimating Project Costs and Duration
For decision-makers of an organization to approve a project, naturally, the decision-makers will require the estimated projects and duration of the project in question. However, attributable to the nature of a project which is a one-time event, it is difficult to reliably measure the estimated time of completion and costs. Furthermore, under the unique one-time nature of a project, the actual time and costs could deviate significantly from the estimated ones. Our team is experts in assisting the project team of the company to explore the different methods to provide the best estimate of project costs and the expected duration of completion. Furthermore, we could advise on the aspect of introducing a buffer to the estimate and incorporating specifications into the project control to improve project measurement against expected outcomes.
Developing Project Team
Having a properly and fully functional project team is key to project success. Lack of this key factor will certainly result in the project failing to complete at the expected timetable and costs, and more importantly with the expected results. We could assist with sharing advice in identifying the needed skills and experiences required in a project. In addition to this, in the aspect of developing a functional project team, we shall extend our service scope to dealing with collaboration issues, resolving conflicts, developing a high-performing team, and more.
Managing Project Team
Once a project team has been assembled, the next important step is to manage the project team effectively. Our experience revealed the traditional top-down approach to managing the project team does not produce a favorable result as opposed to the coaching-style method. The coaching-style method simply transfers the decision-making from the project manager to the team members. The primary reason being the team members who participated in a project come from different backgrounds, and skills and have acquired different experiences, which make them more qualified to make relevant decisions in a project and to yield better project outcomes. However, despite their experiences and equipped skills, the team members often make the wrong decisions because team members commonly place more weight on keeping group harmony among team members than tentatively evaluating the proposed alternatives which should yield better results if these alternatives are carefully assessed and evaluated. Therefore, the key role of the project manager is to carefully manage the behavior of the team members and steer the members of the team in the right direction. Our team could first assist with identifying the different and unique management styles, behaviors, and skills of the team members, and with this understanding, we could work closely with the project manager in providing advice on the different types of the decision-making process, and which process is deemed the most relevant, the right approach in reaching a consensus with the best interest of the project, assisting with finding out the causes of faulty decision, and more.
Balancing discrepancies from expected outputs
As mentioned in the preceding topics, a project is managed from the aspect of completing on time and within the stipulated budgeted costs, and most of all, delivering the expected outcome. However, it is very difficult to meet all these expectations with no or minimum deviation from the project expectations since there are always project issues or constraints causing the variances. Our team shall assist by working closely with the project manager, and the team members, to identify and address various project constraints, advising on how these constraints could potentially affect the project process, introducing corrective solutions, and on some occasions, how the project manager and team members should balance the constraints with project expectations to achieve the best possible results.
Managing Project Changes
Project changes are commonly found throughout the project, and these changes come in various sizes and effects. Despite the broad array of different changes, the project manager and project team must address, log and approve these changes effectively, and promptly, to avoid causing any derails in the project. The key to managing these changes is a properly structured system to minimize any disruptions, confusion, and rework. Our team could assist the project team by assisting in developing a structured system that encompasses the relevant procedures for logging and reporting issues, managing these issues, and more. It is relevant to note that depending on the size and nature of these changes, resolving these issues may require the participation of the executive committee of the organization.
Project Close-Out
Invaluable information and knowledge were created throughout the project, and it is very useful for the project team to capture this knowledge and store them in the knowledge base of the company for future references, and even on some occasions, the industrialization of the new products or designs. Our team could assist the project team in identifying the different factors and measurements in determining whether a project is truly completed, assisting with guiding in preparing the project close-out report, and several other related aspects.
Managing Project Risk
The biggest risk to a project is the uncertainty, and the greater the uncertainty, it also means the higher the project risk. For example, the attempt of an organization to introduce a new and highly innovative technology inherently has a higher risk, attributable to the high level of uncertainty. In addition, a project with a longer duration length has a higher risk as compared to a project with a shorter completion timeframe. Furthermore, the eventual success of a project is dependent on the license approval by the relevant government authority is also a strong indication of project risk due to uncertainty in obtaining the approval. Fortunately, project uncertainty can be managed systematically. Rather than waiting for the risk to occur and only then, taking necessary actions, our team shall assist in this aspect by introducing proper understanding and planning of overcoming these risks through identifying these uncertainties, prioritizing them, and assisting the project team to decide whether they should accept these uncertainties or taking necessary means to overcome these uncertainties.
Managing Project Quality
One common issue with project planning and project management is the element of quality assurance is typically overlooked by most project teams. There are inherent benefits associated with properly managing project quality. For example, a project with good qualities means fewer errors which also means fewer reworks and therefore, more likely to complete on time, fewer errors and reworks could also mean the project is on the right track, and finally, the customers or stakeholders will be more confident with the project outputs. In the nutshell, good and effective project quality management will benefit all parties involved in the project, ranging from the project manager and his/her team members to the stakeholders and customers. Our team could assist in this respect by merging the relevant quality elements into the project plan, incorporating quality audit and checking procedures into the development process, quantifying costs associated with quality issues, and more.
Managing Project Procurement
Depending on the nature of a project, certain projects require investment in machinery, equipment, materials, and specialized subcontracted workers to support the project. Therefore, the company must have a procurement system in place specifically catered to this purpose. The system generally encompasses the bidding process to ensure only the most suitable suppliers are selected for the project, a system to issue purchase orders, goods receipts, quality control, and more. In short, the concept of a project procurement system is essentially a smaller version of the broader purchasing function of the company. Our team could assist with developing the procurement management plan, establishing supplier selection criteria, the bidding process development, buy or make analysis, assisting in reviewing the contract terms and conditions, and several other related aspects.
Measurement and Reporting
Upon commencement of a project, the project must be closely monitored throughout the entire process, and any issue noted during the process must be identified and reported on a real-time basis. The constant monitoring of the project through a series of measurement standards and tools is crucial as it allows the project manager to identify and correct these issues on an immediate basis, which in turn minimizes any potential delays in project completion, preventing the issues from further deterioration and affect the subsequent phase of the project, and ensuring the project can be completed within budget. Our team shall assist the project team of the company in advising the relevant approaches in which to monitor and report on the progress and components of a project.
Change Management
Every company has its own well-established business and operating model which not only laid down the foundation of how the company sells and delivers its products and services to its customers but also the long-established policies and standard operating procedures, its relevant investment in training programs, and history of the company define the identity and culture of the company. The longer a business and operational model of the company has been established, naturally, it will be harder for the company, in particular its management and personnel, to accept new changes to the company. Furthermore, the attempt to introduce new changes to a company with subsidiaries and/or branches situated across the country or located in different countries will confront a new increased level of resistance to new changes attributable to different local cultures and operating environments. These changes can range from minor improvements via introducing the adoption of a new centralized computer system and/or new software, to changes of major effect such as replacing existing products and/or services with new ones, internal organizational restructuring encompasses the change of management authority, shifting of decision-making authority from headquarter to local offices, outsourcing a specific departmental function, and more.
In our experience, failure to cut through the existing business practices and operating model is the primary factor in project failure. As a result of which, the outcome is the waste of significant resources dedicated to the project, and a group of upsetting key employees who may potentially leave the company. Our team could assist in overcoming barriers by managing these changes, via proposing a selection of high-level change management methods, including but not limited to identifying the most relevant change initiatives, prioritizing the identified initiatives, introducing changes in the most difficult environment, and minimizing initiatives failure.
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