INF338: Leadership & Comm Skills for Project Management

Final Paper – Group Project Management
Kimberly V. Adams
INF338: Leadership & Comm Skills for Project Management
Instructor Paul Richardson
September 5, 2016
Introduction
Project Management is considered as a highly valued skill in today’s corporate life. This job strongly requires the ability to oversee and administer the contingent end-to-end processes of a pre-determined project. Thus, this role strongly requires “careful and thoughtful planning and monitoring throughout the project.” Consequently, since a project manager administers a group who works on the project, a project manager has to make sure that a smooth and fluent working dynamics exist in between group members. In simpler terms, a project manager acts as an overseer that monitors and administers working relations between members to ensure that the goals of the project are achieved. In terms of theory, Project management is usually loosely replaced (or perhaps mistaken for) by other terminologies such as Project Management Methodology and Project Management Approach. Even though these concepts are somehow similar to the general term – Project Management – these specify in greater detail the aspects, methodology, and the objective of the trade. In line with this, I believe that it is essential that we give a definition on each of these meanings before we proceed with the particulars of our construction project before we can construct a project strategy that would maximize the output of our project plan.
Project Methodology and Project Approach
According to Špundak (2014), “Project Management methodology is usually defined as a set of methods, techniques, procedures, rules, templates, and best practices used on a project”. This means that these are the guidelines that are widely known in the field of project management and that are being followed by most project managers. In Špundak’s article, he gave an insight into the wide scope of definitions about Project methodology. One of the definitions that he cited is from Gane (2001), who defines project management as; “methodology from the knowledge perspective as knowledge set about tasks, techniques, deliveries, roles and tools used during the course of the project paired with knowledge about adjusting all of that to specific project”; and Cockburn (2003), who defined the term as; “any principle project management team relies on in order to successfully deliver project result”. Based from all of these authors that he cited, it is apparent that Project methodology basically defines the tools and practices that a project manager employs to reach his goals. However, in this paper, much emphasis is given on the types of Project Management Approach and its application.
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As compared to Project Management Methodology, Project Management approach is the template that categorizes whether the project manager deals with the planning, conflict, and closure of the project in a (1) traditional or a more (2) flexible approach – which also gives the name for the two main categories of Project Management approach. Traditional approach sees the project as linear and its goals as robust or non-changing. Due to this, the traditional approach believes that a project’s goal can be reached in the shortest and most efficient way possible as long as specific and defined steps are followed by everyone. According to Popa (2016), this type of approach (and its results) can be improved by “(1) preventing and reducing risks, (2) staying within the budget, (3) completion in the pre-determined deadline, and (4) insurance of project’s quality.” Thus coming from this, any failure in the project is believed to be a result of a failure to comply with instructions. These days, the traditional approach is mostly used in less complex projects, which include goals that can be defined in the project’s onset. However, the vulnerability of this approach can also be credited to its “robustness” and inability to adapt to certain issues that might arise during the project, thus making way for a more modern and flexible “Agile approach”.
Agile approach (also known as a lean approach, adaptive approach, or extreme approach) is widely known and used due to its flexibility and ability adapt to any changes that might happen during the project itself. In this approach, few plans would be developed for the project before it starts, this is significantly different as compared to the traditional approach that finishes a layout of the whole project timeline even before the project. This kind of planning opens an avenue for plans and ideas that are conceptualized through “experiencing the project”. In other words, through the team’s firsthand experience of the project. Furthermore, in this new approach, more emphasis is being given to the team’s dynamics, or the interaction of each member, as compared to whether the plan is being thoughtfully followed or not. However, the agile approach can only succeed with strong management, effective communication, thorough and consistent re-evaluation of needs, and right delivery strategy. This is because of most of the times, the agile approach can be used only to vindicate acts of tardiness and inefficiency (Špundak, 2014) and this is also the reason for its vulnerability. In order to give a better view of the agile approach, we can use Highsmith’s (2004 as cited by (Špundak, 2014)) five-phase proposal on how the agile approach can be used. These five phases are (1) Envision, (2) Speculate, (3) Explore, (4) Adapt, and (5) Close. In line with all of this information regarding the Project Management Approach, we now proceed with its practical use in our proposed project. By taking all of these into consideration and placing it in line with a project’s size, orientations, and goals, I believe that both of these approaches can and should be utilized in any single project that a manager administers.
The Project
Our project revolves on the renovation of a building that would serve as the base of operation of a small business company. The renovation needs to accommodate the technical requirements, space, and comfort needed to provide the best working environment before employees move in. Also, the walls will need to be knocked down to add more space, phone and computer lines installed, restrooms updated for multiple employees plus handicap accessible, electrical wiring and components will need to be updated, and the building must be certified up to code. Our initial team composed of a project manager (myself), administrative specialist, financial manager, construction contractor, an electrician, IT technician, and a plumber. Due to the relatively small size of the building, it is noticeable that we have only employed a small team that specializes in their own particular line of work. In the course of this project, a mixture of traditional and agile approach would both be used in order to efficiently deliver based on the project requirements. Further details of the project are discussed below.
The Meeting plans
The project that I proposed is a building renovation. By basing from the categorization of traditional and agile approach, this project would most likely require a specific set of goals and methods that have to be achieved in a pre-determined set of time – thus, the traditional approach is required. However, because of the nature of the company (which is only small), and the inevitability of things going “not according to plan”, the project plan should also have more emphasis on increasing the dynamics between the project members and having a flexible set of methodologies available.
As can be seen from my previous paper (Week 4 paper; the Meeting plan), in the initial meet the main goals of the project should already be laid out. The task of laying the general plan of the project should be divided by the project manager in between the members before the meeting. However, sin...