HRM517 Assignment 5

Before the commencement of any project work that one may have, there are a number of strategies necessary to sustain and manage project progress. To begin with, it is paramount to ensure that the project foundation for success has been laid (Van, 2015). This implies that all the project details have been thrashed out and the entire team is made aware of these including the expectations involved. Some of the crucial details to cater for include attaining approval from all stakeholders. Moreover, defining the project scope is a prerequisite for the sustaining project success. This may include specifying the different roles, duties, and responsibilities for each of the team members. Van (2015) adds that it is paramount to design a detailed plan that helps to outline all the project deliverables (including timelines and deadlines) followed by the development of measurable criteria for defining success.

Besides finalizing the project details, being clear on the expectation of the project is another key strategy that can help project managers to sustain project success. It entails letting the each team understand the particulars of the responsibilities of individual team members as such making it easier to sustain accountability within the team, adds Van (2015).

Thirdly, the most crucial strategy of any project manager is to gather together a team of competent people capable of attaining the project goals, says the Society for Human Resource Management (2016). This involves choosing people who have the right combination of skills, talent and personalities that best fit the project demands. It is mandatory for the project manager to keep in mind that the team’s skill sets ought to be aligned with the definite project requirements. In addition to this, the project manager should endear to rid of excess baggage that comes with having too many unnecessary people within the team that increase team redundancies and create a drag on the team progress.

2. Strategies that could be used to address and resolve any risks within the control of the project.

One of the best strategies that can be used to manage and resolve risks quickly, efficiently and effectively is by actually understanding the risks that the project faces, which would help the project team to establish a control mechanism (Kloppenborg, 2019). Understanding the prevailing risks helps the team to create a risk register that encompasses all the possible risks and mitigation measures. By doing this, the project manager prepares the team in case the project falls into risks. Furthermore, it mandatory for the team to have a risk management team within as part of part of the risk management strategy. The risk management team usually assesses project progress and puts mitigation measures in place. It projects possible future risks based on the changing project dynamics and advises the entire team accordingly.

Besides having a defined risk management strategy in place, it is important for the team to have a working communication strategy in place, according to Kloppenborg (2019). The communication strategy aids the team to pass risk based information effectively and efficiently within the team. Information passed includes a clear definition of the risk, course of action for each team members and the potential pitfalls if the each team members fails to act as required. The communication strategy includes clear channels for directing feedback on risk management progress.

Thirdly, Kloppenborg (2019) avers that it is crucial for project manages to lead the team to not only to closely monitor but also to control the progress activities of the project. An effective project monitoring and control mechanism assists the project team to create new targets, goals and plans based on the emerging needs. Not only does close monitoring help the project stay on course but also ensures that there are consistent improvements on the project efficiency, processes, outcomes, as well as accountability.

All the processes described herein are vital towards successfully averting risks in a project management context as each plays a crucial role. However, without gaining considerable knowledge of the potential risks that the project faces, any other strategy that is employed (including those not enumerated here) is likely to backfire. Project managers must first seek to investigate the specific risks that the project faces before describing the risks mitigation measures. Having wrong data on potential risk may lead the project manager to prescribe risk mitigation measures that are not consistent with the nature of the prevailing risks. As such, understanding the risks that the project faces is a prerequisite step in risk management strategies on which other risk management activities are based on.

3. What actions should a project manager take as they begin to close out the project?

There are project managers who believe that the attainment of project deliverables marks the end of the project, and as such there is no need to systematically close the project. This is a huge mistake since projects are not started for their own sake. Normally, there is an underlying purpose why the project was started. Properly closing out a project is beneficial not only to the team bust also to the organization involved. It can lead to major lessons being learnt, and may form the foundation of future projects, explains Bolat & Temur (2019). According to Kloppenborg (2019) closing a project is s systematic process that involves “all the project activities across all the activities of the project with the aim of brining the projects, or a project phase to a conclusion”. This has implications on the project processes as it implies that closing a project is the “formalized acceptance that a project” has run its course and has attained its deliverables such that it needs to be formally brought to a close. Bolat & Temur (2019) add that a project may also be brought to a close even if it has not met the project deliverables. This occurs when the project no longer serves the purpose it was designed for. Not meeting the project deliverables does not preclude the project from a formalized closure.

There are a number of actions available for project managers. To begin with, it is important for mangers to ensure that the necessary work and phases have effectively elapsed and that all risks and deficiencies have been addressed, says Kloppenborg (2019). Secondly, it is unethical to close out a project without express approval of the project’s sponsor as well as project clients. This implies that seeking approval from the sponsors and clients is one of the most important activities needed before the process of closing out the project commences. This eliminates debate based on doubts and skepticism surrounding project closure.

Having obtained approval, the next logical action for project managers is to conduct an appraisal of whether (or not) all project related governance issues and protocol have been successfully executed. One of the biggest questions involved in the appraisal goes beyond looking at the approval of closure process to assessing whether all the project appropriate policies have been implemented successfully. Moreover, data is collected on whether the project policies actually we complied with established procedures of the organizational. This kind of appraisal allows the project management team to take corrective measures before closing out the projects so as to address notable deficiencies identified during the appraisal process (Bolat & Temur, 2019). Data gathered during the appraisal process can be critical in guiding future phases of the same or a different project.

4. A review of Project Management in Action: The Power of Lessons Learned

This section evaluates the power behind learning for project management teams. It uses specific examples to draw conclusion on how power behind the “lessons learnt”. For instance, Kloppenborg (2019) it uses NASA as an example of how to draw powerful and sophisticated databases of the lessons learnt to help the organization with the overall project needs. There exist project systems through which team members submit comments about the lessons gained that would be useful to the present as well as the future teams. Such insights are vital to the ongoing success of the project team. The assertions in this section are premised on the maxim that success is only attained through consistent learning from ones mistakes as well as the mistakes of others. This emphasizes the building the culture of “what we know so far and who knows what”, which leads to the building of a system that relies on existing data that can be investigated and as such providing very useful insights.

References List

Bolat, H. B., & Temur, G. T. (2019). Agile approaches for successfully managing and executing projects in the fourth industrial revolution. Hershey, PA: IGI Global

Kloppenborg, T. (2019). Contemporary Project Management. (4th ed.). Stamford, CT: Cengage Learning.

Society for Human Resource Management (2016). Viewpoint: Teamwork Is a Two-Way Street. Retrieved from https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/hr-topics/behavioral- competencies/relationship-management/pages/teamwork-is-a-two-way-street-real-world- relationship-management.aspx

Van, H. T. (2015). New SC&RA guidebook helps project engineers manage work. Engineering News-Record, 275(15), p19-19