Question

The Communications Management Plan helps in defining the communication requirements for the project as well as how the information has to be disseminated. This paper provides a communication management plan for the Wilmont, a United States-based retail, pharmaceutical company that is focusing on the establishment of a system that will lower the delivery cost. Therefore, the provided Communications Management Plan will set the communications framework for this project. The communication plan will guide communications throughout the life of this project that this company is undertaking, and the communication management plan will be updated as communication needs change. The communication plan identifies individuals who require contact while specifying the time and how communication is done. The paper also describes the individuals responsible for the production of the conversation, determines the various technologies used to communicate, identifies the various Communication constraints, identifies the policy for confidentiality, identifies the procedure for communication outside the project team, stakeholders, and sponsor group among other factors.

In this case, the individuals who will need communication include the project team members, Project key stakeholders, Project sponsor, Project manager, steering committee, the Technical lead team, the change control board, as well as the customers or the client. Each of these individuals required various communications (Stackpole, 2013).

Project Sponsor-This is an individual who is responsible for the funding of the project; hence, it significantly contributes to the success of the project. The Project Sponsor is typically at the executive level communications. Therefore, the conversation must be presented in the form of a summary unless the sponsor requests a detailed discussion. This communication can be done monthly (Stackpole, 2013).

Program Manager-A more detailed communications are required to be done regularly

Key Stakeholders- The Key Stakeholders include executive management with an interest in the project and critical users identified for participation in the project.

Change Control Board-Mostly, the Technical design documents, user impact analysis, and implementation strategies are the usual types of communication required by the change management board. Any proposed changes have to go through the change control board.

Customer-The The customers or the client will take part in reviewing the prototypes, approval of designs as well as the implementation stages, and acceptance of the final deliverables that this project will generate. In this regard, therefore, they have to be informed about the project status taking into consideration the potential impacts on the schedule for the final deliverable as well as the product itself.

Project Team-This includes all individuals taking part in performing work on the project. They need to have a clear comprehension of the work that has to be done as well as the framework in which the project has to be executed. Procedures have to be communicated to them in an effective way (Stackpole, 2013). Therefore, the communication that they require includes an appropriate schedule as well as work packages. Consequently, they need a whole level of connections that can be done through day to day interactions with the Project Manager as well as other team members in addition to the weekly team meetings.

Steering Committee-The Steering Committee takes into consideration department management. These individuals need communication regarding matters that are likely to change the project scope and deliverables. These communications can be made when needed or as soon as a change factor is identified.

Technical Lead-The project technical Lead needs close and regular communications with the Project Manager as well as the Project Team.

The Project Manager is typically a primary communicator for the project. The project manager will distribute information based on the Communications Management Plan of the company (Van Dokkum & Ravesteijn, 2016).

Since this is a large project having a large number of stakeholders with different technological capabilities, different technologies will be used for communication. The various techniques, in this case, may include the share drive, video teleconferencing, telephone, and email. Therefore, all communication technologies will be used to ensure that all responsible for the project can get the project communication (Ying & Pheng, 2013). In this regard, therefore, the determination of the communication methods, as well as the technologies available at the company, is a crucial part in determining the stakeholder communication requirements.

In this regard, therefore, the project team will determine, based on the Wilmont Corp. organizational policy, the communication methods as well as technologies depending on factors such as stakeholder communication requirements, available technologies (internal and external), as well as organizational policies and standards.

Wilmont Corp. maintains a SharePoint platform within the PMO that the project will use to provide updates and also provide project communications. This technology will be essential to provide notification to the senior management and the stakeholders having a compatible technology. It will also facilitate the collaboration of the stakeholders and project team members.

Additionally, the stakeholders without the ability to access the SharePoint, a web site for the project, will be established to ensure that they can access all the communication about the project. Access to the website will be controlled with a username and password. Each stakeholder will not be able to access the SharePoint; each will be given a unique username and password that they will use to access the web site. The project manager ensures that all the project communications, as well as the project documentation, are copied to the web site while at the same time ensuring that the content is similar to what is contained on the SharePoint platform.

Moreover, Wilmont Corp. will obtain software licenses for MS Project software. Therefore, all the project teams have to develop, maintain, and communicate schedules using this software. Thus, for this project, PERT Charts are the preferred format for advertising plans for all project stakeholders. The timing of the project will, therefore, be maintained on the SharePoint platform as well as on the project website. Additionally, they will also be archived on the internal Wilmont Corp. shared drive residing in the PMO program directory (Ying & Pheng, 2013).

Project communication constraints may include scope, budget, scheduling, as well as resource requirements. Additionally, other restrictions may also include legislative, regulatory, technology, and organizational policy requirements that have to be followed as part of the communications management (Dienel, Walk, & Jain, 2012).

Wilmont Corp.'s organizational policy requires that only the Vice President or higher-level employee has the authority to access and distribute any confidential/restricted information. Additionally, the project manager has to ensure that approval is requested before the distribution of any confidential information about the project is done. This will ensure the security of all sensitive information (Dienel, Walk, & Jain, 2012).

This requirement will be defined and communicated to all the project team members through the company’s secure communication channels. However, the team members are also expected to report any disclosure of critical information immediately they realize.

Wilmont Corp.'s organizational policy states that where applicable, standardized formats, as well as templates, will be used for all formal project communications. However, communicating outside the project team, stakeholders, as well as the sponsor group, can be done via secure means as well as through internal company resources, and the outside individuals are expected to have access to receive project communications (Dienel, Walk, & Jain, 2012).

Dienel, H., Walk, H., & Jain, A. (2012). Constraints and opportunities for the development of communication and participation strategies. BoD – Books on Demand.

Stackpole, C. S. (2013). A project manager's book of forms: A companion to the PMBOK guide. John Wiley & Sons.

Van Dokkum, E., & Ravesteijn, P. (2016). undefined. Strategic Integration of Social Media into Project Management Practice, 35-50. DOI:10.4018/978-1-4666-9867-3.ch003

Ying, Z., & Pheng, L. S. (2013). Project communication management in complex environments. Springer Science & Business Media.