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Industrial Project Management Assignment 1-Group Case Study 2011/11/01 Fund-Raising Gala Dinner I. Project planning 1. Project charter a) Project description Due to the limited funding from both government and donation, Gala Dinner event is intended to publicize the new service of Rehabilitation Center which is aimed to provide occupational rehabilitation and training for disabled person, and to raise 2. 5M HK$ for this Non-government Organization to sustain its new program.
We wish Gala Dinner event will make this kind of public-service activities draw more attention and concerns from society, institutions, enterprises and individuals, benefiting more disabled person. b) Project objectives I To publicize Rehabilitation Center with its new service of helping adults, who are disabled, and raise 2. 5M HK$ for this new service, strengthening the influence of public-service on society. II key criteria: cash, securities, asset received is worth 2. 5M HK$ or more c) Key stakeholders Stakeholder| Major Benefits| Attitudes|
Project Sponsor| Reputation, donation, new program can be executed| Proactive, active| Donator| Magnificent reputation| Active| Disabled Person| Substantial guideline, training, benefits | Proactive| d) Vision The success of Gala Dinner event will benefit disabled person, sponsor, as well as those of the donators. For disabled person, they will get more substantial help from this training program, which could build up their working skills and confidence to better reintegrate into society. Donators would get fine reputation of giving back to society and aiding the weak.
In addition, sponsor could raise enough capital to further sustain its organization and promote related activities. e) High level costs I Dinner, venue renting and employee compensation are the three most costly respects of the event. II Dinner could be further divided as cookers, raw materials, cook, etc. III Venue renting includes room, table/chair, utensils, decorations, cloth and equipment, etc. IV Employee compensation comprises salary, bonus, commission, employee incentive, employee benefits and so on. f) Major milestone Project | Phase| Event planning| 1 Jan ~ 20 Jan| Speakers selection| 21 Jan ~ 30 Jan|
Determination of venue| 31 Jan ~ 6 Feb| Food service planning| 7 Feb ~ 9 Mar| Print and communication| 10 Mar ~ 10 Apr| RSVP| 11 Apr ~ 20 Apr| Decoration and equipments reservation| 21 Apr ~ 28 Apr| Plan gifts| 22 Apr ~ 8 May| Transportation events| 9 May ~ 12 May| Evaluation| 13 May ~ 5 Jun| Execution| 6 Jun ~ 31 Jun| g) Assumptions and constraints I The most critical assumption of this project is that local government will give substantial support for our activity, because our operation capital coming from government is so limited this year, so the support from government in others respects will be available.
II Such that without enough support from government, there will not be many interested donators or related institutions. h) Project phases with associated deliverables Deliverables| Target date| Person in charge| Project team assembled| 1 January| Zhang Long| Project plan completed| 3 January| All members| Project charter| 10 January| Zhang Long| WBS| 15 January| Ran Ou| PDM Network| 25 January| Kong Xiangtianrui Nie Chen| Risk Assessment/Matrix| 10 February| Kong Xiangtianrui Nie Chen| Project execution completed| 30 June| All members| Project closed out| 30 June| All members| ) Resources Resource| Description| Human resource| Team members responsible for his own part respectively, casual| Working capital| Venue rent, dinner fee, staff compensation| Facilities and equipments| Computers, office, printers, etc. | Venue and decorations| Stereo system, lighting system, projector and photographic equipment| 2. Work breakdown structure 1. 1 Budget report 1. 11 Employee Compensation: 1. 111Salary 1. 112Bonus & Commissions 1. 113Employee Incentive 1. 114Employee Benefits 1. 115Temporary Labor 1. 12 Other Expenses: 1. 12 1Seminars & Training . 12 2Consulting Fees 1. 12 3Legal Fees 1. 12 4Other Professional Fees 1. 12 5Contracted Services 1. 12 6Recruitment 1. 12 7Advertising 1. 12 8Marketing Materials 1. 12 9Office Expense 1. 12 10Telephone 1. 12 11Computer Lease 1. 12 12Repairs & Maintenance 1. 12 13Utilities 1. 12 14Office Supplies 1. 12 15Dues & Subscriptions 1. 12 16Room and facility Rent 1. 12 17Postage 1. 12 18General Insurance 1. 12 19Taxes & Licenses 1. 12 20Software Licenses 1. 2 Supervision & charter 1. 21 Project description 1. 22 Business objectives and success criteria 1. 3 Stakeholders 1. 24 Vision 1. 25 Project Scope 1. 26 Assumptions and Dependencies 1. 27 Constraints 1. 28 Milestones 1. 29 Business Risks 1. 210 Resources 1. 3 Resource 1. 31human resource 1. 311Plan 1. 312Job analysis and design 1. 313Staff selecting 1. 314 Staff training 1. 315 Task allocation 1. 316 Evaluation 1. 317 Reward 1. 32Facility 1. 321 Stereo system 1. 322 Lighting system 1. 323 Projector system 1. 234 Computer 1. 235 Printer 1. 236 Photographic equipment 1. 33Material 1. 331Office supplies 1. 332Raw material 1. 333Banner 1. 4 Dinner 1. 41 Menu 1. 2 Shopping list 1. 421Plants 1. 422Animals 1. 423Kitchen ware 1. 43 Cooking 1. 423 cookers 1. 423 raw material 1. 424 cook 1. 42 1. 44 Serving 1. 5 Room& Equipment 1. 51 Site/Room 1. 511 1. 52 Tables/Chairs 1. 53 Setting/Utensils 1. 54 Decorations 1. 55 Cloth and equipment 1. 6 Guests 1. 61 Guest List 1. 611 Entrepreneur 1. 612 Writer 1. 613 Painter 1. 614 Actor& Actress 1. 615 Singer 1. 616 Scholar 1. 62 RSVPs (Invitation) 1. 621 Letter 1. 622 Email 1. 623 Visit 1. 63 Name Tags 1. 64 Special Needs 1. 7 Staff 1. 71 Shoppers 1. 72 Cooks 1. 73 Serves 1. 74 Hosts . 75 Cleanup 1. 76 Security 1. 77 Stylist 1. 8 Speakers 1. 81 Invite 1. 82 Transport 1. 83 Coordinate Topics 1. 84 Backup for No-shows 1. 85 Thank yous 1. 9 Fund-raising activities 1. 91 Commercial advertisement 1. 92 Auction 1. 93 Online donation 1. 94 Entertainment ticket fee 2. 0 Donation 2. 01 donation 2. PDM 3. Risks analysis Ranking 1. Risk of Profits Yield Management 2. Risk of Budget Management 3. Risk of Human Resource Management 4. Risk of Time Scheduling 5. Risk of Leadership 6. Risk of Implementation 7. Risk of Inner Relationship Coordination Mechanism . Risk of Supplier Management 9. Risk of Communication 10. Risk of Environmental Issues Solutions 1. Risk of Profits Yield Management To apply the method of MBO (Management by Objectives) 2. Risk of Budget Management To audit the budget periodically and leave 20% budget flexibility 3. Risk of Human Resource Management To manage human inertia and tasks arrangement to achieve the matching relationship of person to position 4. Risk of Time Scheduling To adjust the time scheduling periodically for the flexibility achieved 5. Risk of Leadership To supervise? oordinate and stimulate team-working 6. Risk of Implementation Invitation: ?Speaker- More Candidates ?Guests- Emergent Solutions when trouble confronted Logistics: Contract Management Procurement: Suppliers Management 7. Risk of Inner Relationship Coordination Mechanism To create conflict solving mechanism between teams 8. Risk of Supplier Management To make information transparent and let benefits among different parties to be balance 9. Risk of Communication Have Meetings at regular intervals and the instant messenger 10. Risk of Environmental Issues
Wastage disposal and treatment Ranking matrix 1. Unlikely| 2. Possible| 3. Likely| 4. Almost Certain| Outcome not expected to occur| Outcome might occur at sometime| Outcome could occur occasionally| Outcome will occur often| | Risk of Implementation(6)| Risk of Human Resource Management(7)| Risk of Profits Yield Management(8)| | Risk of Supplier Management(5)| Risk of Time Scheduling(6)| Risk of Budget Management(7)| | Risk of Environmental Issues(4)| Risk of Communication(5)| Risk of Leadership(6)| | | | Risk of Inner Relationship Coordination Mechanism(5)| . Project Strategy Dinner Agenda: 6:00-6:30 Registration 6:30-6:35Welcome by Rehabilitation Center 6:35-6:45Kick-off introduction 6:45-7:20Speech of sponsors 7:20-7:35Amusement lucky-draw 7:35-8:20Speech of donators representative 8:20-8:50Speech of disabled individual representative 8:50-9:10Networking break 9:10-9:25Charity auction 9:25-9:45Donation 9:45-10:30Amusement activities 10:30Wrap up Dinner Theme: Enjoy your night while having a heart of gold
Guest of Honor: As our organization is based in Hong Kong we especially would like to invite local celebrities and business men. Also responsible persons from the Government are strongly encouraged to join. Venue: The venue should be a location with 2 separated rooms (one for dinner, one for amusement) and an open terrace and outside bar to enjoy the night outside, because the event will held in the summer (July). Food & Drink: We hope to find a caterer who offers us a dinner consisting different influences of Asian cuisine.
Financing Strategy: We would like to find a main donator coming from the industry or a private person. For that purpose we are inviting and introduce our service and program to a wide range of possible sponsors in advance. Furthermore every guest gets encouraged on this event to spend money. They will pay an entrance fee to join the dinner which will is already part of the donation. In addition we would like to raise money from the population through advertisement in newspapers and TV. II. Project execution 1.
Write a short memo to the sponsor to explain the reasons for changing the approach and explain how the outsourcing fee (it will cost a lot, say at least HK$ 120K management fee to manage the event and 10% take on the amount of fund raised thru the agent’s program) can be covered in the budget as well as reaching the project goal We decided to hire an event management company to perform this fundraising task instead of doing it by ourselves. The reasons to support this decision are listed as follows. i. Lack of experience for our team.
Our team realized this event management is a lot of difficult than expected because lack of experience for such a big fundraising event is the biggest challenge for our team. The best record we attempted once was HK$500K which is much less than the HK$2. 5M target this time. Therefore, if we handle it by ourselves, we may reach the goal difficultly and inefficiently. ii. The benefits for choosing outsourcing. The company we cooperated with had some fundraising experiences before so that they can perform our task efficiently.
As we know, the experience for the fundraising is one of the most important factors. Meanwhile, they understand the processes and rules of fundraising which we are familiar with but not sophisticated. Due to the experiences of this professional company, they will avoid some unexpected risks in the process of fundraising task so that we can reach the fundraising goal efficiently and timely. iii. Skilled business ability and reasonable and acceptable outsourcing fee. The abilities, skills, and knowledge of this professional outsourcing company are without any doubt.
We investigated their past records and experiences carefully. In addition, compared with other outsourcing companies, the management fee of this company (HK$120K+10% take on the amount of fund raised) is reasonable and acceptable. Name of company| Characteristics| Best record| fees| A| The largest fundraising company in Hong Kong| 50M| 130K+12%| B| An old fundraising company which enjoy a high reputation in this field| 20M| 120K+10%| C| A new company founded in 2009, but connect-line limited| 1M| 100K+9%| D| A global sophisticated company with excellent business but costly| 80M| 150K+13%|
It seems that if we handle this task by ourselves, the cost of management may be lower than that we choose outsourcing. However, in consideration of the extra cost included time cost, transaction cost, and the unexpected emergency situation we encountered which are belong to the intangible costs and indirect costs that are difficult to measure in monetary terms, the whole task will be much more complex for us to handle. In addition, the total budget of costs will become similar or even higher than that for outsourcing. | Our team| outsourcing|
Management fee| 50K| 120K+10% take on the amount of fund raised thru the agent’s program. The total outsourcing fee is 370K. | Cost of planning| 50K| | Cost of executing| 120K| | Reserves| 100K| | Others| 60K| | Total| 380K| 370K| Therefore, it is perfectly to find an outsourcing company for us. The total cost of outsourcing is lower. Meanwhile, this outsourcing company will provides a more professional and more efficient work so that we will save a lot of time and energy. We can use the budget for the task and plus partial reserves for the emergency situation to pay the outsourcing fee.
In this way, we can also solve the problems with cost control which existed in many organizations if we handle the task by ourselves. In conclusion, it is the best choice to hire this event management company to perform the task. 2. Describe 10 possible risks that you might encounter in the outsourcing attempt. What can you do to reduce the procurement risks? According to a reference, four states of PRM maturity can be described as follows: * Ignorance * Awareness * Evaluation * Risk Management A risk is any event that could prevent the project from progressing as planned, or from successful completion.
Risks can be identified from a number of different sources. Some may be quite obvious and will be identified prior to project kick-off. Others will be identified during the project lifecycle, and a risk can be identified by anyone associated with the project. Some risk will be inherent to the project itself, while others will be the result of external influences that are completely outside the control of the project team. In this case, the fund-raising team realized that the fund-raising event is much more difficult than expected. Since the team has never hosted such event, it plans to outsource to an experienced company.
There are 10 possible risks listed below based on functions. Also, each risk will also receive response/action plan under the description as the following classifications: * Avoidance–Change the project to avoid the risk. Change scope, objectives, etc. * Transference–Shift the impact of a risk to a third party (like a subcontractor). It does not eliminate it, it simply shifts responsibility. * Mitigation–Take steps to reduce the probability and/or impact of a risk. Taking early action, close monitoring, more testing, etc. * Acceptance–Simply accept that this is a risk.
When choosing acceptance as a response the IMPD is stating that given the probability of occurring and the associated impact to the project that results, they are not going to take any actions and will accept the cost, schedule, scope, and quality impacts if the risk event occurs. * Deferred–A determination of how to address this risk will be addressed at a later time. External Risk Macro-economic Environment Risk Within the constantly changing global environment, Macro-economy is also important in risk management. There are two aspects to appear this risk.
First of all, exchange rate is an old issue and will be presented every time people talk about global economic environment. Exchange rate influences amount of sales and continually effects company’s capital flow. Secondly, price fluctuation largely affects cost on raw materials which is related to cost reduction. In this case, the fund-raising team can only use Transference, Mitigation, and Acceptance to try to weaken the impact of this risk. Capital Turnover Risk Customer wants to obtain the most service for the least cost by: 1. Carefully defining and controlling the services and related costs; 2.
Requesting proposals from a wide range of providers; 3. Negotiating the most effective price (not necessarily the lowest price). Outsourcer’s goal is to maximize long-term profitability through: 1. High price-to-cost ratio; 2. Proposing flexibility in pricing rules to allow for additional revenue generation; 3. Large volume of standard services; 4. High customer retention; 5. Economies of scale. There are two main reasons why certain costs may be overlooked or hidden from the due diligence evaluation of service providers. First, some costs are very difficult or practically impossible to quantify.
Intangible costs might relate to such aspects as perceived quality of service. Other costs are easier to define, but the probability of their occurrence is very uncertain. Such is the case with outsourcer viability. Reasonably good estimates of the cost impact of failure of a service provider can be made, but the probability that the outsourcer will fail is uncertain, particularly at the time of the evaluation. In fact, if outsourcers were known to be having financial difficulties at the time of the evaluation, they should not have been included in the short list of finalists.
However, even though an outsourcer is in financial distress, it might continue to provide services. Additional funding (from a venture capitalist, for instance) could save the outsourcer or the provider might be acquired by another company, perhaps a competitor. Table 4. 2, illustrates the differences between situations in which there is an understatement of costs and/or overstatement of benefits and situations in which the expectation of something happening was explicitly included or not. Internal Risk Decision-making Risk Generally speaking, decision-making risk means loss of control.
Besides those benefits the organization can obtain through outsourcing the event, the other side of the coin to handing over responsibility and blame to service providers is loss of control over. It is debatable whether the fund-raising team does, or indeed can, avoid some or all responsibility through engaging an event management company. This decision-making risk may result from perceptions regarding the different goals and attitudes of internal and external staff towards service, information asymmetry, profits, and survival.
Customer hands over control and responsibility to the service provider and does not maintain in-house capability. Here, the reliance is on the service contract to ensure that third party performs and enforces requirements. However, Outsourcer prefers having greater control since, among other benefits, it makes it harder for customer to terminate services and perform the services in-house or at a competitor’s facility Reduce the risk: This may be somewhat offset by greater formality, as embodied in explicit service level agreements (SLAs), which almost always exist in arms-length relationships between customers and providers.
Operations Risk The services and systems provided by the outsourcer should integrate well and easily with other customer operations. This might require, in some cases, considerable customization of the services and systems. The outsourcer also wants the systems and services to integrate well with existing customer systems and services, which the outsourcer is not able to replace because it is not interested in doing so. However, the outsourcer’s preference is for its customers to use the “plain vanilla” systems and services, with a minimum of customization.
The more the systems and services are tailored to the meet the customer’s requirements, the more difficult the support and the more resources required to maintain the specialized system and services. Besides, the operations risk may also cause over budget because once the outsourcer wants to change some operations ways, it may change the budget as well. Reduce the risk: * Train staff and volunteers * Make an emergency plan * Ask signature when execute each process. Confidential Risk The fund-raising team, has to leak large amount of information such as Enterprise Strategy, Core Technique, Business Indicator and Human Resource Management, etc.
It has become very important to ensure that outsourcer who has access to personal and confidential information is protecting that information from inappropriate disclosure and from misuse. In particular, customer organizations are increasingly being held responsible for securing and protecting customers’ information. Reduce the risk: As a matter of fact, a burgeoning body of laws and regulations holds boards of directors and senior management directly responsible for any breaches that disclose nonpublic personal information (NPPI), in particular to those who might exploit it for fraudulent endeavors.
Obtain certificates of insurance from all vendors, contractors and co-sponsors Legal review of all contracts Schedule Risk Perhaps the worst nightmare of the team of the event management company is the prospect that the outsourcer will fail and leave team in the lurch without access to critical services and systems. There have been a number of immediate and dramatic instances of failure of managed security service providers (MSSPs), which threatened the ability of customers to stay in business.
In this case, the whole Fund-raising project will last for six months and the demand and environment may have unexpected changes. Goals are to know the status of the schedule. Influence factors that cause schedule changes, determine that the schedule has changed, and manage changes when they occur: 1. Perform reality checks on schedules 2. Allow for contingencies 3. Don’t plan for everyone to work at 100%capacity all the time 4. Hold progress meetings with stakeholders and be clear and honest in communicating schedule issues Reduce the risk: Tools and techniques include: Progress reports * A schedule change control system * Project management software, including schedule comparison charts like the tracking Gantt chart * Variance analysis, such as analyzing float or slack * Performance management, such as earned value Quality Risk Clearly much of the concern stems from the fund-raising team’s suspicions, which may be justified, that the company (outsourcer) does not have the same level of commitment to meeting service requirements as an internal group. Customer wants guaranteed aggressive service levels, adhering to specified metrics, with high costs (e. g. nonperformance payments) if the outsourcer does not meet the service levels. Customer wants compensation for business loss. However, Outsourcer prefers looser or nonexistent service-level requirements with minimal give-back in the event of not meeting any specified service levels. And it wants to be responsible only for subscription fee. Reduce the risk: * Check some aspects before the event, such as seating, parking, electrical, food safety, etc. * Provide adequate hand washing facilities Communication Risk Communication risk may happen during the information delivery such as explaining commands and giving orders.
Sometimes, those misunderstanding issues can cause huge loss of both sides. Obstacles: 1. Company policy/philosophy 2. Inadequate business case 3. Dependency on supplier (concern) 4. Labor/community reaction (concern) 5. Loss of critical capability Reduce the risk: * Build a convenient communication approach * Organize mini meeting from time to time * Make sure the conversation target is the right person * Clear responsibility of everyone Security Risk The project is a fund-raising event and during the event, the security is as significant as other aspects. Reduce the risk: Post event safety rules and regulations * Train staff and volunteers * Post and practice evacuation routes * Occupancy monitored and limit not exceeded Relationships Risk About this risk, the fund-raising team may build both external and internal relationship. It should have personalized relationships with internal employee and external customer. On one hand, administrative and employee should have a direct, interactive and honest relationship which helps them to improve the team’s management and working efficiency, and achieve the project goal in the end.
On the other hand, the relationship with its contractor is significant. Without trustful contractor, the risk may be serious and the result can be really bad. Reduce the risk: * Strengthen connection by organizing communication meetings between manager and team members * Sign legal contract with contractor * Ask for quality assurance certificates of suppliers of contractor Appendix and Materials: 3. Describe 10 selection criteria to select the appropriate management company, providing details on screening factors and weighting factors with rationales for this project.
Due to the plan to hire an event management company who has some fundraising experiences, the team needs some criteria to select an appropriate company. In the following you will find this explanation. As the project already started and the date for this event is fixed, it is very important to select a company who reacts very quickly in their work and who is willing to operate day and night to meet the schedule. They should have the resources and capabilities to fulfill this task in a short period of time, because there is not that much time left as one month is already gone from the processing time.
Another very important criterion is the price for the service and the cost transparency of that company. Based on the fact that the government funding is limited and the slowdown in regular donation, the team can’t afford a high amount of money to raise this event. It is impossible to extend the budget of the project as the Non-Government Organization still needs most of their income to keep the rehabilitation centre running. The company should be very flexible in their process and operations. They must be able to react to a specific task if some problems occur. Planning an entertainment event needs e. . catering, venue, performers, and service crews and in case of cancellations or problems they are in charge to find a suitable solution, which has to happen mostly in a shortage of time. In addition there has to be openness in communication, because this kind of event needs a lot of information transfer between both parties and they should be willing to do this. Planning an event is a very creative task and you are free to choose your favorite program and sequence. Numerous options mean numerous likings and every person has another liking, so a good basis of communication is needed.
The Business Know-How is another criterion to consult in choosing the right company. That means how many experiences this company has with organizing fundraising events. The points to consider are: How many experiences do they have generally with organizing events? Have that been only small events or also high dimension projects? And have they done fundraising events before? Finding a company with experiences in that would be the objective, but maybe you have to pay a higher price for their service. As a result balancing all the factors, which are important for, is necessary.
Another important factor is that you have to pay attention to references from former customers of companies. They can give you the information you need. Have they been satisfied with their service and achieved through cooperation their objective for the fundraising event? Also you are able to find out if the cooperation was conjointly and desirable. Furthermore you learn more about their work practice and how tasks are handled in that company. The offered service portfolio also plays a role in the decision. When they have cooperation with other service providers it can be valuable for you.
For example they have a long term contract with a location and this includes providing the employees to serve the guests and the catering you only need to book the package. Hopefully this long term contract enables you to get a discount for that service. On the mental side you need a company you trust in and feel sympathy. After revising different proposals you choose the one you most feel trustworthy to succeed. Faith in them is necessary as the project is very important because the decrease in money is a risk for the new program to scale-down and this is your last try to rescue this project.
In your last choice you need someone to belief and trust in, which is guilty for the strategy to raise this event and the company consultants as well. To think about the contract itself and the including rules, an exit-rule or termination fees are obligatory. In case the service provider cancels the cooperation without finishing the project, a fee is demanded, for example the overall costs of the event plus one fifth of key objective (HK$ 0,5M). It is handled like a refund for you, imaginative he cancels the contract 3 weeks before the date you are not able anymore to run a successful event.
The last key point is that you are aware of your personal knock out criteria. Consider what factors are important for not choosing this company. For example has never done a fundraising event before, wants more than HK$ 1M for the execution etc. In other words create a list what a company should provide at least, that you are willing to accept the offer. Finding the perfect company is not the easiest task and should be considered reasonable. Mostly you won’t meet all your criteria, but try to find a balance of factors that satisfy you. Screening factors are helpful for your search.
In this way you gather information about the company itself, their strategy and working habits. Get information through other customers, interview the vendors, call for requests of proposals or have a look at old projects. All this is useful to examine your decision. 4. What would you do in managing the issues of Peter and Mary? Peter’s issues: Analysis: First of all, as we can see, Peter had been working hard within the first two months. But, after that, he shown up a great decline of enthusiasm for his work, he began to arrive late for work and significantly reduce his over-time commitment.
In addition to this, the quality of his work had been greatly reduced. Generally speaking, there are two major factors that affect Peter’s working enthusiasm: internal and external causes. Internal causes are Peter’s self-factors, including achievement motivation, self-efficacy and self-motivation etc. External causes are work environment, including boss, coworkers, and also the work itself etc. Actions: i. Understand Peter’s situation from both life and work. Realize what is Peter really wanted to get.
According to Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, people’s behaviors are guided or motivated by a sequence of needs: Physiological, Safety, Social, Esteem and Self-Actualization. To motivate Peter, the project manager needs to understand Peter’s motivation with regard to social, esteem, and self-actualization or growth needs so that PM can provide appropriate motivational incentives that meet Peter’s needs. ii. Adopt effective motivational approaches to instill enthusiasm and bolster morale. For example, promotion, benefit package, work challenge, friendship, etc.
By using these approaches, make Peter feels: 1st his work is important and meaningful; 2nd his boss has been concerned him all the time; 3rd his own position is a good stage to make full use of his intelligence and wisdom. Etc. Mary’s issues: Analysis: As we can see in this case, the relationship between Mary and her team members was not good, they complained about each other. In addition, Mary was strict and had a strong desire for success so that she was not satisfied with her team members and outsourcing vendors, and also worried about the fail of the project will make her get blame. Actions: i. Have an earnest communication with Mary.
Including the following points: a) Firstly, express my congratulations to Mary for the news of her promotion. The congratulations must be sincere. In this situation, try to play the role as a friend not a manager; Make positive feedback to Mary for her strict working style. b) Give Mary some kindly advices about the ways of leading her team. For example, be patient and kind with your team, and assume the best about people. Do not assume that your team members are not competent to their works; Fix the problems instead of blaming people, help people work out problems by focusing on behaviors, etc. ii.
Plan some social activities to help Mary and her team members get to know each other better. Make the social events fun and not mandatory. For example, an outdoor expanded training, say, rock-climbing, camping, etc. These could help to build trust and strengthen cooperation consciousness between team members. Meanwhile, this is a good opportunity for everyone to relax in the high intensity work. iii. Make some appropriate adjustment for human resources. Based on the overall situation of the project, make some appropriate decisions on human resource allocation to meet the need of every part in the project. . Project controlling 1. Identify at least three strategies and tactics to deal with the above change request as a project manager, and provide reasons to support your views. As the new director will have a further impact on the organization, so her opinion has to be seriously considered. So the strategies are based on how we can rearrange the schedule if we take her suggestion. Since the project is now in the phase 2(the out-sourcing company provides its delivery), the most affected roles are the vendor. And as the project manager, I will take three strategies to solve the issue.
Strategy 1: Keep to a fixed deadline a) I need to talk to the director about this fixed deadline, try to see if she can have an agreement on sacrificing some quality about this additional objective. b) And I’ll try to get some financial support from her because the extra resources added should be paid. c) I’ll talk to the vendor about the situation. Try to see if we can add more resources (e. g. head-count, another vendor who can help too) to adapt to the change. And if we can have the employees to work overtime with a well pay back. Strategy 2: Keep to a fixed budget ) I need to talk to the director about this fixed budget, try to see if she can provide some extra financial support to help with what the change will bring. Or we can only sacrifice the standard of the materials and the quality of the event. b) I’ll present clearly on how much delay of the delivery it may cause if we fulfill the change. c) I’ll talk to the vendor about the situation. Try to see if we can have some volunteers to conquer the difficulties caused by both the change and the limited budget Strategy 3: Keep to a fixed quality ) I need to talk to the director about this fixed budget, try to see if she can provide some extra financial support to help with what the change will bring. b) I’ll present clearly on how much delay of the delivery it may cause if we fulfill the change. c) I’ll talk to the vendor about the situation. Try to see if we can add more resources (e. g. head-count, another vendor who can help too) to adapt to the change. And if we can have the employees to work overtime with a well pay back. No matter which strategy I prefer, I will share all of them to the project steering group, who can make the decision on which strategy we should choose. . If you know this incident might happen, would you do anything different to prevent this conflict? Well, as we can see the time table. There are two things happened two weeks before, one is the vendor started to evaluate and plan for the whole event, the other is the new director is appointed. That the new director will have an impact on the organization is a common sense, so I should talk to her as soon as possible about the objective of the project, by then, we can have a more direct and quicker response from the director.