Leadership: Enhancing the Lessons of Experience, Essay Example

Abstract

Project management incorporates many tools and techniques to facilitate the opportunity for the success of a project implementation. When developing a project there are three areas of concern including scope, schedule and cost of the project. By utilizing the best practice framework outlined by the Project Management Book of Knowledge (PMBOK) the project team will have the best environment to adhere to the client’s requirements while also meeting the time and cost demands.  Leading a project requires the ability to lead, manage, facilitate and mentor all aspects of the project in order to successfully complete the deliverables.

Project Definition

In recent years there has been an opportunity to raise funds during the election at the local social club where the polling will occur.  This provides a very limited window of time for the accumulation of funds for the group.  With a bake sale, goods could be offered that do not impact the voting process and have a high margin for profitability for the group.  The logistics of the voting operation directs every voter past the area of opportunity for the bake good sales.  There is a seasoned group of volunteers that have expertise in this event from the past or have the complimentary skillsets needed to run the project to success.

Project Metrics and Scope

Success is ultimately achieved by fulfilling the customer’s needs and expectations.  The goals and objectives of this project have goals that are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-bound.  Each objective will have a pass/fail criteria established with the stakeholders so that at the end of the project the criteria accepted at the beginning of the project will be the same criteria that is measured for project completion. In order to understand what is to be delivered at the end of a project there must be boundaries and guidelines established to set the parameters or scope of the project.  Metrics and measurability of those metrics include understanding what the project encompasses and how to guide and direct the project team to achieve those objectives.  Utilizing metrics, or representations of progress, shows how the project is progressing and provides insight into where project management actions need to occur in order to manage the triple constraints.

Defining scope is the process of determining a common understanding of what the project will include in or exclude out of the final deliverable.  Scope management is a key success factor in completing any project.  If scope is not managed correctly, the requirements and deliverables may fluctuate so much that the original intention of the project may never be met and could result in a fail project attempt.  As any project progresses through the phases, the intricacies and details of the project gain clarity.  This is where the art of project management dances with the scientific project management methodology to build and execute a project.

Project management incorporates many tools and techniques to facilitate the opportunity for the success of a project implementation. When developing a project there are three areas of concern including scope, schedule and cost of the project. Each of these areas is specifically managed by the project manager and without that insight there is greater opportunity for resource attrition, inefficiencies and project failures.  The project must have a set of achievable goals and provide a benefit to those with a stake in the outcome of the project (PMI, 2008).  Providing validity and clearly stating why a project is important to the stakeholders allows the purpose to be highly visible and not come into question later in the project.

Driving Results

Driving the behavior needed will be monitored and controlled through metrics (Hughes, Ginnett, and Curphy, 2012). These metrics will be goals established on past performance, needed performance and clear guidance from the project team. The primary behavior of the project team is a sense of accountability. This accountability is based on the overall scope of the project and its ultimate success for the volunteer group.  Success is achieving enough funds to the social club so that they can definitively achieve their financial goals set by the group during the strategic planning meetings.  In order to do so the proper mix of product, pricing of the product, inventory turnover, logistics, sales and management of the bake sales opportunity must work in conjunction. This is a cross-functional team that will have, at all times, a clear vision of the goal, the purpose of the goal and precise goals and objectives on how to meet those goals.  This information will allow the team members to focus on their primary responsibility and take full advantage of their skills and abilities.

The types of metrics used are predictive, diagnostic and retrospective.  The predictive metric is used to predict the total amount of sales which drives the production of baked goods.  The diagnostic would focus on the current operations and inventory turnover.  The team could adjust what is on the table by the movement of the product and emphasize certain areas or change product layout to increase sales in real-time.  The retrospective metric is the total sales.  While this seems like the main way to manage the team due to the encompassing nature of the sales figure, it is, in essence, too late to manage from this metric.  The sale has already occurred and if they are leading or lagging is based on leadership’s prior decisions.  This is a good overall success indicator but it is in retrospect.  Metrics can always be improved in a continual basis.  Re-evaluation of key performance indicators is the responsibility of the leadership and should always be reviewed to ensure the metrics are driving the team to the appropriate behavior as well as driving towards the strategic intent of the organization (Schmidt, 2009).

References

Hughes, R., Ginnett, R., & Curphy, G. (2012). Leadership: Enhancing the lessons of experience. (7 ed.). Montouri, Amsterdam: McGraw-Hill/Irwin.

Project Management Institute. (2008).A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide) Fourth Edition. Newtown Square, PA: Project Management Institute.

Schmidt, T. (2009). Strategic project management made simple. (1 ed.). Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.