1.2. Question 1
1.2.1. Project Stakeholders
“Stakeholders are people who are involved in the project and those who may be (or think themselves to be) affected by it.” (Keeling, 2000:181)
Throughout the lifecycle of a project the involvement of stakeholders is crucial. They are likely to inherit benefits from association and completion of a successful project can be tangible or intangible. However failure of the project can lead to a negative inheritance, therefore contingencies should always be in place. This can be avoided if responsibilities are allocated accordingly and relationships are well established (Keeling, 200:184).
Associates of the project, direct or indirect and internal or external, may not be fully convinced or understand the benefits that could arise, thus communication is paramount to increase awareness and changing mindsets. Segmenting stakeholders can aid effective communication by aiding the project manager in deciding who to transmit messages to, assess feedback as well as indicate consistency of reactions with segments. This is usually considered in the communication plan, and shown on the management communication matrix (Keeling, 2000:182-192). Figure 1 signifies a general approach to segmenting stakeholders.
Figure 1, Typical Stakeholder Groups. Source: Keeling R, 2000:182
Managing the processes within a project creates value for the stakeholders, which is required in orders to gain their input. (Lockyer & Gorden, 1996:36). Input in the form of advice and assistance in the creation of project plan is required (Lockyer & Gorden, 1996:23). The maximising the satisfaction of stakeholders, through identifying and understanding their implied and stated needs, is the crux of the quality concept (Lockyer & Gorden, 1996: 36), and helps to maintain the quality factor of the project if it is not the overriding factor in project control.
In the Peterborough City Park Project (PCPP) the stakeholders, their segmentation and details of the project required are:
- Concerns & Priorities
1) The Project Manager
Concerns for the project manager are varied in scope and depth. They include: improving and maintaining communications, identifying culture and matching management style as well as the inter-personal relationship with them, obviating potential areas of conflict, increasing and maintaining motivation, overseeing the project, releasing resources from interested associates, collating of power to which can be utilised to influence team members. Identification of the roles of stakeholders as team members in light of Belbins’ team roles combined with the project lifecycle; enable effective use of people and productivity as well as increasing the probability of project success.
These can be summarised as requiring the integration of stakeholder, project lifestyle and the performance of people. The concerns are similar to their roles, which is encapsulated in Figure 2.
The success of the project and completion on time will take precedence as it is a reflection of the project manager’s employment accomplishment, which will affect their future employability.
2) Peterborough City Council
Their concerns will be in delivering the project in time as it is a reflection of their efficiency and commitment to provide and actualise public services. The creativeness of the art sculpture will also be of importance to attract public, businesses and organisation to the city in order to improve the local economy. Ultimately their priority is in fulfilling the time factor in project control.
3) Local Businesses
Through association with contributing towards public services the businesses will be able to enhance their public relations image and obtain free publicity, thus increasing their awareness amongst the public as well as external bodies. This should result in increased revenue via increased market reach. However if the project is unsuccessful it could have a detrimental effect upon the business. Hence their concerns will be in how the finished project is portrayed and advertised as well as communicated. Marketing of the project and the completion of the project to desired goals quality being the overriding factor on their behalf will be of priority.
4) Local Sponsors and 5) National Funders
They provide the resources, usually financial, to allow implementation of the project. It has been ascertained they fulfil three roles; architect, signpost and sustainer which are near in importance to those of the project managers. Efficient use of the resources they provide will be of precedence as will be the maintenance and gain of the correct balance between the project leader and themselves. As some sponsors can be non-profit organisations concern will also be in ensure their awareness and public relations are increased to take advantage of opportunities & benefits that may result.
6) Peterborough City Council Staff
Important in the administration of the project, their formal concern will lie in the smooth operation of the project. On a personal level though, this may differ as they will seek empowerment in line with Hertzberg’s Theory Y, and self-actualisation in line with Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs theory. Overall the success of the project will reap satisfaction for them and thus will of priority.
7) Environmental Artist and 8) Landscape Gardener
An ergonomically designed and creatively imaged park will be of utmost importance. Safe and successful moving of the trees and building sculpture, which are focal points, draws another set of concerns. Consistency in the blueprint and actual construction of their designs will also be cause for significance, as often problems encountered can result in necessary changes being made from the original plan.
9) Stonemasons
The preservation of ideal weather conditions are required for the extensive stone work to be completed, as does the rest of the park.
10) Contractors
Timeliness in completion of work, to specification and within budget is important. This will include working closely with the project manager, sponsor, funder and project team hence communication is paramount.
11) Public and 12) Children
The entertainment value and benefits, is of priority to parents and children respectively, of the recreational park. The scenery and tranquillity will be of appeal to others as well.
1.3. Question 2
1.3.1. Network Diagram
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Question 2
1.3.2. GANTT Chart
1.3. Question 2
- Calculations & Dates
The critical tasks in the project are 1, 2, 3, 7 10, 14, 15 and 17, hence this is the critical path which is 50 days. The latest date the project must start in order to meet the opening ceremony on April 19th 2003 is February 10th 2003. This can be deduced from the Gantt chart.
The earliest, latest times and slack for each task can be viewed in the table below.
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Question 3
- Adjustments & Alterations
In the event that bad weather threatens to cause project delays of up to six days the critical path will need to be crashed. A total crash is advisable due to the unpredictable nature of the weather in the United Kingdom. The adjustments that could be made would be on the critical path and are as follows:
- Hiring and applying extra employees, as this would shorten the time it would take to complete tasks.
- Extending the working hours in the day so that the workable hours are not just restricted to nine am to five pm, as this will shorten the time taken to complete tasks. Night shifts could also be made available.
- The days workable should also be extended to include the weekend and will have the same effect. The duration of task seven could then be reduced to nine days if the three weekends (29-30/02/03, -9/03/03 and 15-16/03/03) were worked. Thus would enable the project to be crashed by six days.
- If bad weather actualises then constructing marquees to work under would overcome the problem.
- Tasks could also be completed simultaneously to shorten overall time.
Implementation of these points will allow the project to be bought back to schedule; however this may require a trade-off between the factors of time and cost in project control. In the PCPP this would not be a problem as the project manager has indicated that there will be a small project surplus.
Conversely these points are subject to impediments due to three reasons:
- Additional resources applied may not expedite the activity. For example the cement in building the toilet block can not be shortened as there is a fixed time cement requires to dry.
- The additional resources required may not be available at the time required. For example the delivery and installation of the art feature may require specialists to complete the task, who may not be available on the dates required.
- Some activities cannot be expedited further, as they can only be expedited to a limited extent. For example delivering and planting the large trees can only be conducted by the number of people as there are number of trees, thus any additional people applied would be a waste.
Another optimisation procedure however could be employed to produce better schedules, by using Dynamic policy Scheduling Method (DPSM). This is where the project is divided phases, dependant on the project duration and clock cycles are selected and then priority rules are selected accordingly. Results produced by using this method of scheduling in comparison to traditional priorities, include improved certainty of shorter schedule durations, increased reliability and better quality. Thus the need for the above adjustment could be bypassed. However it must be noted that time and resources are required to use DPSM (Khamooshi, 1996: 13-22).
- REFERENCES & BIBLIOGRAPHY
GORDEN, J & LOCKYER, K (1996) Project Management and Project Network Techniques. Pitman Publishing.
KEELING, R (2000) Project Management: An International Perspective. Macmillan Business.
KHAMOOSHI, H (1996) Network Based Project Planning & Schelduling. Industrial Management & data Systems, Volume 96: Number 6.
LOCK, D (1996) The Essentials Of Project Management. Gower Publishing Limited.
MANTEL, J. S & MEREDITH, R. J (2000) Project Management: A Managerial Approach. Wiley.
