Project goals are specific results that must be achieved during the project implementation. Project goals affect every decision in the project cycle, which is why it is important to articulate them clearly from the start. One of the best ways to set specific and specific goals is to use the SMART methodology in project management (Burke, 2021). A SMART system is often used to set personal and business goals, but it is also effective for developing project goals.
Measurable Objectives
When the goals of a project are somewhat vague, it can lead to a loss of motivation. In order to know exactly what results in the project have already been achieved, the goals must be measurable. In addition, measurable goals will allow the manager to track progress throughout the project cycle and help stay focused to meet deadlines if unrealistic goals can doom the managers and the team to failure (Cruz Villazón et al., 2020). An achievable project goal may challenge the team but be within their ability. Setting an achievable but challenging goal means identifying actionable opportunities or resources previously eluded attention.
High-Level Requirements
It must be remembered that in the process of high-level writing requirements, two critical aspects must be carefully balanced. This is because the requirements document should be easy to read, and the requirements sets should be easy to work with. The former implies that the requirements document should be structured so that it is easy for the user to understand the wording of each requirement in the context of the entire document. The second aspect refers to the quality of each requirement, what language it is written in, how clearly and accurately it reflects the essence, and how much the requirement can be represented as an element with which it is convenient to establish links from other requirements.
Assumptions and Constraints
Assumptions are factors that affect a project, the values of which are uncertain. At the time of project initiation, it is imperative to identify as many assumptions as possible and document them. External conditions and assumptions are formulated without fixing which the project cannot be completed: conditions beyond the parties’ control, without which the project’s content cannot be clearly defined. Constraints are conditions that affect or determine the actions of a team.
Project Description
When describing any project, variables are used to characterize the amount of any economic resources, such as money, products, materials, and raw materials. As the project progresses, these variables change. Design materials – a document containing a description and rationale for the project. This term covers the documents that are mandatory in the design of capital construction facilities and additional materials.
High-Level Budget
One of the most challenging problems of creating a project facing the organizers is determining the cost of funds for promoting goods and services. To calculate the total budget for advertising, four general methods are usually used: based on the company’s capabilities; as a percentage of sales; based on the level of costs of competitors; based on the goals and objectives pursued by the advertising program.
Success Criteria
The first criterion for the project’s success is the provision of projects considering business factors. Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are a method used to measure the benefits received from the implementation of a project. They give an idea of the scope of the project. Performance indicators are set by managers at the beginning of the project and are listed in priority order (Adafin, 2020). One of the critical factors for the project’s success is its compliance with the set initial goals.
High-Level Risks
There are different classifications of risks that are worth considering in order to understand the possible future complexities. Time risks are the likelihood that tasks in a project will take longer than planned to complete. Be mindful of deadlines because time is a resource. The payroll also grows if the team spends much time on tasks. In addition, project stakeholders may need more support.
Project Milestones
Each project for understanding its execution can be divided into several stages. As part of the first stage of the project initiation, work is carried out on a preliminary assessment of the project. The company’s specialists conduct an analysis based on which the management decides whether the project is necessary for the company. The result of this stage is the charter of the project. The project selection stage is necessary for deciding on project planning. Further, in the process of implementing the planning stage, the main plans of the project are developed, based on which a project management plan is formed.
Project Manager
A project manager is endowed with the responsibility and rights to manage work within the framework of a project task. The delegation of relevant powers to PM is carried out by the investor or the customer based on a contract, the essential terms of which and the KPI are agreed upon at the stage of developing the project charter (Irfan et al., 2021). The manager creates favorable conditions for completing project tasks on time and within budget. To make a project successful, the project manager provides several functions.
Project Sponsor
The project sponsor is an employee, usually a senior manager of the organization implementing the project, who oversees the project from the side of the project owner’s organization, and provides overall control and support for the project. The project sponsor is responsible for achieving the project’s end goals and realizing the benefits to the organization. He is responsible to the CEO/President or the Governing Board. The prominent role of the sponsor is the implementation of the task.
Project Stakeholders
A stakeholder is a person, group, or organization that can influence, be affected by, or perceive itself to be affected by a project’s decision, operation, or outcome. Stakeholders may be actively involved in the project or have interests that may be affected either positively or negatively during the execution or completion of the project. Different stakeholders may have competing expectations, creating conflicts within a project. Stakeholders can also influence the project, its deliverables, and project team members to achieve results that meet strategic business goals or other needs (Vuorinen & Martinsuo, 2019). Stakeholders include all members of the project team, as well as all stakeholders, both internal and external, to the organization.
The Project Charter
The project charter briefly presents its objectives, scope, and the people responsible for its implementation. This document is created to obtain the approval of the project’s main stakeholders. The charter should offer a concise and exhaustive explanation of the project’s main elements before work begins on it. A project charter is one of many materials that can be created during project planning.
Stakeholder Register
Register of Stakeholders – a document containing a description of all stakeholders of the project. In this case, an interested party is considered to be an individual or legal entity that in any way can influence the course of the project. Project Stakeholder Identification is the process of identifying all the people and organizations affected by the project and documenting meaningful information regarding their interests, involvement, and impact on the project’s success.
Planning
A scope baseline is a set of scope-related documents that specify the approved project scope. A project scope baseline consists of a description of the scope and a defined work breakdown structure for that project, subject to approval by the relevant stakeholders. Project results and progress are measured against this baseline. While this is a common and accepted definition and broadly consistent with PMI terminology, it is not the only one. Some authors define baseline volume differently.
Project Schedule
Schedule development analyzes activity sequences, durations, resource requirements, and time constraints to create a project schedule. Entering activities, durations, and resources into the scheduling tool generates a schedule with planned completion dates for project activities. The development of an acceptable project schedule is often an iterative process, i.e., specific steps in the development of the schedule occur many times (Kerzner, 2019). As a result, the planned start and finish dates for operations and project milestones are determined.
Project Budget
The budget structure is determined by the chart of accounts of the cost accounting of the project: a traditional and a chart of accounts of management accounting specially developed for a specific project. In any case, the project budget consists of the estimated income and estimated costs. In turn, the cost estimate includes a management reserve, an estimate of contingencies, and a basic, operating budget, which is a set of spending on resources that can ensure the implementation of design work.
Various Management Plans
A project scope management plan is a statement that describes how the work that needs to be done to produce a deliverable with specified characteristics will be identified, developed, and tested and specifies the activities to manage the project scope. A requirements management plan is a component of a project management plan that describes how to analyze, document, and manage the project and product requirements (Burke, 2021). A schedule management plan is a component of a project or program management plan that establishes the criteria and actions for developing, monitoring, and controlling the schedule. The project budget management plan lists project costs distributed by project activities. The project’s preliminary budget is formed in relation to the results of the project analogs. After determining the amount and cost of the resources used, as well as after the conclusion of contracts, the project cost plan is specified (Kim et al., 2020). A quality management plan is a component of a project or program management plan that describes how existing policies, procedures, and guidelines will be implemented to achieve quality objectives. A business process improvement plan is a set of methods and approaches that allow company leaders to improve their work efficiency.
A communications management plan is a component of a management plan that describes how and by whom information about the project will be managed and communicated. Risk management plan – a document developed at the beginning of the project and containing descriptions of the risk management structure of the project and the procedure for its implementation within the project; included in the project management plan (Burke, 2021). A procurement management plan is a component of a project or program management plan that describes how the project team will purchase goods and services from an external performing organization.
Execution
Organization of project execution – the process of ensuring the implementation of the project plan by organizing the implementation of the work included in it and coordinating the performers. Any project goes through certain phases in its development. The stages of the project life cycle may differ depending on the scope of activity and the adopted work organization system (Burke, 2021). Project execution is an integrated process. Actions in one direction usually affect other directions as well. Such interrelation forces to balance between project objectives – often, improvement in one area can only be achieved at the expense of deterioration in another. To better understand the integrated nature of the project, we will describe it through the processes of which it consists and their interrelations. The repetition of initiation at different phases of the project helps to control the project’s relevance.
Monitoring and Controlling
Many industries depend on sound project management to produce products and services that meet stakeholder expectations. One way for companies to communicate progress to stakeholders and keep documentation of their projects is to create status reports. Regarding change, project management usually distinguishes between two aspects of working with them – implementation and control. With the introduction of changes, at first glance, everything is clear – something needs to be changed, and we are working on it. When complex approval procedures and requirements characterize the project, resource management practices are applied in the company, and any change can significantly affect the project implementation plan. The process of adjusting project execution consists in making changes to the project specification, project plan, cost, and network schedule. The project management issue log refers to a document that teams use to record any issues they encounter throughout the life of a project. This allows people to report problems as soon as they become aware of them, which can help project managers develop effective solutions quickly. In addition to recording the particular problem, individuals can include a label or ID in the problem log, making it easier for project managers to track them (Burke, 2021). The project manager then assigns the documented task to the team member responsible for solving it.
Closing
As important as starting a project in an organized way, it is just as essential to finish it in an organized way. The need for such a planned completion of the project lies in the ability to get the maximum benefit from the work done, from the results delivered by the project, and from experience gained by all project participants. At the meeting, a brief overview of what was done in the project is made, what was done well and what could be done better in project management, mistakes made, and practical techniques and solutions found are documented. Techniques and processes that have performed exceptionally well or poorly are recorded as lessons learned and made available for collaborative study by other projects in the organization.
Sometimes the success or failure of a project is evident. If any project deliverables are to continue to exist and operate after the completion of the project, then in many cases, they will need support from the designated organization. The transfer of results to the support service includes the transfer of knowledge and the completion and transfer of all necessary documentation, including lists and descriptions of the remaining or upcoming work (Nicholas & Steyn, 2020). If the project was significant to the organization, at the end of the project, it might make sense to assess the performance of all the people who took part in it. In such a case, the Sponsor and the Project Director evaluate the Project Manager.
Reference List
Adafin, J., Rotimi, J. O., & Wilkinson, S. (2020). Risk impact assessments in project budget development: quantity surveyors’ perspectives. International Journal of Construction Management, 20(1), 13-28. Web.
Burke, R. (2021). Project management techniques – Artificial Intelligence. 4th Edn. Burke Publishing.
Cruz Villazón, C. et al. (2020). ‘Identification of key performance indicators in project-based organisations through the lean approach’. Sustainability, 12(15), 5977. Web.
Irfan, M. et al. (2021). ‘Role of project planning and project manager competencies on public sector project success’. Sustainability, 13(3), 1421. Web.
Kerzner, H. (2019). Using the project management maturity model: strategic planning for project management. John Wiley & Sons.
Kim, S., Chang, S., & Castro-Lacouture, D. (2020). Dynamic modeling for analyzing impacts of skilled labor shortage on construction project management. Journal of Management in Engineering, 36(1), 04019035. Web.
Nicholas, J. M., & Steyn, H. (2020). Project management for engineering, business and technology. London. Routledge.
Vuorinen, L., & Martinsuo, M. (2019). ‘Value-oriented stakeholder influence on infrastructure projects’. International Journal of Project Management, 37(5), 750-766. Web.