Management homework help. Reply 1
After reading this week and doing more in-depth research, I can say that monitoring the project is nearly essential as having the foundation and planning of the project in the first stage. The project manager is responsible for keeping track of the original plan making sure everything is complete in time and as accorded. To measure the project success is ideal to evaluate five points that will ensure the project is on the right track; schedule, quality, cost, stakeholder, and performance. (Westland, 2015)
Schedule – After the plan is outlined, it is crucial to follow it, including being on time with the original timeline. Some tools help with the project’s measurement, creating reports weekly, monthly, or by stage.
Quality – It is recommended not to wait until the project is complete to take a closer look at the project’s rate. It is essential to check at the end of every stage to ensure the quality meets the standards set out on the plan.
Cost – is one of the most challenging phases for project managers. Evaluating how the project is financially performing is crucial. It will help to re-forecast the budget is needed before it is too late, and the team runs out of money.
Stakeholder – the wider team, is essential for the project; thus, ensuring that everybody is engaged and happy will result in better performance. Evaluating their satisfaction could help with this phase.
Performance – After gathering all the information mentioned above, sit back, and analyze the project as a whole. Is the project on track as agreed? Are the benefits still realistic?
Reply 2
It’s not only the planning the project which plays an important role, it’s also the monitoring of the project that determins the success. Deadlines, milestone and others need to be maintained. This can be done by using tools like scheduling meetings for example. Meetings are an important part to discuss important information. Meetings can be either done daily, every two days or a couple of times per month, depending on the project and how necessary it is. Additionally, variation reports can be created which compare the actual figures with the planned ones. Technical meetings with external people can also help to monitor the project from a neutral perspective and hear more opinions. The last tool which can monitor the project is forecasting the project. Even though it can be hard to forecast figures because the future can’t be foreseen, it is important to predict future cash flows and profits as accurate as possible. An accurate forecast avoids extra time and costs in the future (Kloppenborg, T. J., Anantatmula, V., Wells K.N, 2019).
