Project Execution: Monitoring and Control

• Project execution focuses on monitoring and controlling the project.

Contents

• The lecture contents include project integration, scope, schedule, cost, quality, resource, communication, risk, procurement, and stakeholder management.

Introduction

• Project execution is about executing and monitoring project processes.

Executing Process Group

• This group includes processes to complete work defined in the project management plan to meet project requirements.
• It involves coordinating resources, managing stakeholder engagement, and integrating project activities based on the project management plan.
• A key benefit is that the work needed to meet project requirements and objectives is performed according to plan.
• A large portion of the project budget, resources, and time is expended to these processes.
• Processes may generate change requests, which, if approved, can trigger planning processes and result in a modified management plan.

Monitoring and Controlling Process Group

• This group includes processes to track, review, and regulate project progress and performance.
• It identifies areas where changes to the plan are needed and initiates these changes.
• Monitoring involves collecting project performance data, producing performance measures, and disseminating performance information.
• Controlling involves comparing actual performance with planned performance, analyzing variances, assessing trends, evaluating alternatives, and recommending corrective action.
• A key benefit is that project performance is measured and analyzed at regular intervals, events, or when an exception occurs, to identify and correct variances from the management plan.

Project Integration Management

• Includes directing and managing project work.
• Involves coordinating planning and execution efforts
• Encompasses managing project knowledge.
• Includes monitoring and controlling project work.
• Requires performing integrated change control.
• Focuses on objectives of integrated change control.
• Deals with change requests and work performance reports.

Directing and Managing Project Work

• Involves leading and performing the tasks defined in the project management plan and implementing approved changes to achieve project objectives.
• Provides overall management of project work and deliverables, thereby increasing the probability of project success.
• Manages the allocation and efficient use of available resources.
• Incorporates changes to project plans based on work performance data analysis.
• Project execution typically consumes the majority of project time and budget.
• Project managers need to lead the project team, manage stakeholder relationships, and ensure alignment with the project management plan.
• Crucial aspects include project resource, communications, and stakeholder management.
• Project managers need to be well-versed in project risk and procurement management if the project involves significant risks or outside resources.
• Project managers must be flexible and creative to address the unique situations during project execution.

Coordinating Planning and Execution

• Project planning and execution are intertwined and inseparable.
• The main function of a project management plan is to guide project execution toward good products or work results, documenting what constitutes success.
• Updates to plans should reflect knowledge gained from earlier work.
• Improving coordination between plan development and execution requires those who will do the work to also plan the work.
• Project managers need to solicit input from project team members in each knowledge area when developing the overall project management plan.

Managing Project Knowledge

• It is the process of using existing knowledge and creating new knowledge to achieve project objectives and contribute to organizational learning.
• Explicit knowledge is easily explained with words, pictures, or numbers, and is easy to communicate, store, and distribute.
• Tacit knowledge is difficult to express, highly personal, and sometimes called informal knowledge.

Monitoring and Controlling Project Work

• It involves comparing actual performance against the management plan and periodically assessing performance to determine if actions are needed.
• It includes checking the status of individual project risks.
• It maintains an accurate, timely information base about the project's products and documentation.
• It provides status reporting, progress measurement, and forecasting.
• The process provides forecasts to update cost and schedule information.
• It monitors implementation of approved changes.
• It reports on project progress and status to program management.
• It ensures the project aligns with business needs.

Causes of Project Changes

• Inaccurate initial estimates
• New regulations
• Specification changes
• Missed requirements

Performing Integrated Change Control

• Involves reviewing change requests, approving changes, managing alterations to deliverables and documents.
• Also involves communicating the decisions.
• It reviews change requests for project documents, deliverables, or the project management plan and determines their resolution.
• Change must be considered in an integrated manner to address overall project risk.
• A change request can impact the project scope, management plan, or other documents
• Changes may be requested by any stakeholder throughout the project cycle.
• The change control level depends on the application area, project complexity, contract needs, and the context of the project

Objectives of Integrated Change Control

• Includes influencing factors that create changes to ensure that they are beneficial.
• The project manager must make trade-offs among project dimensions, such as scope, time, cost, and quality.
• It is determining that a change has occurred.
• The manager must know where the status of key project areas and keep management informed.
• The point is managing changes as they occur, exercising discipline to minimize the number of changes.

Change control systems

• These systems involve procedures describing how modifications to project deliverables and documentation are managed.
• Effective systems encompass the necessary forms, tracking methods, processes and approval levels to authorize changes.

Change Control Board

• Change Control Boards are formally established groups responsible for reviewing, evaluating, approving, delaying, or rejecting changes to a project.
• They record and communicate their decisions.

Change Requests and Work Performance Reports

• Main outputs of monitoring and controlling project work are change requests and work performance reports.
• Change requests include corrective and preventive actions and defect repairs.
  • Corrective actions should improve performance.
  • Preventive actions intend to reduce negative impacts.
  • Defect repairs bring deliverables into alignment with requirements.
• Formal processes are used by many organizations to track changes.
• Work performance reports include updates, progress, and other information to communicate performance.

Project Scope Management

• Consists of validating and controlling scope.

Validating Scope

• It is the process of formalizing acceptance of completed deliverables.
• Objectivity is brought to the acceptance process.
• The acceptance increases the probability of final product and service acceptance.
• Verifying the project scope helps reduce scope changes.
• The project team has to develop a process for scope validation.
• Procedures must ensure customers are getting what they want.
• Confirm resources for desired products and services.
• Verifying the project scope with users through the project is key.
• Developing a process for controlling these changes is important.

Controlling Scope

• It involves monitoring the status of the project and managing changes to the scope baseline.
• Good control requires effective requirements, scope definition, and validation.
• Approved or recommended actions should be processed through integrated change control.
• Control scope manages actual changes and integrates with other control processes.
• Uncontrolled expansion without adjusting time, cost, and resources is called scope creep.
• A change control process is standard for every project.

Project Schedule Management

• Includes controlling the schedule.
• It takes into account issues with controlling changes to project schedules.

Controlling The Schedule

• Managing the status of the project and changes to the schedule baseline.
• Checking the current status of the project schedule.
• Influencing contributors to schedule changes.
• Reassessing schedule reserves.
• Ascertaining change
• Managing changes

Issues with Controlling Changes to Project Schedules

• Many issues are involved in controlling changes to schedules with ensuring a realistic schedule.
• Important to follow schedule with discipline and leadership.
• Tools assist in developing schedules, managers handle personnel issues.
• Most projects fail due to internal or people issues.
• Perform reality checks to manage changes.
• Soft skills control schedule.

Project Cost Management

• Focuses on controlling costs.
• Focuses on maintaining a project budget.

Controlling Costs

• Involves influencing the factors that create changes to the authorized cost baseline.
• It ensures change requests are acted on.
• It entails the management of changes as they occur.
• It makes sure cost expenditures don't exceed the allotted funding.
• Monitoring cost performance is key to isolating variances from baseline.
• Cost control also includes overseeing work performance against budget.
• Prevents unapproved changes from affecting cost.
• Informing stakeholders is vital.

Maintaining a Project Budget

• Monitoring is key to accountability.
• Milestone re-review can identify needed resets or revisions to checkpoint management.
• Control updates costs and manages changes against the cost baseline.
• Controlling cost involves sign-off plans and stakeholder updates.
• Managing changes alongside forecasts and tracking is essential.
• Acknowledging budget misses is key.

Project Quality Management

• Focuses on managing and controlling quality.
• Includes auditing quality to see where it exists.
• The outcome should be based on measurements of control.

Managing Quality

• Translates management plans into executable quality activities with company standards.
• Increases meeting objectives and identifying poor processes.
• Sometimes it is called quality assurance.
• Quality deals with project processes effectively and meeting standards.
• Managing includes all activities.
• Quality work comes from everyone.

Managing Quality

• Process implements planned acts and processes with the management plan to design and improve various aspects.
• Builds confidence, adherence, confirmation and improvement.

Quality Audit

• It is a structured, independent process to determine if project activities comply with standards.
• This may be conducted at set intervals.
• Audited topics can include: Quality, Collection, Analytical, Cost

Controlling Quality

• It is the process of monitoring and recording results to evaluate project outputs meet stakeholder expectations.
• Determine the project outputs and their ability to comply with standards.
• The process measures compliance and fitness.
• Verify conformance of compliance from specifications.
• Control should be formal with sponsor or customer data.

Outcomes of Controlling Quality

• It is being able to take action if products or services are rejected and reworked.
• It is action compliant stakeholders should take and improve if something happens.
• Process adjustments should remedy problems based on quality control, or an update will be needed to the organization.

Project Resource Management

• Includes managing and controlling team resources.
• It considers the dysfunctions of teams and adjusting resources appropriately.

Managing Team

• Tracking performance to improve behavior.
• Required skills for fostering leadership.
• Emphasizing the importance of communication with staff.
• Provide support with challenging requests.
• Staff levels should vary based on work effort.
• Intensive support should be offered to under qualified staff.

Five Dysfunctions of Team- High performing vs Dysfunctional Teams

• The five dysfunctions are: Inattention to results, Avoidance of accountability, Lack of commitment, fear of conflict, ansd absence of trust.

Controlling Resources

• It is ensuring resources allocated to the project are followed correctly.
• Process should be continually checked.
• Control is physical resources.
• This includes: Monitoring, Identifying shortages/surpluses, Ensuring appropriate release of resources, Informing necessary staff, and Managing changes for new items.

Project Communication Management

• Includes managing different modes of the various communication techniques to enhance information.
• It will also need to report on performance to see where issues need to be addressed to enhance existing channels.

Managing Communications

• Managing and delivering communications in a timely manner.
• It enhances flow from teams to staff.
• Identifies communication, methods, and techniques for staff.
• Aims to ensure stakeholders are informed to have communications available.

Using Technology to Enhance Information Creation and Distribution

• Technology can help disseminate useful information with emails, messages, websites, phones and new technologies.
• Systems used can help create and store electronic formats easier at local sites or in the could.
• Backup plans should be ready.

Reporting Performance

• Sharing of resources with internal staff to promote objectives.
• Normally completed as reports with progress or data.
  • Progress reports: Describe what teams had accomplished over a specific period.
  • Status reports: Highlight if a team is in the right frame in terms of cost benefit analysis, and triple restraints

Monitoring communications

• It is a process to ensure internal staff are meeting requirements
• To offer help with information flow problems.
• Stakeholder input is key.

Project Risk Management

• Implementing risk responses.
• Monitoring risks.

Implementing Risk Responses

• The process of implementing risk responses.
• It helps ensures responses are done as needed, while minimizing risks when possible.

Monitoring Risks

• This includes the results of the management process summarized in the risk register with risk control, strategy event, and change management system.
• It is identifying new land mines which could derail plans.

Project Procurement Management

• Includes conducting and controlling processes.

Conducting Procurements

• Involves deciding who will do the work.
• The process of obtaining seller responses.
• Includes implementing any legal agreements.

Controlling Procurements

• It is the process of regulating relationships with various sellers.
• Administrative tasks may be needed.
• This includes: Collection, Refinement, Set up, and Monitoring

Project Stakeholder Management

• Is the process of managing project engagement to see what the best practices are for internal personnel.
• All the while, you should be constantly tracking various members and their support levels.

Managing Stakeholder Engagement

• Communicating with staff to foster involvement.
• Increase internal support while maintaining resistance.
• Ensure stakeholders can see results while improving relations.

Managing Stakeholder Engagement - best practice

• Be clear in your project process and discuss what you are going to do.
• Explain consequences and set up any forms of contingency plans.
• Provide any surprises about challenges that occur and maintain your goals with new course changes.

Monitoring stakeholder engagement

• Monitor level for alignment.
• Engage stakeholders through new goals and set stage or early engagement.