Project management module (advanced level)

PROJECT MANEGEMENT MODULEADVANCED COURSE OF MEDIA LITERACY 1

1.PROJECTMANAGEMENT MODULE

ADVANCEDCOURSE OF MEDIA LITERACY


AUGUST 2014

AUTHORAuthors: Skaidrite Bukbãrde, Žarko Čižmar, Antra Skinča, Ivan Stojilović.Partners: Telecentre Europe, DemNet, Fundatia EOS - Educating for An Open Society, IAN, Telecentar, LIKTA, Langas ateit, Fundación Esplai.Coordination of the content development: Alba Agulló

GRAPHIC DESIGN AND DESIGNFundación Esplai (www.fundacionesplai.org) & Niugràfic (www.niugrafic.com)

UNDER CREATIvE COMMONSAttribution - NonCommercial - CompartieIgual (by-nc-sa)

TO ObTAIN PERMISSION bEyOND THIS lICENSE, CONTACThttp://tma.telecentre-europe.org/contacts

ACCESS TO MUlTIMEDIA TOOlkIThttp://tma.telecentre-europe.org/toolkit

lEGAl NOTICEThis project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

Index 1 PROJECTMANAGEMENT MODULE

1.1 Introduction P.4

1.2 Ten Axioms for Success P.6

1.3 What Is Project Management? P.7 1.3.1 Scope Triangle

1.3.2 Scope 1.3.3 Visions and Goals

1.4 Understanding the Project Life Cycle P.9

1.5 Stage 1: Initiating P.11

1.5.1 Setting SMART project objectives 1.5.1 The Kick-off Meeting

1.6 Stage 2: Planning P.14

1.6.1 The Elements of a Project Plan 1.6.2 The Fine Art of Scheduling 1.6.2.1 The Format of Project Schedules 1.6.3 Costing and Budgeting 1.6.3.1 Costing 1.6.3.2 Budgeting 1.6.4 Risk Management 1.6.4.1 Risk Profiles P 1.6.5 Change Management

1.7 Stage 3: Executing P.20

1.8 Stage 4: Controlling P.20

1.8.1 Managing People 1.8.1.1 Negotiation 1.8.1.2 Building a team 1.8.1.2 Group development 1.8.2 Effective Leadership and Management

1.9 Stage 5: Closing P.25

1.9.1 Review 1.9.2 Agree 1.9.3 Complete 1.9.4 Celebrate

1.10 Annexes P.26

Annex 1: Work plan for Visual Art Festival Annex 2: Template of a Project Initiation Document (PID) Preparation Information Annex 3a: Project Schedule – Simple Example

Annex 3b: Project Schedule – Complex Example Annex 3c: Example of an Event timeline for an exhibition Annex 4: Recording risks

1.11 Activities P.35

1.12 Bibliography P.37


Upon completion of this module, students will be able to define the concept of the project, explain the role of project management, write a brief description of the project, define the objectives and expected results of the project, divide the project into smaller components, make a schedule of activities, and plan the roles and responsibilities of the project team members.

1.1 IntroductionProject Management is something that every person is faced with at some stage of his or her life. Everyone has to organise a birthday party or a function of some kind. Project management is more a part of one’s daily life than we realise or even think of. The basic principles of project management can be applied in organising Sunday lunch for a family gathering, managing the school drama competition, organising a national arts festival and building a bridge!

All projects have common characteristics: every project has a scope, budget, timeframe and schedule. Projects also differ. Un-derstanding how projects differ and what that difference means to the management of the project is critical to successfully ma-naging a project. Large, complex projects need project manage-ment tools, systems, and processes that are very different from the small and less complex project.

Project management is challenging1. In some ways, this is a good thing because students who learn how to manage projects well will find it a rewarding career, and there will always be a demand for their services. Project management is challenging because projects consist of many activities that are interrelated, and the actions taken in one activity affect several other aspects of the project. Project management is complex because project mana-

1 Darnall, R., & Preston, J. M. (2010). Project Management from Simple to Complex, Available at: http://goo.gl/M2sbri (accessed on 10 March 2014).

http://goo.gl/M2sbri


gers must understand several knowledge areas and develop a variety of tools and techniques to successfully manage a project. This complexity makes it challenging to learn about project mana-gement because regardless of which activity you begin to study, you need to know something about the other activities to which it is related.

Nothing or very little, in arts and culture happens outside the fra-mework of project management: creativity, activities, doings and happenings2. Project management should therefore be conside-red as one of the fundamentals of the successful management of the creative sector; crucial to the long-term sustainability of arts and culture and ensuring a sound and stable environment in which artists can be creative. The performing and visual arts, broadcas-ting, film-making, writing and design for example encompass a range of activities which are economic and need to be managed well to realise effective results.

2 ARTerial Network Project Management Toolkit for Arts and Culture, http://www.arterialnetwork.org/

• Shows, concerts, productions• Festivals of all kinds• Training projects• Craft development projects• Visual arts projects• Exhibitions of all kinds• Commercial arts projects• Filmmaking projects• Design arts projects• Website design projects• Graphic design projects• Arts development projects• Arts/culture conferences• Arts/culture advocacy projects• Arts/culture competitions• Publishing projects• Symposia, conferences, summits on arts and culture

EXAMPLESOF ARTS AND CULTURE PROJECTS


1.2 Ten axioms for success

To help you get started here’s ten truths from Nick Jenkins book “A Project Management Primer”3:

1. Know your goalIt sounds obvious but if you don’t have an end-point in mind, you’ll never get there. You must be able to clearly state the goal of your project so that anyone can understand it. If you can’t adequately describe your goal in a single sentence then your chances of achieving it are pretty slim.

2. Know your team Your team is the most important resource you have available and their enthusiastic contribution will make or break your project. Look after them and make sure the team operates as a unit and not as a collection of individuals. Communications are vital! Invest time in promoting trust and ensuring that everyone knows what they have to contribute to the bigger picture.

3. Know your stakeholders Spend time with your stakeholders. Stakeholders will either contri-bute expert knowledge to the project or will offer their political or commercial endorsement which will be essential to success. Sha-ke hands as necessary and grease the wheels of the bureaucra-tic machine so that your project has the smoothest ride possible.

3 Jenkins, N. (2006). A project management primer. Available at: http://www.nickjenkins.net/prose/projectPrimer.pdf (accessed on 12 March 2014).

4. Spend time on planning and designA big mistake traditionally committed on projects is to leap befo-re you`re are ready. When you`re under pressure to deliver, the temptation is to “get the ball rolling”. The ball however, is big and heavy and it’s very, very difficult to change its direction once it gets moving. You need to spend time deciding exactly how you’re going to solve your problem in the most efficient and elegant way.

5. Promise low and deliver highTry and deliver happy surprises and not unpleasant ones. By pro-mising low (understating your goals) and delivering high (delive-ring more than your promised) you:

• Build confidence in yourself, the project and the team• Buy yourself contingency in the event that things go wrong• Generate a positive and receptive atmosphere

Consider this: if you finish early everyone will be happy; if some-thing goes wrong you might still finish on time and everyone will still be happy; if things go really badly you might still not deliver what you anticipated but it will still be better than if you over-pro-mised!

6. Iterate! Increment! Evolve!Most problems worth solving are too big to swallow in one lump. Any serious project will require some kind of decomposition of the problem in order to solve it. This works but only with close at-tention to how each piece is analysed and resolved and how the whole fits together. Without a systematic approach you end up with a hundred different solutions instead of one big one.


7. Stay on trackPresumably you have an end goal in mind. Maybe it’s your job, ma-ybe your business depends upon it or maybe you’re going to revo-lutionise the world with the next Google, the next World Wide Web or the next Oracle. If this is the case you need to work methodica-lly towards a goal and provide leadership (make decisions). This applies whether you’re a senior project manager running a team of 20 or you’re a lone web developer or photographer. You need to learn to use tools like schedules and budgets to keep on track.

8. Manage changeWe live in a changing world. As your project progresses the temp-tation to deviate from the plan will become irresistible. Stakehol-ders will come up with new and “interesting” ideas, your team will bolt down all kinds of rat holes and your original goal will have all the permanence of a snowflake in quicksand. Scope creep or drift is a major source of project failure and you need to manage or control changes if you want to succeed.

This doesn’t imply that there should be single, immutable plan which is written down and all other ideas must be stifled. You need to build a flexible approach that allows you to accommoda-te changes as they arise. The best way to handle this is to have a plan, to update it regularly and make sure everyone is following it and pointing in the same direction.

9. Test Early, Test OftenProjects usually involve creative disciplines loaded with assump-tions and mistakes. The only way to eliminate errors is through testing. Sure you can do a lot of valuable work to prevent these

mistakes being introduced, but to err is human and some of those errors will make it into your finished product code. Testing is the only way to find and eliminates errors.

10. Keep an open mind!Be flexible! The essential outcome is delivery of the finished pro-ject to a customer who is satisfied with the result. Any means ne-cessary can be used to achieve this and every rule listed above can be broken in the right circumstances, for the right reasons.

What is Project Management?1.3

An official definition of project management, courtesy of the Pro-ject Management Institute, defines the term as: “the application of knowledge, skills, tools and techniques to project activities to meet project requirements.” A more tangible description is that project management is “everything you need to make a project happen on time and within budget to deliver the needed scope and quality”4. Or project management is an endeavour in which human, material and financial resources are organised in a novel way, to undertake a unique scope of work, of given specifica-tions, with constraints of cost and time, so as to achieve beneficial change by quantitative and qualitative objectives”5

4 Williams, M. (2008). The principles of project management. EAS. IN. 5 Turner, J. R. (1998) The handbook of project-based management: Improving the Process for Achieving Strategic Objectives. McGraw-Hill Professional; 3 edition


Meredith and Mantel6 added a new aspect of project manage-ment-the expectations of the client. One client-centred definition of project management is the application of knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to meet or exceed the expectations of the client. This definition focuses on delivering a product or service to the client that meets expectations rather than project specifica-tions. It is possible to meet all project specifications and not meet client expectations or fail to meet one or more specifications and still meet or exceed a client’s expectation.

The primary challenge of project management is to achieve all of the project goals and objectives while honouring the preconcei-ved constraints. The primary constraints are scope, time, quality and budget.

1.3.1 Scope TriangleThis so called “Scope Triangle” illustrates the relationship be-tween three primary forces in a project. Time is the available time to deliver the project, cost represents the amount of money or re-sources available and quality represents the “fit-to-purpose” that the project must achieve to be a success.

In reality the normal situation is that one of these factors is fixed and the other two will vary in inverse proportion to each other. For example “Time” is often fixed in a project and the “Quality” of the end project will depend on the “Cost” or resources available. Similarly if you are working to a fixed level of “Quality” then the “Cost” of the project will largely be dependent upon the “Time” available (if you have longer you can do it with fewer people).

6 Meredith, J. R. and Mantel, Jr.,S.J. (2008). Project Management: A Managerial Approach. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley

1.3.2 ScopeYou have to know what you are trying to do. This seems obvious but lack of clarity in the early stages of a project is very common and causes many problems. Many projects start up with vague or ill defined ideas of what they want to achieve. If you hope to deliver a successful project in a finite amount of time you need to determine the final state your product must achieve, you need to set yourself a concrete goal.

1.3.3 Scope, Visions and GoalsScope is a general term to describe everything that a project en-compasses, everything that must be achieved for the project to

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be complete 7. This would encompass vision, goals and require-ments and would be embodied in documents such as a “project proposal” and at a lower level “commercial specifications” and “technical specifications”.

As regards vision a single encapsulated idea is needed which defines the aim of the project. Why are you doing the project in the first place? What makes a project a project is the fact that it is a standalone task (or set of tasks) that has an intended outcome. When the project is completed, you move on to the next.

Without a single, linking goal all the dependent steps of project planning become difficult to manage. That single vision may be broken up in sub-goals but it provides the link that holds diffe-rent parts of the project together into a single enterprise. It gives your team and stakeholders a sense of purpose and defines the success of your project. Goals are slightly lower-level and more specific than the vision. Goals should directly support the overall vision of the project but refine its definition. While the vision en-compasses the whole project, goals may refer only to the objecti-ves of a particular segment of the project.

Note that the terms scope, vision and goal are largely interchan-geable. Different organisations use them in different contexts to refer to much the same concepts. The definitions set out here are the most commonly used versions. Use the version most appro-priate to you.


Understanding the Project life Cycle 1.4

Projects, by definition, have a beginning and an end. They also have defined phases between the project kick-off and project clo-seout. A phase represents a grouping of similar activities that has a very loosely defined beginning and end. Phases are typically se-quential, where the prior phase is essentially complete before the beginning of the next phase; however, phases do not have clear-cut end dates and some activities in an early phase of the pro-ject will continue into the later phases. This is in contrast to project beginning and ending dates and milestone dates, which do have clearly defined dates with the expectation that these dates will be met (see example for Art Festival in Annex 1).

Project Management is all about management of processes. The-se processes must be clearly defined and well implemented. The project life cycle is fairly simple-first you start the project (called Initiating), then you go on to actually do the project (through the Planning, Executing, and Controlling phases, which form a loop), and finally you finish with everyone happy and a strategy for the future in place (Closing).

http://www.nickjenkins.net/prose/projectPrimer.pdf


FIGURE 1: PROJECT LIFE CyCLE

Most people spend most of the project time working in the Execu-ting and Controlling phases-actually doing the tasks, building the product, and making sure everything is on track. Of course, this work is hugely valuable-without it, there wouldn’t be much point starting the project at all-but these phases aren’t typically where the success or failure of a project is dictated. That happens in the other three phases-Initiating, Planning, and Closing-which makes them the most important phases of all.8

FIGURE 2: GROUP PROCESSES OvERLAP DURING PROJECT MANAGEMENT9

8 Williams, M. (2008). The principles of project management. EAS. IN.9 Jovanovi, P. (2006). Upravljanje projektom, Fakultet organizacionih nauka, Beograd

1.InitiatingGather all relevant information

Determine precisely what the project is about

2.PlanningPlan all actions to be taken

3.ExecutingBring planning into action

4.ControllingMeasure action

against planning

5.ClosingFinaliseReport

Inititating

Beginning Time End

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PlanningExecuting

ControllingClosing


Stage 1: Initiating 1.5

If Initiating isn’t done right, you often end up in a situation where the project team members have very different ideas about the project’s purpose, and eventually disagree about the point at which the project is really finished. The Initiating phase is one of the most important processes in project management, because this is where it all begins10. It is also the process that normally gets the least attention; this shows clearly in the success of the project. This process is primarily about gathering all the information nee-ded to plan and execute the project successfully.

The initiation phase, which Project Management Institute labels “starting the project”, includes all the activities necessary to be-gin planning the project. The initiation phase typically begins with the assignment of the project manager and ends when the pro-ject team has sufficient information to begin developing a detai-led schedule and budget. Activities during the initiation phase include project kick-off meetings, identifying the project team, de-veloping the resources needed to develop the project plan, and identifying and acquiring the project management infrastructure (space, computers)11. On projects where the scope of work for the project is not well defined, the project team will invest time and resources in developing a clearer scope of work. On projects

10 Williams, M. (2008). The principles of project management. EAS. IN.11 Project Management for Instructional Designers. Available at: http://downloads.pm4id.org/pm4id.pdf

where the major project stakeholders are not aligned, the project team will expend resources and time creating stakeholder align-ment.

All the gathered information must be organised into a Project Ini-tiation Document or Project Charter (Annex 2). The Project Initia-tion Document (PID) summarizes the what, how, when, and why of the project. It represents the agreement between all parties on what the project is about and, importantly, why the project is being undertaken.

The PID needs to summarize:

• the project’s objective (what you’re trying to achieve) • the key deliverables (how you’re going to achieve the objective) • the overall rationale for the project (why you’re undertaking it) • the initial timings (when it will be achieved) • the project’s initial organization (who is involved)

Other elements that should be included in the initiation document are key assumptions and constraints, and success criteria. It’s important that the PID be as concise as possible. The shorter the PID, the greater are the chances that the stakeholders will actua-lly read it at the outset, which can smooth the project’s progress over time.

http://downloads.pm4id.org/pm4id.pdf


1.5.1 Setting SMART project objectivesOne of the main points in PID is defining project objectives. The setting of SMART objectives is a useful tool for management at all levels in an organisation. A well-defined and agreed (set of) ob-jective(s) is a necessary pre-cursor to detailed project planning. For the objectives to be useful as an aid to project management they must be12:

• Specific to the project, and within the project. For example the objective: “to improve the efficiency of our interactions with ar-tists.” is too vague. It is really a goal shared by a number of programmes, projects and business as usual activities. On the other hand “to develop relevant communication channels to inform and interact with the local artist in the community.” is a much clearer indication of what the project must do. However it is not yet very measurable.

• Measurable. Measurability will depend on the nature of the ob-jective and may be in terms of such things as performance, cost, effort, % change, amount of time, deliverables, quality levels, numbers of events, agreements, approvals, commen-cement or termination of something, numbers of people/orga-nisations, a benefit to be achieved within the life of the project etc. The example above might be made measurable by saying “increase ArtGuide list sign ups through.

• Achievable. It must be possible to achieve the objective in practical terms and also within whatever time target has been set (see Time bound below). You might need to consi-der constraints of technology, people and processes when

12 Guidelines for Managing Projects (2007) Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform

assessing achievability. You should be realistic without being too conservative - project objectives will often be challenging. Objectives must also be relevant to the bigger picture of the environment within which the project is running.

• Relevant. Is the objective consistent with, and does it contribu-te towards, the goal/objective at the next level up (Programme, Departmental, Organisation)? Make sure the project, or some part of it has not been influenced by an agenda that is not alig-ned with the organisation’s core purpose.

• Time Bound (and, perhaps Trackable). It is useful to have a target date by which each objective should be achieved. So-metimes there will be one date that applies to most or all ob-jectives. In other cases each project objective may require its own time frame. Setting interim time targets may also be use-ful for certain types of objective. This will make the objective trackable so that you can measure whether or not you are on course to achieve it and hence can take early action if not. The following example is both time bound and trackable: “Increase the number of gallery visitors who purchase (in person or onli-ne) by 20% from 2013 figure by June 30, 2014 and by further 10% by December 31, 2014“.

1.5.2 The Kick- off Meeting The kick-off meeting is more of a best practice than a tool. It’s es-sentially a meeting at which you bring together the key players in the project to officially get the project started. Usually this will take at least a couple of hours, but you should judge an appropriate timeframe based on the complexity of your project.


TipThe Seven Essentials of Highly Successful Project InitiationsProject managers know that successful projects most often start with successful beginnings. Before actual project implementa-tion, the mix of the project, people, tools, and approaches could either spell success... or disaster. Project Initiation is that critical stage of the project where information about the nature of the pro-ject, why the project exists, who is involved, and how the project will be delivered must be laid down. Meri Williams, author of “The Principles of Project Management” (2008) cites seven best prac-tices for a successful project initiation:1. Choose projects that are important to the organisation and to its future. Ask whether your project takes your organisa-tion in the right direction.2. Make sure that you have appropriate resources for your project. Ensure that you have the right mix of people, ideas, practices, technologies, sponsors, budget and schedule.3. Include the people who are affected by, and interested in your project. Stakeholders must be able to voice their opinions about the project and provide succinct ideas about whether or not the project matters. The more the project members are pro-fessionally and personally involved in the project, the better it is for everyone.4. Set up a project board with the necessary members at the beginning of the project. A project board (or a steering com-mittee or advisory panel) must be composed of the people who, on top of knowing the right answers, must also ask the right questions. More importantly, you should appoint people who are not afraid to make difficult decisions.

5. Create a Project Initiation Document (PID) and review it with the project team, board members, and key stakehol-ders. Although it may be inevitable that certain aspects of your project will change over time, your PID must record the pro-ject’s very basic information, such as objectives, deliverables, schedules, and initial organisation. These items do not have to be written in detail as a high-level view of the most important facts is all that is needed.6. Get your project started with a kick-off meeting. You have identified the when, what, where, how, and how much of your project. Now it is time to have a meeting so that you can com-municate the answers to all members of the project. It is also at the kick-off meeting where you can make sure that individual members’ objectives for, and knowledge about, the project are aligned with those of the organisation.7. Create a communications plan that outlines who needs to be kept informed about your project’s progress and how you plan to communicate with those people. Your communi-cation plan should consider who should be included in gene-ral and specific communications. Moreover, your plan should identify communication cycles, schedules, and modes of com-munication e-mails, conference calls, and so on.


Stage 2: Planning1.6The planning phase, which PMI labels “organizing and prepa-ring,” includes the development of more detailed schedules and a budget. The planning also includes developing detailed staffing, procurement, and project controls plans. The emphasis of the planning phase is to develop an understanding of how the project will be executed and a plan for acquiring the resources needed to execute it. Although much of the planning activity takes place during the planning phase, the project plan will continue to be ad-justed to respond to new challenges and opportunities. Planning activities occur during the entire life of the project.

1.6.1 The Elements of a Project PlanEvery project planning methodology has its own specific taxo-nomy and names for its parts. But in a very broad sense the mini-mum elements a project plan must specify are13 :

• What is to be done: what is desired of the project and what it must deliver to succeed

• When it needs to be done by: the deadlines by which the objec-tives must be met

• Who is to do it: The people or the team who are to deliver those objectives. This also usually implies costs since in most pro-jects the application of costs implies the use of skilled labour

• How it is to be achieved: This is normally in documents such as a technical specification


1.6.2 The Fine Art of SchedulingIn truth the art of scheduling is based on experience and the more experience you have, the more accurate your schedule will be. However, you can still produce an accurate schedule by following some simple rules.

1.6.2.1 The Format of Project Schedules

MilestonesIn a project, “milestones” usually denote the completion of sig-nificant portions of the project or the transition from one phase to another. At each milestone there will be “deliverables” which must be completed to move on to the next phase. A complex project may involve different levels of scheduling. You might work on a weekly schedule with high level milestones while other team members will have smaller scale schedules with finer grade mi-lestones. In the Annex 3 you can see example of simple and com-plex time scheduling.

The Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)WBS is a hierarchical decomposition of the project into pha-ses, deliverables and work packages. In a project, the WBS is developed by starting with the end objective and successively subdividing it into manageable components in terms of size, duration, and responsibility which include all steps necessary to achieve the objective. The WBS is organised around the pri-mary products of the project (or planned outcomes) instead of the work needed to produce the products (planned actions).



An important design principle for work breakdown structures is called the 100% rule. The 100% rule states that the WBS includes 100% of the work defined by the project scope and captures all deliverables – internal, external, interim – in terms of the work to be completed, including project management. The rule applies at

all levels within the hierarchy: the sum of the work at the “child” level must equal 100% of the work represented by the “parent” and the WBS should not include any work that falls outside the actual scope of the project, that is, it cannot include more than 100% of the work…

FIGURE 3: THE WBS CONSTRUCTION TECHNIqUE EMPLOyING THE 100% RULE (SOURCE: WIkIPEDIA)

WEBS LEVEL 1

1.Bicycle 100

WEBS LEVEL 2

1.Bicycle1.1 Frame Set 15

1.2 Crank Set 5

1.3 Wheels 30

1.4 Braking System 5

1.5 Shifting System 5

1.6 Integration 35

1.7 Project Mgt 5

100

WEBS LEVEL 3

1.Bicycle1.1 Frame Set

1.1.1 frame 71.1.2 Handlebar 21.1.3 Fork 31.1.4 Seat 3

1.2 Crank Set 51.3 Wheels

1.3.1 Front Wheel 131.3.2 Rear Wheel 17

1.4 Braking System 51.4 Shifting System 51.4 Integration

1.6.1 Concept 31.6.2 Design 51.6.3 Assembly 101.6.4 Testing 17

1.4 Project Mgt 5

100


Gantt chartOne useful tool available to project managers is a Gantt chart. This is simply a visual representation of a schedule. In a Gantt chart, time is represented along a horizontal axis and tasks listed down the left-hand side. The duration of a task is then represen-ted in the body of the graph by a horizontal bar. Milestones are usually represented by single points or diamonds. Dependencies between tasks are also shown as linked arrows. An arrow indica-tes the necessary order of completion for each task and therefore the progress of the project.

In the above diagram you can also note that “Web site design” has been broken down into three sub phases. Delivery of the “In-terface”, “Navigation” and “Content development” have all been estimated separately to come up with the overall estimate for the Website design phase and delivery of the Beta version milestone. Note that either different people are working on the “Interface” and “Navigation” (since they are happening in parallel) or someo-ne is working overtime!

FIGURE 4: GANTT CHART

Component/week 01 02 02 04 05 06 07 08 09 10

Scope and Plan

Tech. Requirments

Web site design

Interface

Navigation

Content development

Beta version


1.6.3 Costing and BudgetingAccounting, costing and budgeting are extensive topics in them-selves and I will not attempt to cover all them here. Instead we will focus on the specific application of costing and budgeting to projects and attempt to give you grounding in the necessary terminology and principles.

1.6.3.1 CostingAt a basic level the process of costing is reasonably simple. You draw up a list of all your possible expenditure and put a numerical value against each item; the total therefore represents the tangi-ble cost of your project. You may also however need to consider “intangible” items.

Tangible costs• Capital Expenditure: any large asset of the project which is

purchased outright. This usually includes plant, hardware, sof-tware and sometimes buildings although these can be accoun-ted for in a number of ways.

• Lease costs: some assets are not purchased outright but are leased to spread the cost over the life of the project. These should be accounted for separately to capital expenditure since the project or company does not own these assets.

• Staff costs: all costs for staff must be accounted for and this in-cludes (but is not limited to): salary and pension costs, insuran-ce costs, recruitment costs, anything which can be tied directly to employing, training and retaining staff.

• Professional services: all large-scale projects require the input of one or more professional groups such as lawyers or accoun-tants. These are normally accounted for separately since a close watch needs to be kept upon expenditure in this area. Without scrutiny the costs of a consultant engineer, accountant or lawyer can quickly dwarf other costs.

• Supplies and consumables: regular expenditure on supplies is often best covered by a single item in your budget under which these figures are accrued. They are related to overhead below.

• One-off costs: one-off costs apply to expenditure which is not related to any of the above categories but occurs on an irregu-lar basis. Staff training might be an example. While it might be appropriate to list this under staff costs you might wish to track it independently as an irregular cost.

• Overheads sometime called indirect costs, these are costs which are not directly attributable to any of the above catego-ries but never-the-less impact upon your budget. For example it may not be appropriate to reflect the phone bill for your project in staff costs, yet this still has to be paid and accounted for. Costing for overheads is usually done as a rough percentage of one of the other factors such as “staff costs” or as a definite percentage (for example 7%) of the overall project budget.


Intangible costsIt has become fashionable to account for “intangible” assets on the balance sheets of companies and possibly also projects. The argument goes like this: some contributions to a project are ex-tremely valuable but cannot necessarily have a tangible value associated with them. Should you then account for them in the budget or costing? Typical things you might place in the budget under intangibles are “goodwill” and “intellectual property”. Per-sonnel-related figures are a frequent source of intangible assets and so you might find things like “management team”, “relations-hips” and “contacts” on an intangibles balance sheet.

1.6.3.2 BudgetingOnce you have costed your project you can then prepare an appropriate budget to secure the requisite funds and plan your cash flow over the life of the project. Costing and budgeting fo-llow the iterative life cycle as do other tasks within the project. As you refine your design, so you will need to refine the costing which is based upon it.

As in scheduling, you need to build in adequate contingency (re-serves) to account for unexpected expenditure. For example, if due to a failure in the critical path a task is delayed and a miles-tone (like software purchase) falls due in the month after it was scheduled. This can wreck your carefully planned cash flow. But if you have carefully budgeted your project then variations should be relatively easy to spot and cope with as they arise.

1.6.4 Risk ManagementRisk management needs to happen throughout the lifespan of the project, from inception to its completion. The consequences of not managing risk from the project initiation stage could prove more costly further down the line the more one is vested in the project i.e. the more resources-time, money, human capital -com-mitted to the project. Risk management is concerned with future events whose exact outcome is unknown. In general, these out-comes can either be favourable or unfavourable to your project. Risk management is the art and science of planning, assessing (identifying and analysing), handling, and monitoring actions to ensure favourable outcomes. For example if there is a probability of a loss of power on a film shoot, a generator will be on location. This will minimise the amount of filming time that is lost in the event of a power failure.

1.6.4.1 Risk ProfilesRisk to a project can be measured on two major axes: likelihood of failure and impact of failure. The more likely a problem is to occur, the more risk it poses to the project. Even fairly minor pro-blems or issues can become a threat to the project if they occur so frequently that they can’t be avoided. Similarly, the impact or consequences of a problem are also important. Some problems can stop a project in its tracks all by themselves.

Many systems exist for categorising risks into different categories but the one presented here is fairly simple. In this system each risk item is qualified on two scales: likelihood and impact. Each scale is divided into two simple categories of “low” or “high” and risks are rated according to each scale.


FIGURE 5: RISk PRzOFILES

A “critical” issue represents one that will stop the project in its tracks and must be dealt with immediately. “Major” risks represent a significant threat to the project because of their frequency or because of the seriousness of their impact; these threats usually have to be dealt with as soon as possible. The third category of risks are “minor” risks which are neither likely nor particularly se-rious and can be left until others have been dealt with. In Annex 4 you can see how to record the Risks.

1.6.5 Change ManagementA project of any significant length will necessarily deviate from its original plan in response to circumstances. This is fine as long as the change is understood. If the change is not managed but is happens at a whim, it is no longer a project, it`s anarchy!

Change management is a way of assessing the implications of potential changes and managing the impact on your project. For example a change in client requirements might mean a minor fix or it might mean a complete re-write of the design. Change ma-nagement gives you a process to evaluate this and introduce the change in a controlled fashion.

Major

Minor

Critical

Major

HIG

HlO

W

lOW HIGH

lIkElIHOOD


Stage 3: Executing1.7

The project takes shape during the Executing phase (“carrying out the work” in PMI terminology). This phase includes the ma-jor activities needed to accomplish the work of the project. On a construction project, this would include the design and construc-tion activities. On an information technology project, this would in-clude the development of the software code. On a training project, this would include the development and delivery of the training. There’s really just one rule for the Executing phase of the project: Each and every deliverable needs to have an owner.14 Each and every deliverable or milestone, each page that needs to be built, each database that must be configured, each design that must dazzle, needs to be owned by one person. That individual is per-sonally responsible and accountable for making it happen.

That’s not to say that each deliverable is only worked on by one person, but that there has to be someone in the team who feels committed to getting that design created, page written, or feature built. That person will coordinate the work of the others involved, escalate issues to the project manager if it looks like things are going off-track, and ask for help when it’s needed.

14 Williams, M. (2008). The principles of project management. EAS. IN.

Stage 4: Controlling1.8

The Controlling phase of the project life cycle is all about unders-tanding how you’re doing, tracking your progress, and adapting to changing circumstances.

When we were planning the project, we planned deliverables, not tasks. This means that we are able simply to track whether something is completed or not, rather than worrying about the percentage of each task that’s complete. During execution, we’ve given ownership of discrete deliverables to just one person, so that individual is the ultimate authority on whether or not we’re on track to deliver that element on time.

1.8.1 Managing PeopleIt is not often recognised that a project manager must be a people manager as well. Most project managers excel at the technical aspects of project management such as scheduling, design and testing. Many, however, are weak or uncomfortable with the core management disciplines which deal with ‘soft skills’. This section will give an overview of some important people skills for the pro-ject manager.

1.8.1.1 NegotiationNegotiation is the process of achieving consensus while avoiding conflict. Central to this is the understanding that the best solution to a problem is one which attracts the consensus of all those in-


volved. Finding the best solution will involve compromises and the project manager will be the focal point around which the dis-cussions between different parties revolve.

Negotiating is a skill which anyone can learn, although some will find it easier and more natural than others. It is not the ‘black art’ of tricks and stunts that it is sometimes made out to be. There are techniques, but behind the techniques lie an attitude: your attitu-de to negotiating may be one of the following.

• It is a game of win and lose and I’m frightened I’m going to lose.• It is a game of win and lose and I’m going to win at all costs.• I’m looking for a fair deal for everyone.

Even if you would like your attitude to be the third one, a flavour of the first two often lurks in the subconscious mind of many ne-gotiators. The first attitude leads people to accept poor deals, although the negotiator may be able to invent reasons why they should be considered acceptable. The second attitude leads ne-gotiators to crush their opposite number even when no ‘victory’ is needed. So think about your underlying attitude to negotiating and also think about what actually happens when you negotiate, just to be sure.

1.8.1.2 Building a teamWince if you must at the title of this section, but one of the most important facets of project management is “team building”. Ra-ther than the fatuous team building games you often encounter at company days, I am referring to some more subtle people mana-gement skills.

Trust – Be Open and Honest. Be as open and honest with your team mates as you can. Answer their questions directly and act as a conduit of information for them, not a barrier. If you feel you cannot divulge something, say so. Your team will appreciate your honestly and reciprocate by relaying information and producing honest and accurate estimates for you.

Equality – Be fair and even handed. In public you should dish out credit wherever it is due but never criticism. Being criticised in public, in front of your peers, is not a motivating force for anyone. Open discussion of the problem will encourage the team to take ownership for the problem and solve it themselves.

Loyalty – Protect your team. You will have a split responsibility - on the one hand you have a duty to your client to see the pro-ject succeeds - on the other you have a responsibility to repre-sent your team and to support each other. Usually these two aims should be neatly aligned – but not always!

Learn to delegate. Proper delegation entails laying out the task so someone understand it, so that it has reasonable and achievable goals and so that you give them all the support they require to get the job done. It also entails giving them enough room to get the task done on their own. If you leave the execution of tasks to them they will, in return, leave you alone to get on with your job.Reward collaboration. Members of your team need to feel that they’ll be rewarded for helping each other. These rewards don’t need to be anything as big as a salary incentive -simply acknowle-dging the team member’s individual contributions publicly as and when they’re made is enough to show the value of their work.


Reward collaboration. Members of your team need to feel that they’ll be rewarded for helping each other. These rewards don’t need to be anything as big as a salary incentive -simply ack-nowledging the team member’s individual contributions publicly as and when they’re made is enough to show the value of their work.

1.8.1.3 Group developmentTuckman reviewed about fifty studies of group development in the mid-sixties and synthesized their commonalities in one of the most frequently cited models of group development15. The mo-del describes four linear stages (forming, storming, norming, and performing) that a group will go through in its unitary sequence of decision making. A fifth stage (adjourning) was added in 1977 when a new set of studies were reviewed 16.

Stage 1: FormingIn the first stage of team building, the forming of the team takes place. The individual’s behaviour is driven by a desire to be ac-cepted by the others, and avoid controversy or conflict. Serious issues and feelings are avoided, and people focus on being busy with routines, such as team organization, who does what, when to meet each other, etc. Individuals are also gathering information and impressions – about each other, and about the scope of the task and how to approach it 17.

15 Tuckman, B. W. (1965). Developmental sequence in small groups. Psychological Bulletin, 63, 384-399. 16 Tuckman, B. W. & Jensen, M. A. (1977). Stages of small-group development revisited. Group Org. Studies 2:419-2717 Source Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuckman’s_stages_of_group_development

Stage 2: StormingEvery group will next enter the storming stage in which different ideas compete for consideration. The team addresses issues such as what problems they are really supposed to solve, how they will function independently and together and what leaders-hip model they will accept. Team members open up to each other and confront each other’s ideas and perspectives. In some cases storming can be resolved quickly. In others, the team never lea-ves this stage.

FIGURE 6: TUCkMAN’S STAGES OF GROUP DEvELOPMENT

FOC

US

ON

TH

E TA

SkRElATIONSHIP

Forming

Storming

Norming

Performing

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuckman�s_stages_of_group_development


Stage 3: NormingThe team manages to have one goal and come to a mutual plan for the team at this stage. Some may have to give up their own ideas and agree with others to make the team function. In this stage, all team members take the responsibility and have the am-bition to work for the success of the team’s goals. The danger here is that members may be so focused on preventing conflict that they are reluctant to share controversial ideas.

Stage 4: PerformingIt is possible for some teams to reach the performing stage. These high-performing teams can function as a unit as they find ways to get the job done smoothly and effectively without inappropriate conflict or the need for external supervision. By this time, they are motivated and knowledgeable. The team members are now competent, autonomous and able to handle the decision-making process without supervision.

Stage 5: Adjourning The final stage that teams experience is adjourning-the team is disbanded, usually when the project is completed. Often indivi-duals will have built up strong relationships with other team mem-bers, and may stay in contact long after the initial team has been disbanded.

1.8.2 Effective Leadership and Management A project manager has two roles-one as manager, coordinating the efforts on the project, the other as leader, making sure that the project delivers the right results. Hersey and Blanchard develo-ped a model for understanding how people’s needs for direction and management differ depending on the situation they’re in. In the same way, the style of the manager or leader should change to fit what individuals need most from them18. The leadership and management behaviour types defined by Hersey and Blanchard are illustrated in Figure 6.

FIGURE 7: SITUATIONAL LEADERSHIP MODEL

18 Paul Hersey, kenneth Blanchard and Dewey Johnson. Management of Organizational Behavior, Prentice Hall, New Jersey 2000.

1Supportin

3Delegating

2Coachin

4Directin

Low

Low

high

highSu

ppor

tive

beha

viou

rDirective behaviour


There are four main styles of behaviour leadership and manage-ment:

1.Directing involves close supervision, defining roles and tasks in detail, and telling the team member what to do and how to do it. 2.Coaching, which is more interactive, entails helping the team member to come up with his or her own ideas and follow them through, but still required you to define roles and the broad approach. 3.Supporting. With this style, day-to-day decisions (such as which tasks to complete) rest with the team member; the manager participates in those decisions on an as-needed. 4.Delegating. Wholesale pieces of work are given to the team member to own; that team member chooses if and when to invol-ve the manager.

Team members can be at a variety of developmental levels:

• D1: Low Competence, High Commitment. The team member is keen and motivated, but lacks some of the knowledge or skills required. • D2: Some Competence, Low Commitment. The team member has some skills, but still needs some help and direction, and may lack motivation. • D3: High Competence, Variable Commitment. The team mem-ber is experienced, and has all the right skills, but might lack the confidence or motivation to just “go it alone.” • D4: High Competence, High Commitment. The team member is experienced, confident and motivated-possibly even more skilled than the manager in the relevant arena.

D1Low

Competence

High Commitment

D2Low to Some Competence

Low Commitment

D3Moderate to

High Competence

Variable Commitment

D4High

Competence

High Commitment

FIGURE 8: DEvELOPMENT LEvEL OF THE INDIvIDUAL


Stage 5: Closing1.9

Williams19 listed four step processes in closing your project: review, agree, complete, and celebrate.

1.9.1 Review The first step in closing is to review the project, presenting the product or process that has been delivered. Your focus should be on the success criteria that were agreed in the Initiating phase, and were revisited regularly when changes were made during the Planning, Executing, and Controlling phases. Your project review (which will typically be a meeting, as we’ll discuss below) should essentially answer four questions: • Has the project come in on or under budget? • Has the project been delivered on time? • Has the project delivered the required scope? • Has the project been delivered to the required standard of

quality?

19 Williams, M. (2008). The principles of project management. EAS. IN.

1.9.2 Agree The next step is to gain agreement on exactly what remains to be done before the project can be officially closed. Typical deliverables at this stage would be documentation, training for those who will perform the new process or support the product, and administrative tasks such as completing final budget recon-ciliations.

1.9.3 Complete The next stage is to complete the final tasks and deliverables that were agreed to. How well you execute this point is going to heavily influence people’s perceptions of how the project was handled, so it’s important to pay attention to detail.

1.9.4 Celebrate Last, but certainly not least, it’s important to celebrate the end of the project! It’s easy for projects to fizzle out as they’re comple-ted, for the new process or product to become the status quo for the stakeholders, for the project board’s attention to be diverted elsewhere, and for project team members to float off to their next projects or assignments.


Annexes1.10

Annex 1: Work plan for Visual Art Festival

Visual Art Festival April 2014 - March 2014 APR MAy JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOv DEC JAN FEB MAR

Evaluation and Narrative Reports, VAF13

Staff appraisals, crew certificates

Negotiate Principal Sponsorship, VAF 2014-16

Financial Reports, VAF13

Design and print postcards, VAF14

Design and print posters (1), VAF14

Call for Artists, VAF14

Planning and Budgeting, VAF14

Fundraising sponsors, VAF14

Financial Audits, FY2014-15



Newsletter - Final Call for Artists

Fundraising donors, VAF14

Recruit Press Officer

Staff Training And Development

Selection of artists, VAF14

Assessment

Negotiate contracts with shortlisted artists, VAF14

Open meeting with government & business leaders

Contracts for rental of ve-nues & equipment, VAF14

Planning and Budget Review, VAF14

Newsletter - Announcing List of artists

Workshop - artistic, mana-gement or technical (tbc)

Recruitment of festival crew, VAF14



Preparations for film screenings and projections

Flights, Visas & Accommo-dation logistics, VAF14

Newsletter - Final Countdown

Design & Printing - festival timetables, programmes

Event licenses, artists’ visa and work permits

Street promotion, radio advertising, media campaigns

Plan for 2014 Festival Impact Assessment

Street exhibition

Movers & Shakers networking forum

Visual Art Festival, 8 - 12 February

Documentation, Evalua-tion and Donor Reports


Annex 2: Template of a Project Initiation Document (PID)20

Preparation Information:Project name:

Prepared by:

Signature: Date prepared:

Version Nº:

Project Manager/Team leader InformationName of Project Manager:

Telephone numbers: Email:

Client InformationName of Company/Org:

Contact person:

Telephone numbers: Email:

20 Adapted from ARTerial Network Project Management Toolkit for Arts and Culture

1. Background/Summary of Project

This should briefly describe where the idea for your project came from and how it has been developed. This needs to be short and snappy and tell the reader in just a few sentences what the project is and z: What is going to happen? Why is the project happening? Proof of Viability and Feasibility?

2. Project objective

Your PID should include your main project aims and objectives. It is easiest to just put them in bullet points, that way they stand out on the page and are easily referred to. Don’t try and do too much with your project, keep to no more than four or five aims / objectives – if you try and achieve too much you will end up diluting all your aims / objectives and risk not achieving them.Relevant question: What do we want to achieve?

3. Project deliverables

Here, you just need to give an idea of the biggest chunks of work to be done. Try to make sure that no deliverable will take longer than a month to complete, though-if you’re still looking at phases of three months or more, break those phases into a little more detail.Relevant question: How we’re going to achieve the objective?

4.(optional) Assumptions that have been made:


5.(optional) Constraints

What could slow this project down or stop it?

6.Timeline

In your PID you will need to outline a rough timeline for your project, with key milestones for you to work towards. It will most likely change as you advance through your project and you will most likely experience what is called ‘slippage’ which basically means you are behind schedule – this is not usually a bad thing unless it interferes with the timescales and deadlines of your funders.

7. Funding / budget

In this section you will need to outline two things. First of all your draft costings for the project, itemised where possible, and then where you intend to get the money from own funds, grant fun-ding, sponsorship, etc… It is important to recognise that both your project budget and where you get the money from may change as you progress further through your project planning.

8. Project organisationExplains who’s involved in the project and where they fit in the overall organizational, or project, plan. First you’d include your-self, the project manager, with the project team linked in benea-th. You report to the project board, which is led by the project sponsor. Depending on the specifics of your project, you will li-kely then group the remaining stakeholders into their respective areas (for instance, end users and IT staff).

Annex 3a: Project Schedule Simple Example

Milestone Milestone

Project starts 01 Jan

Complete scope and plan 10 Jan

Specify requirements 21 Jan

Production 1 Mar

Implementation 8 Mar

Review 15 Mar

A simple development project is shown which lists all of its major milestones. There is no contingency scheduled between tasks which could lead to complications or failure of the project to deli-ver on time.


Annex 3a: Project Schedule Complex Example

Phase Start Finish Duration Deliverable

Scope and plan 01 Jan 10 Jan 7 days Project

proposal

Specify requirements 13 Jan 24 Jan 10 days Requirements

spec.

Production phase 1 3 Feb 14 Feb 10 days Alpha

Production phase 2 24 Feb 7 Mar 10 days Beta

Production phase 3 17 Mar 28 Mar 10 days Final candidate

Acceptance testing 7 Apr 11 Apr 5 days Release

system

Implementa-tion 21 Apr 25 Apr 5 days -

Launch 28 Apr 28 Apr 0 days -

Total 67 days -

A project is broken down into a number of phases and the start and finish of each phase is recorded separately. Columns have also been added to include the duration of each phase and the deliverables to be completed at the end of that phase. This new project schedule includes three scheduled iterations of the pro-duction cycle of design-develop-evaluate. The deliverables for these production cycles are an “alpha”, “beta” and “final” version of the system. The first thing to note is that the “Duration” column does not match the number of calendar days between the sche-duled start and finish dates. This is because the duration column indicates the number of working days between the two dates. For example in 2003, while there are 10 calendar days from the 1st of January to the 10th of January (inclusive) there are only 7 working days due to the fact that the 1st is a public holiday, New Year’s Day, and the 5th and the 6th are a weekend .

The next important point to note is that the phases of the pro-ject no longer occur contiguously. That is, there are distinct gaps between some phases of the project. For example between the specification of requirements (which concludes on the 24th of January) and the commencement of the first production phase (on the 3rd of Feb) there are 5 working days unaccounted for. These days are held in reserve by the project as contingency.

How much contingency to include is a matter of experience. As a rule of thumb 10-20% is normal, although more is not uncommon. Take as much as you think your project can live with.


Annex 3c: Example of an Event timeline for an exhibition21

Six months to a year ahead• Define exhibition/ curatorial approach - this may be conceptual

in the case of a curator, or if a solo show, more about objectives• Create an estimated budget and get approval• Contract artist/s• Organise monthly critical assessment meetings to track pro-

gress• Select the date, but before confirming it, clear the date with im-

portant participants and double - check for conflicts with other major functions

• Recruit event team• Draw up preliminary guest list categories. Begin collecting ad-

dresses for save-the-date mailing• Select the theme• Select and reserve exhibition space• Develop an appropriate rain plan if the event is to be held out-

doors –for example if the opening function and speeches are outdoors. An outdoor exhibition including stone sculptures will be rain-friendly

• Choose a caterer• Reserve rental equipment: sound systems, screens, lights, ta-

bles, chairs, tents, etc.• Confirm a master of ceremonies and the program speakers

21 ARTerial Network Project Management Toolkit for Arts and Culture

• Make preliminary security arrangements• Check and confirm insurance coverage for your event if appli-

cable• Get all necessary administrative approvals• Plan promotion and publicity

Three to six months ahead• Finalize image selection and sizes/paper etc., to include in

specific selection of media images. This could be done by the curatorial people/person and should include the artist.

• Develop exhibition text (perhaps for vinyl, press release, ac-companying pamphlet, publication)

• Visit framers for framing selection and order according to sizes• Have images scanned/graded• Print image proofs• Sign-off on the agreed images• Finalize and get approval of the guest list for the opening of the

exhibition• Prepare mailing labels• Select menus for canape’s / snacks or light supper; submit

them for approval• Keep all relevant role players informed of your plans, and ask

for their support• Begin publicity• Begin creating a logistical outline to document all arrange-

ments as they are decided on and confirmed


Two months ahead• Send signed work to printers for printing• Send out invitations 4 - 6 weeks prior to event• Check that the space is prepared accordingly painted if needs

be; equipment checked e.g. air conditioning , sound system, IT equipment check that its working properly, establish what software is needed

• Double-check the extra help that will be needed including ex-hibition tour guides

• Make direction and welcome signs• Send work to framers at the end of this month• Design and order vinyl• Order captions

Two to four weeks ahead• Vinyl check – spelling – check the “missing dots on the i”• Installation of images and vinyl• Lighting rearrangement checked and done accordingly• Record and acknowledge RSVPs as they are received• Mail out confirmation tickets, parking permits, if necessary• Double-check publicity progress. Revise and update plans if

necessary.• Send detailed instructions to all program participants and

speakers• Finalize details with caterer, rental company, and all vendors• Write speeches and introductions if necessary• Create a running order (timing schedule) for the opening of the

exhibition

One week ahead• Prepare the briefing pack (press kit) for the media• Brief the speakers – especially with the biography of the artist/s

and the final running order of the exhibition opening• Ensure all protocol and security arrangements in place for any

dignitaries or VIP’s• Make catering guarantees (i.e. how many people have rsvp’d

and what the final catering numbers are)• Exhibition hanging completed

The big day• Arrive early• Bring the logistical outline, phone numbers of service provi-

ders, running order of the exhibition opening• Be ready no later than 1 hour prior to the start of the opening

Event

After the event (the exhibition opening)• Send thank you notes to staff, volunteers and vendors• Finalize billing and prepare final budget

After the exhibition closes:• Conduct exhibition debriefing to determine success, shortco-

mings and ways to improve in the future• Report writing: with final expenditure. Send to appropriate

people


Annex 4: Recording risksThe simplest way of recording risks is with a table or spreadsheet that lists the risks and their priorities. This can then be regularly reviewed by the project team and action taken appropriately to mitigate or eliminate those risks. Below is an example of a sample risk table for a project:

Description Frequency/Impact

Severity Timeframe Action

Short-term absence of key team

High/Low Major Project Accept

Members Low/High Major Project ReduceLong-term absence of key team

Low/Low Minor Phase 1 Accept

Incorrect scheduling High/High Critical Project Reduce

... ... ... ... ...

In the above table, failure by suppliers to deliver some compo-nents has been rated as a minor risk. This sort of judgement can only be made on the basis of experience and within the context of the current project. If the supplier is well known and trusted, then the likelihood of them delivering late is likely to be low and hence the risk can be classified as minor.

Labelling scheduling as a critical area of project risk is also an outcome of experience. If previous projects of a similar nature have run-over due to scheduling problems then it is highly likely that this project will suffer a similar problem. Here, too, you can see the benefits of having a separate risk-management officer since it is unlikely a project manager, however honest, would rate his own scheduling abilities as “high” risk.


Activities1.11

1. IntroductionIndividual work:1. What is project management? How would you define it using

your words?2. What is a project? Use your language to define it. Did you

participate in any project? Describe it?3. What are common project characteristics?4. List some examples of projects in Arts and Culture or present

some of your project ideas.

2. Ten Axioms for Success. Activities.Individual work:1. List and explain some of the Axioms for Success2. Why is it important to know the project goal? What could ha-

ppen if the project manager or the team does not know pro-ject goals? What is the best way to introduce project goals to the team?

3. Why is team communication important? What are the advan-tages of written and what of oral communication?

4. Is flexibility needed for successful project management?

3.What Is Project Management?Individual work:1. What is the Scope Triangle? How the variation of one of the

factors influences the change of others?2. Define Scope, Goal and Vision.

4.Understanding the Project Life Cycle Individual work:1. Define phases of the Project Life Cycle (use the figure “Pro-

ject Life Cycle” as an additional material from the Student’s book)

2. Draw a Project Life Cycle graph and explain duration of each phase (use the figure “Group processes overlap during pro-ject management” and the example for Art Festival from the Student’s book).

5.Stage 1: InitiatingIndividual work:1. Why is it important to identify risks at the beginning of a project? 2. What are SMART objectives?

Group ActivityProject teams will be established at this point. Student teams will start developing own projects: develop the project’s objec-tives, requirements, constraints, assumptions, milestones, and cost estimate. This is a teacher led activity, where the teacher explains each element and asks the students to identify those elements within the projects.


1. Each group should define own project goal taking care about “The Seven Essentials of Highly Successful Project Initiations” tips

2. Practise a kick-off meeting in groups. Define all roles and tas-ks in each group.

3. Define project objectives according to SMART rules4. Create Project Initiation Document (Use Template of a Project

Initiation Document from the Student’s book)

6. Stage 2: PlanningGroup ActivityContinue with the teams organized in the previous session. 1. Project teams should define own Project Plan (continue wor-

king on Template of the Project Initiation Document from Stu-dent’s book)

2. Practice WBS and Gantt chart on own project (use MS Pro-ject or some free tool. For example http://www.ganttproject.biz/ or http://www.smartdraw.com/software/projectchart.asp)

3. Develop a budget for own project (use MS Excel or some other software for developing a budget)

4. Define all types of risks for own project (use template for Re-cording risks from the Student’s book)

7. Stage 3: ExecutingGroup Activity1. Simulate implementations of the projects. Develop different

possible scenarios for project implementation.

8. Stage 4: ControllingIndividual work:1. Discuss four main styles of behaviour leadership and mana-

gement

Group Activity1. Continue with simulating implementation of the project2. Practise the following exercises: Negotiation process and/or

Building a team

9.Stage 5: ClosingGroup Activity1. Review the following questions for each student team work:

A.Has the project come in on or under budget? B.Has the project been delivered on time? C.Has the project delivered the required scope? D.Has the project been delivered to the required standard of quality?

2. Prepare presentation of own project and present it to other groups (use PowerPoint or some other tool for the presenta-tion).

http://www.ganttproject.biz/

http://www.ganttproject.biz/

http://www.smartdraw.com/software/projectchart.asp)


bibliography1.12

• ARTerial Network Project Management Toolkit for Arts and Culture, http://www.arterialnetwork.org/

• Darnall, R., & Preston, J. M. (2010). Project Management from Simple to Complex, Available at: http://goo.gl/M2sbri (accessed on 10 March 2014)

• Guidelines for Managing Projects (2007) Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform

• Hersey, P., Blanchard, K. and Johnson, D. (2000) Management of Organizational Behavior, Prentice Hall, New Jersey

• Jenkins, N. (2006). A project management primer. Available at: http://www.nickjenkins.net/prose/projectPrimer.pdf (acces-sed on 12 March 2014)

• Jovanović, P. (2006). Upravljanje projektom, Fakultet organi-zacionih nauka, Beograd

• Meredith, J. R. and Mantel, Jr.,S.J. (2008). Project Manage-ment: A Managerial Approach. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley

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PROJECT SUPPORTED By:

THIS PROJECT HAS BEEN FUNDED WITH SUPPORT FROM THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION

Project management module (advanced level)

Education

project plan

role of project management

project life cycle

project team members

format of project schedules

risk management

change management

exhibition annex