Once a project is started, unforeseen circumstances may arise that jeopardize the achievement of the project objective with respect to scope, cost, or schedule. Here are a few examples:
►The cost of some of the materials may be higher than originally estimated.
►Inclement weather may cause a delay.
► Additional redesign and modifications to a sophisticated piece of automated machinery may be required to get it to meet the performance specifications.
The challenge to the project manager is to prevent, anticipate, and/or overcome such circumstances in order to complete the project scope on schedule, within budget, and to the customer’s satisfaction. Good planning and communication are essential to prevent problems from occurring and to minimize the impact of these problems on the achievement of the project objective should they occur. The project manager needs to be proactive in planning and communicating and should demonstrate strong leadership toward the project team in helping them to accomplish the project objective.
Ultimately, the responsibility of the project manager is to make sure the customer is satisfied. This goes beyond just completing the project scope within budget and on schedule or asking the customer at the end of the project if he or she is satisfied. It requires ongoing communication with the customer to keep the customer informed and to determine whether expectations have changed. Regularly scheduled meetings or progress reports, frequent phone discussions, and email are examples of ways to maintain such communications. Customer satisfaction means involving the customer as a partner in the successful outcome of the project by allowing them to actively participate in many aspects of the project. The project manager must be aware of the degree of customer satisfaction throughout the project. By maintaining regular communication with the customer, the project manager demonstrates to the customer that he or she is genuinely concerned with the expectations of the customer which may prevent unpleasant surprises later.
Project Life Cycle
In project management, the sequence of project phases and phase gates is often referred to as project life cycle. Exhibit 3 shows the four phases of the project life cycle and the relative amount of effort and time devoted to each phase. As the project moves through its life cycle, different organizations, individuals, and resources play dominant roles.
Exhibit 3: Project Life Cycle
Projects are “born” when a need is identified by the customer—the people or the organization willing to provide funds to have the need satisfied. For example, for a growing family, the need may be for a larger house, whereas for a company, the problem may be a high scrap rate from its manufacturing process that makes its costs higher and production times longer than those of its competitors. The customer first must identify the need or problem. Sometimes the problem is identified quickly, as in the case of a disaster such as an earthquake or explosion. In other situations, it may take months for a customer to clearly identify a need, gather data on the problem, and define certain requirements that must be met by the person, project team, or contractor who will solve the problem.
This first phase of the project life cycle involves the identification of a need, problem, or opportunity. Once the need has been identified, the customer may request proposals from individuals, project teams, or organizations (contractors) to address the identified need or solve the problem. The needs and requirements are usually written up by the customer in a document called a request for proposal (RFP). Through the RFP, the customer asks individuals or contractors to submit proposals on how they might solve the problem, along with the associated cost and schedule. A couple who needs a new house may spend time identifying requirements for the house—size, style, number of rooms, location, maximum amount they want to spend, and date by which they would like to move in. They may then write down these requirements and ask several contractors to provide house plans and cost estimates. A company that has identified a need to upgrade its computer system might document its requirements in an RFP and send it to several computer consulting firms. Not all situations involve a formal RFP, however. Needs are often defined informally during a meeting or discussion among a group of individuals. Some of the individuals may then volunteer or be requested to prepare a proposal to determine whether a project should be undertaken to address the need. Such a scenario might be played out when the management of a hospital wants to establish an on-site daycare center for the children of its employees. The management team or a specific manager may write down the requirements in a document and give it to an internal project team, who in turn will submit a proposal for how to establish the center. In this case, the contractor is the hospital’s own internal project team, and the customer is the hospital’s manager or, possibly, board of directors. It is important to accurately define the precise need. For example, is the need to provide an onsite daycare center, or is it merely to provide child care hospital employees? In other words, is it necessary for the daycare to be “on-site”?
The second phase of the project life cycle is the development of a proposed solution to the need or problem. This phase results in the submission of a proposal to the customer by one or more individuals or organizations (contractors) who would like to be hired by the customer for paid implementation of the proposed solution. In this phase, the contractor’s effort becomes dominant. Contractors interested in responding to the RFP may spend several weeks developing approaches to solving the problem, estimating the types and amounts of resources that would be needed, and estimating the time it would take to design and implement the proposed solution. Each contractor documents this information in a written proposal. All of the contractors then submit their proposals to the customer. For example, several contractors may submit proposals to a customer to develop and implement an automated invoicing and collection system. After the customer evaluates the submissions and selects the winning proposal, the customer and the winning contractor negotiate and sign a contract (agreement). In many situations, a request for proposal may not involve soliciting competitive proposals from external contractors. A company’s own internal project team may develop a proposal in response to a management-defined need or request. In this case, the project would be performed by the company’s own employees rather than an external contractor.
The third phase of the project life cycle is the implementation of the proposed solution. This phase begins after the customer decides which of the proposed solutions will best fulfill their need and an agreement is reached between the customer and the chosen individual or contractor. This phase, sometimes referred to as performing the project, involves detailed planning for the project and implementation of that plan to accomplish the project objective. During the course of the project, different types of resources will be utilized. For example, if the project is to design and construct an office building, the project effort might first involve a few architects and engineers who can draw up the building plans. Then, as construction gets under way, the resources needed will substantially increase to include steelworkers, carpenters, electricians, painters, and the like. The project will wind down after the building is finished, and a smaller number of different workers will finish up the landscaping and final interior touches. Once this final phase is completed, if the customer is satisfied that the full scope of work was completed on time, within budget, and in a quality manner, then the project can be said to be completed and the goal accomplished. For example, the third phase is complete when a contractor has completed the design and installation of a customized automation system that satisfactorily passes performance tests and is accepted by the customer or when an internal project team within a company has completed a project, in response to a management request, which consolidated two of its facilities into one.
The final phase of the project life cycle is terminating the project. When a project is completed, certain close-out activities need to be performed, such as confirming that all deliverables have