MediCision is a specialist engineering company, based in the UK, which designs and manufactures innovative medical equipment for hospitals and other public and private health-care providers across Europe. The company has seen considerable growth in recent years and currently has a broad customer base and a full order book for the next twelve months.
Following a recent take-over of MediCision, by EuroMedisch, Europe’s market leader, the EuroMedisch’s Project Management Office (PMO) is looking to harmonise the way in which projects are managed across the new, larger organization to improve the proportion of projects that are delivered successfully and to improve resource usage and efficiency. Projects within EuroMedisch have been managed according to Agile principles for a number of years, while projects at MediCision are managed on a “best-efforts” basis with no formal methodology being employed. By introducing a common Project Management methodology across the company, the PMO hopes not only to improve the quality of project management, but also to promote the mobility of project staff across the organization. EuroMedisch’s senior management support this initiative, which they hope will help to reduce lead times for new product development and increase customer satisfaction and retention.
You have been appointed as Project Manager to co-ordinate the introduction of the Agile methodology to staff in the recently purchased MediCision part of the business. The PMO Director (who will act as Project Sponsor) requires this transition to be completed within six months, after which time, all new projects initiated by the MediCision team will be managed following Agile principles. Projects under development will continue to be run according to MediCision’s existing processes until their completion.
Your first task is to prepare a project initiation document (2000 words), drawing on appropriate project management theory and frameworks, to present to the company’s board of directors for approval. The plan should consider the following aspects of the project:
• The project’s scope. ?
• An initial assessment of stakeholders and recommendations on how these stakeholders ?should be managed to maximise the chance of achieving the project’s objectives. ?
• An initial assessment of risks and opportunities presented by the project and the response strategies proposed.
• An outline project plan (Gantt chart) showing the main tasks and significant milestones, supported by a justification of your proposed approach. The Gantt chart needs to show a minimum of 10 tasks. ?
Ganttproject is a good package to try if you have never used project management software before. It is a very straightforward package and can be downloaded for free at
http://www.ganttproject.biz/
There is no need for you to prepare an outline business case and project budget.
The design of your project initiation document should take in to consideration both the soft and hard skills necessary to ensure the project’s success. ?
The word count for this assignment is 2000 words. There is a 10% word limit tolerance. (Maximum/minimum range: 1800 to 2200 words.)
Tables, diagrams, appendices and references are omitted from the overall word count.
Ensure that all tables, diagrams and frameworks are labelled, include a citation and are discussed in the text.
You must state the number of words used on the front cover of the assignment.
Source material
You are required to research and apply project management theory in order to successfully complete this assignment. In order to pass, you will need to use a minimum of 10 separate sources, including a minimum of 3 textbooks and 3 journal articles.
You must use these:
Maylor, H. (2010) Project Management 4th edn. Harlow, FT Prentice Hall
Pinto, JK (2016) Project Management: Achieving Competitive Advantage, 4th Edition, Pearson.
APM (2012) Body of Knowledge, 6th Edition. Association for Project Management.
Andersen, E.S. (2008) Rethinking Project Management: an organisational perspective Harlow, FT Prentice Hall
Cleland, D. I. (1998) Project Stakeholder Management in D. I. Cleland and W. R. King (Eds), Project Management Handbook, 2nd Ed, pp. 275 – 301. New York: Van Nostrand in Reinhold.
Kerzner, H (2009) Project Management: A Systems Approach to Planning, Scheduling and Controlling: 10th ed. New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons
Gardiner, P. (2005) Project Management: A Strategic Planning Approach Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan
Larson, E. W. and Gray, C. F. (2011) Project Management: The Managerial Process. 5th edn. New York, McGraw-Hill.
Lock, D. (2013) Project Management. 10th Ed. Aldershot, Gower Publishing (available in the library in previous editions and as an e-book)
Newton, R. (2009) The practice and theory of Project Management: creating value through change Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan
Koster, K. (2013) International Project Management Thousand Oaks: SAGE
Barber, R (2005) ”Understanding internally generated risks in projects”, International Journal of Project Management 23 pp584-590
Hillson, D (2002) ”Extending the risk process to manage opportunities”, International Journal of Project Management 20 pp235-240
Jaafari, A (2001) ”Management of risks, uncertainties and opportunities on projects: time for a fundamental shift”, International Journal of Project Management 19 pp89-101
Olsson, R (2007) ”In search of opportunity management: Is the risk management process enough?”, International Journal of Project Management 25 pp745-752
Ward, S (1999) ”Requirements for an Effective Project Risk Management Process”, Project Management Journal 30 pp37-43
Ward, S and Chapman, C (2003) ”Transforming project risk management into project uncertainty management”, International Journal of Project Management 21 pp97-105
