Effective Project Management †Free Sample - Myassignmenthelp.Com

Questions: Why are accurate estimates critical to effective project management? How does the culture of an organisation influence the quality of estimates? Why is it important for project managers to understand the fixed and variable costs of a project. What are the differences between bottom-up and top-down estimating approaches? Under what conditions would you prefer one over the other? What are the major types of costs? Which costs are controllable by the project manager? Answers: Budgeting Projects Answer 1: A project is required to be accurately estimated for controlling the project development process and it can affect the development of the project negatively. The success of the project is dependent on the proper planning of the project and meeting the requirement. A project schedule or Gantt chart is required to be prepared for the project and it is important for monitoring the progress of the project and differentiate between the loss and the gain of the project. The time estimated for the completion of each of the activity is required to be followed for the completion of the project within it and the cash flow is also required to be maintained to complete the project within the budget. A good decision is required to be taken for the management of the cash flow and allocate the resources to the development team as required. Missing of the deadline for the development of the activity is required to be strictly followed for successfully develop the project. The error in the project is required to be mitigated and a time phased budget is required to be prepared for establishing a baseline for the project and develop the project successfully. Answer2: An organizational culture is required to be managed for influencing the estimation of the quality of the project. The quality of the project can be estimated following different type of approach such as top down or bottom up. The senior management uses the top down approach and it can be done by the management team for the creation of a relationship with the development team. The bottom up approach is done by involving the team members and the work breakdown structure is created for the estimation of the cost and the budget. The organizational culture is required to be developed for the management of the workplace environment and the behavior of the employees working in the workplace is required to be governed. A guideline is required to be prepared for the organization and it should include the dressing and behavior of the employees for judging the values of the set a new value in the workplace. The main characteristics of the organizational culture are innovation, outcome, attentio n and emphasis on the people. The decision affecting the people is required to be analyzed before implementation in the organization. The estimates done on the project is affected by the organizational culture because innovativeness of the organization can add extra risk in the project development process and this would also affect the performance of the employees working for the development of the project. Answer 3: The fixed cost and the variable cost associated with the project development is required to be clearly understood by the project manager for the estimation of the budget of the project. The variable cost are those that varies upon the number of items or resources included in the project development while the fixed cost are those without which the project development process would not succeed. The project manager can easily identify the fixed cost associated with the project by analyzing the requirement of the project but for the estimation of the variable cost the number of team member and the technical staffs required is required to be listed and the risk associated with the project such as the unavailability of the team members crashing of the project is required to be noted for calculation of the variable cost. The variable cost is required to be broken down into material or labour cost for the identification of the cost. The fixed cost such as the rent of the office, advertisemen t, insurance, electricity, etc. are required to be listed for creation of the budget of the project. The operation cost such as the legal fees, sales and marketing cost is also required to be included as a variable cost. Answer 4: The top down project management approach is used by the project manager for defining the task of the project and breaking the activity into smaller chunk and refining the project with more details. The major task are listed at the top and detail of the task is required to be reviewed by the project team member for the development of the project plan. The conceptual phase and the measurement of the weight is followed using the top down method. The individual activity are not considered for the development of the project estimate. The priority can be set using the top down estimation techniques. The bottom up approach is used for identification of the task that is required to be performed and team members are included in the analysis process. The conflict in the system is required to be identified and the features that is required to be included should be documented for estimation of the requirement. The work breakdown structure is required to be created for creation of a detailed schedule and increase the accuracy of the estimation. The top down approach is best suited for small project where the requirement is clear while the bottom up estimation is required for large and complex project where a schedule is required to be created and followed for develop the project successfully. Answer 5: There are different types of cost associated with the project such as: Direct Cost- it includes the cost of the labour, materials and the other equipments required for the development of the project. Overhead costs- It are the cost of the resources that are required for the development such as the salary of the employees and the development team, rents of the office or the workplace. The direct cost can be included in the project schedule for the estimation of the project budget. Administration and overhead cost- it is the cost of the organization and are not directly related with the development process. The cost is included during the runtime of the project and the promotional cost of the project such as the advertisement, marketing and sales of the product. Baselining A Project Plan Figure 1: Tracking of the project (Source: created by author) WBS Figure 2: Work breakdown Structure (Source: created by author) Bibliography Burke, R. (2013). Project management: planning and control techniques. New Jersey, USA. Kerzner, H. (2013). Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and controlling. John Wiley Sons. Ranjbar, M. (2013). A path-relinking metaheuristic for the resource levelling problem. Journal of the Operational Research Society, 64(7), 1071-1078. Rieck, J., Zimmermann, J. (2015). Exact methods for resource leveling problems. In Handbook on Project Management and Scheduling Vol. 1 (pp. 361-387). Springer International Publishing.