Communications

Exchanging Information:

• According to PMI, project managers should spend as much as 90 percent of their time communicating.
• Information Exchange include:
• Sender: The person responsible for putting the information out there in a clear and concise manner and communicating it to the receiver. It is important for the sender to present the information complete and in a way the receiver will understand it.
• Message: The information being sent and received. Can take any form, written, verbal, formal, informal.
• Receiver: The person the information message is intended. Responsible for understanding the information and making sure they have received all the information.
• Network Communication Model: Lines of communications, which can be calculated as follows:

        (Number of participants × (Number of participants – 1)) ÷ 2

 

Communications Plan include:

• Defining who needs information on your project.
• Defining the types of information each person or group needs.
• Identifying the communications format and method of transmission.
• Assigning accountability for delivering the communication.
• Determining when the communications will occur and how often.

 

 

Communicating with Project Team Members:

Interactions with your team will include both formal and informal communications.

• Formal Communications:
• Kickoff meetings, team status meetings, written status reports, team building sessions or other planned sessions.
• Informal Communications:
• Phone calls and emails to and from team members. Conversations in the hallway etc.
• Engaging Stakeholders:
• Identify which aspects of the project plan to communicate.
• List any known or probable benefits or concerns from the stakeholder.
• Determine key message to convey to each stakeholder.

 

Resource Planning:

Resource Planning is the process of determining the resources you’ll need for the project, including human, equipment, and material resources. This process will also determine the quantity of each resource required to complete the work for your project.

• Types of Resources: You must plan for three different and equally important types of resources namely human resources, equipment, and material.
• Human Resources: Human resources are the people who have the experience and skills needed to complete those activities.
• Equipment: Equipment includes anything from specialized test tools to new servers to earthmovers and more. Equipment needs are specific to the type of project you’re working on.
• Materials: Materials is kind of a catchall category that includes utility requirements such as software, electricity, or water; any supplies you will need for the project; or other consumable goods.

 

Documenting Resource Requirements:

• This document contains a description of each of the resources needed — human, equipment, and material — for each of the work packages on the WBS.
• Equipment and Material Descriptions: The resource requirements document should detail the types of materials and equipment the project is expected to acquire to complete the work of the project.
• Job Descriptions and Titles: A tool that can be very useful for developing the human resource requirements is a resource pool description . This is a list of all the job titles within your company. If you work in a very large corporation, you may want only those job titles associated with a specific department.
• Responsibility Assignment Matrix (RAM): A RAM is a chart that matches your WBS elements with the required resources.

 

Human Resource Planning:

• Organizational Planning:
• Is the process of addressing various factors that may impact how you manage your project team, define roles and responsibilities for project team members, identify how your project team will be organized, and document your staffing management plan.
• You should consider several potential constraints when performing organizational planning. These include labor-union agreements, organizational structure, and economic conditions.
• You need to consider various environmental factors as part of your organizational planning as well, because they may impact both the selection of project team members and how the team is managed. In this case, environmental factors include elements such as organizational policies regarding personnel, location and logistics of personnel, and so on.
• Staffing Management Planning: The staffing management plan is a document where you pull all your staffing data together. The staffing management plan documents when and how human resources will be added to and released from the project team and what they will be working on while they are part of the team. Adding and releasing resources may be an informal or a formal process, depending on your organization.
• Staff Acquisition: In the staff acquisition process, you’ll choose the team members (or organizations) who will work on the project.

 

Procurement Planning:

• Procurement planning is the process of identifying the goods and services required for your project that will be purchased from outside the organization. If your project doesn’t require any external resources, you don’t need a procurement plan.
• Equipment
• Staff Augmentation: Staff augmentation may range from contracting with a vendor to run the entire project to contracting for specific resources to perform certain tasks. In our experience, staff augmentation is often needed for large, complex projects.
• Other Goods and Services: Goods and services that your organization typically does not produce or keep on hand are good candidates for procurement.
• Statement of Work: The statement of work (SOW) details the goods or services you want to procure. In many respects it’s similar to the project scope statement, except that it focuses on the work being procured. It contains the project description, major deliverables, success criteria, assumptions, and constraints. The project scope statement is a good starting point for documenting the SOW.
• Vendor Solicitation: Solicitation planning is the process of identifying the requirements of the product and identifying potential sources. Solicitation refers to obtaining responses from vendors to complete the project work as documented in the SOW.
• Types of Contracts
• Fixed - price contract
• Cost - reimbursable contract time and materials contract

 

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