Cost
The price includes the costs of both the program customization and the technical infrastructure. The technological infrastructure has an average CPI of 0.93, whereas the software customization has an average CPI of 1.18. The amalgamation of the two falls under the budget since the software adaptation is primarily inside it. The entire expense can be found as. It indicates that the project’s overall cost of $1831229.95 falls within the allocated budget by $64770.05.
Time
The project will require an additional 12 days due to the technical infrastructure difficulties. There is one month left on the clock, but the project needs more time than that. Interventions could be taken, nevertheless, to ensure that it is finished on time. Rather than the anticipated 184 days, there will be an overall span of 196 days. This has been made possible by .
Cause
In the initial months of the venture, Martin, as the project lead, had shown indicators of underperformance. In addition to going over budget, the project took longer than anticipated. Despite the excellent software modification, there were a few things that could have been improved with the technical infrastructure. The technical infrastructure side’s timetable performance index was consistently less than 1, indicating the project needed to catch up. An average of 0.94 is the technological infrastructure SPI (Norto, Gershbeyn & Yung, 2006). On average, 1.13 was the SPI for software modification, which was consistently higher than one (Norto, Gershbeyn, & Yung, 2006). June saw the lowest figure of 0.88 before it began to rise gradually. It suggests that June’s problems were the primary reason for the delay. Several factors could have caused the delay in the project’s implementation at this early stage. First, there can be a resource shortage, as demonstrated by the moment MED-X employees were removed from the task to focus on other duties (Newton, 2013). Second, there’s a chance that the purchase of hardware components was delayed, similar to when the Sun server was acquired. It would significantly impact the segment of technical infrastructure. Lastly, as demonstrated by the result of a failure received during the study and there needs to be management, the milestones were either improper or nonexistent.
Recommendations
The project is currently one month behind schedule and $60,000 over budget. The causes of the issue inform the solutions that can be implemented to address it. Martin would need assistance from the bids to finish the project as planned. Martin should, first and foremost, hire more people to help with the project. It can be accomplished by assigning a portion of the software modification team to help with the already behind-schedule technical aspect. In addition, he might employ more people with some of the money still available to ensure that the project launches on October 1st as scheduled. Additionally, if the technical infrastructure staff finishes the project on schedule, he can inspire them (Gido, Clements & Baker, 2016). He might accomplish this by rewarding them with bonuses and incentives if they finish on schedule. Martin should also communicate with the project’s stakeholders more frequently to ensure that incidents are reported immediately and corrected (Harned, 2017). Lastly, he needs to prioritize, track, and determine the risks.
Applications
The earned value measures would be applied differently by me. That idea is significant for both my present and upcoming initiatives. To see potential issues before they arise and take appropriate action, I closely monitor the earned value assessment and insist that it be updated often. In addition, I would make myself more visible and open so that such problems would be manageable for project managers. After identifying this issue early on, the project manager would have enough time to allocate more resources to keep the project on schedule and under budget. In addition, I would place my material orders in advance to ensure the project is completed on time (Stackpole, 2013). To prevent a sizable portion of the project from experiencing functionality issues, as was witnessed in this particular instance study, I lastly use the earned value parameters by running more tests and setting important milestones.
References
Gido, J., Clements, J. P., & Baker, R. (2016). Successful project management. Boston, MA: Cengage Learning.
Harned, B. (2017). Project management for humans: helping people get things done. Brooklyn, NY: Rosenfeld Media.
Newton, R. (2013). The project management book. Harlow: FT Publishing.
Stackpole, C. (2013). A project manager’s book of forms: a companion to the PMBOK guide. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.
Norto, J., F., Gershbeyn, A. & Yung, D. (2006). Ariba Implementation at MED-X: Managing Earned Value.5-404-763. Kellogg School of Management.