Implementation of Automated SMS in Polytechnic Institute

Description of the Task

The polytechnic institute wants to introduce and implement SMS to automate reporting processes, marketing and academic operations like attendance, academic schedule, time table etc. By implementing SMS project the institute will overcome existing problems occurring in these areas. It will also help efficient utilization of human resource and will help to reduce unnecessary paperwork in maintaining students’ information. It will provide easy, accurate and fast data access.  Project manager will give direction, guidance, motivation and will do careful monitoring and controlling to achieve success of the project.  (Watt, Project Implementation Overview, 2018).

Your Role, Responsibility and Authority Level  

Main responsibility of project manager is implementation of SMS in the institute. Project Manager is responsible   for accomplishing the project objectives within the constraints of the project. He will have to control and monitor time, cost and resources. He also needs to identify risk if any and monitor and respond to it accordingly.  Project manager will lead, plan, organize and control the project. He will give direction to team, coordinate activities across different organizational function and motivate team members. Manager will determine organizational structure of project team, their roles and positions. He will appoint right type of person for the task.  Communication skills and relationships with the team members to get the best performance from the project team will be the main focus of area.

Key Stakeholders

In order to achieve success, stakeholder analysis is an important process. It will help us to get the opinions of most powerful stakeholders to help define our project at an initial stage. It will help gaining their support and hence winning resources from powerful stakeholders in terms of money, time and human resources. (Thompson, 2018). It will also help us building strong relationship with them and anticipate and predict their reactions to implement SMS.

Key Stakeholders are External and Internal

Internal

1) Administration Staff – Since this project will automate reporting processes and academic operations like attendance time tables etc., the paperwork will be less. This will make their job easier. However they have high interest but low power so we will need to keep them informed adequately from time to time in detail to get their help.

2) Teachers – Their job would be easier after implementation of SMS. However their feedback and advice is important. So communication with them is essential. Since they have high interest but medium to low power so we need to inform them adequately.

3) Marketing Department – Their job becomes easy after automation of the marketing operations. It will save their time. So they are important stakeholders.

4) Senior Management – Being authority figure, has high power and high interest.  So we have to engage them fully, manage them closely and make a greatest efforts to satisfy him.

External

1) Other Similar Institutions – Other polytechnic institutions might get affected it. They might feel intense competition with respect to the new technology adopted by our institution.

2) Community – Overall community will get affected since less papers means less environmental harm and overall benefits for them.

4) Government – government also has been affected since less environmental harm is beneficial for nation as a whole but they have low power and low interest.

4) Expected key Deliverable’s

Phase 1

• Create implementation project plan
• Deliverables – Project approval –Project including (budget and schedule) needs to be approved by senior management team before implementation.
• Engage stakeholders- Communicate and take their advice and feedback for this project.

Phase 2

• Organising -As a project manager one needs to determine the organizational structure of the project team.
• Deliverables – Each team members will be allocated roles and positions in the given project. It is project manager responsibility to decide how many people needed for this project and getting the right skilled person in the team from various departments.

Phase 3

• Communication and relationships – For project manager communicating with primary stakeholders is essential.
• Deliverables – Involvement, advice and feedback from stakeholders. Training the team as and when necessary.

Phase 4

• Controlling and Monitoring
• Project manager will make sure that the project is running according to set time and progress is achieved. He will determine risks if any and will take corrective actions (Exeter, 2005).

Phase 5

• Final outcomes
• After completion, the marketing and academic operations and reporting processes of the polytechnic institution will be automated. Work will be done more efficiently.  More time will be saved and less of paperwork will be needed.
• Satisfaction of staff of administrative, marketing and academic department will be achieved.
• It will enhance student experience.

5) Budget and Schedule Requirements

This section will include detailed and accurate forecast of total anticipated costs to implement SMS. At the same time, it is desirable to create a contingency fund which can be used in emergency situations such as delay in work. However main goal of SMS would be to complete it at or below the estimated cost without accessing contingency fund (From Innovation, 2018).

To achieve ultimate goal in the SMS realistic, accurate and detailed schedule plays vital role. Scheduling has to be in detail and step by step. All the steps will have to be arranged in their proper order considering their dependencies on one another.

The project might take 1 year to get completed. Following phases should be achieved during this allocated time.

Phase 1 – Creating plan- It   can take 1 month to create plan and get approval from senior management.

Phase 2 – Communication and Relationships- Communication plan   will be developed and followed throughout the implementation of project and beyond.

Phase 3 – Organization and staffing – May take another 1 month.

Phase 4 – Work Execution – Actual work will be done by team members and manager. It might take 8 months.

Phase 5 – Termination – May take 15- 30 days- documentations will be presented to senior management as an evidence that project is complete.

6) Resources Needed

Along with implementation of detailed schedule, proper planning of resources (so that they are available when and where they are required) will help keep this project successful (From Innovation, Completing your project on time and on budget, 2018).

The project will require physical, technological and human resources.

Human resources- will include skilled employees which will help manager to maintain high levels of performance. Skilled employees can be hired from outside or employees from institute can be skilled by providing them training. Also third party vendor is essential.

Technological resources- includes computer infrastructure like database serve  that uses window based operating system ,application server to run all applications, Web server which will provide web interface to applications.

Physical resources- include college, hardware equipment, Wi-Fi network, desktop computers to input details from students or staff (learning, 2009).

Financial resources – includes capital costs and ongoing costs.

Other resources- includes IT academic systems, IT corporate systems, procurement, organisational process assets like documents and processes used in past.

7) Assumptions, Constraints and Risks

Assumptions

• Assuming that the support, advice and feedback of stakeholders will be available throughout this project.
• Assuming that maintenance of software will be done by IT department.
• Assuming that the training required for implementing this project will be provided consistently.

Constraints

• Financial constraints – The project has limited budget which has to be followed. In future the budget might exceed its limit.
• Time constraints – Project needs to be finished on Time as per schedule. However possibility of its exceedance may not be ruled out due to last moment emergency.
• Capacity constraints – The SMS software needs certain IT requirements which may be lacking or needs to be developed.

Risks

• Financial risks – Insufficient funding may delay the project or last minute emergency may need extra finance. Sometimes scope creep or inaccurate cost estimation may lead to escalation of project cost. (PROJECT-MANAGEMENT.COM, 2018)
• Staffing risks – Team members working for the project should be skilled.  It might take extra load on finance for training the unskilled employees and load on time since extra time has to be spent for training them.
• Capacity risks – Insufficient Wi-Fi capacity to cope will increase load. The IT hardware has to be efficient to support the project.

References

Exeter, u. o. (2005, April 12). PROJECT INITIATION DOCUMENT. Retrieved from https://as.exeter.ac.uk/media/level1/academicserviceswebsite/aboutus/biss/iws/documents/APP-12-005Mobile_App_PID_V1_9.pdf.

From Innovation, S. a. (2018). Completing your project on time and on budget. Retrieved from https://canadabusiness.ca/managing-your-business/day-to-day-operations/operations-planning/completing-your-project-on-time-and-on-budget/.

From Innovation, S. a. (2018). Completing your project on time and on budget. Retrieved from https://canadabusiness.ca/managing-your-business/day-to-day-operations/operations-planning/completing-your-project-on-time-and-on-budget/.

Learning, t. a. (2009, April 2). Student Information Systems. Retrieved from https://www.techlearning.com/news/student-information-systems.

PROJECT-MANAGEMENT.COM. (2018). Types of Risk in Project Management. Retrieved from https://project-management.com/types-of-risk-in-project-management/.

Thompson, R. (2018). Stakeholder Analysis. Retrieved from https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newPPM_07.htm.Watt, b. a. (2018). Project Implementation Overview. Retrieved from https://opentextbc.ca/projectmanagement/chapter/chapter-17-project-implementation-overview-project-management/.