IT Project Management Case Analysis - Essay Example

?Running Head: IT Project Management IT Project Management and Section # of Introduction This case study presents the E-health program launched by the Scottish government to address the health problems prevalent all over the country. The country has witnessed poor health statistics, such as the increased number of chronic diseases and health inequalities. The health department identified that the use of information technology could help them to fight with their issues. For this purpose, Scotland launched a new e-health strategy, directed by the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Wellbeing. The target of the new E-Health strategy was to provide the right care to the right patient, by the right physician, at the rite time to deliver the right outcome. The idea was to use integrated care systems, virtual electronic patient records and electronic communications to provide better services to the patients. The execution of this strategy was a big challenge keeping in mind the scale and complexity of the issue. Achievement of same standards and quality throughout the country sought proper project management and constant monitoring. Moreover the resources needed to achieve the required results were also a concern. A lot of technical infrastructure, skill set and knowledge base were required. 14 territorial NHS boards, 8 special NHS boards, all hospitals, and all the GPs including community care services were the stakeholders to the program. To help with the challenges, the Scottish Government formed a new e-Health Directorate with the prime responsibility to manage and guide the e-health program including strategy formulation, resource acquisition, resource deployment, and strategy implementation. The Scottish Government Health Department worked with the collaboration of the Deloitte to implement an e-health program all over the country to achieve the required results which also meant considerable improvement in health department. The project proved to be a major success. The case study then carries on with the reasons and stimulators of success, as described by the involved personnel. The purpose of this paper is to study the reasons in detail, analyze these reasons, identify the key knowledge areas, describe their relation to success, and prioritize these knowledge areas based upon their effectiveness. Key Knowledge Areas Project Integration Management Project integration management involves the processes and activities needed to identify, define, unify, and communicate the project processes and project management activities. Activities of project management which can be directly related to integration management include unification, consolidation, ratification and integrative actions. These actions are quite crucial to project success and completion within the right framework (Boddy & Boonstra, 2005). The e-Health program had a vast scope and there was a huge degree of complexity. The program had to be carried out on a national level and the targets of the new strategy included standardization. The achievement of such kind of targets on a national scale requires accurate and timely use of integration management. A lot of stakeholders involved in the program, mainly the practitioners, the service providers and the authority departments. The scope and autonomy of each department was interrelated, and this meant that the boundaries of responsibility and authority had to be clearly defined. Moreover proper communication channels were vital to the success of the project. Coordination of objectives, responsibilities and resources had to be carried out on a huge scale. All these required dimensions fall with in the scope of Project Integration Management. Project Scope Management The first step of a project is to define its objectives. The objective of a project then determines the resources, processes and figures involved in the project. The inputs and outputs of a project have to be determined in detail and all the needed processes to reach the outputs are outlined. The project scope sometimes evolves along with the project as the feasibility and requirements change from time to time. Scope management also involves catering to these changes through a frictionless approach. Work breakdown structure and verification methods for project implementation are a part of project scope. In the case, the Scottish Health department and the e-health strategy department worked together to form a vision of a healthy society. The vision was to unleash the powers of information technology to improve services provided to patients in terms of time, data, accuracy and precision. The e-health strategy targeted process improvement on an overall scale. Proper definition of vision and objectives of a project provide a better platform to carry on the subsequent activities. Hence, the scope management played a key role in future development of the program (Laudon & Laudon, 2007). The e-health strategy department had also envisioned that the active involvement of some technical expertise was crucial to project success and they joined hands with Deloitte. Later on, this also proved to be a crucial success factor. Project Human Resource Management Human Resource Management in a project involves the organization and management of a project team. The goal of Human Resource Management is to organize the relevant skill based team which can most efficiently perform the activities necessary to carry out the project. The project team has to be actively involved in planning and decision making processes through out the project. The planning, controlling and execution of resources and processes is in the hand so project staff; their skills, experience, and expertise is necessary in each phase of the project (Curtis & Gobham, 2005). Project Human Resource management also requires that the team members are dedicated, enthusiastic and motivated. The team should understand the project in detail and should be able to link themselves somehow to the project success. The e-strategy implement project required distinct skill sets at each phase of the project. Certain areas such as scope definition and long term planning required the expertise of strategic management and project management, while the planning and control of the project required proper project management and coordination. The implementation and support activities of the project required a deliberate and adequate expertise of information technology, and this was provided by Deloitte. Moreover the project also required some personnel who could act as bridge to translate the requirements of the health department into technical language and vice versa. The project human resource was quite careful and this was a critical success factor. Project Communications Management Communication among the team members and the stakeholders of the project is critical to the project success. This can prove to be a pitfall, if not addressed with care and detail. The project team has to be kept on the same level of information and involvement to keep them enthusiastic and motivated. If the project team or the ultimate users of the project are unable to relate to the project goals or the project plans, they underperform resulting in project failures. The e-health program had a vast scope and the number of stakeholders was too high. This required a detailed deal of communication and coordination. A proper project management plan addresses to the needs of communication management. This was carried out effectively and contributed positively towards project success. Project Quality Management Project quality involves the introduction of quality policies, quality assurance and quality control (Wilson, 2001). This is the responsibility of project quality management to ensure that the project objectives are being achieved. This can be done through the use of quality assessment, quality reviews, and processes of constant improvement. The E-health plan used a strong focus on benefits management, constant evaluation and feedback mechanisms to achieve the quality standards. Benefits management is a strategy in which all the action and processes are weighed in terms of benefit associated with them. Those actions and processes are preferred which prove better in terms of benefits provided through them. Prioritization of Knowledge Areas In the context of the e-Health program as described above, the Knowledge Areas can be prioritized as follows, the most important being placed first. 1. Project Scope Management 2. Project Integration Management 3. Project Human Resource Management 4. Project Quality Management 5. Project Communications Management (Clare & Stuteley, 1995) Methodology: The priority of knowledge areas has been defined with respect to success contribution made by each knowledge area. Although all the 5 areas were quite significant and critical to the success of the project, the scope definition, integration management and HR management were the key factors which led to project success. Quality management is the general requirement of every project and it is obvious that it has to be handled whereas communication management works as a constant support to the project team. Conclusion A project is successful only when all the activities and processes of the project are well managed. The E-Health strategy implementation was a big challenge, but it was achieved as a result of efficient and proper project management. The management for every project differs from case to case, and there are certain knowledge areas which are critical for the success of certain projects. Project scope is the most important phase of a project, and is equally important in all projects (Beynon-Davies, 2002). In the e-Health case the most important knowledge areas included Project Integration Management and Human Resource Management, due to the scale and complexity of the project. Communication management and quality management also contributed towards the success of the project. Bibliography 1. Beynon-Davies, P. (2002). Information Systems: An Introduction to informatics in Organisations. Edinburgh: Palgrave MacMillan. 2. Boddy, D., Boonstra, A., & Kennedy, G. (2005). Managing Information Systems: An Organisational Perspective. 2nd ed. London: Financial Times/Prentice Hall. 3. Clare, C., & Stuteley, G. (1995). Information Systems: Strategy to Design. Michigan: Chapman and Hall. 4. Curtis, G., & Cobham, C. (2005). Business Information Systems. 5th ed. London: Financial Times/Prentice Hall. 5. Laudon, K., & Laudon, J. (2007). Essentials of Business Information Systems. 7th ed. London: Prentice Hall. 6. Wilson, B. (2001). Soft Systems Methodology: Conceptual Model Building and Its Contribution. Chichester: John Wiley & Sons Ltd. Read More