How to Maintain Effective Accountability in Project Management - Essay Example

? How to Maintain Effective Accountability in Project Management Due Accountability maintenance is one of the most crucialconcepts of project management focusing on appropriate management of the resources allocated for the project characterized by the dynamic nature of multi-facetted organizations (Gunlach, 2009). Thus, in order to effectively manage projects in an increasingly changing and dynamic society, the information technology and business world has put more emphasis on maintaining high standards of accountability in project management, which many project shareholders and managers believe is essential in successful completion of a project as a result of improved management system (Barron & Barron, 2011). Hence, since most projects are implemented by teams whose heart is performance delivery, project managers need to be accountable to their teams and other project shareholders by ensuring they are empowered and dynamic. Accountability is undoubtedly one of the most important factors involved in the critical path of ensuring project managers account for the efforts of his or her team. The need for accountability in project management is to make sure that all finances and project resources are well utilized throughout a project life cycle (Barron & Barron, 2011). Hence, the ability of project managers to easily avail project data to the clients is important for ensuring good client relationships are maintained as well as establishing trust in the used methodologies. Therefore, accountability is very important to the involved teams because it ensures accountability is kept amongst project team members, a situation which prevents resentment in the project as well as helping to maintain morale (Gunlach, 2009). However, in order to make sure that accountability is maintained in project management there are issues which must be focused on throughout the project period. Firstly, one of such things involves maintaining effective communication within the project team and other stakeholders such as the sponsors or clients (Barron & Barron, 2011). Thus, since project management is usually a team effort, emphasis should always be placed on collaboration and communication in order to make sure everyone involved in the project can appropriately account for the allocated resources such as funds, labour, time, and so on. The significance of communication on maintaining effective accountability in management of projects is because it allows fast and easy process of making enquiries where some issues are not well understood. In addition, it also facilitates easy way of responding to concerns raised by colleagues in the project team as well as sponsors of the project or clients. Therefore, in order to ensure accountability throughout the life cycle of a project, effective communication should be emphasized on because it is the only most important tool for the manager of the project and his or her team members (Gunlach, 2009). This is due to the fact that apart from helping in addressing concerns by team members and clients it also facilitates an easy way of addressing other obstacles to the project such as overlapping responsibilities, changes in project scope, complex integration as well as decentralization of the decision-making processes all of which pose potential conflicts in the project (Ten Step, n.d.). Secondly, maintaining effective accountability in management of any project requires establishment of the necessary project controls whereby planning plays the most significant role (Barron & Barron, 2011). This is mainly because it has been ascertained through experience, that planning for a project long before it commences lays the groundwork for accountability from the project managers and project team as well as ensuring successful completion of the project. Thus, maintaining effective accountability in management of any project and its successful implementation and performance are highly depended on appropriate planning (Gunlach, 2009). In addition, execution of a project is usually done on the basis of a robust project plan and its successful completion is only achievable through an effective methodology for schedule control. This makes the process of developing a suitable system of project control an important component of the efforts to manage a project. Moreover, it has also been proved over a long period of time that putting in place project control systems can greatly project performance because success factors of project management are based on good practices of project control resulting to good schedule and cost outcomes (Ten Step, n.d.). Hence establishing a good project plan acts as a baseline for the project schedule, quality, scope, cost and risks, all of which constitute essential components of the project plan. This plays a very crucial role in maintain effective project management accountability because it forms a basis for the project managers to monitor project progress on which decision necessary for changing the project in order to bring it back on track are based (Barron & Barron, 2011). Furthermore, it is widely accepted that lack of effective planning and monitoring are major causes of project failures due to absolute lack of accountability on allocated resources. Thirdly, putting in place appropriate project progress monitoring measures is another method of maintain effective accountability in management of projects. This is mainly done through comparison of actual performance of a project to the Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) and the schedule (Barron & Barron, 2011). When a project’s actual status is far much behind or beyond the predetermined thresholds, making the variation to significantly deviate from expected values that are predetermined, taking corrective actions is appropriate. This helps to maintain accountability through re-planning of the project schedule, which may require a revision to the original project plan or inclusion of additional mitigation measures (Gunlach, 2009). However, the reporting of a project progress is done through various tools and techniques such as project management information systems that are automated, earned value, status reports and variance analysis reports are all used to continuously monitor the progress of a project thereby ensuring effective accountability is maintained by blocking all the loopholes which could be used to embezzle resources meant for the project (Ten Step, n.d.). Alternatively, there are various counterarguments which have been put forward to oppose the above mentioned propositions. For instance, when the first proposition toward maintaining effective accountability in the management of a project which is ensuring there is appropriate communication, the counterargument which has been propagated is that communication is not necessary as long as the roles and responsibilities of all stakeholders in a project are properly defined in the project plan (Barron & Barron, 2011). However, the counterargument against the second proposition which is the need for effective project control and planning is that, if a feasibility study prior to the project is conducted all plans will be accounted in the study. Moreover, there has also been counterargument against monitoring of the project progress reiterating on the fact that a scope creep and deviation from the predetermined expectations will not be experienced if all project team members play their role appropriately (Gunlach, 2009). Finally, reviewing the recommendations given towards ensuring that effective accountability is maintained in project management against the presented counterarguments, it is evidently true that the counterarguments are not sufficiently strong to be considered more significant against the propositions presented (Barron & Barron, 2011). For instance, irrespective of how succinctly the roles and responsibilities of project team members are defined they can’t replace communication as a method of ensuring accountability in project management. Moreover, project planning and monitoring also can’t be substituted for any other measure as long as accountability will be required in the management of a project (Gunlach, 2009). References Barron, M. & Barron, A. (2011). Project stakeholders. The Project Management Hut. Retrieved on 3rd November 2012 from: http://www.pmhut.com/project-stakeholders-2. Gunlach, M. (2009). Understanding how project monitoring and controlling integrates to other processes. Bright Hub. Retrieved on 3rd November 2012 from: http://www.brighthub.com/office/project-management/articles/40904.aspx Ten Step. (n.d.). Monitor and control the project. Retrieved on 3rd November 2012 from: http://www.tenstep.com/pv/4.0PMonitorCtrlProj.html Read More