Managing a Global ProjectSubscribe

Purpose

This discussion board assignment will challenge you to apply your project management knowledge to a complex scenario involving a large, geographically dispersed project. You will identify potential scope, schedule, and cost management challenges that arise despite using tools and techniques that you previously learned about and that should mitigate such challenges. It will help you consider broader strategic considerations and develop skills in strategic planning and problem-solving to improve project success rates.

Task

In prior PMAN courses, you have discussed and explored various scope, scheduling, and cost tools and techniques. You have also reviewed these tools and techniques in the readings this unit. In those earlier courses, there were discussions about the dismal rates of project success. For example, consider the following from this PMI's Pulse of the Profession: Success in Disruptive Times publication (Project Management Institute, 2018, p. 2):

"Too much money is being wasted on poor project performance, for many reasons: 1) Organizations fail to bridge the gap between strategy design and delivery. 2) Executives do not recognize that strategy is delivered through projects. 3) The essential importance of project management as the driver of an organization's strategy is not fully realized"

"Only 58% of organizations fully understand the value of project management. The importance of fully valuing project management cannot be emphasized enough; organizations that undervalue project management as a strategic competency for driving change report an average of 50% more of their projects failing outright."

There are various telling statistics about the lackluster performance of projects. Here is one of many: 99% of Big Projects Fail. His Fix Starts With Legos. Although you would need a Wall Street Journal subscription to read the entire article, the title itself should get your attention! The odds of success are stacked against megaprojects (and, to a lesser degree, against any large project). Many of these large projects do follow (or at least try to follow) good project management practices, so the question then arises: How come these projects are so challenged despite adherence to so-called "good project management practices."

For this discussion, consider yourself a project manager of a large project (say 200+ personnel) that is geographically dispersed across several countries and continents. Suppose that this project is developing a new high-tech product that requires the integrated efforts of R&D, product management, sales, marketing, human resources, CFO office, operations, etc. You report to your company's PMO Vice President who holds you responsible for the success of the project and jointly responsible (along with sales and marketing) for the success of the product. You can also assume that your PMO team has excellent project management knowledge and skills and that the project is best managed using the traditional/waterfall approach.

Cohen, B. (2023, February 2). 99% of big projects fail. His fix starts With Legos. WSJ. https://www.wsj.com/arts-culture/books/lego-megaprojects-bent-flyvbjerg-big-things-11675280517

Project Management Institute. (2018). Pulse of the profession: Success in disruptive times. https://www.pmi.org/-/media/pmi/documents/public/pdf/learning/thought-leadership/pulse/pulse-of-the-profession-2018.pdf

In your initial post:

1. Explain what scope, schedule, and cost management challenges you might encounter (and why) on this project even if you applied the tools and techniques you learned in prior courses (and which you reviewed this unit).
2. Explain whether you believe there are broader "strategic" considerations (beyond the well-known PM tools and techniques) that you would need to formulate and address to raise the odds of project success. (Use whatever definition of "strategic" you wish.)
3. Outline and justify a few strategic skills you would need to exercise to address the considerations you identified in (2) above and outline the challenges you might encounter when attempting to exercise these skills.
4. with 3 APA FORMAS rEFERENCES