Project Management Processes For Lean Implementation

The voice of the customers for the FIFA world 2018

Planning for major international events happens to be a very difficult task. Planning for only one sports event is always better (Essays, 2013). out this-that one sporting events calls for preparing the stadium, hiring adequate staff, providing security, hotel arrangement, ticket arrangements, traffic planning and transport planning (Cottle, 2011). A small world cup always multiples all that to the number of matches which are usually played in different cities across the given country (York, 2014). Planning for only one match has never been easy, and it can most of the time fail (Sy, 2012). Thus it was not easy to deliver the world cup project which happened  in Russian on June 14 . The success of it mainly depended on the project management (Westland, & Kogan Page, 2010).

The voice of the customer can be classified as the needs and the requirements of the customer towards a product (Westland, & Kogan Page, 2010). It helps the business to know the view of a customer towards a product (Cottle, 2011). By collecting different opinions of our customers from our social media platforms and our websites (Sy, 2012). The following were various expectations of our customers for the FIFA world cup 2018

• Racism Row

One of the critical issues that have greatly plagued the country of Russia is racism. An issue that needed to be avoided during the world cup season (Alegi, 2008). Russians are also thought to have a tense atmosphere of ethnic grouping while world cup will have had a lot of people from diverse background (Alegi, 2008)

. Players like Samuel Etoo, Christopher Samba and Robert Carlos are thought to have suffered racism (Sy, 2012). More racial tensions were  expected in Russia come the world cup season.

• Climate controversy

Russia is famed for having cold weather and since world cup is a competition that called for different teams across the world some of which are not used to such cold weather (Zirin, 2016). People were worried about whether the climate would be hospitable for the 32 teams which were competing (Essays, 2013).  In fact how some people reacted towards this weather was  another interesting thing. In fact, displeasure was also expected from some players.

• Stadium Spectacles

As usual, when a country gets a chance to stage such an important event, it must put more efforts to have good work designs and landscape (Essays, 2013). This has been the case for Russia. In total Russia had 12 stadiums which are located in 11 different cities where the world cup was expected to take place (Sy, 2012).

• Crazy Crowds

Some leagues in the world have very many people supporting them. Their fans are known for coming up with strong singing habits, hooliganism and also great visual fandom. Fervent following Flares and fights are well observed in the Russian premier league (Sy, 2012). Thus the Russians citizens were expected to have a very strong voice since the world cup was in their backyard.

• Vuvuzela Revival

The vuvuzela is one of the most well-known instruments used in by fans in football matches (Müller, 2014). It fast emerged in South Africa, and it was expected to make a return back in the FIFA world cup 2018

• The Stadiums

Critical for Customer Requirements

Russia must see to it that it has enough stadiums that cater for the 64 world cup matches played for over 25 days. Every stadium must have to have a unique design which had a theme form the locality and history demonstrated in its architecture (Zirin, 2016).

• Planning the full Tourist Experience

The Planning team had to go a step further not only planning for the matches but also making sure that tourist has the best experience ever(Westland, & Kogan Page, 2010). People will always need an extra thing to do when they are not watching matches thus having people happy and occupied should also be a goal that the planner needed  to accomplish. It greatly helped to keep public disturbance and violence at a minimum and also it helped greatly to improve the  improve the economy. People might even want to travel back to the country out of what they enjoyed during the world cup. Moreover is that Russia is known to be Avast country and each city has different styles of food (York, 2014).

• Infrastructure preparation

Russia is had 3 million spectators from the different countries (Westland, & Kogan Page, 2010). Thus for every event to be successful the world cup project management team together with Russian government had to greatly invest in infrastructure which included upgrading stadiums and revamping, upgrading stadiums, increasing flights and also improving network transport(Müller, 2014). Local police must also have to be prepared for this event in maintaining law and order and ensuring that everything runs smoothly

• Sustainability

 After the games were over the stadiums were left (Cottle, 2011). It will be very much costly for the Russian government to keep repairing the stadiums

Critical for quality parameters

Many people already started getting world cup fever even before it started .Goals are meant to instil a sense of purpose and in us so that we can work hard to achieve an amazing thing (Westland, & Kogan Page, 2010).The FIFA world cup 2018  is one of the biggest projects which was expected and  also attracted huge media coverage (York, 2014). With 32 countries having  participated  in this event , it was not to be possible if some quality parameters were not checked well in advance (Frawley & Adair, 2014). Below are some of the critical quality parameters that need to be checked to make sure that the goals of the project  are achieved

• Finish on Time

One of the major goals of all projects is having them finished on time (Roudias, 2015). A project is always temporal ,and it has a duration in which it has to be completed. One of the things that make it hard to finish projects in time it is because sometimes the requirement of the usual changes. When a project is using the agile methodology, such changes can greatly affect the date of completion. Based on the FIFA world cup 2018 having it finished on time was one of the major goals the project team  needed to achieve. Because the world cup is usually based on fixed dates, having it completed on time is one of the important project management goals.

• Maintain happy team members

Critical for quality parameters

It is easy to achieve whatever you want when you have a happy team behind you(Frawley &Adair, 2014). Project managers always need to make their team members happy.by creating an environment where every team member knows his contribution to the project matters thus they usually do their best (Müller, 2014).The FIFA world cup planning and project management teams are usually under a local organising committee (Schmidt, 2009). Thus this project had h70%of the Russians participate in it (Essays, 2015) .Thus having happy team members is essential for the success of the project. Many resources had been invested in this project. Thus it was important for the team members to be happy

• Deliver value to customers

It is possible that a project can be within the budget and completed on time and fail to make customers happy (Maylor &Dawsonera, 2010). One of the major goals of  project management is to make the customer happy and also to make sure that the project delivers value.

From the FIFA world cup website 2018, all preparation of this world cup was based on the interests of the football fan. Value is mostly delivered through offering free travel, fan guides and visa waivers (Schmidt, 2009). This was evidence that the Russian country value football fans

• Stay within the budget

The total budget for the FIFA world cup 2018 was 11.8 billion. Staying within the budget is one of the major challenges for project managers (Schmidt, 2009). By spreading the budget to both the government and private companies, it is expected that the project manager will deliver value (Frawley & Adair, 2014).

• Meet the project Requirements

One of the major goals of project management is being able to meet of a project (Snyder, 2018). They involve the capabilities and requirements that a project must meet for it to have satisfied the user by solving his problem.One of the major requirement of the FIFA world cup 2018 was to inspire and connect the globe by using a football game. The FIFA world cup is known for leaving the grand legacy to the country that hosted it (Schmidt, 2009).

Implementation of lean management in the 2018 FIFA world cup

Lean project management

Companies have various projects to deliver  and mostly involves the production of different goods and services (Zirin, 2016). Lean project management tool involves the use of data-driven tools in managing projects by having the processes improved continuously( Snyder, 2018). This method of lean management include Data analysis, increased customer value, eliminating waste and empowered cross-functional teams.

Lean project management is mainly used in complex projects which are greatly affected by resources limitation and cost. The project management methods include Lean six sigma(DMEDI), Deming Cycle and Kanban. This methodologies mainly focus on visual documentation tools, ongoing analysis and process improvement, in-depth planning to eliminate waste.

However Lean project methodologies would have been implemented in the FIFA world cup 2018.The Three Lean principles must have been implemented, for the success of the 2018 world cup (Snyder, 2018). They include focusing on the people, eliminating waste and also focusing on the customer (Maylor &Dawsonera, 2010)

• Focus on the Customer

 Just like in the manufacturing environment, it is good for the planning team to pay much attention to the need of the customers (Ellis, 2016). The project team needed to determine who the customer of the FIFA world cup 2018 is? Or in other words who was thought to benefit from the project?. The management must understand the preference of the FIFA world cup 2018 customers. They needed to know what they value most (Garcia, 2015). They needed to know what the FIFA world cup 2018  customers preferred and make sure that  the project delivers to them (Frawley &Adair, 2014). With these in mind, the managing team will know the need of the customer and delivered the products based on the needs that customers had (müller, 2014).

• Eliminating Waste;

There is always waste in project management (Wysocki, 2012). Waste is something that will not benefit the customer, but he or she is will to pay for it. Sometimes people become used to waste, and they no longer see it as a waste (Roudias, 2015). You need to ask yourself some questions like can you manage to handle the project in just a few steps? Do you pay attention to each and every task or you just pay attention to the critical path? Have you asked the project team for some advice about how to do away with waste?

Coming up with an effective plan on how to execute the FIFA cup 2018 required that the project management team have a closer look on the previous world cup season and check where resources got to be consumed up yet they were not of great benefit to the customers. Everything needs to be placed within the budget since this great event was  to be of benefit to the customers (Newton, 2013). For example, during the2010 world cup, a lot of money were used to build, decorate and maintain some stadium s in South Africa. These stadiums ended up being beyond expectations (Martha., & Voakes, 2015). In fact, there was the overdoing of it. Also during the FIFA world cup 2014, a lot of money was also used to prevent the spreading of certain diseases in Brazil during the happening of the FIFA world cup. However, the disease did not exist in the country in the firsts place. These are different wastes that have been identified from the past FIFA world cups. Thus this had to be highly avoided at the  2018 FIFA world cup .

It’s all about people.

 Those who manage projects by use of lean project management are all aware that it is all about people. This is a culture maintained  in all projects using the lean management tool. One must find out whether he engages people, whether asks for inputs are the people engaged in this project (Wysocki, 2012). There is one of the project tasks that are very hard, and most of the project managers would not want to engage people. In fact, it acts as a way to discover project talent. Thus all stakeholders who were involved in the planning of FIFA world cup 2018. Both the government and the private sector should be needed to be given a chance to air their opinions (Wysocki, 2012). Also, football fans needed to be given a chance to air their opinions.

Implementing the world cup project did not require some extra resources, cash and Engaging capital people makes sure that your project gets to be delivered on time, on budget and offers some good results (Wysocki, 2012).

How agile methodology and lean project management would have been implemented in the FIFA world cup 2018

As a project manager, you have to handle every challenge. On has to deliver quality work on budget and time (Cottle, 2011). Agile and Lean project are two methodologies that are in line with the needs of the modern project managers (Garcia, 2015). Agile methodologies are not limited to any specific practice and approach. Some methodologies like Scrum, XP and Kanban are classified as agile project methodologies (Ellis, 2016) .

Agile development divides the project development process into small processes thus minimizing the much work in planning and design. Instead of looking up for a project that takes a long period to be accomplished quick breaks this whole process into small manageable processes (Ellis, 2016). This iteration usually takes a little time to be accomplished. The agile development cycles also promote better communication (Kerzner & Belack, 2010). During these small processes, the managers usually communicate with the people for better management. This is to help the people stay up to date when delivering the given piece of value. It helps the team members to be more focused on the real actual work on hand. Then if they were managing a whole project at once. Agile methodologies also greatly help in managing quality (Garcia, 2015). After every piece of value has been delivered . The agile team usually look back and try to come up with ways in which they can be able to improve quality. Thus managing the 2018 FIFA world cup will call for the whole project to be divided into small iterations. Where these iterations will be assigned a team.

Lean project management is a process of lean management which is mainly rooted in lean methodology (Kerzner & Belack, 2010). Agile was mainly developed for the optimization of software development teams while lean has been developed to optimize manufacturing  value streams (Kerzner,2011). Today these methodologies are usually used together (Alegi, 2008). Through the integration of agile methodologies in Lean project management helps a project manager to break down a whole project into some measurable and manageable pieces thus making the different teams be able to deliver faster and high quality. As a result, a project is delivered on time.

Thus applying agile methodologies in delivering the lean project management of the FIFA world cup of 2018 would have been easier because the project would have been broken  into small manageable processes which would have been easily managed by small teams (Alegi, 2008). Agile methodologies are the best to use in lean project management especially while trying to deliver a complex project like the 2018 FIFA world cup .The whole project can be divided into small matches assigned to a team  but coordinated by the project managers. In fact, it will be easier this way.

How Lean and Lean Six Sigma would have been implemented in the 2018 FIFA world cup

Lean six sigma is usually based on facts and a philosophy based in data . It mainly favours consumer satisfaction through reducing cycle time, waste and variation thus promoting workflow and standardization .It is best applied where waste and variation exist (Kerzner & Belack, 2010). It is further referred to as DMAIC which means to define, measure, analyse, improve and control. These methods can be best applied in FIFA world cup 2018 project management. This is by defining what customers want and the borders of the project (Maylor &Dawsonera, 2010). We can also use this method to measure the extent to which the world cup will be able to satisfy all customers and by which way (Frawley &Adair, 2014). This method will help to carry out an analysis on what customers prefer best. Generally, lean six sigma management will be of great help to know the needs of the customers and what they want to be delivered to them.

This method would have been effectively used to collect data from customers to make sure that they had the best world cup experience ever offered to them during the FIFA world cup of 2018 (Garcia, 2015).

How PRINCE2 and Lean project management would have been implemented in the FIFA world cup 2018.

Basically PRINCE2 usually means Projects in Controlled Environments (Roudias, 2015). The government of the United developed it, and it is a process-based method. This method is usually based on some principles which are meant to control the whole process of the project. They include

1. 1. All operations of the project  should serve the need of  Customers and the benefits they will draw from them
2. The project team should learn from every stage. Thus everything that happens in every phase of the project should be recorded for future retrieval
3. The responsibility of every person should be clearly defined
4. Apart from planning for every project, each stage should have its planning
5. Teams need to ensure that they offer quality at every stage
6. Project managers manage projects by putting exceptions

There also seven steps in this method. They include start up, directing, initiation, controlling, managing the delivery of the project, managing the stages of the projects and also closing the project (Hahn, 2011). However one must have experience when implementing PRINCE2

Thus it is straightforward to implement PRINCE2 in Lean Project Management. Lean methodology pays more attention to the needs of a customer just like the PRINCE2 method. The PRINCE2 usually divided a project into seven stage (Frawley &Adair, 2014). When this methodology is combined with the lean project it will make sure that in every step the needs of the customers will be catered for and because of the presence of data it will be easy to know how to implement each stage based on the needs of the customers

There was a need to combine Lean project management with the PRINCE2 methodology (Frawley &Adair, 2014). This would have divided the whole world cup project into seven stages (Hahn, 2011). There was to be data analysis for each step which would significantly help in making sure that customers had the best world cup experience ever (Martha., & Voakes, 2015). Through this, it was easy to eliminate waste and everything that would not have been to the best interest of customers and sponsors.

How PMBOK and Lean project management would have been implemented in the FIFA world cup 2018.

This process also breaks down a project into five processes. These processes include Initiation, planning, executing, controlling an closing. However, PMBOK cannot be thought to be a methodology rather it more of conventions and standards of managing different projects (Kerzner, 2011). Thus implementing Lean methods together with PMBOK will see the division of the entire project into the five projects (Frawley &Adair, 2014). Each stage will call for data analysis just like the lean methodology requires it and to makes sure that waste is eliminated it will be carried out based on the interests of the customer (Burton, 2011).

The implementation of the lean methods together with the PMBOK would have seen the FIFA world cup 2018 project divided into five stages since when the idea was conceived. Just like Prince 2, in PMBOK every step must be carried out based on the needs of the football fans across the world.

How Project management organization and Lean methodology could have been implemented in FIFA world cup 2018

Project organization is a process concerned with coming up with decisions and arrangement that affect the whole process of a project. This tasks usually involves organizing the method of the projects, the framework involved in the process. Basically, the project management organization usually requires structuring, configuration, and organization. If this is implemented together with the lean methodology, it will make sure that the decisions made for the execution of the project are proper.

Implementation of project management organization together with the lean project management in the FIFA world cup 2018, would have ensured that good arrangement and decisions that pertain to each team and every match are made (Burton, 2011). This would have ensured that no inconveniences are encountered during the project processes.

• All resources needed to accomplish the FIFA world cup project were available.
• The FIFA world cup was to be held in Russia.
• Only the 12 stadiums were to be used for the world cup events.
• 32 teams were also expected for the world cup event.

Conclusion

Using multiple methodology approach always leads to happier customers and projects teams (Maylor &Dawsonera, 2010). At the beginning using multiple methodology approaches is usually odd especially when delivering complex projects. Thus it okay for project managers to use a combination of Lean, Lean six Sigma, PMBOK, and PRINCE2 methodologies

References

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