Risk Analysis and Project Completion
To measure the success of a project is to deliver a result that addresses the business specific needs (Mind tools, 2012). It is important for the project manager to make sure that the objective is attained and the output is accepted by the different stakeholders. The project closure is composed of three elements (Mastering-project-management, 2009):
- "clean up" project
- Post implementation review
- Lessons learned
When a project closure is not performed we can face:
- Pending activities like closing accounts; paying bills and reassigning the staff and equipment.
- Second is no lessons learned from the activities performed to have n history as reference. The reference is based on the blocking points and the risk encounter during the execution phase.
For my example I have planned a trip to Paris and the planning phase was done with estimate from the internet and booking reference. The first risk encounter is the money exchange rate that increases. Reducing the amount of euro I have to carry. The execution phase showed that the "visa" card usage was better than carrying cash. This risk and the execution need to be saved for next trip in the same region. The same things with the TGV transportation fares that was different from the web reservation and the ticketing at the station.
Another example showing the lack of project closure is the delay on the next project due to issue in the past project.
I have managed a "cut over "project that consisted to move some existing live data sites from an old radio network commander to a new one. There was some customer's complaint after that but the objective was to move these sites technically. We could say that the objective was fulfilled, but when we decide to implement the same project in another region, the manager delayed the implementation because of what he herded from the past project. In the two cases we have cost affected and time schedule affected.
We decided from the example above to follow the process of project closure and send a report highlighting the objective and what specifically was implemented and the allow the senior management to see the risk and take decision for staff and resources allocation.
Task
- Comment on the explanations above by expanding on, questioning, or offering further support for the ideas, or by suggesting new or alternative viewpoints.