Project Management can be defined as the discipline of planning, organizing, and managing resources for the successful achievement of specified project goals and objectives. A project is a set endeavor with specified commencement and completion dates carried out to generate a distinctive product or service which brings about added value or beneficial change. This finite feature of projects contrasts sharply to operations or processes, which are permanent or temporary functional work to continually produce similar products or services. Practically, the management of both systems is frequently found to be quite distinct, and therefore requires the development of different technical skills and the espousal of separate management philosophy.
Every successful Project Manager must control the four essential elements of a project in a concurrent manner i.e. scope, time, resources as well as money. All four elements are interconnected and each should be effectively managed. All must be jointly managed for the success of the project.
Various literature on the project management approach centers on the importance of managing and balancing three elements i.e. money time and people. Nevertheless, scope emerges to be the most important element and it becomes the first as well as the last task for a successful project. First and foremost the approach assists in managing the scope of the project.
The project scope is termed as the designation of what is to be achieved by the project and the budget (of money and time) set aside for the achievement of the laid down goals and objectives. It is very essential that every change in the project’s scope carries an equivalent change in the budget, either resources or time. If the scope of the project is to construct a structure to house four widgets with a $200,000 budget the project manager is expected to do that.
On the other hand, if the scope is altered to a five widgets building, the project manager should attain a suitable change in the budgeted resources. The project manager will evade the change in scope if at all the budget is not altered. It becomes practically hard to manage resources time, money as well as resources effectively unless the project scope is well managed. With a clearly defined project scope that is linked with the budget and timeline, one can start to manage the project resources. These comprise the people, material, and equipment necessary to finish the project. (Burke, 2003)
The project management approach adopted for the planning and controlling of a hotel refurbishment project carries several advantages which are listed under.
The project management approach helps the top management personnel in deciding whether to go ahead with a certain given project or to cut it short. Through proper evaluation and assessment, managers will be able to make informed decisions regarding the undertaking of certain projects. For example, if after carrying out a project management review and it emerges that the project wouldn’t be cost-effective then there will be no point implementing the same.
Therefore, the manager will come up with a different decision altogether. With this, we can say that the project management approach is a decision point to each and every hotel refurbishment project i.e. the approach guides the manager on the best decision to take. (Ransley and Ingram, 2000)
Through the application of a proper project management approach, the business is able to determine the ultimate failure or success of the business with these it becomes possible for the management to foresee the expected outcomes of and project to be carried out. The business will therefore be in a position to avoid massive losses that may have occurred in case there was no project management approach employed. (Burke, 2003)
This approach assists planners in the hospitality industry in providing viable criteria on how to properly rank projects, projects that need prior completion are ranked best but for those that can wait they are ranked last as per the order of ranking.
It gives the hotel management an opportunity to consider various and different solutions to be adopted in order to come up with the best remedies.
Through the approach, firms are able to clarify the goals and objectives of undertaking a given project. With sound clarification, it becomes very easy for the hotel management to achieve the set goals and objectives.
The approach offers a good platform for judging the level of a project’s failure or success. This will ultimately give a go-ahead in case success is predicted or a stop to the whole project in case the results are likely to be a failure.
Any effective and successful hotel maintenance should be planned, implemented, and recorded, through the employment of project management theory it becomes easy to realize highly effective hotel maintenance activities that are supposed to keep the physical property of a building as well as its contents in good form. (Burke, 2003).
The approach provides some form of technical feasibility where it becomes possible for the top managerial staff to evaluate the practicality of the solution or technology applied.
The hotel management is also able to tell whether it possesses the necessary and modern technology that suits the market demand. This in form assists the hotel management team in gathering the required technical expertise to aid in project implementation.
The approach offers operational feasibility making it possible for the hoteliers to predict whether the offered solution to the problem will work as per their expectations it will also assist them in figuring out the reactions of the customers pertaining to the solutions offered. This will also help in establishing how the solution will fit in if incorporated with the other activities in the organization. (Ransley and Ingram, 2000).
Social feasibility offered by the approach assists in finding out whether the project will be received well by the entire community and whether it takes care of corporate social responsibility. Social feasibility will aid in determining the possible outcomes of the changes in people’s attitudes and values in the near future. It will also point out some problems that may arise in predicting changes in attitudes and values and in evaluating the attitudes and values effects as well as suggesting possible solutions to the above problems.
Projects entail that various tasks are carried out which may be dependent on others. With this, the approach assists the stakeholders in the hotel industry to first come up with prerequisite projects so as to give way to the completion of projects that are reliant on others.
Through the approach, it becomes possible to estimate the time required for the completion of projects i.e. the managers can be able to plan for projects based on the expected time schedule without interfering with other operations in the hotel.
This will help in deciding the most critical projects thus allocating time for their completion without delay. It also offers an insight on how long the management may delay those tasks taken as non-critical before the stipulated period of time.
References
Burke, R., (2003) Project Management, Planning & Control Techniques 4th Ed,Wiley, Chichester.
Lock, D., (2000) Project Management (7th Ed), Aldershot, Gower.
Ransley, J, & Ingram, H (Eds), (2000), Developing Hospitality Properties and Facilities, Oxford, Butterworth-Heinemann.
Teare R (1992), Managing Projects in the Hospitality Industry, Cassell, London.
Young T.L., (2003), The Handbook of Project Management, (2nd Ed), London, Kogan Page.