This unit is a discussion about the building of a project communication plan with all the information requirements of a standard project plan. It mainly outlines how communication shall be done during the management of the whole project of server installation. It has made several references to the project management body of knowledge guide and several other samples of project communication plans.
Context and Project Background
This communication plan as earlier seen is associated with the project of installation of a server. The entire project has stakeholders who are responsible for its implementation and they are found in various places across the globe. This project has its own system engineers and testers as part of the stakeholders who are involved to ensure a successful installation of the server.
The total budget of the implementation of this project will affect the communication plan since the communication plan will greatly depend upon the budget drawn so as to communicate to the stakeholders and the client who owns the project. There are also other factors that will affect the implementation of the project and therefore the communication plan. These are the coverage by the media, the political stability and competitors in the server installation field.
When the media focuses on criticizing the project, then the project communication plan just have to be detailed and written with a lot of clarity to make sure that the criticism does not contribute to the downfall of the project. When there is political instability, the project plan explains how this challenge shall be dealt with. Likewise, to competitors, the project plan outlines clearly how the competition shall be kept stiff (Heldman, 2009).
Stakeholder Analysis
The stakeholders in this server installation project are from various places across the globe as already seen earlier. Some of the places of residence include Sacramento, CA; Colorado Springs, CO; Dallas, TX; Nashua, MA; London, England and lastly Baumholder and Germany. Those stakeholders from Sacramento are solely charged with the responsibility of building the individual machines. These machines will mainly have the kluge of boxes which are going to form the project to be installed in Baumholder and London.
On the other hand, the systems’ engineers are found in Colorado Springs while the testers have their residential areas in Dallas. The vendors who have been contracted in the project are mainly involved in assembly work where they assemble processors, CPUs, drives, file servers and the cabling which build up the server kluge.
The technicians that will be needed in the various assembly points in this project are to come from London and Baumholder. These technicians will mainly be charged with the responsibility of carrying out the installations only when they are being supervised by the systems’ engineers. The testers will then follow the installation work to do the testing of the systems.
All the stakeholders in this project are to be treated with a lot of esteem and should not have any working conditions that appear to be or are not conducive. This is because their success in the areas of their responsibility is the success of the whole installation project. Their failure means that the entire project has failed a thing that will greatly cost the customer and even the project manager (Heldman, 2007).
Communication Plan
Communication Objectives
This project communication has key objectives which it is supposed to achieve when addressing the stakeholders, the client and other partners. Some of the objectives to be achieved are:
- To increase the level of collaboration, as far as the project is concerned, between the different stakeholders
- To keep the investors in the server installation project informed of the events that are going to take place
- To elaborate and illustrate the goals that the entire project has
Routine communication
Communication in the implementation of the project is a very vital element that is going to be treated with a lot of seriousness in the implementation process. Therefore, communication shall be done on a daily basis outlining the various levels of the project as it is implemented. The communication will serve to remove any form of misunderstanding or confusion for the success of the project. In case of any meeting to be held amongst all the stakeholders, then the agendas will always be availed two days prior to the actual meeting.
Budget Communication
Once the budget making process has been culminated, the whole of the budget will be availed to the stakeholders before the implementation process starts. This is to allow room for scrutiny and criticism, especially to the sections which shall be found wanting and can compromise the implementation of the project. The budget shall be availed both in soft copy by email and other technological ways of communication like the local network or the website. It shall also be available in hard copy that is in printed form.
Risk and Issues Communication
All the possible risks that the implementation team has taken shall be communicated to all the involved parties prior to the implementation process so as to curb any form of witch hunts or blames. Any arising issues that are weighty, during the progress of installation shall always be communicated soon after consultations in the board of directors of the project. This is to allow deliberations to be made and see to it that some temporal solutions to the issue are provided immediately before the permanent solution.
Communication Objectives and Keys Summary
The main objective of the communication is to create a smooth implementation of the entire project without any form of difficult. This is because the root cause of wrangles and quarrels whenever a project is being implemented is lack of proper communication, which causes misunderstandings. The other objective is to enhance a problem solving mechanism beforehand so as to avoid the interference to the implementation of the project.
Therefore, communication is a very vital element in the implementation process of any kind of project plan. Without proper communication, all the efforts inputted in the process of implementation are rendered useless. All stakeholders in this server installation project must be aware of these facts for efficiency to be maintained in the implementation process (Stackpole, 2008).
Budget
Approximately, 15% of the total budget is going to be dedicated to the process of communication and general correspondence which is inevitable at the start of the project implementation and also during the preparation time. There is however, a possibility of budget overage above the estimate figure. In such an occurrence, the budget will be revised reducing the over budgeted sections so as to balance the total budget.
References
Heldman, K. (2007). Microsoft Office Excel 2007 for Project Management. New York: Wiley Publishing.
Heldman, K. (2009). Project Management Professional Exam Study Guide. New York: Wiley Publishing.
Stackpole, C. (2008). A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide). London: Project Management Institute.