How important are communication skills in project management
Read the case study “Communication Failures” starting on page 329 and answer the questions on page 332.
Response-1
Q1. How important are communication skills in project management?
Communication plays an essential role in for the success of any projects. The internal and external communication is vital for the success of the project. The internal communication is the combination of the employees within the organization, and external communication is essential for managing the flow of information to satisfy the demands of the stakeholders. Most normal strategy for communication is dealing with the project is through reports, messages and reminders and so on (Atkinson & Crawford, 2006). sometimes poor communication may lose the contact when some unexpected issues like changing plans arise in the project, if at such time there is no appropriate communication in the organization then it will affect the organizational decision making policy.
Q2.
Was Herb the right person to be assigned as the project manager?
According to the case study, before making any decision regarding the project. Herbs selection as the project manager for this new project will always need to calculate. The two factors R&D and Manufacturing needs to be evaluated before allotting that to the right person. Based on these two factors Herb is perfectly fit for this position because Herb had in the organization for over eight years and also had an experience on working with Manufacturing and R&D. He had a Ph.D. in engineering and had advanced a reputation as a subject matter professional. Because of his expert skills, he worked by himself most of the period and interfaced with the numerous teams of project only through project team gatherings (Kerzner, 2017). Thus the decision of making him as the Project manager was the correct decision.
Q3.
There were communications issues with Alice, Bob, Betty, and Frank. For each communication issue, where was the breakdown in communications: encoding, decoding, feedback, and so on?
According to the case study, there were communication gaps among all the team members. Betty, Alice, Bob, and Frank were not capable to preserve their communiqué skills with Herb. The absence of suitable correspondence with the project manager, the massive majority of them lost chances to get progressive into the additional level. Both unraveling and encoding were not in the logical way as the communiqué get affected when it’s in collected don’t make a difference it’s an electronic mail, informs, or even content in the project meeting (Kerzner H. R., 2013). In Alice case, it was an encoding problem, she didn’t refer to about the letter of proposal for her progression, and she recognized that Herb would give her that letter nevertheless when she didn’t ask. Sway’s case is untying as he didn’t understand the message from Herb concerning the playing out the week’s test.
References
Atkinson, R., & Crawford, L. (2006). Fundamental uncertainties in projects and the scope of project management. International journal of project management, 24(8), 687-698.
Kerzner, H. (2017). Project Management Case Studies. 329-335: John Wiley & Sons.
Kerzner, H. R. (2013). Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and controlling. John Wiley & Sons.
Response-2
Q1. How important are communication skills in project management?
Communication plays a very important role in any of the projects. The communication between the team members and their superiors is always necessary for carrying out the project in a hassle free way. The communication need to be clear, which if not will create disturbances in the project leading to the failure of delivering the project as per deadlines. Proper communication also reduces the redundancy of data and ensures effective working of project. If the present case study is considered, there is a communication gap between the team members because of which Herb faced a lot of problems. If the communication is clear, then it would be a better scenario for Herb. Hence communication skills are always vital in any project management.
Q2. Was Herb the right person to be assigned as the project manager?
The answer to this question depends on various factors. When looked from the experience perspective, Herb has enough experience of 8 years because of which his company has believed in him. As far as knowledge is considered, Herb is considered a subject matter expert and a Ph.D holder with knowledge of working in both R&D and manufacturing projects earlier. But the only thing that Herb lacks is the experience of being a project manager. Thus I assume communication gap is created between the team members. Considering the above factors, I think Herb can be assigned as a project manager so that he can get better and continue his good work in the organisation. His experience and knowledge would definitely be an asset to the project, if the communication gets better. This will also help the company to enhance their business.
Q3. There were communications issues with Alice, Bob, Betty, and Frank. For each communication issue, where was the breakdown in communications: encoding, decoding, feedback, and so on?
Yeah, there were communication issues with all the four team members. If the case of Alice is considered, there is a encoded message that she expects that Herb would be writing a recommendation mail for her promotion. In case of Bob, there is a lack of feedback as Herb didn’t get the required follow up from the technicians and it would have been better for Herb if he had gone through proper channel involving Bob. In Betty’s scenario, there is a problem in decoding Herb’s message of just determining the cost of procurement because of which Betty has actually procured the materials. The feedback from Franck would definitely have been better in procuring the materials which did not actually happen.
References:
Kerzner, H., & Kerzner, H. R. (2013). Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and controlling. Hoboken: Wiley.
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