Challengesof Project Managers
Challengesof Project Managers
Throughoutthe course, I found out that the processes of balancing thecomplexities of time, resources, money, scope, and people could be alaborious undertaking. The complexities go on to form the coreprocesses and procedures for a routine project manager. The jobrequires a training forum to have skills that guide through theprocess of solving the complexities. To put the manager’s job inperspective, various challenges arise. As learned through the course,the challenges of the project managers exist regardless of theexperience of the professional. Venturing to new and diversifiedprojects will deem the professional to use a little art, entail asleight of hand, and implement a little science to maneuver and comeup with successful projects. The following paper highlights thecommon challenges that act as a threat to the successive completionof various projects under the foresight of a project manager.
Amongthe leading challenges of the profession, I realized that projectmanagers have to deal and triumph through challenges within thecorporate setting. The challenges in the business environment areundefined goals and scope changes (Doraiswamy, 2012). When the uppermanagement lacks or does not agree to the goals of the projectmanager, the whole project has uncertainty of successful completion.The undefined goals mean that the various details of the projects,from the very minute to the complexities of the project, will run tovagueness since neither the corporate figures nor the project managerknows what to do with the project at hand. Scope changes occur whenthe project managers allow the scope of the project to go beyond theoriginal objectives (Doraiswamy, 2012). Doraiswamy (2012) adds thatchanges arise in the project and the clients may feel the need tomodify the particulars of the project. The consequences of changingthe initial objectives fall as a challenge to the project manager. Itis so since it takes top-notch skills and experience for a projectmanager to align with the new changes midway the project. Theprofessional needs to make decisions to offer provisions for theeffective communication of the new plan to the workers, communicationfor the new goals of the project and what the team aims to achieve,and come up with clear communication for the effects of the budgetchanges and deadlines that will please all the stakeholders.
Ilearned that apart from the corporate challenges, the project managerexperiences challenges while working with the accorded team tocomplete a project. Inadequate skills lead the category where aproject may require skills that the contributors lack extensively.Inadequate skills mean that the team assigned to the project lacksthe needed competencies the assessment for the workers is way belowthe recommended levels, and the process of outsourcing and hiringother workers becomes impossible while observing the timeline ofcompletion of the project (Wastian, 2014). Additionally, a clear lackof accountability from the team adds to the challenges that theproject managers face. The lack of accountability extends to thefailure to recognize the involved parties when a section of theobjectives of the project falls short (Wastian, 2014). The problemhas remedies that include using accountability as part of the riskprofile. The course outlines unrealistic deadlines among the mostdiversified challenge of project managers. Many argue that projectshave an aspect of schedule slippage as a common characteristic ratherthan an anomaly. It then translates to a collective problem of themanagers to seek alternative paths and approaches to complete thetasks on time. The delay in completion arises from uncontrollablefactors such a government election, an external event within theproject extensions, and public holidays among other pause factors. Itadds to the task of the managers to plan creatively, findsalternative analysis, and direct new communication to confine to thereality of the deadlines offered by the participants of the project.
Communicationdeficit is a universal challenge for the manager. Carrying outprojects creates a deficit on the infrastructures used to passcrucial information to all the parties involved. Additionally, theculture of good communication is not persistent in many projects. Theright information does not get to the right people, and when it does,it does not get to them at the right time (Meredith, 2011). Meredithcounters that it is imperative for the project managers to develop aproper communication flow and come up with a checklist of theinformation needed for the successive completion of a project (2011).A successive completion of a project has a backslash in thecompetition of the resources needed. The manager ends up in acompetitive spot with other projects and initiatives for labor, time,and money. The challenge extends further when the upper managementlacks to define and set the priorities of the projects. The problemextends when the manager uses the resources allocated for other sideprojects other than the stated ones.
Moreover,the project managers fail to include the customers and the end usersof the project during the development period (Jha, 2010). Theexternal shareholders lack any input in the project since the projectmanagers are busy juggling between the deadlines, the internaldeliverables, and the completion processes. Therefore, it is pivotalto include meetings with the external shareholders in the earlyprocesses of the project initiation to gather information from theend users. The information helps to meet the expectations of the endusers that can additionally add up to the list of the objectives ofthe project (Jha, 2010). Improper risk management is a swellingchallenge to a project manager. It is pivotal for the project managerto possess analytical skills that will help with risk tolerance sinceprojects do not go as planned. Factors are most likely to veer offcourse in the project manager’s job, and the appropriate responseto the factors means the manager holds control of the project fromthe start until the completion of the project.
Itis a common practice to find managers with ambiguous contingencyplans in dealing with the abrupt, unexpected scenarios. The casewhere the contingency plans are vague, the full project may halt andmire in one of the unexpected situations (Binder, 2012). It is anadditional challenge if the manager excludes other participants inthe process of identifying potential unexpected scenarios within theproject. Therefore, consultation with the other members may reducethe risk of an absence of a clear backup plan for the project, andmay help cite numerous scenarios likely to halt the completionprocess. In response, the manager sets strategies to combat with theunexpected situations. Uncertain dependencies extend to add to thechallenges of a project manager (Wilson, 2014). To determine thevarious risks of the project, the dependencies, and getting thereliability of certain links between the projects calls for theassessment (Binder, 2012) and trust from an external participant. Theexternal member carries out an assessment for the whole project andgives the weak points for the project. However, the challenge ariseswhen the external participant makes uncertain conclusions. To controlsuch uncertainties, it is advisable for the manager to have variousinputs from multiple brainstorming sessions, use the providedelements from the course, and apply them to the project, leading tosuccess.
Inconclusion, the project manager has many duties to run, and theoverall success of the project depends on their wits and skills onthe job. The challenges above need a professional to maneuver withgreat caution to come up with the desired project. The success of theproject determines the commitment level of the project manager andbuilds their reputation for handling other projects comfortablywithout the fear of diversity. In such cases, the challenges mayextend to the individual traits of the manager that determines theeffectiveness of usage of the end project. Features such as politicalaffiliations, social prevalence, and moral grounds go an extra mileto push the manager to deliver the expected project that pleases allthe stakeholders while at the same time utilizing the providedresources.
References
Binder,M. J. (2012). GlobalProject Management: Communication, Collaboration and Managementacross Borders.Gower Publishing, Ltd…
Doraiswamy,P., & Shiv, P. (2012). 50top IT project management challenges.IT Governance Publishing.
Jha,S. (2010). TheProject Manager`s Communication Toolkit.CRC Press.
Meredith,J. R., & Mantel Jr, S. J. (2011). Projectmanagement: a managerial approach.John Wiley & Sons.
Wastian,M., Rosenstiel, L., West, M. A., & Braumandl, I. (Eds.). (2014).AppliedPsychology for Project Managers.Springer Berlin.
Wilson,R. (2014). MasteringProject Management Strategy and Processes: Proven Methods to MeetOrganizational Goals.FT Press.