MEL 452- Project Leader Responsibilities

Roles and Responsibilities of a Project Leader:

• Managing and leading the project team.

• Recruiting project staff and consultants.

 • Managing co-ordination of the partners and working groups engaged in project work.

• Detailed project planning and control including:

• Developing and maintaining a detailed project plan.

• Managing project deliverables in line with the project plan.

• Recording and managing project issues and escalating where necessary.

 • Resolving cross-functional issues at project level.

• Managing project scope and change control and escalating issues where necessary.

• Monitoring project progress and performance.

• Providing status reports to the project sponsor.

• Managing project training within the defined budget.

• Liaises with, and updates progress to, project board/senior management.

 • Managing project evaluation and dissemination activities.

• Managing consultancy input within the defined budget.

• Final approval of the design specification.

• Working closely with users to ensure the project meets business needs.

 • Definition and management of the User Acceptance Testing programme.

• Identifying user training needs and devising and managing user training programmes.

• Providing regular status reports to the IPSC Programme Board.  

MEL – 452.AGRICULTURAL PROJECT MANAGEMENT (2+0) UNIT – IV

MEL – 452.AGRICULTURAL  PROJECT  MANAGEMENT (2+0)

UNIT – IV

MONITORING

Definition:

                        A Continuous/ Periodic review and surveillance by the project management, at every level of the implementation of an activity to ensure that input deliveries, work schedules, targeted outputs and other required action are proceeding according to plan.

                        It is a process of measuring, recording, collection, processing, and communicating information to assist project management decision making.

Elements in monitoring:

                        Purpose of a project is to convert a set of RESOURCES into desired RESULTS.

Resources are Inputs Results are outcome:

Inputs  :           Goods, Funds, Services, Manpower, Technology.

Results :           1. Output (Immediate results)

                        2. Effect (Intermediate results)

                        3. Impact (Ultimate results)

Participatory monitoring:

                        The beneficiaries themselves are made partners in monitoring. Project staff and beneficiaries discuss and assess the performance together, in order to understand how they have performed, what the problems are and what the problems are and what the future holds for them.

Monitoring and progress reporting:

                        Progress reports is a statement of facts giving the extent of achievements of any given point of time.

Difference between Reporting and Monitoring:

Reporting	Monitoring
1.      Regular/ ad-hoc	1.      Regular/ continuous
2.      Suitable to smaller projects	2.    Required in bigger and complex projects
3.      Comprehensive and covers all aspects (Physical and Financial)	3.     Selective
4.    Collection and reporting function. It does not ask ‘Why’ and ‘How’	4.      Collection, reporting, identifying shortfalls/ bottlenecks and their causes.
5.     Required by programme administrator	5.       Programme formulation controlling authority (managers) & community.
6.      Emanates from primary level	6.       Carried out at multiple level (from primary, central apex)
7. Reporting of falt accomplishment and therefore passive	7.      Regulates the pace of development not merely recorded it.

Monitoring Techniques:

1.  Regular progress report

                        Progress reports and records submitted by field staff at district and block levels should contain physical and financial progress, targets, coverage, composition of groups and activities.

2.  Monitoring staff performance (Review)

                        It can ensure that individuals are effectively employed to fulfill given tasks. All those employed in a project should meet regularly, to discuss their progress and match with progress and objectives and discuss problems and possible changes.

3.  Tour reports by field staff

                        The most useful information about qualitative aspects of  a programme are obtained from the tour reports submitted by field staff.

4.  Participant observation

                        The field staff may stay in the villages and observe the groups closely so as to obtain sensitive, first-land insights.

5.  Reports from visitors

                        The project staff ensures that all visitors to the project area (Project Director, State level officials, Researchers etc.,) provide a short report on their impression of the schemes.

6.  Interviews

                        Group members and community leaders should be interviewed on their attitude towards the scheme and resultant behavioural changes.

7.  Participatory monitoring

                        The project staff mainly plays a guiding role to formulate appropriate questions and eliciting answers.

8.  Key informants

                        In addition to regular contacts, we must try to interact with other people who may be useful sources of information. Ex. Teacher, postmaster, women, SHGs, etc.,

9.  Complaints/ grievances positions

                        Received from people in general and target group in particular may throw some light on the actual performance of the scheme.

Indicators of monitoring

                        Indicators are measure of change. They help us to substantiate the achievements of the development work, through meaningful and trustworthy statements about what has been done and the benefits of that.

                        Indicators are simplified approximation of achievements or phenomena that are examined. Date(2004).

                        Developing indicators is a necessary pre-condition for effective monitoring.

Types of Indicators

1.  Quantitative indicators

                        Provide numeric information about a change in a situation. Ex : Number of social organizations, No. of farmers using improved variety of wheat.

2.  Direct indicators

                        Provide information which expressly relates to what is being measured. Ex : Information on crop yield.

3.  Indirect indicators

                        Essential information, chosen from among many types of information to serve as substitutes for answering questions or responding to statements that are difficult to measure. Ex: level of poverty in a community.

4.  Process indicators

                        Steps involved in planning, design, collecting funds, construction of a water supply scheme. The processes involved in developing water supply infrastructure.

Ex: Level of participation, and inputs of community during planning.

5.  Progress indicators

                        Seek to measure or monitor changes against stated targets. PI are usually but not always expressed in quantitative terms.

6.  Qualitative indicators

                        Are largely descriptive statements about processes and outcomes?

Ex: What is the level of participation in village organization meetings?

        How are decisions made by the village organization?

        How are community needs assessed?

Types of monitoring

I.Beneficiary contact monitoring

                                    BCM is the key to successful overall project monitoring.

a. Physical                               b. Financial

Objectives:

1.  To maintain records of each participant and to analyse these periodically to monitor the penetration of the service and the establishment of a clientele.

2.    To establish a regular schedule of surveys to enable managers to measure the progress of a project and the responses of its beneficiaries.

3.    To use informal interviews to alert managers to outstanding success stories or problems.

Beneficiary contact indicators

1.    Proportion of the target population known of the project’s services or inputs.

2.    Proportion of the target population has access to particular project services or inputs.

3.    Proportion of the target population adopted elements of the project.

4.    Proportion of the exposed population adopted elements of the project.

5.    Proportion of the adopting population repeated their use of project services.

6.    Proportion of the adopted population continued practices promoted by the project.

7.    Reasons for not using project services or stopped participating.

 II.   Process monitoring

                        PM is an approach that ensures that processes are steered to achieve the desired results and that quality is maintained throughout.

Need for PM

1.    To understand how we are implementing activities and attaining milestones.

2.    To keep an eye on the changing context of the project environment that could affect the project.

3.    To ensure the best possible outcomes for communities.

4.    To ensure that certain quality standards are maintained.

5.    To ensure that processes are observed at a project level.

6.    To learn from similar processes available to the group at large.

Monitoring Risks and Uncertainties

·         Fluctuation in prices of inputs and outputs

·         Delay in implementation. Time over runs

·         Escalation of costs. Cost over runs

·         Yields

Sensitivity analysis

                        The risks and uncertainties and the magnitude should be anticipated at the project formulation stage itself and the project economics (Profitability: Cost and returns) should be worked out for different levels of risks and uncertainties. This is called sensitivity analysis.

Time overruns

                        Delay in implementation and also realizing the outputs. Planned activities include,

Ø  Rephrase the project period.

Ø  Cut down the initial target and reallocate resources.

Ø  Recast the target and outputs.

Ø  Intensify extension and technical support initiatives.

Ø  Concentrate in ‘critical’ activities

Cost overruns

                        If the cost of the project exceeds the originally planned and sanctioned budget, this will affect the projects output and outcomes as well as profitability/ sustainability.

Yields

                        It is necessary to work out the economics and profitability when the actual yield is lower than expected quantity.

Contingency allowances as a remedy

                        Sound project planning requires provision be made in advance for possible adverse physical or price changes that are likely to add to the original cost and time. This is called contingency allowances.

MEL 452 - Unit II

Role Management

Role indicates a set of expected behaviour pattern attributed to some one occupying a given position in an organization. In an organization an employee may have to play a number of roles. This is true in project organization also. In projects Managers/executives may have to play three distinct roles – Interpersonal role, Monitor (informational role), and Negotiator (decision maker role). The function performed in these roles are overlapping and it is difficult to draw any distinct line. The following is the example of some of the major activities undertaken by the project managers in these three roles.

Interpersonal Role

Ø  Built and motivate project team

Ø  Maintain organizational harmony by resolving conflicts

Ø  Communicating expected role to the team members

Ø  Communicate relevant information to stakeholders

Monitor Role

Ø  Monitors progress, cost, time and quality specification with respect to baseline

Ø  Directs inter-function efforts

Ø  Seeks and identifies opportunities to promote improvements

Ø  Ensures availability of adequate resources on time.

Ø  Ensuring visibility of benefits

Negotiator Role

·         The head of the project and single focal point for decision making

·         Representing the organization negotiates project related matters

·         Maintains contacts outside the organization

·         Sole representative for all project related communications

Certain attitudes and behaviour consistent with a role are referred as role identity, role perception, and role expectations. All the above aspects are covered in role management.

Team Building

            Team building is an important component of a project and aims at bring out synergy in diverse manpower required to undertake various activities for achieving project goals. Team building is not confined only to choosing a team, but also involves fostering and motivating it. The process therefore, focuses on improving interpersonal relations and task accomplishment by way of increased organizational effectiveness through diagnosis of barriers to team performance.

            The project team in general is a heterogeneous group with member from varied background and experience. Besides the project personnel, individuals from a number of external agencies like consultants, vendors and contractors are also involved. Not only the composition but the size of a project team also varies with the scope and project complexity. An optimal composition of a team in terms of both skill and size is central to the project. Normally the team should be small to facilitate communication and co-ordination for better accountability. However when the teams are small, some critical skills may be missed in the team and may demand over working of team members. In contract the larger the project team the project may encounter more problems in terms of communication and co-ordination.

            The objective of team building is to improve collective performance in accomplishment of project goal through common understanding and commitment. Team building involves the following:

·         Clarification of purpose

·         Role clarity, unity, commitment and acquaintance among members

·         Effective communication channels for team members

·         Effective mechanisms for conflict resolution

·         Facilitating greater collaboration

·         Promoting creativity and innovation

·         Providing supportive environment involving trust

Some of the key personal attributes of team members contributing towards success of the team are as under

·         Shared value  

·         Desire to collective work

·         Experience in similar or related projects

·         Knowledge and expertise

·         Problem solving ability

·         Initiative

·         Business experience

In teamwork conflicts are common and one should learn to recognize and deal with it. Some of the major sources for conflict include:

·         Money

·         Control

·         Priority

·         Methods and procedures

·         Schedule

·         Personality

To cope with the changes in projects the structure should be flexible enough to that the right combination of the people work together. Project manager, creating an excellent team would find it satisfying to achieve the objectives with little intervention.

A project team is a “group of individuals working independently to accomplish the project objective” (Clements and Gido, 2011:330). The terms “project team” and “project group” are often used interchangeably to describe a number of people who have complementary skills and who work to achieve a common goal, but in the project context that is where the similarity ends. The important distinction between a team and a group is how the people are managed and how they interact together, because they may be doing exactly the same work.  

Clements and Gido (2011:332-336) describe Tuckman’s 5-stage model of team development:

·         Forming: Initial stage which involves the transition from working as an individual to working as a team member.

·         Storming: Team members feel frustrated, angry and hostile due to conflicting individual goals, before the project scope and objective become clearer to them.

·         Norming: After struggling through the storming phase, team members develop strong relationships and interpersonal conflicts are resolved. Trust begins to develop.

·         Performing: The team members become committed and eager to accomplish the project objectives.

·         Adjourning: Seperation

Motivation

            Motivation is the willingness of individuals to exert high levels of efforts for achieving project goals. Motivation considers the interaction of the individual and the situation. Individuals differ in their motivation drive. The level of motivation varies between individuals and within the individual at different times.

            Project work provides stimulation, satisfaction and a sense of achievement to the employees in a project. In fact projects also involve intrinsic motivation where its personnel feel motivated by handling challenging assignments, accomplishing the difficulty goals, the constant work pressures resulting from stringent time frames, or financial and career rewards associated timely goal achievement. A project manager is required to take the following action to ensure a conducive climate for motivation.

·         Delegation of full responsibility for an activity to infuse sense of ownership

·         Equip the person with appropriate resources for completion of the assigned activity

·         Provide timely feedback through constant monitoring

·         Hold the individual accountable for goal accomplishment

·         Provision for incentives and reward

·         Break the cycle of monotony

These driving forces or the motivation factors keep changing from project to project and also with the position of the individuals in the hierarchy. Therefore, it become a daunting task for the project  manager to sustain the motivation of the project staffs over considerably long period.

In reality, there are also some demotivating factors in a project. There include the following

·         Too much work pressure leading to stress and tension

·         Conflicts

·         Formal mechanism of control

·         Inhospitable working condition

·         Risk and uncertainty

·         Complex methods for performance evaluation

For success of projects motivation is not to be restricted to project employees. Motivation of other stakeholders such as venders, contractors etc., in projects is equally critical for project success.

Decision-Making

            Decision-making involves choosing a course of action from a set of alternative available. Decision making is critical in project management where decisions are taken at various stages from concept to completion of the project. There decisions in general are almost irreversible in nature having immediate impact and long term consequences. Moreover the decisions indicating a cascading effect. This makes decision making process in projects complex and critical.

            Projects being unique and non-repetitive, there can hardly be any universally accepted procedure for decision making. In such situation, the past experience and precedents sometimes prove to be of little use. However, there are few decision making tools to aid the project manager. Some of these are as follows.

·         Decision free, graphical representation of decisions and their possible outcomes.

·         Ranking, screening of options based on ranking order in a comparative dimension, say pay- back period, NPV or IRR.

·         Index, comparing based on different indexes such as QU.

·         Checklists scaling and comparing the project dimensions.

In projects the situation change fast and demand not only right decisions but the decisions should be timely. Delayed right decision sometimes adversely impact the projects especially in a climate of high risk and uncertainty. To take care of risks and uncertainty in decision-making project managers may get guided by project risk profiles, decision tree analysis and sensitivity analysis and even simulation.

Definition:

Decision-making is the process of considering the wider aspects of the situation and gaining commitment from the team and stakeholders for the selection of one course of action.  

Steps in Decision-making

 a) Determine objectives: Whereas the objectives in problem-solving referred to the project charter and the baseline plan, the objectives in the decision-making process also need to refer to the wider objectives of the project environment, the company and the external stakeholders. These objectives need to be known because a problem, by definition, is a situation which threatens the achievement of the objectives. Therefore, a decision needs to be made when the objectives are threatened and/or an opportunity is spotted which can enhance the project’s competitive advantage. The need to make a decision will be triggered both by the project problem solving process and events threatening the other company objectives.  

b) Gather information: The gathering of information function should try to obtain all relevant information, facts, figures and opinions together with identifying possible causes of problems, and establishing time constraints. 

c) Decision-making: The next step is to decide on a course of action. One of the key features of decision-making is the power to influence the other people who must accept the decision. This may require a combination of negotiation and persuasion skills. The choice of an autocratic versus democratic leadership style also influences the decision-making process. 

d) Issue instructions: The final step in the decision-making process is to make a decision and issue instructions. The implementation of the instructions has all the elements of a project and should be planned, monitored and controlled as a project. The project manager needs feedback on the performance of the decision because if the problem is not resolved, further corrective action may be required.  

Leadership

            Leadership is the process of guiding the team members for achieving organizational goals. An effective leader is one who carries influence with his superiors, subordinates and peers. He effectively interfaces his organization with complimentary organizations. This concept of leadership is quite appropriate in the context of projects:

The major functions of a leader cover:

·         Effective supervision of resources allocation and utilization.

·         Perception of and reaction to changes in the economic, technological, social and political forces in the project environment.

·         Formation of growth strategies for the organization.

Each of the above roles requires a different blend of conceptual and analytical skills. The success of a leader depends on his abilities to realize the potential in others and direct skills and knowledge of a group towards the  project objective.

In projects leaders should focus on:

·         Complete understanding of the situation.

·         Providing clear direction to teams

·         Provide support to team members

·         Making timely decisions

·         Continuously assess the employee performance and provide appropriate rewards.

·         Development of project personnel.

·         Building trust through sharing success, information, knowledge and values.

Leadership is the ability to influence the behaviour of team members to accomplish the desired results in a project. Leadership style is the way in which a leader achieves the influence.

            Leadership style are generally categorized as task oriented and relationship oriented. Task oriented leaders show higher concern for goal and the work. Here the behaviour may be autocratic. Relationship oriented leaders show more concern for people in relation to task. This type of leadership is more democratic type. In projects the leader has to maintain an optimal balance between task orientation and relation orientation.

            No one style is relevant to all types of projects. Effective style depends upon the leader, the follower, the leader’s interpersonal relationship with his fellows, the nature and environment of the task and the project.

            In projects effective leadership style depends on project circumstances. For example when the project is to be completed in a short span of time, directive style of leadership may be appropriate. In situation when the work force is transient and unfamiliar with the task the project manager may need to adopt aggressive style.

            In project management the leadership style followed should be adoptable to changing situations and requirements.

            According to contingency theories of leadership the most effective style in project management is relations oriented. As Leader, project managers share responsibilities for the physical and emotional health of the project team.