Why Is Project Portfolio Management Particularly Challenging in the Pharmaceutical Industry - Essay Example

Why is project portfolio management particularly challenging in the pharmaceutical industry? Research and development cost are declining and therefore prioritizing a portfolio of successful projects is becoming essential in the industry. To ensure an increase in profits, the life cycle of product development have to be closely managed and monitored. Profitability of any pharmaceutical company heavily relies on project portfolio management. During the implementation of any new project managing of the project portfolio of a pharmaceutical company can be challenging. 1. Transparency Each pharmaceutical company is out to make profit. The need to ensure the competition does not have an edge over the company; a lot of resources are invested in keeping a company’s secrets. The fact that different companies cannot share information on how best to implement projects is a serious challenge in managing different portfolios. 2. Time A lot of time is taken in developing any new drug. On top of time, a lot of individual processes have to be undertaken and some of these processes need to be run simultaneously. It becomes a challenge to the project management team to ensure that time allocated is used as efficiently as it can possibly be used. The team has to ensure that not a single process exceeds its allotted time or the entire project will be affected. In addition to that, the team should be able to reconfigure the timetable if any delays may occur in the process off project execution. 3. Regulations The pharmaceutical industry product affects human health and therefore it has to be closely regulated by the government to protect the people. This regulation are much welcome but they also pose a challenge to any project management team. Everything that is to be undertaken in the development process has to be within the rules and this causes a strain on time and resources which are always limited. If the regulations are not followed a company may end up losing billions therefore the project management in this industry has to be stringent. 4. Multiple projects A single drug company might have several drugs under development at one particular time. These projects have different needs and requirement and this may pose a challenge to any project management team. It is important to ensure that all the resources made available to the team are equitably distributed and well utilized. It is also paramount that not a single project is left behind since if there is an imbalance in the resource distribution, all projects will be affected.? What Are The Advantage And Disadvantages Of Using Project Management? Project management is the process by which projects are planned, operated and monitored (Pinto 5). The main aim of this process it to ensure that the project’s objectives are achieved as efficiently as they possibly can. As much as project management is geared towards increasing efficiency of the implementation of a project, it has both advantages and disadvantages. Advantages Project management has been credited as a tool for bringing changes within an organization effectively. Recent research conducted in several organizations attributes successful management changes have been due to proper project management. Today most organizations include project management as a tool for attaining business goals. Secondly, Project management employs various tools that enable the evaluation of projects. The ability to evaluate projects enables project managers to rapidly determine whether the proposed project is viable and this is done by looking at how efficiently the previous projects were implemented (Pinto 19). The evaluation also enables the project manager to determine the best method to use to implement the proposed project. Thirdly, during the project development and implementation process, the teams involved work efficiently. The use of project management provides a tool to reduce costs implication of any new projects. Using multilevel approach to solve a problem cuts on cost and also promotes communication and teamwork helping achieve business goals in a timely fashion. Disadvantages of Project Management 1. Increased costs In some situation, the project might have high financial and human capital requirements. Situation may arise where costs were underestimated and the diminishing resources may affect how effectively the project is implemented and this may cause further losses to the organization. 2. Lost focus During the course of project execution change in organizations objective may affect the established structures of the project and have a great impact on the output. There is need to closely monitor each of the team member in case situation of the sort arise and this may strain the resources available. 3. Time If time for a particular task is not estimated correctly, the entire project timeline is affected. It is critical that all time estimates are done precisely and in a timely fashion so as not to affect the implementation process of the entire project. 4. Communication breakdown For the project to be implemented efficiently there must be communication between all members of the organization. Failure of communication may affect the progress of the project or even bring it to a standstill leading to loss of strained resources.? Question Three When a company wants to construct a power plant especially a nuclear one, the stakeholders could both disrupt the planning and execution of the project. The stakeholders of such a project include: the government, environment protection activist and the immediate community where the plant is proposed to be built. These stake holders may block the process from taking off the ground. A stakeholder’s analysis should be undertaken to identify the concerns of each group stakeholders that would possibly make them block the development of the power in specified location. Identifying these concerns will go a long way in coming up with possible ways of preventing the problems that may arise. In a situation where prevention is not an option, having the information beforehand may help the management come up with alternate plans before investing in the proposed project. For example, the community may have concern on whether the nuclear plant will have a direct impact on the environment. It the company’s responsibility to make information available to the community on what the possible dangers they might face if the plant is built; alongside that information the company should also indicate the protocols they intend to put in place to ensure the community is protected. The government would want to ensure that the nuclear plant is not abused since the uranium used in nuclear plants can easily be enriched and used for sinister purposes. It is also in the government’s interest to ensure that the rights of the people where the nuclear plant is to be built are not violated and the established regulations are followed to the letter. The core stakeholders in software upgrade include: competitors, suppliers, team members, clients, and management. The suppliers of the new software will play a major role on whether the implementation of the system upgrade will be successful. The completion will potentially loose clients and market share if the new software is implemented successfully; if the implementation fails, the competition gains valuable information on how to avoid mistakes that were made and also gain more market share. Team members affect the implementation of the upgrade directly and they stand to gain or lose if the system is implemented successfully or fails. Management would constantly under pressure to ensure that the upgrade is done efficiently and successfully. The clients stand to gain the most if the upgrade is done successfully since service delivery is bound to increase with successful implementation of the upgrade. Works Cited Pinto, Jeffery K. Project Management. Upper Saddle River: Prentice Hall, 2010. Print. Read More