Strategies Used in the Management of the Musical Event Project - Term Paper Example

PROJECT MANAGING MUSIC EVENT Student’s name Code & Course Professor’s name University City Date Executive Summary The essential elements that build a project are the resources that are allocated for the running of the project and the supervision that surrounds the running of the project. For the three-day music festival taking place in country Victoria, the date allocated is the Australia Day weekend, and the project has been set to take place around the time when the weather is conducive. The planning of the project involves a careful plan of the utilization of present resources, a plan to manage the risks presented by the project and strategy for the leadership and the management of the project. The human resource management plan allocates roles that are needed to be fulfilled in the event and provides for staffing requirements. The employment of staff with competitive skills and the clear allocation of roles appropriately constitute an efficient staffing management plan. The project managers intend to carry out a risk assessment on all the potential risks that would be associated with the event. The leadership and the management team of the event are charged with the responsibility of ensuring proper coordination among the individuals and the teams to ensure that the project runs evenly. Looking at the staffing plan, it is evident that most of the individuals and teams are equipped with knowledge on more than one aspect of events. This inculcates expertise and an advantageous contingency plan. Approaching the risks through identification methods, recording and looking at responses is thus best suited in the control plan for the music event. The complex nature of events does not allow for the manager to oversee all aspect and therefore most of the running of the event is left to the staff. The type of leadership and management practiced will thereby greatly influence the performance by the staff. The three-day music festival is bound to be successful should these strategies be employed precisely in the event. Contents Executive Summary 2 1.0 Introduction 4 1.1 Strategies used in the Management of the Musical Event Project 4 1.1.1 Resourcing Plan 4 1.1.2 Risk Management Plan 5 1.1.3 Leadership and Management Plan 6 2.0 Justification of Approaches 7 2.1 Resourcing 7 2.2 Risk 7 2.3 Leadership and Management 8 3.0 Conclusion 9 Reference List 10 Project Managing Music Event 1.0 Introduction The concept of project management revolves around the balance of the basic elements in a project to ensure its success (Kerzner, 2013). The essential elements that build a project are the resources that are allocated for the running of the project and the supervision that surrounds the running of the project. In the three-day music festival taking place in country Victoria, the date allocated is the Australia Day weekend which takes advantage of the available time that most people will have the celebratory mood that will be present. The project has been set to take place around the time when the weather is conducive for an outdoorsy event. The planning of the project involves a careful plan of the utilization of present resources, a plan to manage the risks presented by the project and strategy for the leadership and the management that will be carried out during the project. This paper thus specifically discusses the plans to be used in resourcing, risk management and leadership and management during the project. 1.1 Strategies used in the Management of the Musical Event Project The following are the approaches that will be used to effectively manage the three-day music event in country Victoria. 1.1.1 Resourcing Plan In the resourcing plan, the project managers will employ the approach of a human resource management plan and methods that resolve overloads. The human resource management plan allocates roles that are needed to be fulfilled in the event and provides for staffing requirements (Kligner et al., 2015). The success of the event is dependent on the presence of both paid and volunteer staff. The employment of staff with competitive skills and the clear allocation of roles appropriately constitute an efficient staffing management plan (Ravand and Saremi, 2015). Table 1: Event Management Structure 1.1.2 Risk Management Plan The project managers intend to carry out a risk assessment on all the potential risks that would be associated with the event. It is imperative to be prepared for any hazard resulting from a possible risk in an event (Rausand, 2015). An analysis will be carefully carried out to identify any hazards or factors that have the capability to present a risk to any of the persons that will be involved in the event. The project manager will thus have a risk assessment team to identify the risks possible. After identification, the risks will be categorized into a register and rated based on their latent damage. Appropriate responses to the risks will then be suggested and discussed to determine how best to handle the threat. RISK RISK RATE RISK IDENTIFICATION STRATEGY RISK RESPONSE Narrow and winding roads leading to the venue with a hilly environment High SWOT The risk is a threat to the participants of the event Mitigation by putting road signs and guides along the way to the venue Emergency team in case of an accident Limited accommodation Moderate Brainstorming, SWOT Exploiting the risk and using it as an opportunity to create temporary accommodations and get extra funding Unknown number of event attendees Moderate Lessons learned from previous events, Brainstorming Research Aggressive marketing to ensure the maximum number of people attend the music festival Table 2: Risk assessment structure 1.1.3 Leadership and Management Plan The leadership and the management team of the event are charged with the responsibility of ensuring proper coordination among the individuals and the teams to ensure that the project runs smoothly (Wheelan, 2014). This will involve the identification of individuals and teams that would bets work together, the noting of the strengths of the team and ensuring that they are used to a maximum in the event process. The leadership is additionally tasked with encouraging the teams and building the competence of the project management team. Ground rules also need to be established to contain the activities of the musical event in one platform. Team development Ground rules Negotiations Putting together individuals with strong capabilities together with those who have limited capabilities to balance the responsibilities Identifying the skills of the members and using them innovatively to enhance the event Assessment of the individuals and teams and issuing instructions for a change and repeated evaluation Encouraging increased teamwork through team workouts and motivation Focus on the theme Competence in working Positive image for the event company Openness with members of the team and participants of the event Trust the team and management Reliable Honest Provision of options Agreeing on a just platform Clarification of roles Table 3: Team development 2.0 Justification of Approaches 2.1 Resourcing The human resource management plan will be used in the three-day musical event together with the resolution of overloads. The success of the event is hugely reliant on the performance of the teams allocated to the tasks needed to be carried out in the event. The plan involves staff who could be available for the entire event right from the planning phase. There is also the need to hire volunteers as the event is temporary and this move helps to save costs. The diverse nature of events calls for a broad staff to handle all the areas (Archibald and Archibald, 2016). In this event, for instance, there are over fifteen roles that need to be addressed and assigned to a various individual by the human resource team to carry out the event successfully. When compared to the approach where methods used to identify the required resources is done, there is a considerable lack of efficiency and adequate effectiveness in the latter approach. Identifying single resources that are required for the event is costly and leads to massive wastage of resources (Raj et al., 2013). Looking at the staffing plan, it is evident that most of the individuals and teams are equipped with knowledge on more than one aspect of events. This inculcates expertise, and an advantageous contingency plan should there be the need to act in on behalf of an individual or a team. Human resources come with natural intellect too as opposed to other resources such as time, money and quantity of products which have to be influenced by human direction (Armstrong and Taylor, 2014). Resource allocation on virtual platforms could be trendy with its projective advantages but still cannot reach the complexities experienced in an event where only there are so many changes, possibilities, potential hazards that can be mitigated by the human touch. 2.2 Risk In the management of risks, among the risks anticipated are; the possibility of accidents from the narrow and winding roads, lack attendance, commotion, and complaints due to limited accommodation and the risk of loss due to an adequate number of people failing to show up for the event. The move to identify the risks as the best approach gives a leeway where the management can somehow control the risk or completely eradicate it. The strategies used to identify the risks are comprehensive such as the SWOT analysis which assesses weaknesses and threats that could both be viewed as risks to the event (Pitchard, 2014). Brainstorming was additionally used and lessons from previous events as well. This would help to identify new risks and avoid repetition of previous mistakes. The registering of the risk allows for their rating which will give the project manager an idea of how to handle the risk presented. The responses to the risks used would be mitigation and research. The risk of accidents cannot be avoided since the roads cannot be adjusted as the terrain is naturally winding and narrow. Furthermore, acceptance of the risks is rooted out as they would result in loss of money, wastage of time and other resources that have been put in and the exposure of the participants to accidents. As compared to the approach of seeking relationships between activities and analyzing risks, there is too much time spent on the two which in this situation are not applicable as the risks are evident (Maia and Chaves, 2016). The seeking of relationships between activities is additionally intensive and could involve the use of extra resources that would be best put in the activities of the event. Approaching the risks through chosen identification methods, recording and looking at responses is thus best suited in the control plan for the music event. 2.3 Leadership and Management Leadership is a sensitive concept in the management of projects as it directly deals with how the resources are handled including the human resources in the project event (Northouse, 2015). Development of the team focuses on refining the staff for the smooth running of the event. It additionally helps to instill the values of the event to the team especially among volunteers and workers under contract who need motivation to explicitly present a refined brand image. Formations of ground rules give the team specific values to work within are helpful in the creation and maintenance of the musical event brand. Additionally, negotiations allow the staff to communicate with the leadership and offer suggestions that would be helpful. Negotiations equally provide the opportunity for a fair platform to change rules and reach decisions and agreements that are beneficial to both the management team and the staff. On the other hand, other approaches such as conflict resolution may be ineffective in that the project manager may fail to have prior knowledge of the staff thus inadequately dealing with the conflict. Looking at team development, conflicts can easily be avoided as the team works towards building each other and ultimately building the project. Use of power and coercion in leadership has various disadvantages such as staff who may be disgruntled (Burke and Barron, 2014). The complex nature of events does not allow for the manager to oversee all aspect and therefore most of the running of the event is left to the staff. The type of leadership and management practiced will thereby greatly influence the performance by the staff. 3.0 Conclusion As seen from the discussion in this paper, the complex nature of the event calls for various aspects of management most especially on resources, risks, and leadership. The use of the human resource management plan has been proven useful in the execution of this event as the human resource team constitutes the most important part in the execution of the event. The risks evaluated have gone through the process of identification, categorization and the suggestions of possible responses to control them so that the music event runs evenly. Management will be focused on the development o teams which have been prepared to handle the event with competence. It will further allow for negotiations and establish ground rules for the team to operate under. As a result of these approaches the three-day music festival is bound to be successful should these strategies be employed precisely in the event. Reference List Archibald, RD and Archibald, S 2016, ‘Leading and Managing Innovation: What Every Executive Team Must Know about Project, Program, and Portfolio Management’, CRC Press, Vol. 22. Armstrong, M and Taylor, S 2014, ‘Armstrong's handbook of human resource management Practice’, Kogan Page Publishers. Burke, R and Barron, S 2014, ‘Project management leadership: building creative teams,' John Wiley & Sons. Kerzner, HR 2013, ‘Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and Controlling’ , John Wiley & Sons. Klingner, D Nalbandian, J and Llorens, JJ 2015, ‘Public personnel management,' Routledge. Pritchard, CL and PMP PR 2014, ‘Risk management: concepts and guidance’, CRC Press. 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