The Use of Different Project Management Tools and Techniques in the Design of Marketing Projects - Assignment Example

Developing Marketing Capability Developing Marketing Capability Introduction The report seeks to elaborate on critical analyses concerning the use of various management techniques and tools in the design, planning, and development of the marketing projects. The report also focuses identifying relevant details on the assessment of the information needs of an organization, with the resource requirement that are related to the effective utilization of the project management tools and techniques. These also include the identification of the contribution of the use of the project management tools to the enhancement and development of the marketing capability. The paper also depicts the understanding of the relevant application of the project management tools with techniques in various situations. The report identifies the information needs in the organization, scope of research and the resource capabilities focusing on the development of a business case for the support of the marketing projects. According to Kennnaugh (2010), it also involves the designing, development and the planning of substantial marketing programs with the use of project management tools and techniques. The designing effort is aimed at the effective delivery of quality marketing projects. The range of the marketing tools and techniques is integrated in order to support the implementation and development of the marketing projects. This also entails the application of the research information for the preparation of proposals in order for the needs to be identified comprehensively in the organization. Finally, the report identifies the ideas concerning the monitoring and measurement of the effectiveness of the marketing projects outcomes via the end process of the projects and giving the relevant examples. Organization’s information needs with effective utilization of the project management tools The organization needs information upon the focus of the marketing project proposal evaluation in order to prioritize the information in different levels of importance. According to Schmidt (2009), the information is applied in the decision making in various market conditions, competition activities, strategic management, and organization capacity. The organization also uses the information in order to manage the risk that is related in the implementation of various plans. The information is also used to facilitate the execution of various marketing strategies, which are designed to foster the process of achieving customer satisfaction in the highly competitive market. These marketing strategies are also aimed at delivering the stakeholder value and attaining the organization set objective. According to Dow, PMP, and Taylor (2010), the organization also uses information for the development of product portfolio, management of the customers’ service delivery anticipations, management of the communication mix and the channels of the marketing. The information concerning the marketing mix is applied in the process of achieving the marketing objectives that are set in the strategies of the organization. According to Barkley (2007), this also includes the conducting of the relevant marketing operations that are focused on the required positioning of the products and services offered by the organization to the market. The organization also needs the relevant information to be used for management and development of various infrastructures of marketing with the organization’s marketing capability. The information is also applied in the development of efficient process and systems that support the approaches for the monitoring of the marketing operations. The information is also required in the management of the marketing teams which involves the coordination of the physical, human, and financial resources in the teams. These also includes the relevant information that is applied in the management of the marketing functions, in terms of finance with the related activities aimed at ensuring the consistency of the reliability and effectiveness of the financial performance. The resources capability and scope of the research project There are various resources in the organization that have a form of capability depending on the planning and management in the organization. These resources are planned appropriately in the organization in order to facilitate the achievement of the desired outcome in the projects. Human resources are one of these resources with the capability of ensuring the attaining of the set objectives. The marketing capability in this point is managed through the teams that are formed in the organization. However, there are various things involved in the management of these teams as the resources of the marketing capability. The manager seeks to identify the team with the characteristics of a highly performing team. The manager focuses on various approaches of team management that involves the team formation, team building, development, coordination, and communication for the management of the individuals William (Dow, PMP, and Taylor, 2010). This also involves the outlining the skills and techniques for the management of the working team. There are various criteria that involved the evaluation of the team performance. This includes the task performance which involves the fulfillment of the objectives and the marketing goals. This also involves the functioning of the team that involves the maintenance of the consistence and the constructive working of the team for the management of the team demands, roles, changes, and processes. It also involves the team satisfaction and the fulfillment of individual relationship and development needs in the organization. According to McDaniel and Gates (1998), the research project requires the management methods for the planning and implantation. The research projects need to use the project management techniques or tools during the planning stage. Therefore, there are preparations that are needed in order to facilitate the achievement of the desired outcome in the project’s research. The project research involves the management methods for monitoring the complex activities that are involved. The research project management is related to the changes that occur in the organization. According to Andler (2011), the project planning tools and techniques have a substantial contribution to the research project. However, there is also the risk of failure and problems that exist thus it requires there to be an assessing option. This also involves organizing the relevant activities together with resources for the reduction of risk in order to receive the desired out come in the research. The scope of the research seeks to explain the main techniques available for the planning, scheduling, controlling, and resourcing the activities of the projects. This is in order ensure that the projects are completed in the in the desired time limits and the within the budget. The research project also involves the roles and limitation of various decision making tools like Gantt charts, PERT and CPA. It also identifies the forecast of different sales with the techniques that appreciate the role of the process planning. The outcome of the research project also explains the key elements and the purpose of the scenario planning and the way it impacts the contingency of planning and the flexibility building in the process. Critical analyses of project management tools and techniques According to Birnberg (2008), these project management tools are used in the design and development and planning of the marketing projects. The marketing projects have numerous activities that run parallel. This brings the need of some part of the project needing the other parts to be completed in order to for them to progress or commence. According to Mantel (2011), the interdependent parts require an approach of consideration and planning. There is a feasibility stage in the project that is reached before the finishing of the plan. The tools that are used include the Gantt chart and the Critical Path Analysis flow diagrams are the commonly. There are other commonly used tools that are used in the marketing projects which include project skill requirement, project budget and project evolution review technique. The Gantt chart plans the time scale for resources and the time that is required. It also depicts the relationship that exists between the task and the project in order to facilitate the monitoring and controlling of the progress of the project (Kerzner, 2009). The charts also indicate the need for the redirection of resources for case of the task falling behind schedule. These charts are also referred to as the excellent models used for budgeting, scheduling, communicating, presenting, reporting the plans of the project in order to progress quickly and efficiently. The Gantt charts are constructed using the MS Excel with every activity having a separate line. The chart also creates the time line for the duration of the projects in terms of days, weeks, and even months depending on the project duration. The time blocks are color coded for the denoting of the types of activities. There is also the scheduling of review in order to insert the break points. The cost column is shown at the end of each line of the activities. The chart can also be applied for the keeping of the track on the progress of activities with the running cost. This also gives the chance for the movement of the time blocks in order to report on the actuals versus planned and for the rescheduling of the plan with the creation of updates to the plan. The costs column is used to show the variance and the actuals for the calculation of the ratios, average, and the totals. The Gantt charts are regarded to be the most flexible of the other project management tools. However, they do not depict the importance or the inter-dependence of the parallel activities that are related. They also fail to show the necessity for the completion of a given task before the commencement of another. Therefore, the critical paths Analysis flow diagram is better than the Gantt Charts for the identification of the interdependent factors for the plan mapping. The critical path analysis is also referred to as the network analysis. They facilitate the identification of the series of the tasks in order to determine the minimum possible duration that the project can take in the critical activities. The critical path analysis also facilitates the identification of the slack/float time in order to establish the resource reallocation. This is done without the compromising the minimum time for the completion of the project. The critical path analysis is used in the management of the project that involves the development of the marketing plans in order to establish a new facility. There is the necessity of identifying the relevant price in order to engage in the efforts of product construction (Barkley, 2007). There is also the need for identification of the length of time that is needed to undertake the project. The PERT (Program/Programme Evaluation and Review Technique), according to Milošević (2003), is a specialized method used to identify the related and interdependent activities within the critical path analysis. The PERT is commonly used in projects that are complex with crucial issues involving the timing and interdependence. The PERT is integrated in the Critical Path Analysis with other project management systems in the project. The Critical Path Analysis flow diagrams are used for the illustration of the interdependent for the factors with the overlapping timing. The analysis also facilitates the plan to be scheduled in accordance to the time scale. The analysis diagram also enables the calculation of the cost and the budgeting. This is a diagrammatic representation of the things that are required to be accomplished. The Critical Path Analysis is created by use of the MS Excel in order to facilitate the planning of the time and financial totals. There is other project management software that can undertake a similar task. (Futrell, Shafer, and Shafer 2002) Contribution of tools to the enhancement of marketing capability The tools of project management are used to establish the relationship that exist among the activities, and also determines the activities that should be preceded by others in the projects of enhancing the marketing capability. The tools are used to monitor and control the project. For instance, the extension of the CPA facilitates the variation that occurs in events completion duration with the basis of the expert committee. It also allows for variations in the event completion on the basis of lending itself to the project in the instances of high certainty concerning the outcomes of the activities. There are some projects like the R&D projects which entail the advertising and communication projects that are used in the marketing capability. The tools are used to establish the relationship with an implication of the cause effect of the event duration. The PERT analysis is expected to infer the risk in the duration of the project (Milošević, 2003). The tools also contribute through facilitating the forecasting which is a robust marketing planning. It is also a pivotal to the budgeting with the allocation of the budgets of the promotional mix. The monitoring of performance in the projects of the marketing process is a substantial contribution of tools to the enhancement of the capability. However, with no assessment concerning the sales, perform the evaluation of the performance is difficult. There are other tools used to perform the evaluation which include the surveys conducted on the customers, sale forecasting, expert forecasting survey, Delphi method, executive judgment, and the market test. The others are time series analyses inform of trend analysis, seasonal analysis and the random factor analysis. The other section that the tools are applied is the establishment and management of the team. It is easy to appoint a team through the identification of the individuals in terms of the referencing stage. The early appointment of the team maximizes their contribution to the project. In order to manage the team in a complex project in which the members operate parallel with dependent activities, there is the need of having the Critical Path Analysis. This will help to depict the order of the task undertaking with the relative task significance. The Gantt chart is also applied in the team management in order to portray the blocks of activities over time in a given cost for the management. The tools are also applied in the management of the small task that have a significant influence on the bigger project in order to foster the achievement of the desired outcome. Futrell and Shafer (2002) argue that, there is other project management software that is applicable to the management of the team members in order to perform their task effectively. The project managing tools can facilitate the comparison of the team member performance in the current project to the previously measured performance. This is in order to define the external benchmarks or standards in the projects. This will facilitate the performance of the employees beyond the level that is assumed to be their potential. The performance is in a way that the observer would be able to identify the team as a better than another comparable group. By use of the projects management tools, there will be fewer resources that will be consumed than the anticipated or necessary. However, there are various barriers that are involved in the issue of team management hindering the application of the project management tools. One of these issues includes the norms of the group that would tend to undermine the performance of the group. The other issue is the lack of relevant support, resources, and information that can be used to accomplish the task. The other issue is on the lack of communication that would cause the uncoordinated effort bring potential misunderstanding with the lack of shares identity and sense of the relevant collaboration. There would also be conflict concerning the interest, status barriers that would also block the team development, interpersonal hostility, and lack of cooperation. The other issue is the underperforming and those who are not motivated. They tend to hold back the team and also cause the mistrust with resentment. There is also the diverting of the team attention that can cause the members to be overconfident in the making of decisions. There could also be the issue of poor leadership in the team which is created by the imbalances and the conflicts. Application of the project management tools to different scenarios The scenarios are referred to as the devices that offer the chance for the ordering of the perception concerning the alternative environment for making the decision. This enables one to be able to evaluate the risk, anticipation of the Key changes while considering the trade-offs for the delivery of strategies. The scenarios logics are considered to be the organizing themes, principle, and assumptions, which offer the scenario that coherent. There is also the consistency and the plausible Key strengths of the SRI international method. This is the ability to develop the required flexibility, internally consistent scenarios that are resulting from an intuitive, logical perspective. The tools are applied in the scenarios of analyzing the decisions of the strategic concern with the identification of the crucial decision factors (Schmidt, 2009). They are also applied in dealing with the key environmental factors and the defining of the scenario logics. It also focuses on the elaboration of the scenarios and analysis of implication of the key decisions factors for the decision strategies. However, there are various common strategic methodologies that are applied for the purpose of planning to distinguish the SRI international approach (Schmidt, 2009). In this scenario, the tools enable the combination of the forecasting techniques for the modification for the reflection of the effect that are impacting events. There is also the likelihood of the probability of the impacting of events for the estimate to be used in the modification of the original, independent trend forecasting. The narratives are also established for the scenarios with the disadvantage of the technique not exploring the effects that influence the events on each of the decision. Conclusion The paper has elaborated extensively on the issue concerning the use of the project management tools in order to develop the marketing capability. This is through a critical analysis of the project management tools. Some of the various tools that were explained in many details were the Gantt chart and the Critical Analysis flow diagram which are the commonly used. Others that have been mentioned include the project skill requirement, project budget, project evolution review technique. The report has also elaborated on the numerous information needs of the organization and the scope of the research project. The paper has also focused on showing the various contributions of the project management tools to the enhancement of the marketing capabilities. Finally, the report has focused on the application of the different tools into the various scenarios. References Bruce Barkley. (2007). Project Management in New Product Development. Georgia. McGraw-Hill Prof Med/Tech. 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