Agile Project Management in Virtual Environments - Essay Example

Agile Project Management in Virtual Environments Introduction Explosive growth in the use of information technology and information systems has seentransition of project management (PM) from the traditional face-to-face to virtual teams. Some common reasons for the transition include flexibility in scheduling work; interaction between cross-functional teams at various locations; savings in transportation costs; and other benefits in terms of environmental impacts. A study has been conducted to describe the important features of virtual PM in the digital age. The study includes a critical reflection on characteristics for managing projects. The study has been conducted in several stages. The first stage was a review of relevant literature, followed by a discussion on specific topics. Leading textbooks on PM and publications in various journals have been referred to. The study has been laid out in several sections. Sections include principal characteristics of virtual and global projects; attributes of virtual teams and communication channels; motivating teams and PM environment; agile PM; change management for agile PM; and conclusion. Throughout the study, the focus has been on the agile aspect of PM. Principal Characteristics of Virtual and Global Projects Ideas, human resources, products, services, and skills move freely regardless of boundaries in global economies. The flow of knowledge, products and services, and capital reflects the economic interdependence between organizations and countries. In globalized economies, resources could be obtained in one market and used for business in another. For example, it is possible to purchase manufacturing equipment from Germany, make products in Greece, and sell products all over Europe. In summary, a firm’s competitive environment is shaped by the global economy. A significant change in the practice of PM has been information management. Burke (2008) observed that the availability of powerful software has seen a shift in data processing from a separate department to the professional’s desk. Project planning software helps the project manager plan and control projects. However, it can be effective only when planning and control techniques are clearly understood. Projects are generally subdivided into different phases for ease of management. These phases are collectively termed as the project lifecycle. According to Burke (2008) techniques for PM include critical path method; work breakdown structure; earned value; resource smoothing; and configuration control. Pages 17-22 According to Cadle and Yeates (2004) characteristics of projects include finite and transitory nature; uniqueness; progressive elaboration; risk and uncertainty; organizationally complex requiring interaction of people, departments, and organizations; managed against time, budget, and human resources; suffering from conflict due to competition for resources; single point responsibility provided by the project manager; and requiring the framework and ability of participants to apply and use leadership skills that are effective. The increasingly complex nature of PM requires the effective use of IT systems, and an agile approach in the management of projects. Pages 1-8; 41-48 Attributes of Virtual Teams and Communication Channels PM require groups of people working together to specify, design, develop, test and implement a new system for the customer. There are areas where suppliers and customers have different ideas about what is to be done and where specifications are ambiguous (Cadle and Yeates, 2004). This requires flexibility of approach to revisit the specification and negotiate with the customer as project proceeds, coupled with well-developed interpersonal and stakeholder management skills. Pages 91-108 A challenge is the difficulty of specifying project requirements “up front,” or difficulties associated with the type of projects such as construction projects where projects can be pre-designed or intangibility associated with software systems (Cadle and Yeates, 2004). A more evolutionary approach is required enabling stakeholders work together to refine the requirements. An agile approach is a better way to deal with the intangibles and uncertainties. Pages 3-9 Virtual teams are groups of people that work closely together to accomplish objectives. Virtual teams may be separated by organizational barriers, space, or time. However, being in a virtual team does not require committed members to be disadvantaged by these. Remote conferencing, desktop video conferencing, and internet or intranet systems are technologies that provide communication avenues for the modern workplace (Johnson, Heimann, and O’Neill, 2001). Pages 25-26 Team cohesiveness, communication, trust, and schedules are challenges for virtual teams. Disadvantages of virtual teams include lack of trust, inadequate physical interaction, predictability and reliability issues, no face-to-face communication, and minimal social interaction. Despite the pitfalls, the benefits outweigh the pitfalls. Distribution of teams has no effect, and virtual nature of team has the same levels relational conflict as face-to-face teams. On the other hand the approach enables organizations access well qualified individuals without location constraints, greater flexibility in operations, and respond faster (Hunsaker and Hunsaker, 2008). There are unique leadership challenges for virtual teams when members are geographically separate, especially in complex projects where members have to co-ordinate their inputs and contributions. Social network maps are based on the understanding of members’ recognition of competencies and consulting approaches (Behrend and Erwee, 2009). Team leaders should use a variety of communication tools for monitoring meetings and work. This allows establishment and maintenance of trust. Such tools can also be used to track knowledge and information flows, allowing for the better understanding of networks. 1) Pages 86-89; 2) Pages 99-101 Motivating and Teambuilding Project Environments According to Gardiner (2005) managing a project requires planning; organizing; controlling; leading and motivating. Planning helps explains the direction of a project, with goals and steps for participants. Planning documents include the activity plan, resource plan, and budget plan. Organizing is about arrangement of people, material and support and resources for satisfying communication, integration and decision making needs for achieving timely project delivery. Controlling is ensuring that the project is managed as specified in the planning documents. Leadership is critical for all activities as motivation of staff is an essential consideration, especially when project work requires tasks beyond normal roles. Rewards include tangible rewards such as money for achievement, or kudos for selection to work on a project, or promotion. It is reassuring for staff that they would return to previous duties on completion of the project. Leadership and team building skills require knowledge and sound understanding of human factors. It involves shaping goals, obtaining resources, building roles and structures, establishing good communications, seeing the big picture, and moving things for successful completion. Skills are required for communication, negotiation, teambuilding, political influence, and creating ownership. Pages 1-14 After selection of the project team, it is important to organize the project team for role clarification. This can be achieved by holding a kick-off meeting or workshop. Models for team development include life cycle, Belbin’s roles, conflict management, fundamental needs, and four pillars model of effective teams (Gardiner, 2005). PM skills include “hard skills,” and “soft skills.” “Hard skills” include technical skills for planning, estimating, scheduling and controlling a project. “Soft skills” include interpersonal communication, commitment to success, negotiation, consensus problem solving, leadership and motivation. Emotional intelligence is the ability to recognise and use emotional states to solve problems and regulate behaviour. Emotions provide useful information to spark creativity, being honest, and developing trusting relationships. Pages 214- 222 Knowledge Sharing in Virtual Teams The most significant challenges to knowledge management are the management of tacit knowledge, and development of knowledge systems. This can be attributed to incentives for contribution, management of knowledge life-cycle, and ownership of knowledge. Behrend and Erwee (2009) suggested that the approach for knowledge management should to capture and transform organizational knowledge into tangible assets, and creation of global knowledge-sharing systems. In this approach knowledge is viewed as a management issue that can be solved by creativity and innovation. Contrary to the traditional ways of increasing knowledge access such as the use of hypertext linking, and databases and searches, the modern approach is a holistic view of the organization, acknowledging the necessity for employees to share knowledge to make knowledge work. The knowledge flow occurring in departments, among people, virtual teams, far-flung teams, or members of regional or international networks is mapped in this approach. Pages 99-101 Leseure and Brookes (2004) have suggested that knowledge management systems should be structured in three layers including infrastructure; infostructure; and infoculture. Infrastructure is the hardware or software that enables contact between members of the network. Rules governing exchange between stakeholders comprise infostructure. They provide resources for people to make sense of events. Infoculture includes the background within social relations based on group processes. Thus, the constraints on knowledge and information sharing are defined. Pages 109-115 Byosiere and Luethge (2008) described knowledge conversion including combination, socialization, internalization, and externalization. The knowledge typology in organizations forms the basis for understanding of knowledge, and development of strategies. This way tacit knowledge can be built for innovation and competitive advantage. The provision of basic training to employees for a certain degree of competency can act as a catalyst for innovation and experiential knowledge domains. Pages 68 - 70 Behrend and Erwee (2009) identified benefits that include influence of diverse team members, brokerage roles enacted by team members, boundary-crossing sharing activities, and keeping track of information or knowledge that flows between members. Pages 109 - 112 Agile Project Management The pace of modern PM has become much faster, requiring a flexible and far more responsible approach towards customers. The use of agile techniques allows managers to perform without the compromise of quality, value, or discipline. Highsmith (2009) has felt that the vision for agility has been changing the practice of product development. This includes agility in people and processes for the delivery of products and services. Responding to change, collaboration with customers, working products, and interactions among stakeholders are principal agile values. Page 6-19 According to Highsmith (2009) agile PM aims delivery of value customer in terms of planning and control, and innovation and adaptability; execution in terms of compliance; employing delivery based on iterative process and feature for creation of improved product, production of early benefits, and progressive reduction of risk; excellence technically; and management of customers and products. Pages 8 - 13 Highsmith (2009) has advocated the incorporation of agile principles, planning for release, scaling of projects, and governance of portfolio for enhancing agility of the whole organization. Performance measurement includes value, quality, and constraints. The five components of agile PM are envision, speculate, explore, adapt, and close. These include organizational and product-related processes for scaling to teams and projects of any size. The framework encompasses technical practices, management of projects and iteration, and governance. The envision phase is about getting the right people. The practice involves getting the right team, product vision, product architecture, identification of participants, project data sheet, interface between customer and developer teams, and practice and processes. The scope of speculation phase is evolution. The practice includes list of product features, features cards, performance requirements in the form of cards, and plans for release, iteration and milestones. The explore phase is about individual performance. The phase includes management of workloads, development of team and coaching, low-cost change, daily meetings for team integration, decision making that is participatory, and daily customer team interaction. The adapt phase is about progress. The phase includes project, product, review of team, and action that is adaptive. The focus is on groups, evaluations of team performance, technical reviews, status reports, and adaptive action. Pages 77 - 230 Change Management for Agile Project Management Using people and organizations representing different cultures, or separated by considerable distances are problems associated with a project (Meredith and Mantel Jr., 2003). For example, agile PM may not work or benefit where changes are inexistent or slow such as the supply of raw materials or commodities. On the other hand new IT systems are associated with changes in processes and procedures; roles and responsibilities; restructuring; new equipment or facilities; or new skills. As all of these involve people, the people are critical to the success of any IT implementation. Proper consideration of people issues is necessary for project success. Information systems being tools that enable people take better decisions, the commitment of the users are important for success. Managing change involves dealing with people, and how involving them at every stage of the project will help realize full business benefits (Cadle and Yeates 2004). Building adaptive teams that could be large requires overcoming challenge to scale; building a framework that is adaptive; organizational structure; self-discipline amongst team; commitment-accountability protocol; and ensuing that the structure and tools are in place for smooth functioning. The integration of best PM practices, management of products, and software development into a framework for supporting mobility and speed allows supporting even the largest projects or organizations. 1) Pages 1 – 5; 2) Pages 331-393 Careful implementation of agile PM techniques can achieve seemingly impossible tasks such as putting he man on the moon; building the pyramids; or creating a database for a large organization (Meredith and Mantel Jr., 2003). Cadle and Yeates (2004) have suggested that managing change is about being proactive, identifying and planning for changes required for supporting the system. When uses have not been adequately prepared for the change such as lack of training or communication, or failure to get the support and commitment, there are post-implementation problems. A change program at project start and running it through the life of the project can result in avoidance of problems. Important considerations for PM include planning for the change program similar to the plan for development and implementation of the system. Development methods that enable people play a part in its development such as Joint Application Development techniques. The change program must not only include communication and training but also consider the impact of the change on users. This includes the timing and methods used to implement the system planning to make the transition easy. The introduction of change should be phased so that there are not too many changes at the same time, and periods of consolidation to enable people become comfortable and confident with new responsibilities, processes, and environments. The users must be involved in planning and implementation of change programme as they understand the issues in the user communities. Those in business should be in control of the change and manage it instead of being bystanders with things imposed on them. 1) Back cover 2) Pages 331-347 Conclusion Globalization has caused economic interdependence among countries and organizations, with PM undergoing an important transition in information management. Consequently, there has been a rapid transition of PM from the traditional face-to-face to virtual teams. Techniques for PM include critical path method, work breakdown structure, earned value, resource smoothing, and configuration control. Characteristics of projects include finite and transitory nature; uniqueness; progressive elaboration; risk and uncertainty; organizationally complex requiring interaction of people, departments, and organizations; management against time, budget, and human resources; conflict due to competition for resources; single point responsibility; and requiring the framework and ability of participants to apply and use leadership skills that are effective. Virtual teams are characterized by groups of people working together to specify, design, develop, test and implement a new system for the customer using technologies such as collaborative conferencing, desktop video conferencing, and internet or intranet systems. Leadership is critical for PM activities as motivation of staff is essential. Rewards include tangible rewards such as money for achievement, kudos for selection, promotion, and reassurance for staff that they would return to previous duties on completion of the project. Knowledge management should focus on capturing and transformation of organizational knowledge into assets, and creation of global knowledge-sharing systems. Knowledge management systems should be structured with infrastructure, infostructure, and infoculture layers. Agile PM allows project managers to achieve goals including faster, flexible and far more responsible approach towards customers, without the compromise of value, quality, or business discipline. Stages of agile PM for organizational and product processes include envision, speculate, explore, adapt, and close. Managing change involves dealing with people, and involving them at every stage for realizing full business benefits. Smart implementation of agile PM techniques can achieve seemingly impossible tasks. References Behrend, F. & Erwee, R. (2009). Mapping knowledge flows in virtual teams with SNA. Journal of Knowledge Management; 13(4):99-114. Burke, R. (2008). Project Management Techniques (College Edition). Burke Publishing: UK. 1-379. Byosiere, P. & Luethge, D. (2008). JOurnal of Knowledge Management. Knowledge domains and knowledge conversion: an empirical investigation. Journal of Knowledge Management. 12(2):67-78. Cadle, J. & Yeates, D. (2004). Project Management for Information Systems (4th edition ). Prentice Hall:UK. 1-448. Gardiner, P. (2005). Project Management: A Strategic Planning Approach. Palgrave Macmillan:UK. 1-336. Highsmith, J. (2009). Agile Project Management: Creating Innovative Products (2nd Ed.). Addison-Wesley:UK. 1-392. Hunsaker, P. & Hunsaker, J. (2008). Virtual teams: a leaders guide. Team Performance Management. 14,(1/2): 86-101. Johnson, P. Heimann, V. & O’Neill, K. (2001). The “wonderland” of virtual teams. Journal of Workplace Learning. 13, 1:24-29. Leseure, M. & Brookes, N. (2004). Knowledge management benchmarks for project management. Journal of Knowledge Management. 8(1):104-116. Meredith, J. & Mantel Jr., S. (2003). 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