The Heart Run Project - Report Example

College: Introduction This report has outlined all the activities carried out by a group in a project called Heart Run. Thevarious parts of the project include breakdown structure, human resource management, scope management plan, quality management, time management, cost management, risk management, and communication management. Finally, the study will also provide relevant recommendations for the project as drawn from the various parts. The project’s aim was to give children suffering from heart failure at London Bridge Hospital a chance to live. Scope management plan As mentioned by (Westland 12) scope management plan makes objectives and goals of a project clear to the team. London Bridge Hospital is one of the hospitals that offer high quality healthcare to patients in UK, heart failure being one of the most expensive healthcare conditions in most hospitals across UK, a good number of children who are admitted in the hospital with heart condition hardly survive. Most of them die while their parents, relatives and guardians are looking for money to meet the required hospital bills. In relation to the issue mentioned, this project’s main objective was to enable the children (between 1-5 years)admitted in the hospital to be able to go through heart surgery and eventually survive the condition by meeting the required bills and providing relevant materials that were required by the children while in hospital. The specific objectives included giving these children opportunity to live and giving hope and sense of joy to their families. The group named Heart Failure Model group was made up of multi-disciplinary team with health professionals from London Bridge Hospital together with parents, guardians, and carers of children suffering from heart failure among other stakeholders. The group carried out several tasks including organizing fund drives and mobilization activities to collect money and other relevant gifts and items that went to children suffering from heart failure to pay their hospital bills. Justification of this project was that there are several cases of children who die at the hospital while waiting treatment and this process is often derailed by financial constraints of their guardians and parents. Meeting the hospital bills for these children, to allow for surgery and treatment was therefore the best gift that such children would receive during this Christmas season and time in their lives. Given the objectives of the Heart Failure Model Group, the project deliverables proved hard to quantify since important results like opportunity to live and joy cannot be measured though they can be felt from the children’s families’ appreciation (Westland 12) and can be seen from the number of children given the required healthcare Breakdown structure for the project In effort to offer the required healthcare to children admitted at London Bridge Hospital, Heart Failure Model Group organized the group into various sections. First of all, the group collected data on the number of children within the specified age gap, that were admitted at the hospital with heart failure problems, this helped in estimating the current financial need by using the hospital charges for the surgery and relevant care that these children require. The project activities were broken into different categories where each team member was allocated his/her tasks and responsibilities. The breakdown structure given below shows various activities and duties for members. The first point was visiting the children’s heart failure ward with doctors, project members and some guardians for data collection, afterwards, the group met to deliberate on the budget and project activities and also to come up with ways of mobilizing citizens and organizations towards supporting the project through various activities. The communication facilitated the various tasks and issues ensuring that the various teams are coordinating and that they had the relevant information to enable them to plan, assess, allocate and meet the bills as planned (Wysocki 262). The project did not isolate kids of the well up from those from families that are struggling with hospital bill since the main aim was to give the kids a chance to live. For this reason, data on number of kids to be supported was provided by the doctors and specialists from London Bridge Hospital and this data helped in organizing activities, setting targets, budgeting and allocation of the budget. The other important part of the project is mobilization; this involved reaching the health support organizations and business corporations for support. The first step involved sending emails to healthcare support organizations and private enterprises sensitizing them about the children hear failure condition. The second activity was to send the letters requesting them for support towards children with heart failure condition fund drive; the organizations included British Heart Foundation, Heartbeat NI, and Action for the Sick Children, ART-X Support Group, Little Hearts Matter, among others. The responses collected from the organizations were reconciled and relevant information passed to the budgeting section (Levine 159). The information helped the budgeting team in planning and setting targets for the funds drive. Finally, the team held the fund drive where members, organizations and the public were invited to contribute towards the project. During the fund drive, various items including snacks, kids’ toys and other items were sold at double the market price to raise funds. The organizing section dealt with facilitation and coordination of various activities including task assignment for the team members, assessing the budget arrived at against the data of cases collected and organizing for the children’s heart surgery and treatment with doctors and cardiologists at London Bridge Hospital. The organizing team carried out tasks like buying materials that were required or recommended by doctors for the kids by the hospital and Christmas gifts for the kids’ families as part of consolation (Levine 159). The other section in this project entailed paying the kids’ hospital bills, the bills were paid at the point of surgery or any other treatment, during the same time, the team selected visited the children heart failure ward with doctors to identify the critical and therefore urgent conditions that required quick surgery and treatment. During such visits and at the point of paying the bills, media channels were called to record the events; this played critical role in creating awareness by featuring the events so that more groups and organizations could volunteer to support the kids and safe their lives, which was the objective of the project. Time management plan The project was planned to take three months and comprised of various activities as given below: Function Time activities Planning and organization 1 week Organize the teams in the various sections of the project Communication 3 months Communication continued until the end of the project, this involved internal through emails, mobiles and telephones, and external through brochures and letters to support individuals and groups Fund drive 1 week A team of seven people ran a funds drive at the hospital premises for one week Facilitating surgery and payment of bills 2 months A team of three members facilitated payment of bills, discharge and provision of required items and materials Cost management plan As mentioned by Westland (p. 12), cost management is a critical element in project management. In terms of human resource requirements, the project required a team of about 30 members, 10 of them were doctors and specialists in heart conditions working with London Bridge Hospital. 10 members were from the hospital administration, 5 were parents and guardians of children admitted in the hospital with heart failure, and 5 were members of the public on volunteer basis. The budget of the project depended entirely on grants, contributions and other donations and the project aimed to raise about $500 million within the three months that went towards payment of children’s hospital bills and facilitating the project activities. The project required managerial, planning, and entrepreneurship skills, which were well taken care of in the criteria used in selection of members. The required information was collected from the hospital and channeled to target groups through media channels and press. In terms of time as a resource, the project took three months as earlier mentioned. Quality management The project aimed at maintaining high quality in implementation and all through to deliverables ensuring that the stipulated tasks were accomplished on time. As part of incoming quality control measure, communication and budgeting were keenly considered (Westland 12). Communication standards maintained by the project were adopted from London Bridge Hospital; these standards were maintained by members when writing mails, holding telephone conversations and any other form of communication. Budgeting quality control was enhanced by preparing start up budget and maintaining it flexible throughout the period to allow for checks and controls. In terms of in-process and outgoing quality control, the project team ensured that high quality of treatment and other medical service was offered to the kids and that the materials bought for them were from recognized organizations and companies. Children with heart conditions are very delicate and require high quality care, only recommended items and materials were taken to their wards to eliminate any form of contamination or infection during visits. Human resource management As mentioned Fox and Waldt (p. 112), human capital is an important asset and thus requires effective planning and management. The project manager divided the project group into various teams to participate in the various sections; communication, budgeting, mobilization, and bills payment. The project had one project manager, four team leaders leading the four sections of the project and reporting to the project manager and each of the team had at least six people. Around four people were selected to handle administration tasks and they worked with the various teams at different points. To ensure that each team had the required skills and resources, the project manager ensured that each team had at least one doctor or cardiologist working with the group to help in providing the relevant information as was required by supporters, group members, and other stakeholders concerning heart failure condition. Each of the teams had at least two members with planning and organization skills. The budget section had two people with expertise and skills in finance to lead the team through the budgeting process. The communication department had two specialists in public relations to lead all the communication activities. Communication management plan The initial communication was done by the public relations specialists, one of who was from the London Bridge Hospital, they organized for a meeting and presented the idea together with doctors to the members and the board of directors for the hospital to sell the idea to them and to seek for their approval. After the project was approved by the board, the members started the external communication through press and media to create awareness and mobilize people for support (Wysocki 262). Any communication with external groups and individuals was drafted and sent to the public relations officers to ensure that all information was compliant with communication standards of the hospital. Any information to the media or press was given by the public relations specialists. The media and the press played critical role in mobilizing support. Risk management plan Risk management plan is essential in every project since risks are inevitable in a way and thus requires project team to identify those risks and plan on alleviation or reduction strategies (Schwalbe 153). Risks identified in the project included financial risks as the potential risk since the project wholly depended on grants and donations as the only source of income for the project. Time allocated for the project was also an identifiable risk since it was short and the activities in the plan were several and deliverables therefore had to be completed within the scheduled time. Children’s possibility of survival was also an identifiable risk since some could die while being operated and this would fail the project deliverables in case a large number of them died. Prioritizing risks Risk scope Cost implication 1 Financial risk High Very high 2 Child survival rate High High 3 Time High High Risk owners: risk owners in this project were the project stakeholders both members and the hospital partnering in the project (Schwalbe 155). The project manager and his team, together with the hospital and other stakeholders were challenged to make effective and relevant decisions. In case of risks, considered strategies included accepting the risk and taking appropriate action to reduce or alleviate it, avoidance where risks would be avoided, transfer strategy where risks could be transferred and mitigation strategy where risks would be reduced and limited to reduce their impacts. The budgeting section was responsible for addressing financial risk, the organizing function was responsible of managing time, while the whole team had the duty to ensure that children death rate are kept very low or avoided. Risks suffered in the project included more than required funds, which meant accommodating a large number of children in the budget and thus stretching planning and organization activities. Time management was effective but the increased funds required the project to stretch its time plan further by 2 weeks to exhaust the funds. About four kids died while going through operation and this was challenging to the group. Recommendations Drawing for the extended time plan and more funds collected, we can recommend the project for effective planning to accurately accommodate such uncertainties. This would require the project to allow for some extension within the time plan to accommodate such changes. The project should also make use of forecasting tools to arrive at accurate and relevant budgeting estimates (Levine 161). Regular monitoring and evaluation of various activities is also important to ensure that activities done are directed at meeting the specified deliverables. Conclusion The project was run effectively except for the few adjustments in time and budgeting that had to be made following changes in estimates. Project planning is identified as central in determining the other variables like quality, organization as well as deliverables. Planning of cost, time and scope is vital in ensuring that project is kept on track and that the objectives are met (Westland 12). This project has given great insights into project features and can be used by project groups to guide them in implementing their project as well as by students to learn and build their knowledge on project management. Works cited Fox, William and Waldt, Gerrit. A Guide to Project Management, South Africa, Juta and Company Ltd, 2008. Levine, Harvey. Practical project management: tips, tactics, and tools, New Jersey, John Wiley and Sons, 2002. Schwalbe, Kathy. Introduction to project management, London, Cengage Learning,2006.  Westland, Jason. The project management life cycle: a complete step-by-step methodology for ... London, Kogan Page, 2006. Wysocki, Robert. Effective Project Management: Traditional, Agile, Extreme. New Jersey, John Wiley & Sons, 2011. Read More