comp.manag.asign 2final

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Compensation Management Code 823 Assignment No.2

TOPICMANAGING A PROJECT FROM AN IDEA TO IMPLEMENTATION

Traditionally, project development includes a number of elements: four to

five stages, and a control system. Regardless of the methodology used, theproject development process will have the same major stages:

• initiation,

• planning or development, production or

execution,• monitoring and controlling, and

• closing.

Initiation

Initiating Process Group Processes.

The initiation stage determines the nature and scope of the development. If this stage is not performed well, it is unlikely that the project will besuccessful in meeting the business’s needs. The key project controls neededhere are an understanding of the business environment and making surethat all necessary controls are incorporated into the project. Any deficienciesshould be reported and a recommendation should be made to fix them.

The initiation stage should include a cohesive plan that encompasses thefollowing areas:

• Study analyzing the business needs in measurable goals.

• Review of the current operations.

• Conceptual design of the operation of the final product.

• Equipment and contracting requirements including an assessment of

'long-lead' items.• Financial analysis of the costs and benefits including a budget.

• Stakeholder analysis, including users, and support personnel for the

project.

• Project charter including costs, tasks, deliverables, and schedule.

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The ro ect develo ment sta es

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Planning and design

Planning Process Group Activities.

After the initiation stage, the system is designed. Occasionally, a smallprototype of the final product is built and tested. Testing is generally

performed by a combination of testers and end users, and can occur afterthe prototype is built or concurrently. Controls should be in place that ensurethat the final product will meet the specifications of the project charter. Theresults of the design stage should include a product design that:

• Satisfies the project sponsor, end user, and business requirements.

• Functions as it was intended.

• Can be produced within quality standards.

• Can be produced within time and budget constraints.

Executing

Executing Process Group Processes.

Executing consists of the processes used to complete the work defined in theproject management plan to accomplish the project's requirements.Execution process involves coordinating people and resources, as well asintegrating and performing the activities of the project in accordance withthe project management plan. The deliverables are produced as outputsfrom the processes performed as defined in the project management plan.





Monitoring and Controlling

Monitoring and Controlling consists of those processes performed to observeproject execution so that potential problems can be identified in a timelymanner and corrective action can be taken, when necessary, to control theexecution of the project. The key benefit is that project performance isobserved and measured regularly to identify variances from the projectmanagement plan.

Monitoring and Controlling Process Group Processes.

Monitoring and Controlling includes:

• Measuring the ongoing project activities (where we are);

• Monitoring the project variables (cost, effort, ...) against the project

management plan and the project performance baseline (where we

should be);

• Identify corrective actions to properly address issues and risks (How

can we get on track again);• Influencing the factors that could circumvent integrated change control

so only approved changes are implemented

In multi-phase projects, the Monitoring and Controlling process also providesfeedback between project phases, in order to implement corrective orpreventive actions to bring the project into compliance with the projectmanagement plan.

Project Maintenance is an ongoing process, and it includes:

• Continuing support of end users

• Correction of errors

• Updates of the software over time





In this stage, auditors should pay attention to how effectively and quicklyuser problems are resolved.

Over the course of any construction project, the work scope changes.Change is a normal and expected part of the construction process. Changescan be the result of necessary design modifications, differing site conditions,material availability, contractor-requested changes, value engineering andimpacts from third parties, to name a few. Beyond executing the change inthe field, the change normally needs to be documented to show what wasactually constructed. This is referred to as Change Management. Hence, theowner usually requires a final record to show all changes or, morespecifically, any change that modifies the tangible portions of the finishedwork. The record is made on the contract documents – usually, but notnecessarily limited to, the design drawings. The end product of this effort iswhat the industry terms as-built drawings, or more simply, “asbuilts.” Therequirement for providing them is a norm in construction contracts.

When changes are introduced to the project the viability of the project has tobe assessed again. It is important not to lose sight of the initial goals andtargets of the projects. When the changes accumulate, the forecasted endresult may not justify the proposed investment.

Closing

Closing Process Group Processes.

Closing includes the formal acceptance of the project and the ending thereof.Administrative activities include the archiving of the files and documentinglessons learned. Closing phase consist of two parts:

• Close project: to finalize all activities across all of the process groups

to formally close the project or a project phase• Contract closure: necessary for completing and settling each contract,

including the resolution of any open items, and closing each contractapplicable to the project or a project phase.

Project control systems

Project control is that element of a project that keeps it on-track, on-timeand within budget. Project control begins early in the project with planningand ends late in the project with post-implementation review, having a





thorough involvement of each step in the process. Each project should beassessed for the appropriate level of control needed: too much control is tootime consuming, too little control is very risky. If project control is notimplemented correctly, the cost to the business should be clarified in termsof errors, fixes, and additional audit fees.

Control systems are needed for cost, risk, quality, communication, time,change, procurement, and human resources. In addition, auditors shouldconsider how important the projects are to the financial statements, howreliant the stakeholders are on controls, and how many controls exist.Auditors should review the development process and procedures for howthey are implemented. The process of development and the quality of thefinal product may also be assessed if needed or requested. A business maywant the auditing firm to be involved throughout the process to catchproblems earlier on so that they can be fixed more easily. An auditor canserve as a controls consultant as part of the development team or as an

independent auditor as part of an audit.

Businesses sometimes use formal systems development processes. Thesehelp assure that systems are developed successfully. A formal process ismore effective in creating strong controls, and auditors should review thisprocess to confirm that it is well designed and is followed in practice. A goodformal systems development plan outlines:

• A strategy to align development with the organization’s broader

objectives

• Standards for new systems

• Project management policies for timing and budgeting

• Procedures describing the process





PRACTICAL STUDY

ABOUT HONDA

Honda Motor Company entered the U.S. market in 1959, selling motorcycles.Twenty years later, the company had expanded sales across the border intoCanada and was opening its first manufacturing facility in the U.S., inMarysville, Ohio. A few years later, Honda became the first Japaneseautomaker to produce passenger cars in the United States, also inMarysville.

A new plant in Indiana, Honda’s seventh automobile plant and fifteenthmajor manufacturing facility in North America, will raise Honda's total NorthAmerican automobile production capacity by 200,000 units to more than 1.6million units in 2008. The plant will increase North American employment tomore than 37,000 associates and deepen North American capital investmentto more than $9 billion. Honda's success depends on its commitment tocontinued investment in its largest market, North America.

PROJECT FROM AN IDEA TO IMPLEMENTATION

THE BUSINESS CHALLENGE

Honda’s North American manufacturing operations span/cover two countries,the United States and Canada. However, IT management occurred at thebusiness-unit level, that is, each manufacturing plant across the continent

had evolved its own IT Project Portfolio Management (PPM) methodologies

and workflows and selected its own supporting software applications. Thatmade collecting and organizing data for any project that crossed business

units especially difficult and time consuming. Increasing interaction among

the various IT groups in the region underscored the potential benefits of standardizing IT operations and improving IT governance and efficiency.Honda’s North American management team decided to look for a single tool

that would unify PPM systems across business units. Four sites were selectedfor an initial rollout of an integrated system: Ohio, Indiana, Alabama, andOntario.





Requests for service from Honda’s IT department could be initiated byemployees at all levels of the company, from assembly line workers toexecutives. Some software handling project and resource management wasconsidered difficult to use; some was obsolete and no longer supported bythe manufacturer. Ease of use and distributive availability were importantconsiderations for Honda.

Another problem was dependence on paper forms, which made controllingand retrieving data cumbersome. Honda wanted to reduce paperwork byautomating PPM forms and processes, allowing input and visibility into asingle data pool from many locations.

Honda representatives began researching available PPM solutions. Theyspoke with prospective software vendors and attended user group meetings.Networking and favorable references introduced Honda to Xinify’s work as aCA Clarity Solutions Service Provider. Honda selected CA Clarity PPM as the

means to a comprehensive fix and chose Xinify to assist withimplementation.

The Solution

Honda formed a project team with members from the four business unitsparticipating in the initial deployment. Team members served as advisors,representing the interests and needs of their respective facilities. Xinify randemos to show how Clarity functioned and how the application could satisfyparticular requirements. To configure Clarity to best suit Honda’s needs,Xinify consultants gathered information about the many PPM processes onwhich the various business units relied, reconciling common elements in dataand process flows, making sure no elements or steps unique to one sitewere lost. The solution had to suit all business units.

There were two main functional parts to the consolidation project: theimplementation in Clarity of the Service Request, the basic form used todemand Honda IT services; and the configuration of Clarity to automate asmuch of the IT project lifecycle as possible. Special attention was paid totransforming Clarity’s pre-configured Idea screen into a new version of Honda’s Service Request. The new Service Request would be familiar to

users by name, would utilize existing terminology, and would emphasizeease of use by the thousands of employees at North American facilities, mostof whose involvement in the project management process would largely belimited to entering and submitting a Service Request.

When management approves an IT Service Request, thenomenclature/classification changes from request to project. The second functional role of Clarity was to automate and facilitate tracking, monitoring,





and controlling of projects from approval to completion. Generally, workflowsfor Honda’s mature business processes were consistent with Clarity’s out-of-box configuration; however, Xinify created custom screens and sub-processes to handle Honda-specific requirements, particularly in the areas of evaluation and chargeback. A major part of automating the project lifecyclewas figuring out how key job functions and key actors fit into establishedprocesses.

Clarity includes configurable access rights, which are critical to managing theproject lifecycle. For example, most of the employees filling out andsubmitting Service Requests need follow-up permission for nothing morethan logging in and monitoring a project’s progress. On the other hand, ITproject managers need access to Clarity’s database from the time a ServiceRequest is submitted until a project reaches resolution. Xinify identified themany types of system users and the levels of access to data each required,then designed a complex network of permissions and assigned them.

Clarity’s notification feature alerts the appropriate personnel that a ServiceRequest or project milestone has been reached and that an action may berequired. For example, when a Clarity Service Request is submitted, thesystem automatically issues appropriate notifications to key people specifiedby the Service Request itself or pre-defined along the Service Request’sapproval path. Using a configurable set of business rules, Xinify customizedClarity to notify pre-defined actors or groups of actors who had ownership of or impact upon work associated with a Service Request or project. Previouslyat Honda, there had been no standard method of notification and thecompany relied heavily on paper forms. The person initiating a ServiceRequest was responsible for manually notifying the appropriate people. Now,Clarity notifies key actors that a milestone has been reached and a review isrequired. Users conduct their reviews and assessments online, enteringpertinent data directly into Clarity screens and passing the data to a centralrepository.

As the consolidation project progressed, the project team met for periodicreviews, agreeing on process flows, screen layouts, data fields, and aframework for defining and assigning access permissions.





THE RESULTS

Clarity proved successful satisfying key Honda requirements:

• All business units now use the same project and resource management

tool.

Data is online and can be entered, retrieved, and shared by users atany participating location, regardless of which business unit owns theproject. All projects must be submitted using a Service Requestthrough Clarity. Previously, there were no controls in place to ensurethat every small project entered the system.

1

• Data is stored in a single repository/storehouse and accessible

internationally and across business units.

Project accounting has improved because data is consolidated.Reporting is easier and providing metrics does not require gatheringdata from multiple systems and multiple locations. Clarity screensreplaced existing paper forms, reducing storage, waste, cost, andeffort.

• Clarity screens and workflows have automated the Service Request

approval process and project management lifecycle.

Various manual processes have been automated, saving time and increasingefficiency. Clarity’s workflows link online actions and lifecycle milestones to

the issuance of notices and action items to key actors.

• Reviewing and reporting is improved.

Project and resource managers can catch data-entry errors, especially ontimesheets, and make corrections easily online. Paper forms have beeneliminated; data goes directly into relevant, single-sourced project recordsvisibly and plainly. A newly-formalized approval process and Claritynotifications prompt managers to conduct their weekly reviews of timesheetand project data. Custom screens and port lets provide users with quick andeasy views into PPM data.

• Data security is improved.

Locking and unlocking mechanisms within the Clarity architecture keepinformation from accidentally being changed. For example, a block of datafields on the Service Request are identified as the Description. These are





locked (made uneditable) when the Service Request is submitted. Lockingand unlocking can also be controlled with user access rights.

As the project advanced, Honda wanted to know how to plumb/examin,organize, and present Clarity data for quick, daily reviews. Xinify worked upseveral custom port lets, which were not part of the original configurationrequirements, and made life a little easier for Honda. Xinify completed theClarity deployment in time for Honda to meet its Clarity training schedule fora phased rollout, beginning with the Ohio and Indiana plants. Deliveryexceeded Honda’s expectations.


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