Design of Project Teams and Collaboration in the Project Environment - Annotated Bibliography Example

Table of contents 1. Organisational context 2. The annotated bibliography 2.1. The design of project teams 2.2. Collaboration in the project environment 2.3. Creating productive environment 2.4. Selecting project team members 3. Conclusion 1. Organisational Context. DeliDrinks is a food processing company based in Australia. For years, we have provided our customers with the best variety of fresh fruit juices gaining leadership position in the market. Our products are popular for being made from 100% natural ingredients. However, over the past year, we have noticed a decrease in the sales of our products. As a result, the Project Management Office (PMO) was tasked with the responsibility of looking into the matter and making recommendations to the company board. A project team consisting of twelve members was put together, including the project team manager. They were provided with a budget of ten thousand shillings to conduct a research and report back to the company board of governors. The project time frame was three months ending 4th September 2016, during which they were to use all available resources to inform our research, draw conclusions and make suitable conclusions to the board. The project manager has asked me to be part of a team reviewing team leadership in the above mentioned project. To carry out the above task, I have first prepared the annotated bibliography below reviewing literature relevant to the topic. 2. Annotated bibliography 2.1. The design or structuring of project teams. 2.1.1. Burke, R & Barron, S 2014, Project management leadership building creative teams, second edition, 2nd ed., John Wiley & Sons Ltd, Chichester, West Sussex, UK. Link to resource. The book focuses on project management leadership and how it is applied in the project environment. The author notes that it is the structured project teams that determines the success of the project based on the time delivery, quality outcomes and completing the project within the structured budget. Additionally, the author identifies that through motivational and the inspiration of the team members contributes towards the best performance of the team members hence the ability to meet the objectives of the project. This book is relevant since it identifies on how to structure and handle project team members in any project. The article further pinpoints that the project size determines the size of the of the project team, hence this project requires a smaller structured project team. As such, the project manager is expected to engage mostly in leading the project team. Lastly the argues that project requires different set of skills at each different phases hence the leadership management needs to structure different types of team involving different leadership styles. The argument is beneficial to this project because generally, it is the structured teams and leadership styles positioned that determines the success of the success and failure of any project. 2.1.2. Lee, MR 2014, Leading virtual project teams adapting leadership theories and communications techniques to 21st century organizations, Best practices and advances in program management series, CRC Press, Boca Raton Fla.  The interest of the author in this book focuses on addressing the shortcomings of the virtual project teams structure based on traditional techniques applicable towards that impacts the structuring of the project team members. In the process, the author advices on new technique on the existing leadership models to e-leadership on how to improve on the virtual project team management. The author further identifies that during the structuring of the project team, it is important to focus on the cultural context of the members in the team. Differences arise based on work/life philosophies, lack of understanding between the team members and cultural diffrences in time and deadline management. If such aspects are not well considered in a project, the possibility of it failing is high. The article further analyzes the various case studies related to the real world application and challenges experienced in virtual management of the project team members hence important to the above project on how to equip project manager with tools and techniques in structuring project teams. Monitoring, controlling and coordination of the project team members through IT pose some challenges hence the project managers need to be attentive and strict when employing such an approach in the project. 2.2. Collaboration in the project environment. 2.2.1. Kerzner, H 2013, Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and controlling, 11th edn, John Wiley & Sons Inc, Hoboken, NJ. In chapter 4, the author focuses on the recruitment of project team members. In section 4.9, the focus is on the project office and how there is collaboration in the project environment. At any given time, the project management office may be handling more than one project. If there is a new project to be taken up by the office and the project team leader is in the process of recruiting members to his or her team, they may require the skills of someone already in another project (pg 196). Therefore, project managers of different teams must collaborate in order to efficiently use the available human resources. The same case applies to non-human resources. Similarly, project managers may require the skills of people who are not part of the PMO. This chapter is relevant to the project at hand because it highlights the necessity of collaboration in the project environment so as to ensure success of the project. Good project leaders therefore work together with other leaders so as to bring together the best team for the job. They also outsource if need be. We can look at the membership of the project team handling the project at hand so as to draw conclusions on the project leadership. 2.2.2. Turner, JR 2014, Handbook of project-based management: leading strategic change in organizations, 4th edn, McGraw-Hill, USA. Page 2 of the book, the author argues that collaboration of the dedicated team members inclusive of different organization contributes towards significant success of the project. In page 136 of the book, the author pinpoints that high collaboration in project environment correlates to higher performance in the project hence quality results. Additionally, in page 396 of the book, Turner highlights some of the important collaboration techniques such as through joint venture, partnering with funding agencies, local labour and variety of suppliers. Turner’s ideologies on project collaboration is important to this project. Based on the author argument on collaboration, this project embracing collaboration is likely to benefit in outcomes such as fast production time of the project, better brainstorming and quality inputs, positive impacts towards project manager and stuff communication and better employee relationships. For this project to attain a working collaborative style, the technique need to be initiated at the beginning phase of the project through schedule training sessions by emphasizing on the importance of communication in most of progress and challenges encountered in project environment, managers checking with team members and partners regularly. Additionally, the leadership management tend to determine the level of collaboration based on the team development level in the organization. 2.3. Creating a Productive Project Environment. 2.3.1. Lee, MR, 2013, ‘Leading virtual project teams: Adapting leadership theories and communications techniques to 21st century organizations’, CRC Press. This article deals in depth with the leadership theories and how they can be applied in developing an organization productive. It also focusses on the manner in which communication techniques in the twenty first century organizational management (Lee 2013). Through the analysis of the various traditional leadership and communication methods, the author compares them to modern methods and proposes the integration of both in the improvement of e-leadership and virtual project communications. In the first few chapters, the book examines the challenges in leadership of multicultural virtual organizations. Through this analysis, we are informed of the best practices for: Preventing social isolation Motivation and management of multicultural teams Work communication Handling cyber bullying and e-ethics environment Moreover, this book demonstrates application of traditional leadership theories in contemporary projects in order to enhance and improve virtual communication and consequently improved project environment. The final chapter of the book discusses the e-leadership skis together with the competencies that project managers require in order to create sustainable project environments that will succeed in the competitive business environment (Lee 2013). The discussion of complete case studies, the book relates the virtual environment leadership like e-leadership to the real world organizations making the book suitable in our case study bearing in mind that the improvement of project environment is highly dependent on the leadership competencies and skills. 2.3.2. Burke, R & Barron, S, 2014, ‘Project management leadership: building creative teams’, John Wiley & Sons. This article discusses the leadership management of a project in detail. This is discussed in the view of the human factors that influence the success of implementing the vision of a project. Through the description of team building, the book addresses the way in which factors like collaboration and motivation can be harnessed for the success of a project (Burke & Barron 2014). Reading through the introductory chapters, the authors analyses the governance and ethics of a project which will eventually result in attaining the project’s lifecycle. Through the subsequent chapters, leadership styles are discussed and special emphasis is placed on team building techniques providing roles for various members of the team which motivates them to work together for achievement of the team’s objectives. In the concluding chapters, the book describes the decision making mechanisms in a team highlighting the delegation of duties and proper communication for the sake of conflict resolution in a given team (Burke & Barron 2014) The manner in which the authors present these ideologies on team management makes the book relevant to the project at hand since conflict resolution, motivation, communication and delegation just to mention but a few work together to create a proper project environment. 2.4. Selecting project team members. 2.4.1. Kerzner, H 2013, Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and controlling, 11th edn, John Wiley & Sons Inc, Hoboken, NJ.  Chapter 4 of the book focuses on organizing and staffing of the project office and team. The staffing process is well explained, starting with the selection of the project management and considerations to be made during appointment (pg 179). Next is the selection of team members which involves both the project manager and upper level management (pg 200). The specific qualifications depend on the nature of the project but a few basic qualifications are laid out. The credibility of the book is beyond question since the author has written the book based on the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK) Guide, the standard guide for project management. As mentioned above, the author is informed by the PMBOK Guide which he regularly makes reference of, even specifying the relevant chapters. This chapter of the book is relevant since gives guidelines on the selection of the project team members. This is a particularly important stage since the success of the project is dependent on the competency of the team members. The guidelines provided in this chapter of the book may prove extremely helpful in handling the project at hand. They will act as a checklist from which to determine the efficiency of the project’s leadership. 2.4.2. Project Management Institute 2013, Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK guide), 5th edn, Project Management Institute Inc., Newtown Square, Pennsylvania. The PMBOK guide provides a five step process for project management. From the five processes, we focus on the third step which is project execution. Within project execution, the first step is to negotiate for project team members. The negotiations will be based on selection of the key performers indicators, the quality and forecasts expected of the selected project team. Based on the individual past learnt experience and skills, the responsibility assigned to the teams needs to align with the individual experience because it greatly determines the end results of the project. The guide book is of much benefit on how to select project team members because they are the major input in the project. During the selection process, track records of the previous assigned duties to members would determine the current selection and placement section in the project. Additionally, the author advocates for project managers to engage in status meetings, tracking and change management through step-by-step process purposefully to determine if the selected team are on track or if new changes are to be made. The author arguments are essential to this project on how to select the team members based on individual skills and since project occurs in phase, it is important for the selection of the teams to be gradually reviewed. 3. Conclusion. The success of any project, regardless of the field or context, is determined by the leadership of the project. This is because the entire process of project delivery is directly or indirectly determined by the project leadership. It is common knowledge that the project team also has a big part to play in the successful completion of a project. However, a team will not function efficiently if they are not properly guided. Essentially, a team is carefully selected and put together by the project team manager. Therefore, because of this mandate, the project manager can either set the project up for success or failure, depending on the choice of team members, from the word go. Hence, it is important that upper level management makes informed decisions when appointing project leaders so the latter can follow the same example when selecting a team. The literature reviewed in the annotated bibliography above is, as a result, indispensable as each provides guidelines for successful project management. The above mentioned books should guide both the upper level management and the project management. They can also be used as a checklist to ensure project leadership is up to standard, as is the case with the project at hand. Reference List Burke, R & Barron, S 2014, Project management leadership: building creative teams, John Wiley & Sons. Kerzner, H 2013, Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and controlling, 11th edn, John Wiley & Sons Inc, Hoboken, NJ. Lee, MR 2013, Leading virtual project teams: Adapting leadership theories and communications techniques to 21st century organizations, CRC Press Project Management Institute 2013, Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK guide), 5th edn, Project Management Institute Inc., Newtown Square, Pennsylvania. Read More