Question

A project manager’s (PM’s) ability to achieve a successful outcome can be impacted by the lack of standardization of PM processes. This case study is designed to help you understand the importance of the standardization of project management practices in your organization and identify ways you can influence the use of a standard process to determine what the potential problems and solutions might be.

You are a program manager who’s been asked to implement a new EHR to help meet new regulatory guidelines. You’re enthusiastic about your role, but have concerns about the lack of project management processes in your organization. You fully understand the ramifications of failure with the implementation, and so you are looking for ways to mitigate issues with a large number of departments involved.

You know that an EHR needs to be focused on patient care, quality, and business and clinical workflows. A multidisciplinary implementation team need to be assembled and must include clinicians and IT and operational staff. Training for staff is required at all levels is required. IT will need to be engaged to customize templates and workflows.

The organization is unsure what value having one EHR will provide, so communication about the benefits of such a system is important. You have a good relationship with external organizations who have implemented their own EHRs. You’re planning a meeting with some of them to see what you can glean from what they learned, during implementation.  

You need to effectively define the scope of work your project teams are expected to deliver. You’re constrained by the availability of clinical resources and related funding. You are told that both of these are not flexible, and your sponsor emphasizes the political nature of the situation. She asks for your input on how to best deal with these constraints from a project management perspective.

• Contrast different communication methods for system downtime events and summarize the pros and cons of each. Please include your reference in your answers.

Answer 1

#. A limiting factor that affects the execution of a project, program, portfolio or process.

Six constraints

Scope; time; cost; quality; resources; risk

Scope (requirement) constraint changes

Sum of all products, services and results. Customer adds or subtracts functionality. Mandated by external regulatory bodies like the FDA. Voluntary compliance ANSI. If scope is increased -->then-->time and/or cost is increased. Additional time is not an option so then your quality will go down.

Cost (budget) constraint changes

Approved estimate for the project activities. Funds could be given to higher priority projects. Funds increased due to need for outsourcing. Funds given to your project if in trouble.

If budget is decreased -->scope is decreased (you lose functionality). If you so no decrease in scope then quality goes down.

Time (schedule) constraint changes

Planned dates for the schedule activities. Specific availability of team members. Level of expertise of the team members. Dependency on other project completion.

If schedule is decreased --> budget is increased. If you don't increase budget it may increase the risk and decrease the customer satisfaction.

Quality Constraint Changes

The degree that a set of characteristics fulfill the requirements. Voluntary compliance to increase quality. Mandatory compliance to increase quality. Quality decreases if the plan is not followed.

Quality constraint change example

If quality is creased then budget needs to increase to pay for the additional scope. If quality standards not followed you could get penalities and it increases the risk and cost.

Resource constraint changes

Personnel, equipment, services, supplies etc. Specific ability of all resources. Triggered by increase in project scope.

Resources change effects

If resources are decreased-> then the schedule is increased (no software or machine). If no increase in schedule (we need to thwart the schedule so bring in more people and that means increase the budget).

Risk Constraint Changes

Uncertain event having a positive or negative effect on project. Introduced internally and externally. Increased despite proper planning. Implemented plans may introduce new risk.

Risk Change Effects

If risk is increased --> schedule is increased. No increase in schedule? Then you're going to need to increase your budget to pay people to deal with this unknown risk.

Balancing constraints

PM must effectively balance constraints. Stakeholder ideas of importance differ. Helps manage project demands and tradeoffs. Provide sponsor with info on all side of constraint hexagon.

Benefits of balancing constraints

Consisten evaluation of project demands for intelligent decisions. Focusing everyone on most important priority at any given time. Ensuring all are sharing same goals and doing tasks to achieve them.

#. Communication methods during system downtime :-

Ameture radio

Mobile Phone

Landline

Pros :-

It reachs to all

Less time

Privacy

Cons :-

Sometimes not reachable

Wrong number

Not working systems