Question

. Why are budgets, schedules, and key success factors essential to operations control and evaluation?

Answer 1

In operations management, it is critical for the project managers to accomplish the key project goals as per the budget of the project, schedule of the project and the key success factors that needs to be identified to measure the success or failure of the project. All of these areas play a very important role in determining whether the project has been implemented to the satisfaction of all the stakeholders or not.

Budgets: Before the implementation of the project begins, the project managers need to determine the budget of the project, i.e., the amount that their organization or the client’s organization is willing to spend in accomplishing certain organizational goals through completion of the underlying project. According to the budget of the project, different project resources are gathered and allocated to perform pre-determined tasks as per the need of the project. If the project manager is not able to control the costs of the project resources, he or she may end up exceeding the budget of the project that was determined before the implementation. In such scenario, even if all the project goals have been met but the costs are not as per the budget, the project may still not be considered to be a success.

Schedules: Similar to budget, schedule of the project is also pre-determined before the implementation of the key activities/tasks. Operations managers make use of various tools such as a Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) that helps in dividing the project related tasks and activities into measurable chunks which is then allocated to different members of the project according to their skill-set, knowledge and experience. In the present competitive business environment, an organization may lack behind its competitors if it fails to stick to the schedule for completing its key projects. In an ideal scenario, scheduling of project related tasks and activities should be done in such a way that they are completed well before their deadline or requirement date.

Key Success Factors: Measuring the success of a project on the key success factors that are critical to the project is essential to operations control and evaluation. The success factors of two similar projects may be different for different organizations depending on their respective organizational goals i.e. what is it that they are trying to achieve through the implementation and completion of the project. Comparing the outcomes of the project with the success factors established at the beginning of the project helps the project managers to evaluate their performance against the set standards and to conclude and report whether the project is a success or failure.