Portfolio 3rd assignment- Governance and Stakeholder’s Management
1. Governance Issues and Recommendations
The following governance issues were reported in the case study and possible solutions are recommended (Western Australian Auditor General 2010).
1.1. Lack of governance structures
The governance for a project involves stating the objectives of the project, explaining how these objectives can be achieved, and then monitoring the progress made on these objectives (Turner 1999). For a major project like Perth Arena, the essential governance procedures were not set in place. Department of Housing and Works (DHW) assumed the responsibility of client and delivery agency. This led to lack of supervision and unclear direction for the project (Western Australian Auditor General 2010).
The Auditor’s report recommended appointment of a client agency while DHW continues as the delivery agency. The client-agency ensures the transparency of project decisions outside the delivery agency. The arrangement would reduce the risk of undocumented changes to the scope,time and cost leading to project failure (Western AustralianAuditorGeneral 2010).This would allow each agency to have clear objectives and accountability towards the project (Zwikael and Smyrk 2015). The government projects such as Perth Arena must implement the project management processes relevant to the project which are understood by the project team, delivery agency and client agency (Patanakul, et al. 2016). DHW must take the lead as delivery agency to implement formal planning, estimating, risk management, change management, project governance, monitoring, controlling and closing processes.
[place-order]
2. Non-compliance with the standard framework
The Strategic Asset Management Framework (SAMF) was set up as a guiding process for management of government assets, both existing and new. It is mandatory under SAMF that projects with estimated cost more than $1 million must have a Project Definition Plan (Department of Treasury Western Australia 2015). There was no such plan prepared for Perth Arena Project at the time of performance evaluation (Western Australian Auditor General 2010). Portfolio 3rd assignment
A Project Definition Plan (PDP) addresses issues with project delivery and its associated risks (Department of Treasury Western Australia 2015). A well-drafted PDP typically comprises of asset definition, cost estimates, project schedule, procurement method, quality management, and change management procedures. The PDP is crucial in early identification of potential risks and controlling irrelevant changes to the project constraints. It provides baseline for the project and is used in development of project brief and tender documents. By skipping this important step, the Perth Arena project was open to risks of scope creep, schedule slippage and cost overruns (Patanakul, et al. 2016)….Show More Content….
1.3. Resource inadequacies in the project team
In addition to the lack of governance structure, the project team at DHW was inadequate for Perth Arena project (Western Australian Auditor General 2010). This could also be the reason that critical components of SAMF were rushed into without thoroughly considering the corresponding risks. Theproject team consists of two officers who wereassigned to the project only on part-time basis. The daily administration was left to the Project Director who filled the roles of both principal and superintendent. The inadequate staffing on DHW side meant that the Project Director had to rely on the consultants for the project management processes.