cis 385 – Assignment 3

Impact of Communication Gap on Project Management

University of the Fraser Valley Duncan Jeffries

Praneet Batwar

6/24/2012

An in depth view and analysis on the importance of Project Communication Management.

Executive Summary

In this report the importance of communications in Project management is discussed. Apart

from listing out the key concepts of Project management such as:

Identifying Stakeholder

Plan Communication

Distribute Information

Managing Stakeholders

Report Performance

Some case studies are discussed such as the AEI, where effective communications

management was used. This ensured the success of the project. The FBI case studies and the US

Census Bureau case studies are a clear example where the client or the contractor did not

effectively communicate the status of the project or the requirements for the project. This

resulted in the total abandonment of the project causing a loss of several million dollars. The

Clark Faucets case studies shows us that lack of proper communication can cause unrest in the

workplace and can eventually lead to serious implications. These case studies strengthened our

belief that communication management is required.

Later on we discussed and listed some reasons that were the major cause of communication

failure. Human factors such as fear, laziness were some of the causes of project communication

failure. Other reasons included Geographic distance, different time zones and technical

problems.

In the end we reached the conclusion that communications in project management should

be managed at all levels of the project.

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Table of ContentsIntroduction ....................................................................................... 5

Subject Overview…............................................................................. 5

Key Concepts………………….................................................................... 6

Project Communications Plan...................................................... 6

Identify Stakeholders......................................................................... 7

Plan Communications…………………………………………….......................... 7

Distribute Information....................................................................... 9

Manage Stakeholders....................................................................... 10

Report Performance………................................................................. 10

Is Project Communications Management Overrated?............... 11

AEI Case Study.................................................................................. 11

FBI Case Study................................................................................... 13

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Clark Faucet Case Study................................................................... 13

USA Census Bureau Case Study..................................................... 16

What Causes Communication Failure in Project Management ?.................................................................... 18

Conclusion ........................................................................................ 20

Appendices....................................................................................... 20

Works Cited ..................................................................................... 20

Introduction

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Communications is probably one of the most important aspects in Project Management. Even

outside of the area of Project Management, Communications is very important. If there is a

mismatch in the information passed between the stakeholders of the project, the overall

success of the Project can be endangered. Communications and human interactions can make

or break the project. It is an area of Project Management which cannot be ignored or

neglected. In this report, first we will discuss the key components of Project Communications

Management. Then we will discuss some case studies which show us how effective

communications management can eventually lead to the success of the Project.

Subject Overview

Communications is the exchange of data or information. It requires information to be

passed on and received. Similarly in project management information needs to be given and

information needs to be received. As a project manager it is important to keep your team

informed about the budget, the time constraints and the levels of quality they have to achieve.

It is equally important to keep the Project Board informed about the progress of the project.

These people include the Executives, the suppliers and the clients. It is also important that all

the relevant information about the project; customer needs, objectives, plan, constraints,

changes, assessed risks and progresses are available at all times (Buehring 2009).

The PMBOK descries Project Communications Management as

“the timely and the correct generation, collection, distribution, storage, retrieval and disposition

of project information.”

Project Managers employ project communications management to ensure a seamless and

effective communication among all the stakeholders of the project. It is a more organized

approach to dissipate information to the various members of the team and the stakeholders

and all the people related and responsible to the project.

Project Communications Management: Key Concepts

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I. Project Communications Plan

Firstly a communications plan has to be made in order to organize how, when and how the

information is sent out. It is the written strategy for getting the right information to right

project stakeholders at the right time. Each stakeholder has unique requirements for

information as their roles and responsibilities in the project vary. Project Communications

Management includes the following processes:

1. Identify Stakeholders – This is the first and an important part of chalking out the plan for

communications. It is the process of identifying all the people and organizations which

are affected by the project.

2. Plan Communications – This is the process of determining the responsibilities and

information requirements of the various stakeholders. This is a very important step. One

wouldn’t want to give the vice-president project related technical information.

3. Distribute Information – This is the process of making relevant information available to

project stake holders as planned. Different channels can be used to send out

information. Presentations, emails, company website, circulars can be used to give out

information.

4. Manage Stakeholder Expectations – The process of communicating and interacting with

the respective stakeholders to meet their needs and answering to any issues they have.

5. Report Performance – This is the process of gathering and giving out performance

related information which includes status reports, progress measurements and project

forecasts.

II. Identify Stakeholders

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Project Stakeholders are the people customers, sponsors, the organizations and the public that

are actively involved in the project. They may have a great influence over the project and play

an important role in the overall success of the project. They may be at different levels in the

organizations and have varying levels of importance. Sometimes major stakeholders can be

external to the organizations and at times can be in a completely different geographic region

(Overseas Software Development). It is essential that the stakeholders are identified early on in

the project. This is important as their levels of interest, expectations, importance and influence

are needed so that the right information is delivered to the right person.

Figure 1 – Interest Grid in Project Stake Holders

III. Plan Communications

Once the stakeholders are identified it is important that a written document that guides the

communication management be written. This can be the part of the overall management plan.

For smaller projects this could be a part of the contract itself and for projects with larger scale it

could be a whole another document.

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This communications management plan is of extreme importance as it chalks out important

information as to who needs what information and by when. Identifying the information needs

of the stakeholder and selecting a suitable means of meeting those needs are essential for the

overall success of the project. To give a crude example, a project manager will have to

determine the dates and kind of information that will be a part of the status report which

should be given towards the end of the project. This will help the project manager analyze the

data to be gathered to be mentioned in the status report. This will also give the manager a

deadline before which the required data has to be gathered.

Figure 2 – Sample Communications Plan

The kind of communication needed is also determined in the plan. There are three different

methods of communications which can be determined by the nature of the information that is

needed to be sent.

Interactive Communications: This is employed when there is some kind of negotiation to be

made. Whenever there is a need for information to be passed both the ways, Interactive

Communication is used. It is one of the most efficient ways to discuss issues and come to a

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common understanding. It includes meetings, phone calls, phone conference calls and video

conferencing, etc.

Push Communications: This is generally used to send out information to a specific or an

intended user. This can be used to send out confidential information too. This is an effective

way of sending out information but it does not ensure that the messaged received was

interpreted correctly by the audience. This includes letters, memos, reports, faxes, mails etc.

Pull Communications: this method of communication is generally used when information is

needed to be passed onto a large target audience. This too doesn’t ensure that the information

is received by the intended audience as the target audience can receive information at their

own discretion. This can include the company website, intranet sites, notice boards etc.

IV. Distribution of Information

This is the process of making the required information available to the respective project

stakeholders. This is mainly the execution process of the Project Communications Plan and is

performed throughout the life of the Project. The main focus here is selecting the appropriate

media and understanding and managing the different distribution channels that are a part of

communications management (See Appendix).

Building on the method of communication that has been determined an appropriate medium

for communication needs to determined. As technology has progressed over the years the

choice of the available mediums has vastly widened. Table A lists some communication tools

that are available.

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Table A

V. Managing Stakeholders

This is the process of communications and working with the stakeholders to meet their needs

and addressing any kinds of issues that has occurred. This process mainly focuses on activities

that are directed at project stakeholders to influence their expectations concerns. Actively

managing and meeting the expectations of the stakeholders is likely to increase the acceptance

of the project. This enables them to be active supporters of the project. This decreases the risk

of project failure by failing to meet its objectives and goals due to unresolved stakeholder

issues.

VI. Report Performance

Report performance is the last and the final process in Project Communications Management. It

is the process of gathering and dissipating performance information related to the project. This

can include status reports, progress measurements and forecasts. Performance reports need to

cater to audience at different levels. The format of the reports will depend on the kind of the

audience the report is being presented to.

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Communication Tools

Type/Technique Description

Email It allows the members of the team to communicate text,

images, audio, video files between members

Memos Provides a formal forum to communicate important dates,

policies and procedures

Instant Messaging Gives team members a platform to communicate real-time.

Project Status meetings Provides regular status updates and reviews of the project

Telephone/Video Conferences Bridges gaps in team members caused by geographic

indifference.

Intranet Formally communicate status, progress, highlights and

objectives.

Project Road show Provides feedback to all stakeholders or users

Walk-about Involves a hands-on face to face approach with your team.

Is Project Communications Management Overrated?

Now that we have had a grasp over different important concepts of Project

Communications management, let us analyze the importance of Communications in PM. Some

might argue that managing a communications plan is important, but not as important as

managing costs or time. That brings us to our main argumentative question. Is managing

communications in Project Management not as important?

In 1998, French computer manufacturer BULL had requested an independent survey.

Spikes Cavell and independent Research Company was to do the survey. The survey was to

identify major causes of IT Project failures in the finance sector of UK. 203 telephonic interviews

were conducted where several project managers from finance, utilities, manufacturing,

business services, telecoms and IT service sectors were questioned. The survey revealed that

Bad communications or communication breakdown accounted for 57% of the projects failure.

Where solutions are supplied by an external party, the supplier client relationship is the key for

the success of the project. About 60% of the people who were surveyed believed that

communications is essential in the making this relationship work.

AMERICAN ELECTRONICS INTERNATIONAL CASE STUDY

Back in 1994, AEI was awarded with a contract for R&D and production qualification for

an advance type of guidance system. The Mask Project, which was the name of the project,

would easily be 30 months in length. The length of the program was justified as 15 different

units had to be tested. As this project was longer than any project AEI had ever encountered

the executives at AEI were concerned about the staffing.

Blen Carty, the project manager for the preliminary testing phase, was aware of the

upcoming issues when the follow-on contract would be given and the main project would

commence. Blen felt that the managers would be reluctant on giving up their key personnel

fulltime to his project and lose their services for duration of 30 months. With an intention of

discussing and solving this issue, Blen Carty held a meeting with John Wallace, the director of

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project management, and Dr. Albert Runnels, the director of engineering. The key-problem was

discussed and a final conclusion was reached. It was decided that the names of the top people

of the company including several Ph.Ds. to be added into the proposal. This would initially bloat

up the management volume. Once the contract is finalized, necessary assignments would be

made depending on who is available.

The fact that Blen Carty identified the issue and took it up with the stakeholders helped

the team reach a conclusion. This conclusion was instrumental in the completion and the

success of the project. Had the issue not been addressed the follow-up contract wouldn’t have

been offered in the first place. Furthermore let us look at the completion of the Material

Development Project.

The Materials Development Project was a major success, from its inception, everything

just went smoothly. Richard Flag a Ph.D. in engineering was to serve as project engineer. This

was risky as Richard was a research engineer. During development however Richard showed

that he was capable of performing the role as a project engineer. Flag made sure that excellent

working relation with development lab personnel and managers was maintained. Richard spent

10 minutes each week to personally inform them of the status of the project. The department

managers liked this approach taken by Richard as they got first-hand unfiltered information

about the project. They also liked the fact that they did not have to spend hours in team

meetings.

Although not planned, but the communications approach Richard Flag took was quite

instrumental in the success of the project. This shows that maintaining excellent relations with

the stakeholders and having an effective communications plan is necessary for the success of a

project.

FBI CASE STUDY

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In 2003, FBI had come up with an ambitious plan to replace paper based reporting of

crimes and investigations. An online system was proposed and the contract was given to SAIC.

The project was called Project Trilogy. SAIC came up with 730,000 lines code for the Virtual

Case File and it seemed to work very well. Zalmai Azmi the FBI’s technology chief then enquired

about the error rate. The errors reported were in hundreds. As different tests were being done,

the number of errors kept multiplying. A few days later Azmi warned the director that $170

million proposed system was in serious trouble. A year later the project was dead.

It was later reported that FBI’s approach to the project was flawed. But FBI was only

partly to blame for the failure of the project. Even though SAIC knew FBI had a flawed approach

to the project, they kept quiet for several reasons.

- The FBI was paying the bills and SAIC did not want to cut their source of revenue.

- They were reluctant to tell FBI that they were at fault.

- There was no one willing to tell the government that they were asking for the

impossible.

This is a clear example of lack of communications due to fear of being criticized.

Sometimes the contractor is afraid of losing the business if they point out mistakes with the

requirements of the clients. Worst case scenario is that along with losing a potential client they

also lose face. If SAIC had told FBI upfront the flaws with the requirements of the project, the

project would have ran smoothly and wouldn’t have cost the US Government $170 Million.

THE CLARK FAUCET COMPANY CASE STUDY

The Clark Faucet company had become the third largest supplier of faucets for both

commercial and home use. Customers would evaluate the faucets by design and quality. Each

faucet needed to be available in at least 25 different colors. Although The Clark Faucet did not

spend a great amount of money on advertising, they spend some money on giving out ads in

professional journals. Most of the company’s marketing and advertising funds were used for

the semi-annual home and garden trade show and the annual builders trade show. These were

really important as they were used to show case the various products offered by the company.

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One large builder could easily order 5000 components for the furnishing of a newly constructed

hotel or building. Missing one such opportunity meant missing out on a opportunity to earn a

large revenue.

Although Clark Faucets saw good market success, the culture at the company wasn’t

looking so bright. The marketing and the engineering team would never talk to one another.

The engineering team wanted freedom and the marketing team wanted a final say on what the

engineers conjured up with. The conflict became so intense that several attempts to implement

Project Management completely failed. No one wanted to be project manager. Meetings were

not attended and time was spent on personal projects rather than required work.

The executive council decided to step up and make a strong attempt in implementing

Project Management. It was needed not only for new product development but also for

enhancements. To first resolve this conflict some interviews were conducted in order to pin

point the major cause of this uncooperative nature. The engineering team mainly had

complaints that the marketing team did not understand that there was other work to be done

than just coming up with new products. The engineering team also wanted to be left alone and

let them finish their work uninterrupted. The marketing team on the other hand said that the

revenues generated at these trade shows directly impacted their livelihood. They want new

products up in time for the tradeshows.

Looking at this case, it is clearly understood that it is a clear case of lack of

communications management. Judging by what the engineering team has to say, the marketing

team makes ton of changes after the initial input is given. This obviously has major implications.

If there was a more organized approach to this such as weekly status reports or weekly

meetings between the engineering and the marketing team, in the presence of the upper

management. Negotiations and discussions could have been made regarding new product

designs. The engineers could give the marketing team a clear status reports indicating how

further along are they into the project. This could avoid further conflicts and result in the

smooth functioning of the firm.

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USA CENSUS BUREAU CASE STUDY

In 2008, the Census Bureau decided to introduce 500,000 handheld devices to allow the

officials to follow up on the individuals who failed to mail in responses to the 2010 Census. It

was abandoned as it wouldn’t have been completed in time for the 2010 Census. This system

was initially meant to replace the clipboards, pens and papers which they had used in the past.

The company which was hired was Harris Corp. of Melbourne, Fl. under a $600 million contract.

Apart from building the handheld devices, Harris Corp was to even create a system to manage

the data.

What went wrong? After the initial contract was signed the number of changes

requested by the Census Bureau increased. At one point 417 new technical requirements were

made. This vastly increased the production costs and increased the time. This was a major

break in the project. The census officials did not clearly state what they wanted from Harris in

its program. This resulted in bloating of the costs and made the project risky. Steve Murdock

the director of the bureau states “We now understand the problem of the FDCA program was

due to a lack of communication between the Census bureau and the prime contractor. We did

not effectively convey to the contractor the complexity of census operations and detailed

requirements that needed to be fulfilled”. The overall failure of the project increased the total

cost to increase to $ 3 Billion, which would bring the 2010 Census bill to $14.5 Billion, the

highest ever recorded.

This is clear case of lack of communications between the client and the contractor. Had

there been a clear channel of communication between the census bureau and the contractor,

and all the technical specifications would have been conveyed early on in the project, the

project would have been completed on time. This is where the importance of Communications

plan comes into picture.

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Analyzing these case studies it is quite evident that an effective communications

strategy can make or break the project. Now we have come to a come conclusion that effective

communications is needed in project management. Unlike other mismanagement it is quite

hard to spot issues with Project Communications management. Let us look at some of the

major reasons that cause Project Communications to fail.

What Causes Communication Failure in Project Management?

There is failure in communication when someone working on the project fails to

communicate information about the project. It can be as simple as a team member not telling

his project manager that he is having issues with his task and he won’t be able to finish it time.

Another major example is project manager failing to inform the stake holders on the status of

the project. The third and probably the most is the client failing to convey all of the

requirements for the projects beforehand. Communication failure always has a negative

impact. It can result in failure to meet deadlines, increment in project costs, project delays, role

confusion, failing to meet requirements, negligence by the stakeholders etc. Most common

reasons that are responsible for communication failure are not technical reasons but rather

“human reasons”

Ignorance/ Feat of Criticism: This is particularly seen where the client does not want to seem

technically under-knowledged in front of the project manager and fails to give out features that

he requires.

Stress: Doing many things at many times for long periods of time can eventually lead to stress.

How fast a human can get stressed varies from person to person, but it does affect everyone.

This leads to forgetting to send out important memos and mails regarding important topics

Laziness: Although not a good thing, laziness is also a very important reason for project failure.

Lazy project managers will just simply not want to find time to communicate with team

members. Sometimes a project manager will see that it is not required to hold a meeting over a

petty issue and just send out a memo, but fails to realize that meetings is a way to actively hold

discussions and receive information rather than just send out information.

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Fear: A project manager might be fearful of to report to the external client that the project is

behind schedule or a developer might be scared to tell the project manager that he or she is

having with a particular task. This fear is usually a direct result of strict or demanding project

managers or clients.

The Non-Human reasons that cause communication failure includes

Distance: For many projects distance can cause a lot of misunderstandings thus creating a gap

in the communication. Many times having a face to face meeting would have been effective to

discuss requirements and issues. But due to distance this is done over the phone or video

conferencing.

Different Time zones: When a project manager is on the other side of the planet as compared

to the team, there are definitely major implications. The project manager will hardly find his

team awake when there is a 10 hour difference between the team and the manager. This is a

huge issue as most of the communication is done by e-mail. Real-time communication is rarely

possible and is hard to discuss critical issues.

Technical Issues: Technology plays an important role in communications. There can be many

issues that cause communication failures. E-mail getting deleted or directly sent to the spam

folder. People not checking their voice mails, failure to respond to mails, etc these all eventually

lead to communication failure.

Conclusion

Looking back at what was discussed it quite safe to assume that even if Project

Communications Management is over rated it is required and it is important. Small reasons

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such as a missed email or an ignored voice mail can have major implications. In order to

correctly plan communications in Project management, the five steps have to be followed

systematically i.e. Identify Stakeholders, Plan Communication, Distribute Information, Manage

stakeholder expectations and report performance. It is also important to understand that it is

not easy to spot any disruptions in communication as many human factors can be the cause

too.

Project Communications Management doesn’t just mean agreeing on requirements at

project conception or handing out status reports, it means managing communications at every

level of the project.

Appendices

Appendix A

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These are the various channels one must keep into account while developing a communication

plan.

Works Cited

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p=1964/>.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/03/AR200804030

2068.html>.

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http://calleam.com/WTPF/?p=1894

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9. Gaunt, Richard (2010, Nov 5) the Importance of Communication in Project

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http://www.arraspeople.co.uk/camel-blog/projectmanagement/guest-blogger-

project-failure-is-also-due-to-poor-communication/>.

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cortex.com/Stat_Failure_Rate.htm>.

11. Kerzner, H. (2009). Project Managment Case Studies. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons.

12. PMBOK 4th Edition (2008). Project Management Institute.

13. Project Communication Handbook 2nd Edition (2009). Office of Project Management

Process Improvement

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