OGL 320 Module 1A Baseline Assessment Essay

Your existing competencies and experiences in PM.  Where are you at

now? 

My professional experience is in human resources, specifically in the

recruitment/talent acquisition function. The majority of the experience in PM
related activities I’ve had would be in that capacity. I’d like to describe one project
that would be a representative example of my project management related
experience.

A few years ago, I was contacted by a literary agent about writing a book on
career management. The agent and I developed an idea, she then approached a
publisher, Adams Media in Boston, MA. The idea was accepted, a contract was
developed, and Get Hired Fast was born.

The publisher didn’t provide anything other than editorial support, so I had to not
only find a way to come up with a plan to develop content that people would want
to read for career advice, but also to build a plan that would be achievable from
start to finish. This began with creating milestones and attaching dates to those
milestones rather than assign it to a task (De Reyck, p. 14). The next stage was
to use a decidedly low tech approach such as sticky notes (De Reyck, p. 15) to
define and identify tasks and their dependencies and place them in a logical
sequence to outline the project.

For me, the milestones were (1) the project start after approvals were granted for
the concept, including book length by chapter count and word count, and (2)
creation of the galley print after principal writing was complete and my final red
pen edits were sent to my editor and her team for review. There were lots of
sticky notes all over the wall between the start and finish milestones, branching
out in several directions.

As this was the first time I was writing a book, I had no idea how to assess my
completion times. This is where I encountered the “Planning Fallacy”, known as
the tendency to hold a confident belief that one’s own project will proceed as
planned, even while knowing that the vast majority of similar projects run late
(Buehler, Griffin and Ross, p. 366). As I soon discovered, the planning fallacy
was quite common in the book publishing sector. However, I didn’t think any of
that would apply to me.

What I thought would take three or four months ended up taking thirteen months,
not including additional unexpected production delays that took the time between
the two anchor milestones (start and finish) to a total of eighteen months. From
conception of the book to copies on the shelves at Barnes and Noble it was
almost two years. This required lots of patience, persistence and perseverance.
Define and describe your role and responsibilities for this course in
relation to your summary of your academic and professional experience
thus far.  How is it similar or different?

I think there is a great deal of similarity between our student roles as PMs in OGL
320 and what our roles, responsibilities and expectations are in our overall
academic and professional lives. So much of what we do in both sectors revolves
around the need for effective and efficient scheduling procedures. Critical
success factors often fall into two distinctive groups: those related to initial
planning and those concerned with tactical operationalization (Herroelen, p. 414).

An example of this in real time for me in OGL 320 is that at the outset of the
class, I set an initial plan in place for accomplishing my client objectives, only to
find that it has already required adjustment from a tactical point of view just a few
days into the workload. This is very similar to real life situations at work where I
have an initial plan of how to approach a project only to encounter minor (or
sometimes major) course corrections to accommodate a variety of unforeseen
factors.

What is the title of your role in this course?  In OGL 320 I am the Project
Manager for my client, Dr. Chandler. What does that role mean to you? For
me, it means meeting my client’s assignment objectives by allocating a sufficient
amount of time, effort and energy to the requests of my client. Additionally, this
means meeting those requirements on time and accurately against the rubric for
each individual assignment or project component submitted.

What you want and what you do not want out of your experience with this
course.  What you do not want out of your experience with this course. I
seek to gain a more formal grounding in the project management process.
Selfishly, this comes at an opportune time for me as I am about to undertake a
new responsibility where having these skills and this knowledge would be very
beneficial for me, which is an invitation I have to join the school board where my
children attend school. I can’t really think of anything I do not want out of this
experience with this course, as I feel it will be very positive for me.

What you plan to invest to accomplish your goals for the course.  How will
you manage your time to invest about 20 hours per week in this course?  I
have committed to, and scheduled, 20 hours a week to be successful in OGL 320
by fulfilling the project requirements for my client in this session. For example, as
class was getting underway in the first few days, I reviewed in detail the course
syllabus and plotted out a 20 hour per week schedule for the duration of the
session. Upon completion, I scanned a copy, emailed it to my client, and
scheduled a 30 minute introductory call to discuss it. In that call I also got my
client’s input on what it would take to be successful in the course.
An additional step, which will happen in the coming week, will be to schedule a
recurring weekly call to discuss progress against project objectives and any
issues that may require attention. In this call I will also assess client satisfaction
with accomplishment of objectives.

References:

De Reyck, Bert (2010), Production and Inventory Management Journal, Vol.

46, No. 2, PDF

Buehler, Roger; Griffin, Dale; Ross, Michael; Journal of Personality and

Social Psychology, 1994, Vol. 67, No. 3, pp. 366-381

Herroelen, Willy; Production and Operations Management, Vol. 14, No. 4,

Winter 2005; pp. 413-432