MERU UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

ASSIGNMENT: GROUP WORK

UNIT: BFB 3467 PROJECT MANAGEMENT

COURSE: BCOM

DATE: 21/03/2023

GROUP MEMBERS

1.BS203/100277/19 SIMON MUSYIMI SAMUEL.

2. BS203/100231/19 JOHN NDERITU MWANGI

3. BS203/100409/19 OGINGA MICHAEL OYOO.

4. BS203/100310/19 SALEE MWANZIA JOSHUA

5.BS203/100270/19 KOKI MWANZIA

6.BS203/100295/19. DENNIS MUTUNGA MULINGE

7.BS203/100385/19 AYOTI SYLVIER

8.BS203/100365/19. ERICK BWIRE OTIENO

9 BS203/100404/19. WICKLIFE OTIENO OLE

PROJECT CONTROL SYSTEMS
Project Control Systems are the data collecting, data management and analytical procedures
used to guess, acknowledge and constructively impact the time and cost outcomes of a project
or program; through the communication of information in formats that evaluate actual
management and decision making.

Project controls systems assist in communicating about the objectives, priorities, and
outcomes in the project. They assist in defining success, measuring performance outcomes,
and establishing measures of success.

Project controls represent something like a mathematical model of our project. Like all models,
we should expect that they represent a useful, but flawed, vision of reality. When we confuse the
model with the project reality, we can make a serious mistake.The numbers that make up
controls models are estimates, approximations, and based on imperfect measurements. In
effect, our project controls systems are stochastic systems and must recognize some variation
which to assess our performance.

Too often our project controls get so convoluted that project management loses faith in the
message they provide. They stop being used and instead are fed only as a matter of compliance.
They become a drag on the project as much as an assistance to the project. This state should
not be allowed to exist. We need to design our controls systems to provide the information
needed by management to make wise evaluations and decisions, not to comply with some
theoretical structure that has no meaningas.

Elements of Project Control system.

Depending upon how Project Controls is viewed will impact what is considered as the
elementary parts of the function. Here it is supposed that project controls are regarding about
assessing initial baseline performance parameters, observing the current status of the project,
calculating the future potential of the project, identifying any differences, and considering right
action to be taken to recover any positive difference.

Here change refers to actual variance identified in project control documents and also the
potential differences possible from project issues, threats, and opportunities. On this basis the
elements of Project Control systems are to do with calculating and monitoring controlling
variables, these are generally cost and time aspects:

Planning and Scheduling

Risk Management (includes identification & assessment)

Cost estimating and management

Scope and Change Management

Earned Value Management

Document Control

Supplier Performance

Maintaining the project baseline

Reporting
Examples of project control systems
Project Planning

Planning is one of the important steps in which controllers and project managers work together.
Whether it’s creating project plans, schedules, work-breakdown structures or cost estimates,
planning gives your team a baseline to work with throughout the project.

Budgeting

Integrating the budgeting process into project activities is essential to calculate costs
accurately and to understand when and why variances occur. By time-phasing budgets and
refining the numbers, a transparent model is available for senior managers and team members
alike. This model serves as a benchmark throughout the project to understand vitally important
cash flows.

Risk Management

Project controls provide a meticulous approach to managing risk. By preemptively identifying

risks, monitoring risk continuously, and developing contingency plans to address and mitigate
issues, it becomes possible to reduce impact on budget and schedule. It also helps prevent
some risks from happening in the future.

Change Management

When a project deviates from its original estimates, it’s often not due to a single factor, but due
to the cumulative effect of several factors that tend to go unnoticed. This is why change
management is critical. By tracking changes and understanding their impact, while following a
clear process for evaluation, approval, and accountability, projects can stay on their charted
trajectory.

Forecasting

By increasing the accuracy of estimates-at-complete, project controllers and managers can gain
more insight into the current drivers of cost and schedule overruns. Good progress
measurement is a vital input to the forecasting process. It serves as the comparison against
actual and committed costs that enable project controllers to extrapolate a forecast using a
combination of standard forecasting methods and formulas. Regular, timely updates aid the
project controller by enabling faster response and corrective action to when a project starts to
Quality control

Quality control is the process of ensuring that deliverables and production on a project meet the
required standards. A project management system may put safeguards into place to identify
when metrics show quality levels have fallen below a set threshold. This allows you to make
prompt changes in order to increase quality levels and meet targets.

Communication pipeline

Communication is important on any project, and your project management system can facilitate
this in two ways. First, noting plans for formal communication within the organization, such as
any important events and meetings. The software you use as part of your project management
systems may also help you improve communication on the project by providing software, such
as company chat rooms or messaging systems, to discuss the project.

Performance Management

Defining and using key performance indicators (KPIs) to monitor project health and forecast
trends is crucial to take corrective actions. Organizations that use performance information to
manage projects, like the calculations used in Earned Value Management, achieve a 68%
success rate, compared to a 7% success rate for projects that don’t leverage this data.

Project Administration

This process involves establishing processes and systems that can help team members
communicate and collaborate with each other. The goal is to track status updates, capture
meeting minutes and lessons learned, and manage workflows seamlessly so teams can focus
on actual execution rather than routine tasks.
The benefits of good project control systems
When it’s done right, it helps every part of the business run more smoothly. It allows your team
to focus on the work that matters, free from the distractions caused by tasks going off track or
budgets spinning out of control. It empowers them to deliver results that actually impact the
business’s bottom line. And it enables your employees to see how their work contributes to the
company’s strategic goals.

Here are just a few of the benefits of good project management:

Save time and money

With the right planning, you can ensure that your work is delivered on time and within budget.
Using project management methods, you can map your project’s journey from the outset and
know in advance where the deadlines — and projected spend — are going to fall, so you can
more efficiently allocate your resources, helping you to avoid delays and project overspend.

Improve internal communications

Working together can be hard. With more efficient project management processes, you can
reduce the complexity of collaboration, increase transparency, and ensure accountability, even
when you’re working across teams or departments.

Make better business decisions

With clearer records of how your project is progressing, you get a deeper understanding of
where your resources are being spent, what you need to prioritize and when, and if you’re at risk
of going off track. Good project management means that you can forecast issues before they
become issues, prevent bottlenecks, and make smarter, data-driven decisions.

Iterate on your successes

Project management helps you to scale high performance and build on your team’s best
practices. By using the data and learnings from previous projects, you’re able to pinpoint where
your team is excelling and where there’s room for improvement. And by measuring your KPIs
you can create and track personalized benchmarks to understand how your team is performing
project over project.

Better project planning

Those are the benefits at an organizational level, and just some of the ways that project
management can help to improve your entire business.
CONCLUSIONS

Project controls can be a key to project success. Effective control system provide a core means
of communication about the metrics of project success and a means to facilitate that success.
Well designed controls systems are relevant to the project management and scalable to the
needs of the project.

To be used in successful projects, controls systems must avoid:

Arbitrary imposition of project goals that do not reflective of reality.

Overly simplistic views of the project and influences upon it.

The trap of mistaking the tools of project controls for their application.

Project controls are relevant to the extent they help us arrive at better decisions, better allocate
the project resources, and initiate better actions.
References

1. Homer, J. L. (2004). The role of project control systems in facilitating and measuring
project success.

2. www.ecosys.net (2012). Project control system.

3. www.pmi.org.(2004). Project control system.