When working as a new project manager lots of questions are out in the air about what to choose for certain things. Up there in those decisions includes the process on how to develop a research management plan and what is best for the development process. A research management plan is important for many reasons. Going into a new project it is important to know the different costs that could go into the development for the project. It might seem pretty streamline at first or looking at it from the surface level but the more you dive into it a lot more issues and complications start to appear. For example, a normal decision for a part of a project could change drastically, especially when you have investors or other people pouring money in the project. As a project develops different complications might come up or the simple fact that the person who is funding for the project can make a change in a decision. Also even more complications can occur down the line with lots of things that don’t end up working like you originally planned, taking more time and money. Some issues that can come from scenarios like this can be avoided also in the end. Having a team that knows each other and knows each other's strengths and weaknesses is a great tool in avoiding problems down the line. Having a team that knows what they are capable of helps a lot with being able to plan around what they think they can do. During scrum meetings you will have time to discuss what the team will be able to do.
There are many steps in creating a research management plan. Going into the plan there are many things you have to understand and think through before creating the plan. Starting off you have to think about the main objectives and goals you want to complete in a project. This includes any major features, anything that could take over many sprints. Mainly things that you would have to think through for the whole project. Doing this as a project manager for your project management plan will allow you to be able to back track from there and be able to see the smaller steps. It's kinda like running if you think about it, if you look at where you want to go you will be focused and what it takes to get there and where you must go to get to that finish line. If you focus too much on where you have to step and only look at your feet you can get lost and go off from where you started because the runner focused too much on the small steps and not the big picture. Going back from the imaginary example it is important to look at the big picture because it allows you to look big and slowly take smaller steps and see what is needed to get to the goal. When you focus too much on the smaller end you can get lost and put too much energy losing track of where you want to go. Another good way to help plan is looking at how much your team can accomplish in a certain amount of time. This is imperative when trying to figure out if you can get a project done within the designated time frame. It takes people being honest with how fast and effective they can work without burning themselves out. Using this information you are able to figure out who can do what and who is capable of completing a certain task. Also, it is important to see who works best and can be most effective with each other. Grouping up people who are synergetic allows efficiency to be at its best. Going into a project it's also important to see what is needed for the project. It can be completely possible to start hiring new recruits if it means getting a job done at the needed time. For a software example this can also mean making sure that everyone’s computers and personal gear can handle the future workload or whether upgrading some work computers could potentially mean more efficiency in the workplace. There are also lots of questions that rely on the project manager when creating the plan. For the most part the project manager is responsible for overseeing all future possible questions and concerns. For example, who will be handling getting the new gear if it is needed. How will you handle a situation where a pandemic occurs and everyone in the office is set home. Does everyone have the communication tools necessary to be able to work from home? How can you get the supplies needed out there as fast as you can? So a plan can be very complex and might see surface level at the top but a research management plan has to be in depth and look at all things that might happen during a given spring and over a whole plan. In all honesty though, in the end there is almost a guarantee that you probably will not be ready for every scenario but it is good to have multiple plans ready at your disposal.
A planned timeline won’t always be linear in the end. You will see a lot of the time that a project plan will look like many stages with each one having its own unique tasks and challenges at hand. Each stage will have different parts of the project being worked on too, this allows you to be able to stitch together the best paths of actions and what is dependent on what so you can try to get high staked areas done as soon as possible. When planning too you can have different types of plans you can have some that take longer to make that give good cost estimates and you can also have ones that are shorter but might be a good quick time estimate. It is always good to have room for unexpected events and not make your plans too critical on running perfectly.
Hyperlinks:
https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Relationship-between-the-research-plan-and-the-principles-of-project-management_fig1_23407569
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