The Dilemma Of A Project Manager Case Solution

1. The definition of the problem you are trying to resolve

The software development company, Yida, is facing a dilemma whether to terminate the project or to initiate a project turnaround effort. Companies ponder upon the project termination stage in situations where either there serious cost and schedule overruns, or the technical risk of continuing the project has become high. In addition, another reason could be when the project specifications are completely out of alignment with the company’s vision and capabilities. Project turnaround would be a case where the project manager would feel that the new requirements can be accommodated within the budget and would not result in further loss.

2. The initial assessment of where Yida currently is (how they got where they are)

Yida is at a stage where it is pondering whether to continue the project or terminate it due to multiple issues. Both parties have reached this stage due to various lacking in their strategy. First of all, the representative appointed from the client side were not authoritative enough; hence, they were not able to adequately handle the issue. Secondly, the phase of requirement gathering was carried out as a mere formality, which later resulted in major disagreements between the client and the development team as they were not on the same page. Third, the first formal communication between the client and the development team was carried out after six months of the initiation of the project and even at that stage, both parties faced huge problems due to communication gap. Fourth, the client failed to communicate their concerns with the project interface to the development team, which resulted in huge delay and budget extension. Apart from this, the development team had not provided any prototype to the client so as to demonstrate a pre-final product. This led to the delayed identification of problems.