Can any Project Managers Help Please?

[NagaisAce]

Hi
I am being thrown in the deep end and have to come up with a Project Plan for a Project that has started but is spiralling out of control due to extra requirements being thrown in and a concern that deadlines are slipping/wont be met.
This is my chance is shine!!! but I have no idea what I am doing. Can you recommend any tools or websites/resources I can use?
I have printed out the Prince 2 methodology but on further reading people seem to prefer scrum/kanban. Should I forget the methodology and just read up on using MS Project or Gant chart?
I think I should just pick one and use it as I dont have a lot of time - read they want something tomorrow.
Any help you can give me is appreciated

BUMP

I'm not a project manager but seeing as you havent had a reply as yet I thought I'd offer my opinion.

Your deadline is tomorrow so I would think using a Gantt chart and listing all of the tasks with approximate completion dates would be best. Seeing everything written down in the meeting and having the ability to adjust accordingly will help everyone.

You can tinker with it later but an understanding of what needs to be done is probably going to impress your boss most.

I use a combo of all the methods you list, but given the time constraints, I’d be tempted to go with common sense.

Get on a whiteboard, or sheets of flip chart stuck together, and draft out your timeline along the top in weeks or months dependent on the timing of the project. Then list out key milestones against key dates on the main board. Have a look at those milestones and see how you could best group some of them to form workstreams E.g. ‘assess’ phase or ‘design’ phase. Then, along the left hand side, draft these workstreams or phases in the rough order in which they’ll start and shuffle your milestones around so they’re sitting in the right horizontal for their workstream or phase.

Now consider the ‘critical path’ for each of those milestones - what will have to happen in order to deliver them? Draft those activities in blocks that feed into your milestones.

Now consider the dependencies - what things will have to have been delivered to kick other things off? You might then have to adjust some of your timings - you’ll have to do this all the way through this process, as you work through activities and realise some will take longer or shorter than your initial thoughts. Any dependencies can be mapped with a thin dotted line from the activity or milestone to the thing that depends on it.

You should then end up with a decent visual plan, that you could draft up in PowerPoint - I find it easiest to have a table with workstreams down the left and weeks or months along the top, then map onto it chevrons for activities and triangles for milestones. This is useful for presentation purposes.

If you do this, you’ll have a really good grasp of all they key activities etc. You can then translate this into a fairly simple project plan using either MS Project or Excel - same principles, with overall work stream headings in the left column in bold and, sitting underneath each of them, discrete activities to deliver them. Each of these lines will have a number in both Project and Excel, and you can include a column called Dependencies in which you can just put the line numbers, separated by commas, for the activities that need to happen before that activity can be completed. You can then also add in dates due for each activity and percentage completed (Project can do this more automatically, but you’ll have to play around with it.

Hope that helps - shout if you need more info!

Wow thanks guys.
I have started with gantt chart with whats been done so far and am currently chasing folks for confirmation of the other requirements already agreed- not as easy as it sounds !!!. I am drafting these on a whiteboard on post it notes.
Brilliant idea to group them - I can then focus on current timelines and agree to finalise the rest later this week. Need to work on my assertiveness skills to request sticking to the plan. I think. Should work as people recognise its failing znd no one is taking control. Bit rubbish really but good opportunity for me I guess.

I feel a bit more in control. Thanks so much for such detailed feedback.

As you need to whip people into action, you may want to introduce regular project catch-ups.
If there is lack of clarity on who does what, introduce a RACI.
If appropriate, introduce a RAID log and review it at intervals with the project sponsor.

As PM, you need to ensure all communication flows.

Each work stream needs an owner, they carry out the work in time as agreed in the project plan. If they are unable to, they need to let you know ASAP.

If scope creep happens again, it needs managing.

RACI is good idea as there will be senior management in meeting do i can assign them in the meeting and then hold them accountable.
Thank you.

I'm a Programme Manager and between jobs at the moment so will pop back when I'm home as would be happy to sort of mentor you through things if you like... (currently in a car as passenger).

A few things to consider:

1. Identify delivery people who will be able to give you regular progress reports (those people may serve as useful representatives of a team, so you only have one point of contact to get info from)

1. Set up a drumbeat of regular meetings eg 1 weekly project meeting for 30 mins, just for updates on progress.

1. Try to get a skeleton/ outline plan out there, and ask people to comment on your timelines, and tell you if their deliverables are realistic. Getting people owning their delivery deadlines is very helpful.

1. Consider a separate communications pack, ie a milestone report/highlight report just for senior management. They don't want all the gory details, just the summarised headlines of how the project is going, and when the end is in sight.

Also, determine your scope, get that agreed with key stakeholders. The most frustrating thing to derail a project is poorly defined / constantly shifting scope and different people having a different understanding of what the scope actually is.

Get the scope agreed by your project sponsor/senior management, especially if they are signing off the budget.

If the scope needs to change, revalidate that with the sponsors. If the sponsors change the scope, communicate it back to the project team ASAP!