Project Management Assignment: Planning For Renovation Of Royale Pizza

Question

Task:
Case Study: Royale Pizza
Background
Royale Pizza was established in 2007 by an entrepreneur with more than 20 years of experience in the foodservice industry. Known for its high quality and authentic Italian pizzas, Royale Pizza now produces and delivers 40 types of gourmet and classic pizzas. The shop is located in one of the busiest streets of Melbourne CBD, near the Southern Cross Station, and offers its customers a fresh food menu, via its?online?(delivery of online orders) and?offline (dine-in) channels. Close to the CBD and railway station, Spencer Street has a mixture of businesses, including tertiary education facilities, hotels, and apartment buildings. Royale Pizza has a wide customer base including locals and tourists and must cater to the needs of a diverse range of customers with different backgrounds and different food preferences. Royale Pizza is open until late it is a great option for the tourists and other customers to order their pizzas when most other food venues are closed or have limited menu choices.

Opportunity
Royale Pizza is continuously trying to increase its food quality and ultimately increase its annual sales and profitability. Recently the owners have decided to renovate the entire pizza shop and buy some new equipment enabling them to expand their business by serving other types of food (e.g., fish & chips, and pasta), reduce their food waste, and are aiming to increase their profitability by 25%.

The major renovation project includes two key components: the purchase of new equipment and fit-out, and infrastructure re-development. Key deliverables will be: new flooring, installation of the air-conditioning system, dust-free painting, increasing compressor capacity, and professional cleaning of the kitchen exhaust system. New equipment to be purchased and installed includes 3 deep fryers, 2 boilers and 1 dough roller. A new Point of Sale (PoS) System with the required hardware and software will also be installed.

As the current floor plan of the shop has little room for expansion, changes need to be made to deliver the renovations. The stairs located in the rear area of the shop need to be removed in order to provide more food preparation space for the kitchen staff. As a result of this major change in the layout, the installation of the purchased equipment can be only done after the completion of construction activities. As part of the renovation project, the shop owners aim to create additional dining-in spaces to serve more customers. So, 2 new sets of chairs and portable tables also need to be purchased. Due to the Melbourne City Council regulations on the use of walkways/footpaths as dining spaces, any expansion in seating capacity must be indoors only.

The owners have estimated that the total cost of the work would be roughly around AU$40,000. The start date of the project is the 2nd of March. The target date of project completion would be 4 months from the start date. As the shop should be closed during the construction, installation and painting activities, no sales and revenue have been predicted during this period. As a result, there is a strong imperative to finish on-time and on-budget to minimize any further loss of revenue by Royale Pizza.

As the Project Manager, you will play a leading in this project. Your expertise is in the management of projects and your ability to bring the key stakeholders together and to deliver projects that fulfill the project brief, requirements, and business goals. You have strong risk management skills which will be useful in a project such as this with tight timeframes and a small budget.

While the aim of the renovation for Royale Pizza is to expand their menu offerings, reduce their food waste, and increase their profitability by 25%, your role is to deliver a renovated retail food outlet that will enable them to do this. You are not involved in whether they have the business skills to deliver on this.

Your role will be to coordinate the shop re-design, sourcing, procurement, delivery, and installation of new equipment. You will need to rely on other people to deliver the work including the Royale Pizza shop manager; a Main Contractor and various other installation contractors; the equipment suppliers; and the Industrial Body responsible for technical health and safety compliance certification. While you are an “expert” project manager, you have not worked on a project with a small restaurant outlet before, so to support you, you have arranged to have an industry consultant available should you need advice.

In the first meeting held with owners, the Main Contractor and other key stakeholders, the issue was raised as to why the construction and installation stages could not be undertaken simultaneously. The Contractor also raised the issues of the electrical wires under the rear stairs which would need careful attention when removing the stairs and that the state of the wiring was at this stage an unknown factor. They also indicated that the water faucet in the rear area of the shop could not be removed or disconnected due to the safety issues.

In order to ensure that the renovation meets the required health and safety compliance certification and can be given a “Certificate of Occupancy” (which the owners will need before they can reopen the business), safety inspections will be conducted every fortnight. These inspections will take at least 4 hours and will include the “testing and tagging” of all electrical cables and appliances (both new and ones currently installed) and certified as “safe” after completion of each stage. Mechanical ventilation compliance will also be checked as one of the safety considerations. All these safety controls have associated costs that will need to be factored into the project budget plan.

Project management assignment task: Building on your project case study, you are a project manager for the case study, and are now required to prepare the entire project plan (i.e. the project goals, scope, schedule, resources, budget, risks, implementation, monitoring and control, performance evaluation and closure). Base your responses on current recommended practice, as described in contemporary literature and personal research into the industry of the Case Study. The focus is to be on the selection and application of appropriate theory, tools and techniques NOT how accurate your budget, schedule and resourcing are.

Answer

1. Project Goals and Scope
1.1 Scope Description
The primary scope of the project discussed in the project management assignment is to renovate the Royale Pizza shop and also to buy new and modern equipments, which will help them to increase their business and profit by twenty-five percent (Collins, Parrish & Gibson, 2017). The project will also emphasis on the re-development of its infrastructure and will also focus on providing other variants of food like fish chips and pasta other than food, to target large number of customers.

The main objectives of project are listed below in SMART format.

1.2 Project Deliverables
The key deliverables of the project include-

• The key deliverable of this project is to deliver a new floor system for Royal Pizza shop to give it a new look.
• The project will also implement an air conditioning system, dust-free painting and will also aim in maximising the compressor capacity to create a unique ambience for its potential customers (Jaber et al., 2018).
• The project will also ensure to purchase and install modern equipments like the deep fryers, boilers and also dough rollers. Apart from that, the project will deliver a modern point of sales (PoS) system.

1.3 Project Acceptance Criteria
The main acceptance criteria for the project include the following.

• The construction is completed as per the initial plan.
• The furnishing and equipment installation are done as per the approved blueprint.
• The quality standards set at the start of the project are met.
• The project fulfils the health and safety guidelines as directed by the Australian government.

1.4 Project Exclusions
The following are excluded from the project-

• Recruitment of new staff members to assist the increase number of customers and the business
• Hiring of professional chefs to prepare the unique food menus for its potential customers
• Modification of Royal Pizza’s website such as incorporating eye-catching content for its new products and offerings to draw clients
• Providing training to the staff members of the shop to handle the new equipments effectively and successfully

1.5 Project Constraints
The project constraints have been mentioned below-

• Economic constraints primarily occurred as a result of budget limits and funds allotment. Due to the extreme budget constraints, the chosen approach for buying new equipments may not be the right approach for meeting the project's goals and ensuring efficiency. It will have an impact on the project's progress.
• There seem to be legal constraints since there are numerous restrictions that govern the infrastructure project. The legal constraints are directly linked to labor law, safety standards, and a supervisory strategy.

1.6 Project Assumptions
Resource Allotment - There are adequate assets accessible within the company to construct the renovation project (Samaraweera, Senaratne & Sandanayake,2018).

Design - The requirements from the project and also the specified functionalities that must be applied with in project will not diverge from the existing classifications.

2. Project Schedule
The project schedule is required to be developed in order to allocate sufficient time periods for each work packages in the project such that they can be completed within the final deadline of the project. When the project is a bit complex and detail oriented, the most suitable method of project scheduling is preparing the work breakdown structure and allot suitable time period to each of the work packages specified in the work breakdown structure (Demirkesen & Ozorhon, 2017). The time estimation is generally done by estimating the amount of time that will be required to complete each activity of the project by discussing with the team that will in the project. However, while developing the schedule, it must be kept in mind that the schedule must be aligned with the final deadline of the entire project.

This construction and furnishing project of Royale Pizza has been allowed a total time of 4 months for completion. However, in the initial plan presented, it is seen that actual time required for the entire project is 6 months. The extra time in the plan can be reduced by conducting some of the activities in parallel so that multiple activities are completed within the same space of time, thus saving considerable amount of time. In this case, the procurement and logistics related activities will be conducted side by side with construction and installation works, thus effectively reducing the total duration of the project to 4 months.

The schedule plan developed for this project is shown as follows.

From the schedule developed above, it is seen that the project can be complete within the four months time period if specific adjustments are made within the schedule. If the four phases of the project are considered separately, they will require a total of 6 months that is suitable for the project. However, this is not a feasible time limit as no extra time can be provided for the project. Hence, the suggested method is to perform certain activities in parallel to save time. In this case, the procurement and delivery phase is conducted side by side with construction and painting so that additional time is not wasted and the project can be completed within the 4 months time period.

The schedule can be further clarified here in the form of a Gantt chart as follows.

Figure 1: Gantt Chart of the Project
(Source: Created by Author)

In the schedule shown above, it can be seen that there are two different paths from the start to end of the path. When this case occurs, the path with the longest duration is known as critical path. It is important to define the critical path of a project in order to determine time flexibility of activities that do not lie on the critical path. The critical path of this project is shown below with the critical activities being highlighted in red.

Figure 2: Critical Path of the Project
(Source: Created by Author)

Finally, the network diagram of the project is drawn as follows.

Figure 3: Network Diagram of the Project
(Source: Created by Author)

The resources assigned to the work packages of the schedule denote the responsibilities of the team members in the project. Once they are assigned to specific work packages, they are required to perform those activities within scope, time and budget. There are also three milestones specified with exact dates that must be fulfilled. The project team is required to follow the timeline and sure there are no delays in the project delivery.

The work breakdown structure that will be followed for allocation of resources to the project is shown in the following diagram.

Figure 4: Work Breakdown Structure of the Project
(Source: Created by Author)

3. Project Budget
There are multiple ways for budget estimation in a project but for the project like this one under focus, it is wise to determine the budget for each stage of the project separately with specific estimation methods. In this case, there are four main phases of the project and the final budget has been fixed at AU$ 40,000 without any flexibility. Hence, while estimating the budget for this project, it will be required allocate budget to specific phases in such a way that the total budget will not exceed the allocated budget. Various estimation techniques like analogous estimation, parametric estimation, bottom up estimation and others can be used for separate activities within the project phases (Radujkovi? & Sjekavica, 2017). Additionally, there might be some direct and indirect costs for certain activities and thus, all these factors need to be considered while estimating the budget. The budget breakdown can be derived directly from the schedule chart and the breakdown can be used to allocate budget to activities separately. While allocating the budget, the constraints and assumptions must also be specified so that the project team is aware of the factors and ensure there are no extra and unnecessary expenses. The extra expenses will lead to cost overruns and financial problems for the organisation and hence, they must be avoided at all costs.

The budget estimation for the project is shown as follows.

4. Project Risk

5. Implementation Plan
A project implementation process divides a project further into different stages deemed necessary to achieve a specific objective of the particular project. In the renovation of the Royal Pizza outlet project, the project has been divided in to four segments in order to complete the whole project within four months and within the estimated budget allocated by the business owner. Moreover, for the successful implementation of the project, the project team should ensure that all the mentioned features and facilities are properly implemented in the given project (Li et al., 2017). The four main stages of the project related to the implementation plan include designing of the phase, procurement and the delivery phase, construction and the last stage is installation. Within the delivery phase, the project manager needs to provide a complete design of the overall structure to continue with the project. The floor plan should include all the facilities which will make the project more effective and successful. However, for successful implementation, the project team should ensure that they are able to complete the entire project within AUS$ 40,000 and should not exceed the budget. In the procurement and the delivery phase, it is the responsibility of the project manager to ensure that all the stakeholders (internal and external) have come together on the same page to accomplish the project which will meet the scope statement, prerequisites, and corporate objectives. The project manager should have comprehensive risk management abilities, which would therefore be beneficial throughout the project with strict deadlines and a limited expenditure (Alvarenga et al., 2018). Further, the project leader might also oversee the re-design of the facility, as well as the sourcing, purchasing, transportation, and setup of new machinery. The project lead will have to count on others to do the job, such as the Royale Pizza shop management, a Construction Manager and many additional installation vendors, technical experts, and the Workplace policy accountable for safety and security of the workers.

In the construction phase, to successfully implement all the mentioned featured, it is important to adhere to the company and Government rules and regulations for doing the construction work for Royal Pizza successfully. Healthy and safety compliance need to be followed to ensure the safety of the laborers (Jaafar et al., 2018). Moreover, it should be ensured that the remodeling fulfills the necessary hygiene and safety compliance accreditation and can also earn a Certificate of Occupancy. To ensure safety, the project team should test all the electric appliances and cables and should certify them as safe to use, so that others can use them in construction phase. The last phase in the implementation process is the installation of the new equipments, where each of the equipment needs to be tested properly to analyze the risk beforehand and to safely install the equipments at Royal Pizza store. Moreover, for successful implementation, the project requires to provide effective training to all the staff members and contractors to carry out the infrastructure project effectually. The project will place a strong attention on monitoring and evaluation, ensuring that all phases of the project are effectively executed.

6. Monitoring and Control Process
Monitoring and control of a project is extremely essential as it helps to ensure the project does not deviate from the scope and unnecessary activities are performed. Deviation from scope generally occurs due the scope creep, which is a phenomenon that appears when the project team does not have a clear idea about the project limitations and boundaries. Due to scope creep, the project team indulges in unnecessary activities that are not part of the project and as a result, it leads to wastage of time and resources (Silvius, 2017). This in turn results in financial losses for the organisation conducting the project. However, scope creep can also create certain opportunities in rare cases when the organisation gets new ideas beneficial for the project from the extra unnecessary work. However, in general, scope creep needs to be avoided so that unnecessary complications are not caused in the project. If scope creep occurs in the project, it is recommended to control the project and introduce specific changes that can bring the project back on track.

In this project for Royal Pizza, renovation works will be conducted that includes construction and furnishing works. Due to the city government’s laws, all the renovation and expansion works need to be done in-house. As a part of the requirement, the current floor plan will be re-evaluated and changes will be made in addition to furnishing and installation works. For these purposes, a well developed plan has already been forwarded to the project team (Heagney, 2016). However, simply forwarding the plan is not sufficient and it is important to monitor the progress of the project on daily basis. The project team leads should keep track of the project daily and he in turn should update the progress of the project to the project manager on weekly basis. The project manager needs to review the weekly report to check if the project is on track in terms of scope, time and cost.

While monitoring the project, three main aspects that need to be considered for evaluation are discussed below.

Scope – Scope monitoring will be required to ensure scope creep does not occur in this project for Royale Pizza. Out of scope work like construction outside the planned area, installation of more expensive equipments instead of the ones specified and other unnecessary work must be avoided at all costs (Picciotto, 2020). The project manager needs to keep track of the work and in case unnecessary work is done, which is not specified in the plan, the project team will have to penalty for the same and abandon the unnecessary work on first notice. Any extra unnecessary work out of scope will cause financial problem for Royale Pizza and hence they must be avoided.

Time – Time is another aspect of monitoring in this project. Royale Pizza has specified that they will not be able to allow more than 4 months of time for the project as it will increase their financial losses. Hence, the project manager must track the project and ensure every milestone is reached at the specified deadline.

Cost – Like time, cost is also not flexible in this project, as Royale Pizza has already allocated AUS 40,000 for the project without any chance for extra funding. The project manager needs to keep track of the expenses and ensure the team is not spending more than planned.

Other than the aspects above, it is also required to perform monitoring of the individual team member’s performances in the project, role of the main stakeholders and also quality requirements that need to be met (Rodríguez-Rivero et al., 2020). This are all that need to be done to ensure best possible outcome from the project so that the investment made by Royale Pizza is actually beneficial for them considering long term future. In addition to monitoring, controlling of the project is also necessary. Controlling of this project is to be done by progress tracking and making internal changes that will help the project to remain within the scope and avoid wastage of time and resources.

7. Project Performance Evaluation
While the project monitoring is done, it is also required to evaluate the performance of the project. The main purpose of measuring the performance of the project is to ensure the required milestones are met and within the constraints set by the project owner. The same is applicable for this project as well (Kivilä, Martinsuo & Vuorinen, 2017). There are several tools and techniques that are used to plan and track performance of the project that can be used in this project. Some of these tools are discussed below.

Gantt Chart – Gantt chart is a project management tool used to develop the schedule of the project using the work breakdown structure. This tool also links various tasks according to requirements such that the team understands which task needs to be done after which task. This tool can also be used for tracking the project performance as a whole. Using the tool, it can be ensured that the task sequence is followed and the specific milestones are reached by the time.

Network Diagram – Network diagram is a tool that is used to expand the project schedule in detail and can be derived from the Gantt chart directly. Network diagram tool can be used in this project to keep track of the project performance in terms of time allocated to each of the work packages (Papke-Shields & Boyer-Wright, 2017). Using the network diagram, the manager of this project will be able to view if each work package has been successfully completed within allocated time or not and if not, he can take appropriate actions against the project team including penalties.

Earned Value Analysis – Earned Value Analysis tool can be used in this project to keep track of the cost performance of the project. As already discussed earlier, the project must stick to the total budget allocated and no extra and unnecessary expenses will be tolerated. The EVA tool can be used to detect any discrepancy in the costs already encountered in the project and determine if rest of the project can be completed within the allocated time.

There are other tools available for project performance evaluation as well but since this is not a very large scale project, these tools will be sufficient to keep track of the performance. In addition to these tools, the awareness of the project manager is also necessary for keeping track of other factors like workers’ performance; quality related aspects and others as these are also important contributing factors towards the successful project performance (Armenia et al., 2019). Additionally, if the project performance is deemed not satisfactory by the project manager, he can introduce change management to ensure the project performance is enhanced and boosted to bring to the optimum benchmark as expected and specified.

8. Project Closure
The final part of the entire project will be project closure, which will occur once the entire project is completed, reviewed and finalised. However, the closure of the project will not just be a simple sign off from the stakeholders. Rather, it will require a detailed review of the work done in the project as well as whether the necessary government introduced guidelines are met. Once the construction and furnishing work is completed, Royale Pizza will need to earn a Certificate of Occupancy before they are allowed to reopen the business. The main criterion for earning this certificate is to meet the health and safety compliance and guidelines as published by the Australian government (Tereso et al., 2019). In order to ensure these guidelines are met, there will be safety inspections made by government officials every 14 days and hence, it is the responsibility of the project team to fulfil the guidelines and criteria while working on the project. As soon as the supervisions and inspections are complete and the Certificate of Occupancy is earned, Royale Pizza will be able to close the project officially and then restart their business. In this case, the company needs to first finalise payments for the contractor and the project team members as specified in the contract for the project. Once the payments are finalised and the project review is also complete, the individual stakeholders will need to fill the sign off form before the project manager gives the final sign off and officially close the project.

Once the project is closed, a reflection session can be conducted where the internal members of the project will reflect upon the work done in the entire project. This will help them to identify what went right and what went wrong and they will learn lessons from the same that will in turn help them in the future ventures. They can also document their lessons learned so that they can reflect upon them later when working on a different project.

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