Question: Mary, a project manager working for a telecom company called BETTA, was asked by the CEO to manage an important project. The project was about

Mary, a project manager working for a telecom company called BETTA, was asked by the CEO to manage an important project. The project was about a huge celebratory event for the company having reached its market share target. A team of 20 people had been appointed to work on this project by their respective functional managers. Mary was so excited to have been given the opportunity. She scheduled a meeting within a month and was able to secure the corner of the cafeteria as all meeting rooms were booked. She sent a brief email to the attendees with the title, Mandatory meeting - must attend event celebration project. Since she did not know how to use MS project, she had hired a contractor under a standard cost-plus contract to complete a preliminary MS Project Gantt and Resourcing charts for this project. The contractor invoiced her but the amount was two times over what she expected. She had attached the contractors MS Project Gantt chart with all the tasks, budget and resource assignments to the email she sent the invitees. 7 people were late and she texted everyone who was late, and waited 15 minutes until everyone showed up. By the time she started the meeting, John, a busy accountant got up politely and said he had to leave early because of month-end deadlines. Jane, a sales manager, who had been given a task to secure a music band for the project, seemed to be distracted by her phone. When Mary tried to draw Jane's attention back to the meeting by asking her a question, Jane said that she was texting a client hoping she can close a deal and that was worth $1.1M. Jane also said that she knows nothing about music bands. When Mary asked everyone about ideas to make the project successful, they mostly complained about being involved in this project, being too busy, and said that they had other more important things to do. At the end of the meeting, Mary determined that she did not achieve the kick-off meeting objectives. She did not leave her cubicle for days and thought about recommending that the project be shut down altogether. She did not report the situation to the CEO and did not mention anything when the CEO came by her cubicle a couple of times during his regular MBWA routines. She did not tell him about the invoice either as she planned to negotiate with the contractor first. In her status report she said, Kick-off meeting held. Tasks/schedule established using MS Project. Please explain your answers to the questions below by providing at least two relevant suggestions for each question. a) What do you advise Mary could have done differently prior the meeting? (4 points) b) What do you advise Mary could have done differently at the meeting? (4 points) c) What can Mary do better for the next meeting? (3 points) d) What, if anything, should she share with the CEO? (4 points) e) If she decides to close the project, what closure activities should she definitely do before she closes the project? What type of project closure would this be? (4 points)

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