I believe that for a project to be successful all phases are important to consider which are initiating, planning, executing, monitoring , controlling and closing. it Starts from planning phase, Which I believe it plays an important role to come up with the idea and to plane successfully how to actually make this idea to become a real device. Same importance the controlling and monitoring phase shows, the idea of keeping up with the project, the work that should be done to meet the expectation needed for the project to be completed. So, this phase is technically what's come after the planning phase which the work that need to be done to make the project. With that being said, I believe that this is equally important. Coming after that phase the closing phase, which the budget and paying the workers and it deals with closing contracts, which also is important phase. I don't believe that there's any phase that is considered to be least important. every phase plays a great role for the success of any project to be completed.
Out of all of the phases of the a project's life cycle, the planning phase is the most important. The professor gave us a very important saying in his lecture: "If you fail to plan, then you plan to fail." This illustrates how important the planning phases. Making a mistake early on in the project cycle, will mostly likely have a stronger negative impact than a mistake made towards the end of the project. If you plan well and prepare for possible contingencies, the more likely that the project will become successful because the planning stage is when you brainstorm on how to address all of the possible obstacles that you can come across during any of the other stages. The amount of effort you put into planning can save you a lot of stress and time later on because you are more prepared to deal with the rest of the project, and it makes you more confident about what you are doing. The least important phase in the cycle is the controlling phase because, at this point, you already have achieve your result. This means that you did achieve something, so all you have to do is maintain it. You know that your project did lead to a success because it yielded a good result. The control phase is about maintaining what you already have, rather than designing something and bringing it to fruition. The control phase is the least important because it won't require as much effort because you are towards the end of the project. When you are at the beginning of your project, you have a lot more things to worry about and work on.
I think that the most crucial phases for the success of a project are the initiating and the planning phases. Initiating phase is where the project manager identifies the project objectives and determines whether the project meets a need in the market. If you don't pay much attention to this step of project management and end up working on a project that no client or customer is interested in, you will have wasted all the money and the resources available to you with no benefit. This is also the phase where you create the scope for your project, which is something you will need to refer back to in each subsequent phase. Planning phase is where you organize all of the tasks that need to be carried out to complete the project using charts. These charts allow you to set critical paths and deadlines that can be followed to stay on track. Once the project is nicely planned out in this phase, executing, monitoring and closing phases should be pretty easy.
To start off, I would first argue that it is inaccurate to even consider a single phase as being the "least important" out of the rest when talking about the project life cycle. Like many systems, every aspect has its own unique role and importance and without one, the others are negatively impacted and sometimes even useless. In the case for the project life cycle, I strongly believe that every phase depends strongly on the others and therefore they all have an equal importance. If I were to have to answer the question, however, and choose one to be the least required in terms of completing the project with the smallest negative impact, I would probably say the closing phase. Because the closing phase entails closing contracts, paying the workers, giving final reports, and logging everything during the project, I believe that by ignoring the closing phase, the only damage that is caused is done towards the workers and the engineers who would benefit from the knowledge when starting a new project in the future. If every other phase were to remain as a higher priority, the project, in theory, would still be completed successfully. Furthermore, the most important phase, in my opinion, would have to be the planning phase. The planning phase, if executed properly, removes a tremendous amount of risk and errors that may arise in the future during the executing phase and reduces the amount of work and activity throughout the controlling phase. If milestones are clearly and accurately laid out, resources are allocated, and priorities during each week are set in place from the beginning, the team as a whole should operate rather smoothly and efficiently until the end of the project. Of course, however, this would all be useless without the proper execution during the execution phase considering the gameplan requires actions be made in an orderly fashion. Nevertheless, if more effort, research, and resources are dedicated towards the planning phase, less pressure will be placed on the following phases (executing, controlling, and closing) which occur closer towards the final deadline of the project where there is very little room for readjustments and changes.
I think the executing phase is the most important. A lot of people believe planning to be the most important. It is but one cannot plan for all the eventualities and problems that will arise in the project. But once that project makes it into the execution phase then it becomes critical that those who are in charge of the actual execution of the plan execute. Inevitably there will be issues with the execution that cannot be planned for. Things like critical personnel being sick or otherwise unable to do their job. In order to properly correct them and get the project back on scheduled those executing on the project will have to work harder.
I have some experience with this in my co-op. I have been working on this project where the ingredients in the formula needed to be cleared or use by the department that is responsible for that. We had protections in place if the specific person we would be working with was unable to complete their tasks for any reason, but we had no plan for if their whole office got sick and was unable to complete their portion. All of our other steps were relying on this one (because of company policy not for this project). Luckily during execution we were able to change to a different team and they were able to take over the work and get it done quickly. But if execution was unable to pivot quickly we would have been delayed at least one full week, possibly more.
Whilst my belief may come from a singular experience, I still think it holds true that execution is the most important. Does anyone disagree with what I've said?
I think no single phase is more important the others because the end project results in the efficiency of all the phase combined. However, I think the initiation phase should be given ample consideration as it set the tone for the rest of the project. Once the initiating phase is perfectly elaborated, everything else falls in place. This step is basically like the blueprint of the project. When elaborating the planning phase, communication should be highly valued. Lack or deficiency in communication could result in major setbacks and can possibly undermine contracts with clients. I think the less challenging step is the closing phase because if the initiation and planning stages have been done smoothly, the closing step should be relatively short and easily manageable.
Besides having a solid technical background that most people are suggesting, I believe a manager should have excellent communication and people skills. We can't really coordinate a project if you don't relate or assimilate with the people actually doing the project. In planning the project, the manager should also set his/her deadlines way prior to that of the client as to compensate for any unforeseen event which may delay the project execution.
To me, the executing phase seems like the most important part of the project life cycle. While insufficient management of the other stages could result in a less than ideal outcome, insufficient project execution could quite easily result in the premature termination of the project. While I consider a parts of the project cycle to be important, I believe the execution stage is the one most closely tied to the ultimate generation of a product.
I would consider the closing stage of the project cycle to be the least important, if the distinction had to be made. In my mind, I’d consider the closing stage to be little more than a formality if the project were efficiently initiated, planned, executed, and proactively controlled throughout.
In my opinion the project management life cycle is a series of activities that are very important to achieve a project goals. I can say the initiation phase is the most important, it is the first phase of the project management life cycle. During this phase a project manager must identify a business need, problem, solve this problem, identifying scope, develop a statement of project initiation document in order to achieve the project goals.
My opinion is that the planning phase is the most important. The planning phase establishes the "what by when". It defines what deliverables are expected when. During the planing phase resources are allocated such as funds and people. If planning gives estimates which are too divergent regarding funds or personnel then a tremendous amount of stress will be unleashed on the team. Additionally, there is a really big perception risk in the eyes of the stakeholders. Meaning stakeholder may loose confidence in the possibility to realize the product due to missed deadlines or request for fund excessively exceeding planned estimate of funds required.
On the resource side a bad plan has the potential of constantly diminishing the accomplishments of the development team because they are constantly unable to achieve unrealistic milestones created in the plan. Even if the development regularly make progress by delivering increasingly more mature realizations of the product, it will tend to be late and therefore perceived in negative way.
Additionally, quality may suffer due to time constraints not matching the
available time required to complete the most thorough testing. This increases the risk of the company adopting a perception of FDA regulation as the bare minimum required to save time.
Conversely, a good plan can account for loss of a critical personnel, or a slip in schedule and may even help to secure additionally funds if project deadlines are being missed. Since the project will have had some histiory illustrating the usage of personnel and funds.
In my opinion, the planning phase of the project life cycle is critical to the success of the project. More detailed project planning can improve the success rate of the project. Without considering the unexpected situation, careful planning can make the whole project organized and improve the efficiency of project completion. This enables the executing and controlling phases to proceed smoothly.
In contrast, the closing phase of the project life cycle is the least important. When the project reaches this stage, it means that the most heavy part of the project has been completed. The closing phase requires summaries and reports, which are relatively easy for the entire project life cycle. So I think the closing phase is the least important in the project life cycle.
Due to how dependent the executing, monitoring & controlling, and closing phases of a project are on the planning phase, I believe the planning phase is the most important. The planning phase finalizes the members of the project team and its leader. The dynamic between each team member and the PM can determine if and how efficiently each task is completed. The project timeline/deadline, required resources, potential profit, methods of communication, scope, scheduled meetings, are either discussed or established during this phase. Without careful planning, the project is vulnerable to pitfalls such as scope creep, lack of accountability, unclear objectives, and inadequate resources. These pitfalls can lead to delaying or scrapping a project long before the verification & validation processes.
Since every phase is required to ensure the success of a medical device, I find it difficult to name a phase that is the least important. The closing phase may not hinder the completion of device development, but failing to close contracts and forgetting to pay all contributors by the designated date will open the door to lawsuits. This can lead to project or even company shutdown.
I believe the initiation and the planning phase is the most important phase in the project management life cycle as most of the things are solidified in that and the next phases fall accordingly.
The initiation is the place where we decide whether the time required for the project, will this project help the company in any way, how much money it would cost, do we have the resources to do the project and all the things are established so that we can move forward with the planning phase.
The planning phase is where there is a meeting with the stakeholders and the baseline is identified.
The scope is defined and the project manager is assigned in this phase which is the captain of the ship.
The phases, later on, are important as well as one thing depending on the another but in my opinion these two phases are the most important phases among the rest.
I think the planning phase is the most crucial phase in the project management life cycle since the other phases are dependent on the planning phase. It is the phase where the project team is formed which marks how successfully the project will be completed. Depending on the type of project, a team will be selected from different departments. The team members would meet post the selection of team members in order to decide on how to organize the various tasks involved in the project. The better the planning, the better the execution and the phases that follow.
The planning phase also involves the way the tasks are organized for the smooth flow of the project. This is done with the help of a Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) which helps in understanding the flow of the project tasks and the timelines of the tasks. In the planning phase the estimate for the costs and resources is also performed which are also important factors to be considered in a project. Hence, depending on how well all of the above is planned the next phases will follow in a successful way.
In my opinion, the obvious answer for which phase of a project’s life cycle is the most important would be the executing phase. Because, if the executing phase doesn’t happen, then nothing happens in the development of the project. But additionally, if the planning phase is skipped or not done correctly, then the executing phase will likely not go smooth and the project could very well be derailed. So I think the correct answer is that all phases of the project’s life-cycle are incredibly important to the success of the overall scope of the project. As for which is the least important, all of them are important, but like said in the lecture this week, the initializing phase is the one most commonly glossed over.
