I doubt that changing positions mid-project is something that happens often. If it does, I would still think that they would continue their role in the project or at the very least assist the person who is taking over their old role. They would oversee and train their replacement. Bear in mind that this will only happen if there is no one else working the role. If there are multiple people doing an aspect of the project they would take the reins.

If you are in a weak matrix organization then the functional heads may have more power than the project managers and may dictate who is allowed to be on your project team and for how long. These employees will still have to answer to their functional heads who may pull them off of a project entirely for whatever reason. If all parties are taking into account the best interest of the company then both the functional heads and the project managers will negotiate for their employee's time resource so that their normal departmental work and their project work both get done. If an employee quits outright without giving two weeks or offering to train their replacement, then you will rely on the current project team members, completed documents, past meeting minutes, status meetings, and historical lessons learned documents to get the new employee up to speed.

A team is only as good as a team without its most valuable member. Team members get sick. They take vacation time. Emergencies happen. There will be a time when highly valued members aren't around to help, but if a team is well organized, efficiency shouldn't be affected. If a great employee leaves the team in the middle of a project, the team must be well-structured enough to pick up where the resigned employee left off. This is done by never depending on one person. Employees should be cross trained in more than one position in the case they have to take on new responsibilities. Many companies have their employees complete training rotations. Money invested in employees is money well invested for the company. This ensures that the company has highly skilled employees ready to take on more than one role if required. Of course no employee should be spread out to thin, but there is always value is cross-training employees when possible.

jr377, I would have to disagree drawing from experience. There have been people who are on a project with me doing a certain task who, for various different reasons, get transferred to another project. The reason for this often has been due to people leaving the company, higher priority projects needing more of the departments resources, etc. To mitigate this, ideally (like you said) there would be other people who are doing the same tasks who would either fill in for the gap or train a new employee who would take over the task. Another way to mitigate this is have the leaving employee train the incoming employee (if there are no reduntant employees doing the task). This of course does not really protect against sudden changes where people drop from the project due to leaving, but it is at least a measure to take.

There should always be a backup plan if this situation every happens and I don't believe that someone can leave without month or two week notice. But even though this happens I would have contact info from former worker and ask for all the notes, tests, plane,etc. preformed so for and if he was waiting for results from someone, so I would update new worker. I would prefer to have two workers so they can tackle the task faster because if I only have one worker trying to learn everything and perform task will be time consuming and time is precious. To keep on schedule I would have two workers working and later reduce to one worker. I would also work with them and assist so I can give a hand because as project manager I is his duty to communicate and make sure everyone completes their task.

The project eventually if gets into upgradation, new skills will be needed so for that new employees plays a major role because they already have learnt those skills in the university.

The easiest solution would be to consult the heads of your department which is where you received your former team member from and ask if you could get a replacement. This would seem like the best solution because obviously there are other individuals in the company who have the required set of skills for the job. Another potential solution would be for you to fill the void yourself partially. This is not ideal at all as you already have a great deal of responsibilities trying to manage the entire project from start to finish but since you know how to do at least some of the work, you could complete some of the tasks until you find a more permanent solution. Getting some of the tasks done is better than not getting any of it done. Also, another idea would be to divide up the work between the remaining members of your team. Try to separate the work based on who can do each task and ensure that everybody is compensated for the additional work. Ensure that everyone who is involved is doing the same amount of additional work more or less. If you could automate some of the work, then that would help mitigate the pain and loss.

Filling a position of an employee that performed critical work for a project can be very challenging. This is especially because he/she is probably an expert in the tasks they perform for the project and know the most about whatever they’re doing. A solution could be trying to find someone on their same team that can take on the work they have been doing. For example, at my company, there was an employee on my team that was an expert in python coding. He was working on a big project that used python. Mid-project, he received an offer from another company and left. Our manager was struggling to find someone to replace him. But she quickly realized that by getting the people that were familiar with his work together they can piece together a temporary solution. So two of the employees that worked closely with him teamed up and took on the rest of the work he left behind. By piecing together their small knowledge, they were able to complete his part and the project moved on with little impact with respect to time.

I was recently involved in a project where a team member was moving to a different company and had several critical tasks that the project depended on. We developed a strategy that ensured that we would minimize any potential delays due to the change when we replaced him. First, we made his incoming tasks as top priorities. All other team members were required to provide their deliverables that were required for Bruce's tasks. In the same time, the replacement associate had to dedicate most of his time looking over Bruce's shoulder to pick up on the skills needed to perform each tasks efficiently and successfully. Lastly, Bruce agreed to be available via phone and email if any consultation was necessary. With all of this together, we made a rather risky transition flow as smoothly as possible.

@gy66 I think that a thorough onboarding process when hiring a new member to fill a spot that is vacating is especially important. If this is not done well, then there can be clear gaps in knowledge that will affect the movement of the tasks for the project. In my own experience, while I thought I had a thorough onboarding process into my internship, I was not told of all my responsibilities, so when there were some tasks that were assigned to me, I had to take additional time to learn them properly and consult members within my team. This caused a delay in the project and put additional burden on being within the scope of the project. 

There are always changes in course of the project ,that might be with the tasks or the staffs involved .These changes may bring confusion in handling day to day task and also slows progress of the project .Changes are inevitable in a project but planning these changes play a important role in the success of the project .In my previous job I have faced a similar situation where one of my teammate jumped to a different position and his responsibility had to be taken care of ,which was also very critical for the day to day of the project .This is where the leadership of the project manger comes into play and as expected our project manger divide the work in the team and to help the transformation he himself took some responsibility on him .It is important to take All the aspect of the change  into consideration while planning a project .

I don't think if someone is doing a job well, they will be looking to switch their positions, however, if this is the case, I believe the PM should discuss with this employee that they have certain goals to meet, and once they have finished with their assignment or task, they will be required to find a capable person to carry on their role and train them. However, since I believe this case is incredibly rare since if everyone is up to speed and communicating properly, other team members can shrae the task. But this is a rare case.

It is important to attempt to prevent a situation like this by ensuring that people on the team are not going to just leave without notice, and that management is not constantly shuffling people around. But such things are inevitable so it is important to have a plan in place in the beginning to ensure that if this does occur its effects can be mitigated as best as possible. At the beginning of the project all the duties are known, so creating a plan for the transfer of duties if a person leaves the team suddenly can be created as well. Then it can be enacted quickly to prevent too much time loss for the project. Beyond this knowing the options as far as recruiting from both within the company and externally are important, as these are options if the situation is more dire and there is too much work to be moved around. But if this is the case, then at the end of the project, more people should be hired to ensure that people aren’t crushed with work.

First off, change within the context of project management is anything that transforms or impacts projects , tasks, processes, structures, or even job functions. Therefore change management refers to the tools and processes you use to manage change within a project and its project team. Importance of change management for project success … organizational change management id much more than managing the natural changes that can occur in any organization. Change management  is managing change so as to ensure the desired behavioral outcomes would result and work towards ensuring the goal.