How might a project manager assess the contribution of each member of the project team?

During the progress review, how might a project manager assess the contribution of each member of the project team?


You could use simple analysis of met deadlines just to say they have met these deadlines at these times with the tasks split within the group. Make sure you know what member was responsible for what and look at what is done.


You could also possibly do a kind of peer review to simply ask the other team members if their peers are pulling their weight. I was never a fan of peer reviews because they can add tension between teams even when everyone is doing there part.


Id say over all the best way would be to ask for a regularly updated progress report from the team on what has been done and who has done it. If done fairly regularly then you can keep up to date and it will also keep them on the ball because they wont want you to see no progress between reports.

The Clothing Shack

I thought my presentation was good as a general website expansion/advertising idea. But didn't really touch much on the companies needs or desires. I kind of dodged the catalog idea and didn't present any hardware or software solutions. I didn't really give them a solution but more of just some general ideas. Wasn't paying much attention to my posture or voice but tried to keep good eye contact. Was much less nervous this time then the last presentation.

Tips for presenters.

Today we presented our ideas on the clothing shack.
As far as today's presentations everyone seemed to present in a calm confident fashion and had all done some research or thought into how they where going to tackle the idea or problems.

A few tips I would have would be.

• Follow a logical flow. Use one idea to point out the next. Don't jump to a different point without explaining first because it makes the audience stop to try and catch up.
• Don't go do broad on the topic or to narrow especially when you are on a time restraint. If your to broad then you wont cover anything tangible and if your to narrow you might give them to much information to quick or not cover enough points on the topic.
• Watch the way you move your hands or feet. Don't pace back and forth. Any repetitive or seemingly nervous behaviors are distracting.  

How often and in what ways might internal politics factor into project success?

I don't think there will ever be a project in which internal politics do not effect the project. In my experience with projects there is always some personnel or corporate conflict that will put the project on pause or cause the project to get off track. Part of doing a project that requires input from multiple people in multiple people is planning ahead for the unexpected.

You are always going to have some John Doe who doesn't like the plan outline or budgeting of some Mr. Smith and maybe not only because he doesn't agree with the plan itself, it could be that John just has a problem with Mr. Smith himself. How I see internal politics is the pressures that come from those above you, the pressure you have to put on those under you or your peers and the problems that all this working together and agree can bring with it. Maybe someone doesn't have there head in the right place.

(I'll come back to this later to edit and add more)

What is failure?

Failure in my basic understanding is when expectations for any given project or goal is not met. It's when where you want to be falls behind where you want to be. Now that by itself is not necessarily failure. In my opinion failure is when this expectation falls so far behind the goal that it is no longer recoverable, whatever you goal was in no longer obtainable. For example if a NASA rocket has issues and can not launch but it is only a delay to launch again other day I would not define that as failure. Now if the rocket explodes and can never have a chance to launch again then I would define that as failure. So all this is only my definition.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines failure as

 a. A failing to occur, be performed, or be produced; an omitting to perform something due or required; default.

Saying that failure is simply when something doesn't happen as or when its suppose to. Whatever is produced does not fulfill what it is suppose to. What was presented does not fill the need or the needed is not produced at all, it failed to occur.

and then sometimes 

Reasons Projects Fail

The reasons projects fail stated in article all actually seem pretty obvious. It all really points to one reason which is poor planning.

Poor Planning - Really not thought out with reachable goals and deadlines or with proper work force and materials.

Poor communication - Documents, plans or verbal communications are done poorly or not at all.

Resources - Not enough, not right ones or miss used resources. Leads to delays and wasted money.

Changes - With poor planning they might find their idea is not going to work and have to rethink the project causing delays and wasting resources.

Delays - These can come from natural sources or human problems and mistakes. Changes in the project can also cause delays.

Like I said it all points to the first point with is simply bad planning from the very start. The project needs and good solid foundation because you can start work on it.

Cameron as a Project

As with any project the overall goal is success (or at least I would hope so). But to succeed there are many things that need to come into to play. From the point of a student we can pick out things like:


 - Finishing assignments on time (Try not to do them the hour before class like I am now)

• Understand and learning the materials from these assignments.
• Figure out how it applies to your field or every day life.
• This also goes for studying for exams.

 - Attendance (Coming to every class and if thats not possible keeping up with the work)

• Come to class on time.
• Come ready to listen and participate.
• Get good sleep and eat before class so you have energy.

 - Social Networking (Get to know your peers and teachers)

• Makes coming to class and participating easier.
• Needed in careers as well.
• Could help you get a job later if you have connections

If I had to split a successfull student into 3 categories those would be them. Success in terms of a student is really getting good grades and of course learning something along with those grades.