Assessment Task 2: Operational Plan Project

Task summary

This assessment task requires you, in the role of Team Leader of Boutique Build Australia to modify and implement an operational plan. This will involve communicating with the company’s CEO and conducting a short meeting with several colleagues.

Required

• Computer with Microsoft Office and access to the internet
• Boutique Build Strategic Plan
• Operational Plan
• Project Management Policy and Procedures
• Recruitment, Selection and Induction Policy and Procedures

Timing

The assessor will advise you of the due date of this submission.

Submit

• Email to your assessor with your operational plan attached.
• Email to your assessor with your revised operational plan attached.
• Email to Brisbane Boutique Build staff
• Email to your assessor with changes to your operational plan

Assessment criteria

Students must complete all of the activities listed and will be assessed against the assessment criteria included in the checklist included with this task.

Re-submission opportunities

Students will be provided feedback on their performance by their Assessor. The feedback will indicate if you have satisfactorily addressed the requirements of each part of this task.

If any parts of the task are not satisfactorily completed your assessor will explain why and provide you written feedback along with guidance on what you must undertake to demonstrate satisfactory performance. Re-assessment attempt(s) will be arranged at a later time and date.

Students have the right to appeal the outcome of assessment decisions if they feel they have been dealt with unfairly or have other appropriate grounds for an appeal.

Students are encouraged to consult with their assessor prior to attempting this task if they do not understand any part of this task or if they have any learning issues or needs that may hinder them when attempting any part of the assessment.

Assessment Task 2 Instructions

Carefully read the following:

Boutique Build Australia was established in 2013 and is a boutique building company based in Sydney that specialises in the design and build of high quality designer homes for the Sydney metropolitan and surrounding areas. The company has been operational for three years and employs approximately 50 staff including the CEO, Operations Manager, Human Resources Manager, Team Leader, Marketing and Sales Manager, Customer Service Team Leaders (2), Customer Service Officers (6), Site Managers (3) and a large team of tradespersons some of whom are employed and some of who are contractors.

The personnel are generally managed as three overlapping teams: administration, sales, and on-site.

The company is in a period of expansion and has opened an office in Brisbane with the goal of expanding into Brisbane and the surrounding area, as well as the environmentally friendly build market.

The company’s CEO has sent you the following email:

Dear Team Leader

At a recent executive meeting it was decided that Boutique Build Australia should participate in the upcoming Australian Home Show in Brisbane on (Date). It will run for three days, from 9am to 17pm, and be widely publicised in the media. We will be building our own stand on the site, within the 4m x 4m area we have rented for $35,000.

We will be working closely with the Exhibition Centre’s staff to ensure that everything runs smoothly. I would like you, as Team Leader to take on the responsibility for co-ordinating our side of the organisational process.

Boutique Build took part in a similar show five years ago in Sydney, and I have attached the operational plan from that project to this email. Please use this to guide your work on this project.

Boutique Build, and prices, have changed a lot over the last five years, so it would be good if you met with some managers from the other teams to go through the operational plan together and make any necessary alterations. I will organise a short meeting of around 15 minutes with the sales and marketing manager, one of the Site Managers, and yourself. Do some brainstorming and work through the goals for each team and how they will achieve them. When you have updated the operational plan, send it back to me for input before going further with the project.

Remember to refer to the company’s strategic plan when modifying the operational plan. In fact, the operational plan should explain how it relates to the Boutique Build Strategic Plan.

Use our Project Management Policy and Procedures to guide your work on this project, and don’t hesitate to contact me if you have any questions.

Regards, CEO

Complete the following activities:

1. Prepare for a meeting with the team

Review the case study information, the company’s Strategic Plan, their Project Management Policy and Procedures, and the Operational Plan.

Review the Australian Home Show at:

http://www.melbournehomeshow.com.au/

to give you some background for the meeting.

The meeting will provide an opportunity for different managers to have an input into the stand. You will be collecting ideas about how the team can fulfil the association’s objectives. You are expected to encourage all team members to be innovative and constructive in their participation.

The meeting will be your opportunity to determine what parts of the operational plan are still relevant, and which need to be varied. That includes the teams’ responsibilities and approximate costs. Assume that the budget will remain the same until more accurate cost estimates are obtained in the case study for activity 3.

As well as leading the meeting, you will be taking notes, and modifying the operational plan afterwards. Take a hard copy of the operational plan to the meeting with you to take notes on.

When you are ready to conduct the meeting, write an email to the CEO (your assessor).

The text of the email should be in grammatically correct English, written in an appropriate (polite, business-like) style.

It should introduce the subject, then outline your plans for the meeting and the congress stand.

The email should not be longer than three paragraphs.

Your assessor will respond to your email with the time, date, and place of the meeting.

2. Conduct the meeting

During the meeting, you are required to demonstrate effective interpersonal and communication skills including:

• Speaking clearly and concisely
• Using effective non-verbal communication skills to encourage audience interest
• Responding to questions
• Asking questions to seek feedback
• Use of active listening techniques to confirm and clarify understanding.

Begin the meeting with an introduction of the project.

In the course of the meeting, you are to:

• Define what changes have to be made to the operational plan for this project
• Determine who will do what
• Determine an approximate budget for each task
• Define the key performance indicators (KPIs) that will be used to monitor performance systems and processes.

Close the meeting by thanking the participants and telling them when they will receive a copy of the project’s operational plan when you have sent it to the CEO for their feedback.

Shortly after the meeting the Marketing Manager and the Building Manager send you the following:

Design of stand: There are several builders and contractors who have built show stands before, and they have found some old plans for the last stand that can be modified to meet their requirements.

Building stand: The estimate of the cost of building the stand in Sydney, then taking it to Brisbane and bringing it back is:

Timber                $2,000

Cladding            $2,000

Fixtures                 $500

Paint                     $800

Transport            $2,000

Total                  $5,300

About half of the timber for the stand can be sourced from the building leftovers from worksites around Sydney. However, due to insurance issues, Boutique Build’s operational planning processes stipulate that this must be approved by the company’s CEO. A short proposal should be sent to the CEO requesting this. The proposal should state why offcut timber is being used, and for what purpose. It should be a few paragraphs long, and can be included in the text of an email.

Staff trades people will be able to do the work in between on-site jobs, so there will be no further labour costs.

Company brochures: These will be designed in-house by one of the company’s architects. 1,000 copies will be printed for $80.

Catering: a barista with a professional coffee machine will be at the stand for the duration of the congress. The barista and machine will cost $1,000, and the coffee and milk is estimated to cost $300.

You have met with your Manager, and have come up with the following:

You and will fly to Brisbane and stay there for three nights in a hotel near the exhibition centre. The flights will cost a total of $400, and the hotel room will cost a total of $360.

Paying the staff who will be attending the stand over the week end will cost $3,800 in wages.

Stand staffs’ induction will be done this on the morning that the Show opens. All of the staff are familiar with its products, and are proud to work for Boutique Build.

3. Vary the operational plan

Review your notes from the meeting, and write an updated operational plan.

The operational plan should include:

• The goals of the project and how they will be realised.
• The project’s relationship to the company’s strategic plan
• The ways in which the project’s progress will be monitored
• The resources required
• Contingency management
• The teams’ responsibilities
• Project Budget

This version of your operational plan is a draft version until it approved by the CEO. Make sure that the document’s name reflects this.

Write an email to the CEO (your assessor).

The email text should:

• Begin with a brief summary of the project and the meeting.
• Introduce and summarise the attachment,
• Describe the chosen performance monitoring systems and processes
• asking the CEO for their feedback, and seeking their approval to move forward with the project.

The text of the email should point out that CEO approval is necessary for building site timber offcuts can be used to build the stand.

Attach your draft operational plan to the email.

5. Write an email to the CEO (your assessor).

Your assessor should have responded to your email with some changes to be made to your operational plan.

Update your Operational Plan, and make sure that you have given this document a different name to the draft version that you sent to the CEO last time.

The text of the email should be in grammatically correct English, written in an appropriate (polite, business-like) style.

It should introduce and summarise the contents of the attachment, and seek their approval to move forward with the project.

Attach your revised operational plan to the email.

6. Write an email to Brisbane Boutique Build staff (your assessor).

Review the company’s Recruitment, Selection and Induction Policy and Procedures

This email should inform staff members who live in Brisbane that Boutique Build will have a stand at the Australian Home Show and ask if they are prepared to work on the stand during the congress days.

Carefully read the following:

On the day before the show begins, two hours before you leave for the airport, you receive the following information:

• One of the contractors who were to work on the stand is in hospital with acute appendicitis. They are operating this afternoon.
• The Site Manager has already arrived in Brisbane, but forgot to bring the brochures from the office.
• Instead of giving you hard copies of the Customer and Team Member data collection documents, the Marketing Manager sent them to you as an email attachment late last night.

7. Write an email to your CEO (your assessor).

Consider the contingencies listed above, and decide what to do to compensate for each.

The email should inform the CEO of the above changes to the plan, and what you propose to do.

The email should ask the CEO’s approval for your proposed changes to the operational plan