THE THREE GREATEST BARRIERS TO ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE

The need for rapid organizational change is a fact of life in today's business environment.
While there may be a few companies whose leaders are committed to a belief that it is good for everyone to "shake things up" from time to time, most organizational change is undertaken to accomplish key strategic goals. No matter how necessary change seems to upper management, many barriers must be broken down if a planned strategic change is to be implemented successfully. The key to successful change is in the planning and the implementation. The three greatest barriers to organizational change are most often the following. 1. Inadequate Culture-shift Planning
Most companies are good at planning changes in reporting structure, work area placement, job responsibilities, and administrative structure. Organizational charts are commonly revised again and again. Timelines are established, benchmarks are set, transition teams are appointed, etc. Failure to foresee and plan for resultant cultural change, however, is also common. When the planning team is too narrowly defined or too focused on objective analysis and critical thinking, it becomes too easy to lose sight of the fact that the planned change will affect people. Even at work, people make many decisions on the basis of feelings and intuition. When the feelings of employees are overlooked, the result is often deep resentment because some unrecognized taboo or tradition has not been duly respected.
2. Lack of Employee Involvement
People have an inherent fear of change. In most strategic organizational change, at least some employees will be asked to assume different responsibilities or focus on different aspects of their knowledge or skill. The greater the change a person is asked to make, the more pervasive that person's fear will be. There will be fear of change. More important, however, there will be fear of failure in the new role. Involving employees as soon as possible in the change effort, letting them create as much of the change as is possible and practical is key to a successful change effort. As employees understand the reasons for the change and have an opportunity to try the change on for size they more readily accept and support the change.
3. Flawed Communication Strategies
Ideal communication strategies in situations of significant organizational change must attend to the message, the method of delivery, the timing, and the importance of information shared with various parts of the organization. Many leaders believe that if they tell people what the feel they need to know about the change, then everyone will be on board and ready to move forward. In reality, people need to understand why the change is being made, but more importantly, how the change is likely to affect them. A big picture announcement from the CEO does little to help people understand and accept change. People want to hear about change from their direct supervisor. A strategy of engaging direct supervision and allowing them to manage the communication process is the key to a successful change communication plan.

The Lower Employee Stress More Employee Performance

Creating a high performance organization is a popular theme in the training and development field. To survive in these competitive times, companies can't afford anything less. Creating a high performance organization requires understanding what factors influence performance. One of the most significant factors is stress.Historically, stress has been viewed as an inevitable consequence of work life; or at most, a health care issue. Neither view begins to capture just how costly this problem is to employers. Research shows that stress interferes with human intellectual, emotional, and interpersonal functioning. In fact, nearly every popular training and organizational development initiativu is directly compromised by the intellectual, emotional, and interpersonal consequences of stress.Initiatives like The Learning Organization, Process Re-engineering, Diversity Training, Collaborative Team Work, and The High Performance Organization are all impacted by the way people are affected by stress. In this article, we will highlight some of the research findings and discuss their implications for today's organization.

Stress, Threat, and "Numbing Out"

When animals, including human beings, are exposed to potentially life threatening situations; their bodies release endorphins, which are nature's pain-killer. This makes sense from a survival perspective. If you are being attacked by a predator and are injured, you don't want to be focusing your attention on how much you hurt.This response doesn't just happen in response to tangible, visible threat; it is also triggered by potential threat. Thus, if we feel threatened or fearful, our body releases endorphins. Implications for the workplace.In workplaces where people are constantly afraid and insecure, employees are at risk of "numbing out" to protect themselves. We see it in the blank faces of clerks, the lack of enthusiasm by front line workers, and in the remarkably insensitive ways managers and employees treat each other. The very mechanism which allows a person to survive an emotionally painful environment also makes it difficult for them to respond sensitively and em-pathetically to others. This numbing process affects far more than the interpersonal realm of organizational performance. It affects all aspects of decision-making, innovation, and safety. With their thinking impaired, people are at greater risk of causing serious mistakes and accidents. They are also obviously less likely to make wise decisions and create process improvements.
Stress and the Loss of Creativity

Creative and innovative thought are is at the heart of the learning organization. An organization's ability to innovate is perhaps the most important source of competitive advantage. Organizations who know how to stimulate and leverage innovative thought are able to respond more rapidly and resourcefully to market changes and customer requirements than their slower, less innovative competitors. Despite the tremendous contribution innovative thought makes to organizational survival, most organizations don't realize how they prevent such thought from being exercised in their organization. The typical high stress workplace the physiological and psychological affects of stress on the human brain and mind compromises such creativity and innovation.This narrowing of attention, by definition, prevents divergent thinking, which is the foundation of creativity. Divergent thinking is the ability to see connections between very distantly related ideas and context. It is an important component of "thinking outside the box." When people are stressed, they are able to perceive obvious connections and associations between ideas. When people are in a positive emotional state, their ability to make more distant, novel connections and associations increases. Thus, stress compromises, at the most fundamental neurological level, one of the foundational skills of creativity and innovation.
Implications For The Workplace

One obvious implication of this research is that employee intellectual functioning can be very powerfully influenced by their environment. In workplaces where employees feel helpless and dis empowered, they are less likely to think in intelligent, creative ways. Another important implication, and this is born out by other research, is that perceived control plays a major role in whether a person is affected by a potentially stressful workplace. Workers in jobs with similar demands, but different levels of control, exhibit very different psychological and physiologiccal responses. With the same demand level, workers in low control workplaces are significantly more affected by their work.It is important because in reality, there is no way we can create a workplace in which a person has total control over their work and over their destiny. No organization can guarantee lifelong employment, no one can foresee market changes or economic downturns. But, as long as people have open lines of communication and know that they can get the information they need - even if it's "we don't know yet," they experience a sense of control. Thus, organizations which enable open, honest communication create a context in which people are less likely to be stressed out, and because of that, more likely to utilize their capabilities.
Summary

To create a high performance organization, an organization which brings out the best in its people, we need to understand how stress affects people's intellectual, emotional, and interpersonal functioning. By drawing on the wealth of research available, we can make recommendations which increase the probability that people will not be compromised by stress, but instead, perform at optimal levels.

Process Of Structuring An Organization

Organizing is a continuous managerial process.It includes the following four stages.

1. Division of work:Allocating works in such a way that an employee or group employees can perform the works comfortably, logically and satisfactorily is called division of works. Division of works makes a total work smaller, simpler and separate. This brings specialization in works and increase productivity. How does division of work specialization in function? After division of works necessary authority as well as responsibility is also delegated to individual or group. If one performs only one type of works taking authority and responsibility, it makes him experienced, efficient and creative. Skilled person gets specialization in his work. How does division of work enhance in productivity? Division of work simplifies works. Employees acquire experience and skill. They can accomplish work relatively in short time. So it increases productivity also. So a manager should make division of works on the basis of nature of the woks and should hand over to individuals or group according to their ability and skill.
2. Departmentalization:The task of grouping the activities of an organization is called departmentalization. The activities should be departmentalized wisely and skilfully.After the grouping of activities it is arranged in organizational structure. Works can be departmentalized on different basis. Function, product, area, customers, process, time etc. are the main basis of departmentalization. In Nepal it becomes better to departmentalize it on the basis of five development region. So it becomes better for the provident fund office to departmentalize its functions as Eastern Region,Central Region,Western Region,Md-Western Region and Far- Western Region. A manager should give special importance to departmentalization while in organizing. Departmentalization means classifying the total function of organization and handing over to able employee for performance.One type of functions that is suitable for one department should go to unlike department. Suppose, if there are purchase department, production department, account department and personnel department, the responsibility for employee recruitment should been made in the related topic in this chapter.
3. Hierarchy:The third stage of organizing is to determine hierarchy. This makes clear about who to order whom and who to obey or who to request whom. Top level manager gives orders to mid level managers and mid level gives order to lower managers and the lower manager gives order to their subordinates to perform works. Request goes from lower to higher level whereas order goes to lower level from higher. Many levels in an organization make the hierarchy tall whereas a few levels make it short.
4. Co-ordination:The task of bringing uniformity and harmony in organizational function is called co-ordination. Uniformity in operation, cooperation, knowledge of goal to be achieved and information are the important elements of co-ordination.This is called the essence of management. This plays vital role in achievement of organizational goal.All level manager bear the responsibility for bringing co-ordination in the operation of their organization. So all the manger should be conscious about it. If co-ordination is effective, uniformity in operation appears cost becomes effective, a sense of mutual cooperation develops in employees etc.An organization can reap such benefits from co-ordination.
   

How To Build The Best Performance In The Organization

There is no particular ways or formula which can lead the organization toward the success.But we can find several common characteristics among the successful organizations in the world.All the organizations try to find out or build the best possible ways of best performances.But some organizations become able or some may not be to find the best possible ways of performances.In other words in this 21 century the organizations mostly try to adopt the best performance techniques but it is not guaranteed to be best performers.If the organizations fail to build or

adopt them, they try to stand for better chance of performing well.

Nowadays, in the organizational world the high

performance companies are the role model for those organizations which are not able to build the best performances.Because the high performance organizations represent the real world versions of the modern managerial ideal.similarly they are so better or excellent in so many areas in the world they consistently performs the best against its competitors for its extended periods of time.

In the organizations the manager want to know more about the high performance of the organizations so that they can apply the practical knowledge or lessons learned from their ow companies or other different activities.The main objective of the organizations is to ensure their activities or organizational excel in the market.All the managers or the all other employees always try to get their aim in the stipulated time with minimum cost.Therefore they always try to build the best performance in the organization.Most of the organizations are

managed for their on objectives but the main aim of them are almost same in the planning and decisions ,making process.And only a few organizations will achieve their objectives for the best performance.

This is the truth that only some organizations perform better than others.Because they are not able to find out the possible ways of the high performance.Similarly they are unable to build the deep study about the time period required for them.They are not able to find out the suitable measures,financial or physical resources. In summary they can't select the est ones to use.In the same way there is the problems of determining which organizations are high performer or which organizations can build the best performance.

It is important that the manager should try to determine the reasons that can lead the organizations so well or lead the organizations to perform the best.There are so many difficulties in the organizations. But despite these difficulties the researchers or other team should try to identify and study the high or best performance organizations.So many things can be analyzed or learned during this period.They should continue their work to build on one another's work in order to formulate more sophisticated ideas about organizational performance.

If this study or work goes on continuing in that track, building the theoretical work of the others as it provides new insights about high performance organizations.The team of the researcher should analyze the business literature in this and conduct the global survey at the characteristics associated with best performance towards the end of this process.As i know the high performance organizations survey 2007 by American Management Association and conducted by the institute of corporate prod asked about 1368 respondents about a series of the organizational characteristics that literature suggests are associated with est performance. This study also inquired about the market share, revenue growth, profitability and costumer satisfactions.This type of activities shows the possible ways about how to adopt the best ideas for best performance in the organizations.This study also helps to correlate the responses about market performance with responses about strategy, leadership,customer orientation and other factors.From this study we can formulate the performance into three sectors.They are low performance,middle level performance or high or best performance in the organizations.

Like other survey data the results presented here may not be exact or this data have their limitations.We know that all the high performance organizations conducts the best level performance than the lower one.Generally speaking high performance organizations are superior to their low performance in the following areas.

• The strategy of the high performance organization is more consistent and clearer.Their philosophies are consistent with their strategies.So they are more likely than other companies.
• They always performs the best for the customers.It means high performance organizations always try to provide the world class customer values and they think seriously about the customer's future and long term needs and satisfy their expectations.
• The leader of the high performance organizations are very clear, fair and talented.They also provide the best job to the people or performs the clear activities.They also convince the customers that the success of the organizations depends on their behaviour.
• The high performance organizations always gives serious attentions towards customer's needs.They clearly clarify the performance measures ant they provide the good training to the people.
• In this type of the organizations the employees always use their high skills,experience and ideas in the solution of the problems.

This study also indicates that the best performance organizations may also improve in various ways.for example we can see.high performance organizations are more fair and clear about their strategies compared to other but it may be harmful to them.Similarly the organizations having high performance are more likely than low performers to report that their organizations wide performance measures match their organizations's strategies.

THE BLENDING OF TRADITIONAL AND AGILE PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Traditional project management involves very disciplined and deliberate planning and control methods. With this approach, distinct project life cycle phases are easily recognisable. Tasks are completed one after another in an orderly sequence, requiring a significant part of the project to be planned up front. For example, in a construction project, the team needs to determine requirements, design and plan for the entire building, and not just incremental components, in order to understand the full scope of the effort.

Traditional project management assumes that events affecting the project are predictable and that tools and activities are well understood. In addition, with traditional project management, once a phase is complete, it is assumed that it will not be revisited. The strengths of this approach are that it lays out the steps for development and stresses the importance of requirements. The limitations are that projects rarely follow the sequential flow, and clients usually find it difficult to completely state all requirements early in the project.

Today, business processes are more complex and interconnected than ever before. Additionally, they reject traditional organisational structures and involve complex communities comprised of alliances with strategic suppliers, outsourcing vendors, networks of customers, partnerships and even competitors. Through these alliances, organisations are able to address the pressures of unprecedented change, global competition, time-to-market compression, rapidly changing technologies and increasing complexity at every turn. Because of this multifaceted nature of businesses, projects that implement new business systems are also more complex.

For years, economists have been warning that success in a global marketplace is contingent upon the capability to produce small batches of tailored products on a tight schedule to meet growing demands in emerging markets.

Improving these performance records is a goal for any organisation. However, if traditional project management is somewhat ineffective, it's time to examine other methods of designing and delivering projects.

Agile project management:

For projects involving a significant software component, traditional project management can be somewhat ineffective since the requirements are elusive, volatile and subject to change. An alternative approach, Agile Project Management (APM), is emerging in the industry. APM is a highly iterative and incremental process, where developers and project stakeholders actively work together to understand the domain, identify what needs to be built, and prioritise functionality.

Agile methods are used when these conditions are present: project value is clear; the customer actively participates throughout the project; the customer, designers, and developers are co-located; incremental feature-driven development is possible; and visual documentation (cards on the wall vs. formal documentation) is acceptable.

The Agile approach consists of many rapid iterative planning and development cycles, allowing a project team to constantly evaluate the evolving product and obtain immediate feedback from users or stakeholders. The team learns and improves the product, as well as their working methods, from each successive cycle. After a streamlined planning, requirements definition and solution design phase is completed to get the project underway, iterations of more detailed planning, requirements, design, build and test take place in waves. This approach allows for immediate modifications of the product as requirements come into view. APM requires a dedicated full-time project team that includes a customer or end user, where team members work from the same location.

The agile project management environment:

APM development is conducted collaboratively, with a small co-located team. This core team usually consists of two developers who write code in pairs (for quality control), the customer/end-user, IT architect(s), a business analyst and a project manager. The work is accomplished through a series of sessions where the team writes code, then tests working modules of the system and repeats the process. There is minimal documentation as the team relies almost exclusively on informal internal communication.

Again, this differs from the traditional approach where a considerable amount of time is invested in planning and a significant amount of requirements documentation is produced. The Agile team identifies and prioritises the features based on business value, and after high-risk components of the system are produced, works on the highest value features first. This approach works if the solution can be delivered incrementally to the customer. If this is not possible, features still can be built incrementally and then integrated into the first release of the system.

Agile management components:

There are several key elements that provide the basis for APM. These techniques can also be used in traditional software development methods to improve project performance.

They are:

1. Visual control:This is a "cards-on-the-wall" method of planning to assist a team in organising the work of the project. For example, one successful Agile project team placed different colour groups of cards that represented the features of the solution on the wall. The features that were designed, developed, tested and in production were one colour, the features that were designed, built, tested but not yet put in production (but ready to go) were another colour. The team was able to see at a glance where they were with each feature set. Visual control ensures that every member of the team views the project the same way.
2. Co-located high performing team: In Agile development, all the key team members are co-located, including the customer/end-user, preferably in a work room. This approach greatly increases the quality of co-ordination and communication. However, this may represent a significant cultural change for IT developers. Since project managers are responsible for building a high performing team, they need to ensure that they have been assigned developers who truly can work in this collaborative manner.
3. Test driven development: In cases when the customer is having a difficult time articulating requirements, Agile teams often use test-driven development. This requires more iteration between requirements, design, development and test. Agile teams almost always develop test plans at the same time they define requirements; if a requirement isn't testable, then it is not yet fully developed. This is a best practice that can be used in traditional development to ensure requirements are complete, accurate and testable.
4. Adaptive control: Everyone on the team is constantly adapting. Because of this dynamic environment, the project manager needs to be seen as a leader, not a taskmaster. Instead of setting rigid instructions for the team to follow, the project manager facilitates the team in establishing working relationships, setting ground rules and fostering collaboration. Agile team members continuously adapt to improve their methods as they incorporate lessons learned from the previous cycle into the next iteration, also a best practice for any project
5. Collaborative development: APM relies on collaboration among all team members to deliver results, capture candid feedback and implement learning's on the next iteration of the solution. This is one of the strengths of APM constant feedback and improvement. The project manager completes the initial planning and the business analyst defines and prioritises the solution features in collaboration with the customer and technology representatives. Then the Agile project teams collaborate on the design, development, testing and reworking of each incremental build. It is this constant collaboration with the customer that promotes project success.
6. Feature driven development: This practice greatly reduces complexity and allows the team to focus on one feature at a time. For example, one team is working on Feature #4 and that's the team's only focus. They don't concern themselves about Features #1-3. It is the business analyst and project manager who ensure the next feature in the backlog is truly the next priority, based on business value and risk. Typically, high-risk components or core infrastructure pieces are built first, and then everything else is prioritised based on business value. The goal is to build the feature-driven components with only a one-way dependency to the core system; therefore, specialised components are independent of each other and can be created in any order or even in parallel.
7. Leadership and collaboration rather than command and control: "The principles of APM are timeless and links closely to leadership. It addresses a lot of the steps that facilitate leadership much more than traditional management," says Sanjiv Augustine, Managing Director of the Lean-Agile Consulting Practice at CC Pace Systems in Fairfax, VA. The project manager works with the client management, the IT management and the key stakeholders to ensure they know the project's status. Additionally, the project manager removes any barriers hindering the core Agile teams.
8. Lessons learned: After each cycle, the team holds a lessons learned session to determine what they can do better on the next iteration. As the team learns, it adapts how the members are working together to continuously improve team performance.

The value proposition:

"The traditional project management approach," reports, "is a linear approach where you try to get it all done at one time. We do a lot of very detailed planning at once up-front and then deliver it in what's known as the Big Bang. That industrial age thinking has spilled over from software development to other projects as well." This is the heart of the difference between Agile and traditional project management.

The Big Bang now comes from the greater flexibility and collaboration APM provides. "Just enough" planning is done up-front. As each increment of the system is built, the team gathers input and learns from customer feedback. Since the customer sees and/or experiences a working prototype, he or she is better able to refine or redefine requirements and describe to the team what the organisation really needs. The Agile method embraces changes that add value, and reduces the cost of change through iterative development. Making changes to a small module is very cost-effective, compared to designing and developing a huge system and then trying to make changes to it.

Can agile project management work?

"At its heart, project management, traditional or Agile, has very similar principles. It's about doing a good job for the customer. It's about leading a team. It's about delivering measurable business results," says Augustine. Many of these principles or practices can be implemented into most team-structured environments. Yet, some project management professionals may discard the principles of Agile management if they are unable to adopt all of the components and practices. This is a mistake. For example, what happens if they cannot get the user to sit full-time with the team in the workroom? It doesn't mean they can't incorporate some of the other pieces of Agile management such as visual control and feature-driven development. Besides, even if a user cannot be involved on a full-time basis, most users are willing to participate on the team, especially during the testing and feature prioritisation. The rest of the time, the business analyst can represent the user while the full time core team continues to work together.

Incorporating Agile management techniques into projects fosters a focus on the benefits of each feature. In traditional project management, the teams strive to finish the project on time and under budget and often lose sight of the overall benefits the entire effort is intended to bring the organisation. It's important to remember the strategy the project is expected to advance as well as the total cost of ownership and not just the project costs. In this way, the benefits of the project will be obvious, whether the team is constructing a building or developing a new business solution.

Factors for Managing Project Quality

Each and everyone in this world have the different views toward the factors that increases the quality of the project.Similarly commentators have differing views on what constitutes a quality project. The generally agreed parameters are that it delivers the desired outcomes on time and within budget. Through my long experience, there are major factors for managing project quality, they are;

1.Good plan:

This is the first factors for managing the project quality.The Plan is fundamental or important factors to achieving project quality. The overall project plan should include a plan for how the project manager and team will maintain quality standards throughout the project's cycle.

2.Appropriate communication:

This is the second important factors for managing the project quality.Despite good project planning and scheduling, poor or absent communication with team members and stakeholders can create the problems in the project.Project managers should have the excellent communication skills and a comprehensive scheme which encourages formal and informal discussion of expectations, innovation, progress and results.Therefore it is an important that appropriate communication is the important factors.

3.Manage stakeholders:

Stakeholders are those person who has an interest, can influence or is affected by the project's implementation or outcomes.First of all we should identify them and analyze their concerns and what they want to know and prepare the strategy to provide the appropriate amount of information and opportunities for involvement.Then we can engage them in the project for the quality.

4.Good measurement:

The another important factors for managing the project quality is proper measurements.It is important to identify the key outcomes and outputs of the project in the starts of the process of the project and how we will measure whether they have been delivered. This level or implement processes that measure progress, both qualitatively and quantitatively, throughout the project at individual, team and whole project levels. As a result of this problems can be identified properly and successful tactics can be promulgated throughout the project.Therefore it helps the project manager to implement the project plan in proper way that may increase the project quality.

5.Regular or Constant review:

Good or regular review mechanisms is also an important along with the good measurements for managing the good quality of the projects. Successful project managers should diligently and regularly review progress against the schedule, budget and quality elements of the project. Regular review allows problems to be identified early so that corrective action can be taken to keep the project on track. Constant review also helps the team members to learn and improve their skills in the project which helps to make the quality in the projects.

6.Act early:

This is the final or important factors for the project quality.Measurement and review are important, but they are only effective If the project manager takes action on issues identified then the measurements and review are meaningful and they are effective.Simple issues should be addressed immediately and more complex issues should be added for action into the project plan and resources allocated to address them.

The above mentioned six factors are the most important for managing the project quality.

TRADITIONAL PROJECT MANAGEMENT VS SCRUM

Traditional IT project managers have struggled to use the PMI methodology when it comes to software development for decades. Using the traditional project management methodology for software development is similar to trying to put a square peg into a round hole; you can force it, but it just does not fit as well as it should.
Over the past several years, the Agile methodology has really started to gain momentum. This is in large part due to the popularity of Scrum, even though Agile has been around for nearly two decades. Scrum is one of several frameworks that fall under the Agile umbrella. Some of the others include Extreme Programming (XP), Rational Unified Process (RUP), and Design for Six Sigma.
Control Theory
There are generally two different types of control theory. The first is the defined (or theoretical) process. This is what traditional project management follows; it's all about command and control. There are lots and lots of planning. We plan what we expect to happen, then enforce the plan; sometimes regardless of the conditions. Finally, this process makes use of change control. We will often find a change control board that oversees any change requests.
Scrum, on the other hand, employs what is known as the empirical process. In this process, we learn as we proceed. Instead of planning everything up front and planning on how to handle change, the empirical process states to "plan for change." As a matter of fact, the empirical process embraces change through inspection and adaptation; two of the three pillars that uphold every implementation of empirical process control.
The Three Pillars
Traditional project management for years has followed the "iron triangle"; time, cost and quality. These are still the three pillars every project manager must juggle. In an ideal world, projects would be delivered on time, under budget, and be of the utmost quality. In reality, this rarely happens. For software development projects, obtaining all three never happens.
A ScrumMaster also follows three pillars. Their pillars are transparency, inspection and adaptation. Transparency involves open communication with all members of the Scrum project team, and the ScrumMaster proudly displays their team's burn-down charts where everyone can see. They also review how well they did at during their sprint during what is known as a Sprint Review. Finally, adaptation involves making changes and improvements to tasks that can be improved.
Beginning the Transition
For many companies trying to make the transition to Agile, the first thing they must understand is that a good project manager will not necessarily make a good ScrumMaster. They are not directly interchangeable. Contrary to some thought, a good ScrumMaster does not have to have Project Management experience.
As a matter of practice, the best ScrumMaster's are generally very technical. Former SME's and technical leads make for a great ScrumMaster. This is because they can better empathise with developers, they understand the big difference between level of effort (LOE) and duration, and they can better help prioritise features along with the Product Owner.
ScrumMaster
The ScrumMaster's primary job is to adhere to Scrum values, practices and rules. They are an advocate for Scrum and help it get accepted and adopted throughout the organisation. They also act as the figurative "shield". The ScrumMaster protects the Team from outside political noise and ensures nobody goes directly to any team member without following the proper chain-of-command. This allows the team to remain focused on the job at hand, and if any issue is a priority, the ScrumMaster and Product Owner will discuss it and prioritise it within the Product Backlog as appropriate.
Product Owner
The Product Owner's primary responsibility is to manage the Product Backlog. The Product Owner is a single person, not a committee. The collection of stakeholders can influence the Product Owner, but the Product Owner has the final say. The Product Owner sets the priority of each feature/request. For new Product Owners, the ScrumMaster will work closely to teach him or her how to do their job.
The Team
The Team is responsible for turning items on the Product Backlog into potentially shippable functionality every Sprint. The Scrum Team is cross-functional. In other words, they consist of people with one or more specialties; including, but not limited to quality control, development, database design, business analysis. The team is self-organising and self-managing. As such, everyone has the same title: Scrum Team Member.
Transition Hurdles
Agile Methodology does not conform to PMI Methodology. This is absolutely the largest hurdle to overcome and where the internal conflict of project managers occurs; even more so for seasoned PMP's. To successfully complete the transition, the department must choose one or the other when it comes to Software Development. Failure to conform to the Agile principles will lead to a failed transition.
Dual Role or Two Different Resources
Any transition to Agile is in-and-of-itself a project. Therefore, a Project Manager should be chosen to lead this transition. Also, the ScrumMaster's life cycle is revolved around software development; which is only a subset of the entire project life cycle.
As any Project Manager is aware, being a Project Manager is a full-time job. Being a ScrumMaster is also a full-time job. The big question is can a single resource successfully perform both roles? The answer, like so many requirements developers are given is, "it depends." Some companies will try to fill both of these positions with a single resource due to budget constraints or other reasons. This is a perfectly acceptable reason, but not necessarily the best one. A Project Manager who is a Certified ScrumMaster can perform this dual role, but this is discouraged.
Deprogramming Project Managers
Traditional plan-driven project managers must be deprogrammed before one they can become a successful agile project manager. President Eisenhower said it best when he said, "Planning is essential, plans are useless." That phrase sums up the biggest difference between Agile and PMI. Success is no longer measured by how well the triple-constraints are balanced; it is only measured by the Customer. Project scope is no longer the driver; scope is driven by time and budget. No longer is success measured by the completion of tasks and phase-gate reviews it is measured by the delivery of features and functions. Finally, learn to embrace change; love it, live for it.
Working Together
The Project Manager and ScrumMaster must be treated as peers if the project is to be successful. The Project Manager is in charge of the entire project, whereas the ScrumMaster is in charge of the software development portion of the project. It is very important that Management respect the difference.
During the actual software development, the project manager must let the ScrumMaster run Scrum using the Agile methodology, not the PMI methodology. As a Project Manager, the tricky part is "letting go" and trusting the ScrumMaster. This portion of the EXECUTE process group must be considered a "black box". The Project Manager is now considered a "chicken"; he or she can listen in, but carries no weight.

Emerging Business Environment In Nepal

Nepal is included in the list of the least developed countries. The responsibles causes for the Nepal to be least developed countries are;

• Not to appear in the world arena till 1950,

• Not to develop basic infrastructure,


• To be geographically landlocked,


• Not to be dedicated in development etc.

But Nepal has been marching towards industrialization in a planed way for the last some years. It has entered in the 10Th plan.Nepal has adopted mixed economy. It has adopted the policy of free market and economy liberalization after 80s. It has already privatized some of the state owned public corporation.Nepal government has also adopted the policy to hand over state owned enterprises to private sectors expect those related to defense and other basic needs.The government has made no policy to nationalize any private company.

The social awareness of Nepalese people has already risen high. Consumers are conscious. consumer's forum, environment protection forum etc. are active. So Nepal civil society has awakened. Nepal has remained active in different international forum. Nepal has expressed its commitment in different international issues. Employee's participation us increasing in decision making process. High level technology and methods have transferred. So private sector investment is increasing in core industries. Private sector is developing and multinational companies are appearing.

1. Increase of private investment in core industries:Nepal's core industries such as electricity, communication, transportation etc. were conducted only by the government. But now the government has adopted open door policy in all the sectors including these sectors except those related to defense and very important basic needs. This has paved the way towards industrialization. As a result private investment in hydro power, communication and other sectors is increasing.


2. Development of private sectors:Economic reform program has shown symptoms in economic sectors mainly in the private sectors. Private sectors has gone ahead in sectors of hydro power, airlines, communication, road, water supply, food and drinking water, banking and financing companies, hotel, small and cottage industries, services industries etc.


3. Appearance of multinational companies:Nepal has adopted the policy of open market and economic liberalization. It has forwarded special policy to attract foreign investment. So, the foreign investor have entered Nepal through multinational companies. Now hotels, banks, hydro power projects, nursing homes, finance companies etc are being run in joint venture with the members of WTO. Globalization has begun to influence Nepal's business environment.

Project Management System Evaluation Checklist

Since the early 1970s the commercial project management system have been seen in all the sectors.Because the project management multitude products are now available on the current markets at some expensive and some reasonably price tag. As PC's proliferated in the workplace, so did PM software, which also brought an ease-of-use element to project management.However,all project management packages were created equally would be a gross exaggeration. Each has a specific niche they address in project management or target a specific industry.

There are some of the general requirements for the project management system evaluation checklists which discussed bellow.

General requirements.

1. The project management system should support any type of project that may be large or small; not just those limited to a specific part of the business.Similarly the project management system should be flexible in application and accommodate any and all methods of work effort (new development, maintenance, and modification/improvements).
2. The project management system should distinguish between Direct, Indirect, and Unavailable activities.
3. The project management system should promote the "Mini-Project Manager" concept.
4. The project management should provide an integrated approach to support all activities of project management, not just some; this includes Planning, Estimating, Scheduling, Reporting, and Control.
5. Project management system should promote and enforce in-house project management standards; e.g., use of standard methodologies, labour rates, time reporting, etc.
   
6. The project management should provide a universally applicable calendar and allow for the specification of a standard reporting cycle.

Planning support

1. The project management system should support various Work Breakdown Structures (WBS) - not just a single methodology. This includes controllable levels of WBS. Also, provides a library facility for reusable methodologies that can be automatically loaded upon request. Ideally, the WBS can be tied to specific information resources i.e. systems, programs, files, thereby enabling the ability to record and monitor time for a specific information resource.
2. The project management system should support internal project dependencies and external dependencies.
3. The project management system should allow for multiple projects, multiple human resources i.e internal employees and external contractors and multiple assignments for a single human resource.
   
4. The project management system should provide a Skills Inventory to track skills and proficiencies.
5. At last project management system should be able to manage the properties of the projects.
   

Estimating support

1. The project management system should provide for both Detail estimates (for a specific phase of a project) and Order-of-Magnitude (for the entire project).
2. The project management system should allow multiple versions of estimates (after all, estimates will inevitably need to be revised).
3. The project management system should provide a means to maintain estimating guidelines and generate tentative estimates accordingly.

Scheduling support

1. The project management system should provide for automated calculations using "Effectiveness Rate."
2. The project management system should allow multiple versions of schedules (project schedules, like estimates, will change over time).
3. The project management system should provide facilities to manage resource allocations. This includes plotting both estimated and actual project assignments, as well as monitoring "effectiveness rates."
4. The project management system should be able to calculate critical paths of projects.

Reporting support

1. The project management system should provide facilities to record and verify time on project assignments.
2. The project management system should provide for the recording of "Estimate to do" (the amount of time remaining on a given assignment).
   
3. The project management system should maintain historical time data that is used in history reports and to update estimating guidelines.
4. The project management system should allow the recording of "out-of-pocket" project expenditures.
5. The project management system should provide a scratchpad facility to record project notes as well as formal reports (e.g. Project Proposals, Cost/Benefit Analysis, Project Audits, etc.).
6. The project management system should provide a standard facility to generate a variety of project reports .

Control support

1. The project management system should post reported time to projects and to human resources reporting it. Also, post time to information resources to monitor activity.
   
2. The project management system should provide various summary reports to analyze projects and human resources, both by project and by department.
3. The project management system should provide the ability to bill end-users for project costs which includes charge back to multiple users at varying rates.

DISTINCTION BETWEEN FORMAL AND INFORMAL ORGANIZATION

An organization established under certain rules and regulation is called formal organization. In such organization the duty, authority, responsibility and accountability of the person involved are clearly defined. But informal organization is spontaneously established with feeling, sentiment, spirit. whim, desire, concept etc. of similar minded persons. In such organization duty, authority, responsibility etc. are not defined. It functions with the understanding of the persons involved in it. So there are basic difference between formal and informal organization.

1. Formal organization is formed for achievement of clearly defined objective. Such organization are established to produce consumer goods and services and meet their needs. The main objective of the formal organization is to save their organization, make it stable, develop and expand it, earn profit and provide public services etc. But informal organization has no such objectives, it is only an association of similar minded persons. It is inspired by the feeling of the friendship,fame, respect, unity, safety of job etc.
2. Formal organization is established with certain process but informal organization comes to exist spontaneously.
3. All the members of the formal organization are bound together with authority relation. In such organization a hierarchical structure of lower level, middle level and higher level managements work in co-ordination and can be showed in a chart. But informal organization is not so and duty, authority and responsibility of its members are not found in written forms. So they cannot be shown in chart.
4. In a formal organization particular works which are performed for the achievement of organizational goal are identified. The identified works are classified in different groups and sub groups. But it is not so in informal organization.
5. In formal organization duty, authority, responsibility etc of each person is clearly defined by line, rules and regulation. Si it is not done in informal organization.Informal organization works with unwritten rules, regulation and code of conduct.
6. In formal organization efficiency, skills, discipline, control,etc.are given emphasis but in informal organization freedom, homely environment, friendly behaviour etc are emphasized.
7. In formal organization communication system operates in the predetermined model and way, but communication system operates in natural way. even then communication system becomes effective in informal organization.
8. A formal organization follows traditional norms and values. It adopts environmental changes less, but informal organization becomes dynamic and works according to the changing environment.
9. Leadership is already fixed in formal organization but in informal organization leadership is not fixed. It depends on the individual ability, efficiency and charisma informal organization.
10. All the activities of a formal organization are directed towards achievements of the organizational goal. So less importance is given to social and psychological necessity, interest, expectation, feelings etc. of the persons involved in it. But in informal organization priority is to social and psychological necessity, expectation, interest, feelings etc of its members.
    

RELATION BETWEEN LEADERSHIP AND MANAGERIAL EFECTIVENESS

The task of guiding employees for the achievement of organizational goal is called leadership.The leadership performs the important function such as planning, organizing, directing to employees, motivating to them, co-ordinating organizational activities, making quick and rational decision, representing the organization, forming organizational goal, bearing responsibility etc. The leadership brings changes in employee's behaviour and motivates them to be dedicated to the organization.
To achieve pre-determined goal through utilization of available resources and is the managerial effectiveness. The managerial effectiveness includes the achievements of goal within expected time.
There is deep relation between leadership and managerial effectiveness. They cannot be separated from each other. The leader5ship of manager should be efficient and skilled to get managerial effectiveness. The relationship between leadership and managerial effectiveness can be expressed in the following ways.

1. For increasing managerial effectiveness the goal of the organization should be properly formed. There should be wise leadership to firm right goal. So there is relationship between leadership and managerial effectiveness.
2. Teamwork should be given encouragement for managerial effectiveness. This is the task for efficient leadership. So there is relationship between leadership and managerial effectiveness.
3. Organizational activities should be well co-ordinated for managerial effectiveness. Co-ordination becomes impossible without sound leadership. So there is relationship between leadership and managerial effectiveness.
4. The leadership should represent the organization for managerial effectiveness. This task can be done by efficient leadership. So there is relationship between leadership and managerial effectiveness.
5. Ability to taking quick and rational decision needs for managerial effectiveness. Wise leadership can do this easily. So there is relationship between leadership and managerial effectiveness.
6. For the organizational effectiveness it needs to look at whether organizational works have bees performed according to goal or not. If there is difference between goal and result, causes of the difference should be identified and the corrective action should taken. Such task can be done by wise leadership. So there is relationship between leadership and managerial effectiveness.
7. The employee should be motivated towards work for the organizational effectiveness.They should be given proper direction. Their behaviour should be changed and made the dedicated to the organization. Different motivating programs should be conducted. This task can be done by effective leadership. So there is relationship between leadership and managerial effectiveness.
8. The organizational effectiveness should be good to bring managerial effectiveness. If the organizational structure is not suitable to the nature and scope of the organization, there comes flabbiness in management. Forming proper organizational structure, making clear the duty, authority and responsibility of the employees is the task of leadership. Therefore there is relationship between them.
9. Information system and supervision should be effective for the managerial effectiveness. Effective information system and supervision become impossible without efficient leadership. So there is relationship between them.
   

Resolving Project Team Conflicts

Conflicts on project teams are a fact of life! Only on rare occasions do conflicts not arise even on the smallest projects conflicts rear their ugly heads! It's human nature to have conflicts and it arises for any number of reasons,includingMisunderstandings,Personality clashes,Disagreements about the right way to approach a problem.

Egos.

As a project manager, it is an important of the project manager that his/her responsibilities includes managing conflicts on the project team in proper way. In my experience the best way to manage a conflict may be to ensure that the parties who are involved in the conflict and this ones may be developing the solution.First of all they have to come to agreement or make the agreement on how to resolve the conflict themselves then we can resolve it for them.

If we keep or bear the conflicts only in our mind we can't find the proper solution or that sometimes a conflict cannot be resolved. For example, if we have two persons on the project team that just are not going to get along no matter what too much has happened between them.If we can't help them we can resolve their conflict that they must work together professionally for the good of the team and the project on their own way.in this condition our main duty or job is to help them to figure out how they are going to get through this project being cordial and professional with each other.

Here are some important suggestions to get us moving in the right direction:

First we should schedule a first meeting with the individuals who are having the conflict to discuss.In this discuss we can discuss about what are the issue? Then we should discuss about it to resolve the conflict sitting on the table.Similarly we should discuss about their perspectives.Then we have to work with the parties to create the base for resolving the conflicts.In other step we can ask them who are in conflicts about what they can do to get past the issues or put it side based on the base that we made for resolution of the conflicts in order to move forward with working together.This suggestion may be useful to resolve the conflicts that occur in the projects in course of action.

Similarly we should make the meeting for at least of 2 hours based on the issues.Here in this meeting we can discuss about the effect of their conflicts.We can explain during this meeting how the conflict between them is affecting the project activities and the team as a whole. Our main goal is to get them to at least communicate with each other to get everything out in the open. We want to be or should be sure that they are really listening and hearing each other.But confidence should be there between them because confidentiality is key here.We should try to remind them the causes of conflicts. In some cases, I have found it helpful to meet with the parties individually to help get them thinking about how they might approach resolution of the conflict with the other individual.

We can schedule a meeting for the following day to discuss how the conflict between the individuals might be resolved.

We should ask the persons who are involved in the conflicts about their ideas on how to move forward with resolving the issue what did they think about the evening before, based on the criteria agreed, this may help to resolve the conflict in the way what we want.

Similarly we can ask them what alternatives can they come up with to work together effectively? and can they come to consensus on any of the alternatives? or can they utilize the alternatives that made by the agreement in proper way?

Here in this situation we should help them to get them talking to each other about their ideas to resolve the conflict and, ideally, help them in coming to a consensus on how to resolve it.But we have to remember that we cannot resolve it for them because they need to do so themselves. We are just providing the discussion for them in resolving the project team conflicts.The one of the important role of us to help them to work toward coming to consensus on resolving the project team conflict by asking questions, probing for details, etc. If one comes up with an idea, see how that idea might be tweaked so that it is acceptable to the other individual.If our effort is beneficial for them in resolving the team conflicts the we can make further help them.

we should keep one thing in our mind that sometimes consensus cannot be reached and the conflict is not able to be resolved, but still we should try and we still need these individuals to work together.How can they do so? What can they need to work together professionally and cordially toward the successful conclusion of the project team conflicts?One we reach the conclusion or there is agreement on how to work together in spite of the conflict between them we should review what was agreed and we should get their commitment that they will continue to work on the resolution of the conflict and abide by the plan they developed to resolve it.So these effort may be the useful factors for resolving the project team conflicts.

THE ILLUSION OF RISK MANAGEMENT

High profile IT project failures are nothing new; in fact few projects are 100 percent successful in delivering everything the customer wants on time and within budget. So it is small wonder that businesses put loads of effort into trying to minimise the risk of their projects becoming one of these statistics.
The traditional way of doing this is to spend considerable time and effort gathering together all the requirements for a new system, then designing a complete solution up front, from which detailed programming estimates can be produced. The theory behind this so-called Waterfall methodology is that the estimates will be accurate, and there will be no major surprises once development gets underway. Unfortunately this approach is based on a number of faulty assumptions, which means it rarely works in practice!
Assumption: It's possible to identify a complete set of requirements up front
In fact, building a computer system is akin to driving down a country lane at night; the driver can only ever see as far as her headlights allow, but each bit of progress that is made illuminates areas that could not be seen at the start. This is true even in domains that are relatively well understood.
Assumption: The requirements, once identified, will not change
There is an inevitable lag between initiation of a software project and its eventual delivery, and even if it were possible to identify a complete and accurate set of requirements up front the constantly changing business landscape dictates that requirements will change along the way. Waterfall projects typically resist absorbing such changes due to the knock-on effect on the design and schedule, with the result that the eventual delivered system does not match the requirements.
Assumption: It's possible to produce estimates with a high degree of accuracy
Surprisingly, a number of studies indicate that on average, fixed scope projects cost almost twice as much as estimated. Apart from the problems of changing requirements, this may be in part due to initial estimates being artificially low in order to secure contracts in the first place.
Assumption: The development phase is simply a mechanical process of transforming the design into code
This is where software development suffers because of attempts to liken it to the construction industry. In fact, there is a lot of art in the craft of programming, which makes it a lot less predictable than managers would like.
As much as corporate managers would dearly love the Waterfall approach to work, in practice it is extremely unreliable, inefficient and inflexible. Yet in spite of credible alternatives (the Agile family of methods) which appear to deliver far better results in practice, managers frequently persist with this discredited methodology because of the illusion it projects of being less risky and allowing them to remain in control.

MAJOR PROBLEMS FACING BUSINESS IN NEPAL

There are many problems that businesses are facing in Nepal they are as follows.

1. Interference: Intereferen is the main problems of management in Nepal. Government and political leaders interfere in the management of public enterprises of Nepal. Similarly members of greater share holders family interfere in the management of private firm. Such interference is found in all the managerial functions like planning, organizing and controlling.
2. Lack of finance: The other management problems of major industries is the lack of necessary financial resource. It is difficult to get loan from bank for industry. Banks provide loan only by taking good security. As good loan proposal is to be prepared, copy of feasibility study is to be attracted with and complex process is to be fulfilled.
3. Small market: Nepal's market is small and limited. There is no access to all parts of the country. As small quantity of goods is to be produced for small market, the production cost reaches high.As a result the price of the goods also goes high.Since Chines and Indian goods enter Nepal at lower price, Nepalese industries cannot compete with the Chines and Indian goods.This also has shrunken the market of Nepalese industries.So small market is also a problem for management.
4. Lack of mutual trust: There is dearth of mutual trust in Nepal. Mutual trust cannot be found even among the departments, levels and employees of the organization. Due to lack of trust authority is not delegated to the lower levels.Such mistrustful environment becomes detrimental to the industries. Similarly such mistrust is found between public and private sectors.The government plays only the role of controller rather than helper. So lack of trust has remained as great problem of management.
5. Lack of efficiency manpower: Efficient and skilled manpower cannot be found in Nepal's labour market. Labour is supplied from the crowed of unskilled and inefficient people.This creates a problems in management.Only traditional labour from agriculture sector is supplied to industrial sectors.Totally inexperienced and unknown persons are to be employed and make them experienced. So this is also a management problem.
6. Lack of technical knowledge: The manager working in organization should have technical knowledge. But the manager working in the business of Nepal have not got technical knowledge. Because of the absence of technical knowledge in other employees, except the related ones, organizational performance cannot be effective.So the lack of technical knowledge in employees is also a great problem for management.
7. Labour problems: Labour organization gives pressure on management to fulfil their interest by holding demonstration, calling for strike, locking up, sit in etc. As the leaders of labour organization are affiliated to political parties and leaders, the labour organization becomes strong. The ,management is compelled to compromise with the labour organization even against interest of the enterprise or organization.
8. Lack of infrastructure:The infrastructure such as transport, communication, electricity, water supply etc become necessary for industrialization.But these infrastructure are not available properly.So this is also a great problems for management.

MOTIVATION THROUGH EMPLOYEE PARTICIPATION

Participatory management is a method in which the employees are involved in every function of management. They are enpowered.Employees are made involved in management by making owner, giving autonomy and providing change to take participationin decision making process.This increase teir dignity, respect honour and self actualization.As a result, they get motivated to work.To involve the employees in management is an important source of motivation.This increases productivity of the organization, commotment of employees, internal motivation and the employees become ready to accept responsibility and accountability.There are two techiniques to encourage and empower the e,ployees. They are...

1. Quality of working life:Quality of working life is a technique to motivate employees to work. QWl indicates the relationship of quality between total work environment and the employees. If the quality of working life of employees is good, they become satisfied and ardworking or get motivated to work. They become successful to perform challenging work.Sufficient and reasonable remuneration, healthy and safety environment to give personal identity, opportunity for persona development and security, opportunity for human competence development etc. are as a whole the working environment. They are called quality working life.If the QWl is good the employees become satisfied. So the management should improve this environment. For this the mechanism such as share ownership, flexible working hour, quality control team etc should be organized and activated.

• Share ownweship...The employee can be involved in mangement bu providing share ownership. Nowdays most of the companies make the employees owners bu distributing shares to them. Doing so the employees tink the organization to be teir own, they become dedicated to the organization and get opportunity to take part in decision making process.
• Flexible working time....Two types of working table can be used. The first fixed time working and second flexible working time.The working time from 9 am to 4 pm is called fix time working. Most of the countries of the world use tis type of time. But using this working time, employees cannot get time to pay electricity tarrif, children's fee to school, post office to drop the letters, draw money from bamk etc. So the employees should be given the facility to reach office earlier in morning and leave it before office time or reach late in the morning and work there even after the office time or use the long break for such private work and work in the office up to late eening. If such facility is given they need to take leave and can do their private work.
• Quality circle...The team formed to solve producton problems and improve quality of goods is called quality circle(QC). QC is a small group of employees. QC is formed involving experienced and specialist employees. Such circle tries to decrease cost price, increace quality of goods.

2. Self managed team:The tea formed without formalsupervision is called self managed team. The duties , authorities and responsibility of the members of such organization are not formally defined. The leadership of such team is held on the basis of personal charisma.The menber of the team work with disciline and become goal oriented. They have high morale. They utilize the freedom to use to show their ability. Self managed team are a group of 10 to 15 employees. They have responsibility of planning and sheduling of work, task asignment to members, taking action to solve problems, decision making about operation and collective control over performance.The characteristics of such team are....

• The team becomes resonsbility for the whole work.
• The menber becomes gifted with various qualities and skills.
• The authority to determine working procedure, making work routine, handing over work etc lies with such team.
• The performance of the team is based on remuniration and feedback.

Self managed team is spontaneously formed. The team menbers get opportunity to show their efficiency and skill in performance.

MANAGEMENT OF THE AUDIT FUNCTION

An effective audit function should provide all levels of management an independent appraisal of their operations and assist them in achieving maximum efficiency while achieving overall organizational goals. However, before the manager of the organization’s audit function can begin to promote the audit department’s positive contributions to the organization, improve upon the products generated by auditing (i.e., audit reports, analysis), or contribute to the overall continuous improvement of the organization in general, the audit department’s leadership must seek feedback on its own performance. There are many sources of feedback; both internal and external to the audit department.
Feedback from Management
Certainly one of the most important sources of feedback is from senior management. It is critical the audits scheduled to be performed by the audit department closely match the interests of the company’s senior leadership. The audit department’s mission statement must be in line with organizational policies, special interests, and short-term and long-term goals.
Feedback from the Auditee
We might think it unusual for the auditor to ask for feedback from the auditee, however, it is important that his or her voice be heard. There is nothing quite so difficult as requesting an assessment of your performance by those whose management and leadership abilities you’v just reviewed and critiqued. Nevertheless, it is important to know how you and your work were perceived by the auditee. From the initial contact, to the audit entrance conference, through to the exit briefing, we need feedback regarding the auditee’s perception of ours(and the team). Without this feedback, we will not have the information we need to improve our future performance.
Feedback from Audit Team Members
Almost as difficult as asking for performance feedback from the auditee is requesting it from our own audit team members. No one is as tough on a quality auditor’s performance as a fellow auditor. Obtaining feedback, and evaluating team effectiveness, is usually best achieved in the Process Review and Action Team (PRAT) setting. The PRAT is one avenue that may be used to determine not just whether the audit team’s performance can be improved upon, but how it can be improved upon. Methods such as brainstorming; nominal group technique; cause and effect analysis; and so on, work well in this forum.
Customer Feedback Regarding Product and Service Quality
Customer feedback in the form of survey data, interviews, complaint rate, etc., is a vital source of feedback. This information is critical to the audit function in that the quality system elements designed to assure product quality (e.g., process control, corrective and preventive action) were probably assessed by the internal audit department at one time or another and found to be acceptable. Negative customer feedback may be indicative of:
One or more quality system elements having gone awry since the last assessment.
The quality system element(s) previously assessed may have been done so incorrectly.
Management’s “pencil whipping” of corrective and preventive actions to earlier audit findings.
A lack of, or insufficient follow-up action in response to audit findings by the quality audit function.
Audit Function Effectiveness Rating
The overall effectiveness rating of the audit team usually comes from one or both of the following sources:
External customers-the suppliers, distributors, manufacturers, etc., whose quality system, process, and/or product we have assessed, and/or;
Internal “customers”-our supervisor, his or her supervisor, and those responsible for managing and maintaining the daily internal processes and products within the company.
Quality auditors are judged on their performance. Specifically, their appearance, their conduct, their approach to the audit. Within this sphere of professionalism, “customers” of the audit department generally judge auditors using one particular type of criteria: the “quality” of audit findings and observations to include the soundness of the logic supporting the auditor’s recommendations to correct those findings and observations. Nothing is more frustrating to an auditee than to be the recipient of an audit write-up that has no apparent impact upon the quality system, process, or product.
Setting Management Goals for Continuous Improvement
Setting organizational goals for continuous improvement is a necessity. Continuous improvement certainly applies to quality auditing as well. As technology and the way in which it is managed and manipulated advances, quality auditors need to become experts not only in their area of expertise, but also in the latest management theories and practices, as well as in state-of-the-art technology. Continuous improvement involves knowing what type of management your company is practicing (i.e., integrated process teaming, concurrent engineering, etc.), as well as the hardware and software in use, especially as it applies to automated procedures, work instructions, engineering drawings, and revisions. As a minimum, quality auditors need to educate themselves on the latest in:
Quality auditing philosophy, techniques and practices;
Management philosophy, techniques and practices, as well as:
Computer hardware and software.
To add maximum value to the organization, the audit function must ensure its auditors are proficient in all three areas.

DELEGATION OF AUTHORITY

To delegate means to grant or confer the authority from superior to subordinates to accomplish a particular assignment. It is a simply a matter of entrusting part of the work of operation or management to others. It is the ability to get result through others.

A manager is required to perform a lot of work. It is quite difficult for him to concentrate on every piece of work, so he shares the task and authority with subordinates. Delegation of authority as such means granting authority and responsibility regarding specific job to the subordinate. The shares of routine authority and responsibility with the subordinates is delegated of authority.

According to Haimen-''delegation of authority merely means the granting of authority to subordinates to operate within prescribes time.''

The analysis of the above definition reveals that delegation of authority is an important element of organization.It has got the following features.

• Obtained authority only can be delegated.

• The officer who delegates the authority remains liable even after the delegation of authority to subordinates.
• Authorities granted as per delegation can be withdrawn.
• Authorities regarding ordinary and routine works only can be delegated.
• There should be control of the officer over subordinates in case delegation.
• The subordinates works according to order and instruction of the original officer.
• Authority,responsibility and duty is clearly specified.

Advantages of the delegation of authority.

Managers benefit from delegation of authority in many ways:

• The manager distributes their work load to others. This enables them to concentrate on the higher function of management like planning, organizing etc.
• People are motivated to give their best work at work when they have authority with responsibilities.
• It binds the formal organization together.
• It enables those who are close to the scene of action to deal promptly with the problems that arise. Time is saved by not sending information up the line and seeking direction down again.
• But for delegation firms would remain small and an increase in their size may burn up the candle of the manager's energies too soon- he may be physically and mentally exhausted.
• The importance of delegation in effective management is obvious. as it enables effective management, supervision and control.