Introduction
The ability to reduce the time required to explain a task to an employee and track its completion can significantly affect the efficiency of the company and improve the bottom line. This project aims to improve the current practices used in the company and implement a new approach to setting tasks and communicating with colleagues. This procurement plan outlines the required resources and cost estimates that allow understanding of the financial spending necessary to complete the project.
Objectives
The goal of the outlined project is to choose and install an appropriate application for managing tasks and train the employees to use it efficiently in their daily work. The objectives include improving the daily workflow, examining the information technology skills of team members, and implementing a cost-effective management system. This will be achieved by identifying the knowledge gaps of the current personnel and providing training that will help address them.
Cost Estimations
The most important part of this plan is task management software since the implementation of the system is the primary objective. The total payment for one year of using Wrike software is estimated at $2970 for ten users (“Plans available for every team,” n.d.). Google docs for business is another essential element of this procurement plan. The cost of the G Suite application that allows advanced access to Google Docs is $5/month, meaning that the company will have to spend $600 to pay for a year of using it (Allen, 2017). Miscellaneous costs included in the estimation are $2000 and can be used to change a vendor in case these applications are not suitable for the specifics of the team’s work.
Communication software will be used, apart from emails and in-person meetings. Based on research, Slack, which is a software allowing managers and employees to chat in different threads dedicated to a specific task. The functionality and easy to use interface are the two main aspects since there is no need to install this application on each individual’s computer and the messaging process is similar to that used in popular social media, which should affect the adoption process positively. The price for this application is $12.50 for one month per user if billed annually (“Slack for teams,” n.d.). It is anticipated that at least ten team members will use this software, including the manager, which results in a need to allocate $1500 per year for the task tracking software.
Education lessons will be provided for free by the vendors of the software; hence, the company will not have to dedicate specific funds to this element. However, it is assumed that at least two team members will have difficulty adopting the new computer-based system due to a lack of necessary skills. Hence, it is advised that an additional budget of $79 is included in the procurement plan. This price corresponds with the price of one month use of the online-based educational course from Coursera that will help explain the basic concepts of information technology necessary to use the software.
Information technology professional wage is the most expensive element of the project’s budget. Based on the estimations of the averaged salary for this position, the project’s budget incorporates $50,000, which is consistent with a salary paid for a year of work (“Information technology professional salary,” n.d.). It can be summarized that the budgetary requirements for the proposed task management system implementation total at $59,244. The cost estimate is provided in the Appendix, which presents all the details connected to the price of each item.
Assumptions and Timeframe
Based on the provided information, a request for action is to allocate the financial resources before the August 21st – which is the date assigned for software implementation. In order to facilitate the process of procurement, it is necessary to ensure that a timeline for each task is clearly defined and completed. For instance, for this project, it is vital to assess the information technology knowledge and skills that the staff possesses to develop a learning program. Some individuals may require additional training, apart from the one offered by the vendor.
Next, having a business version of Google Docs is vital since this software will be used to track changes and requires. Additionally, upon completion of this project, it is assumed that the team will use Docs to share files for their daily tasks.
Next, it is assumed that the office will be rearranged to accommodate the new set up since the employees will have fewer meetings and more time dedicated to individual work. Thus, new chairs and tables will be purchased to organize the space according to the new requirements. Finally, it is vital to have an information technology professional to ensure that employees can consult him or her when necessary. It is assumed that the company does not currently employ an information technology professional, and thus, he or she should be hired.
Forecasted project time is one month, beginning from August 7th and ending on September 10th. The procurement plan outlines the necessary forecasted resources that will be used to execute the project. The main dependencies are the ability to adequately examine the information technology knowledge of the current personnel and choose an appropriate course that will not be time-consuming since this project should be completed in a month. The primary constraints include the availability of financial resources required to hire a new employee responsible for information technology. Overall, this paper provides an in-depth explanation of the procurement plan that will be used to implement task management software for the team.
References
Allen, J. (2017). The lowdown on G Suite pricing options for business and enterprise [Blog post]. Web.
Information technology professional salary. (n.d.). Web.
Plans available for every team. (n.d.). Web.
Slack for teams. (n.d.). Web.
Appendix A
Table 1. Cost estimate (created by the author).