a major company has agreed to participate in the citywide Adopt-a-School program

Question

a major company has agreed to participate in the citywide Adopt-a-School program. You have been asked to lead the Book Bag drive sponsored by this company.

1. Human Resource Plan: Describe the resource requirements for the project and the roles and skills required of each team member, including the roles and responsibility of the project manager. Include details of the methods to be used for obtaining the team necessary to complete the tasks listed in the project schedule.

2. Cost and Budget Estimate: Develop an approximation of the monetary resources needed to complete the project activities. In addition, aggregate the estimated costs of individual activities to prepare the project budget.

3. Procurement and Acquisition Plan: Describe the plan to purchase or acquire products, services, or resources needed from outside the project team. The document should also forecast the processes of administering and closing procurement for the project

Explanation / Answer

Human Resources Needs in the Business Plan

The trick to writing about your business's human resources needs in the management plan section of your business plan is to be able to describe your human resources needs specifically.

To write something such as, "We'll need more people once we get up and running" will impress no one.

Begin with the bottom line. How many employees will your business need and what will it cost you? This is what will be of most interest to the people reading your business plan.

Then consider how your business's human resources needs can best be met. Will it be best to have employees or should you operate with contract workers or freelancers? Do you need full-time or part-time staff?

Outline your staffing requirements in this section of your business plan, including a description of the specific skills that the people working for you will have to have.

Now you're ready to calculate your labour costs. You can calculate the number of employees you will need by figuring out how many customers each employee can serve. As an example, if it takes one employee to serve 150 customers, and you forecast 1500 customers in your first year, your business will need 10 employees.

Next, determine how much salary each employee will receive, and total the cost of salary for all your employees.

Add to this the cost of Workers' Compensation Insurance (mandatory for most businesses) and the cost of any other employee benefits, such as company sponsored medical and dental plans to calculate your total labour cost.

You also need to describe how you're going to find the staff your business needs, and how you're going to train them.

Your description of staff recruitment should explain whether or not sufficient local labour is available, and how you're going to recruit staff if you need to go further afield.

When you're writing about staff training in your business plan, you'll want to include as many specifics as possible. What specific training will your staff undergo? What ongoing training opportunities will you provide your employees?

Even if your plan for your business is to start as a solo act, you need to include this section on Human Resources Needs in your business plan to demonstrate that you've thought about the staffing your business may require as it grows and that your business has (or will have) human resources policies in place. Business plans are about the future, and how your business is going to succeed.

The role of a project manager

All school property projects, no matter how small, must have a project manager. If the project requires building consent, it must have a professional project manager. Whether you are a professional project manager, or a non-professional project manager working on a project that does not require building consent, you must follow the Ministry’s project management requirements.

As a project manager on a school property project, you must understand all the legal and Ministry requirements for school property projects.

Your duties include:

functions include:

Capital Budget

The following are capital budget items—those expenses which deal with furniture, fixtures, and non-consumable Montessori hardware. The costs listed are estimates established in 2015. For the operating budget, consult the next section on Finances.

School Apparatus

Preschool or Elementary $27,000-$35,000 (for one classroom).

Practical Life

Preschool $850-$980—equipment for washing, pouring, polishing, food preparation, eating, etc. (per classroom).

Furniture

Preschool or Elementary $4,000-$5,000—includes chairs, tables, and bricks and boards to build shelving (per classroom).

Office Furniture and Equipment

Budget $2700-$4,500. Much equipment is available used, but options such as a computer or laminator can be very expensive.

Books

Budget $1500-$2,500 per class. There is nothing like beautiful books, although used books are sometimes better than new.

License and Occupancy Fees

Budget $1500-$2,000 per class.

Building Repair

Refurbishing a classroom depends strictly on the condition of the site and the standards of the school. It always represents some expense.

Follow your school’s established process for planning and approving the procurement of goods, works or services.

As part of this, you should create a written document or ‘business case’ that you can use to:

·         specify what you need, why and by when

·         request approval to go ahead with the procurement process

·         record your decision-making process

You should also check that there is an available budget.

If you’re buying for a local-authority-maintained school, ask your local authority about their rules for procurement spending.

To help build your business case, consider the following areas.

Collaborate with other schools

Schools have identified the benefits of working together to buy goods, which can result in saving time and cost.

Talk to other local schools about your procurement need so that you can find efficient ways to work together and get a better deal with suppliers.

Consider whether you can:

·         borrow equipment

·         share resources and staff expertise

·         share knowledge of markets

·         compare prices and experiences from previous purchases

·         buy together so that you can:

·         use your joint influence to get a good deal (eg on price or service levels)

·         reduce the effort involved in managing multiple contracts

Create an outline specification

A specification is a description of what your school needs to buy.

As part of your planning process, it may be useful to create an outline specification that you can develop more fully once you have approval to go ahead.

Creating an outline specification can involve:

·         considering why you need to make the purchase

·         meeting with ‘users’ (ie the people who will use what you plan to buy) and discussing their needs

·         talking to potential suppliers (‘market sounding’) to:

·         understand what options are available to you

·         compare costs to help you understand the ‘market price’, which you can then compare with your budget

·         identifying the project’s likely timescale and when you need the purchase to be in place

·         considering whether you need external expert help to develop your specification and/or run the procurement process

Choose your procurement process

The easiest and quickest option is to buy goods, works or services through a framework agreement. We recommend using this process for low-value purchases.

However, if you feel that using a framework won’t allow you to meet your particular requirements; you can run your own procurement process.

Check whether your school or local authority has rules that determine which procurement process you should use.

Run your own procurement process

In some circumstances, you may find it preferable, or necessary, to run your own tender process to select a supplier. Bear in mind that this is likely to take longer, use more resources and cost more than using a framework.

For a low- or medium-value purchase, you can seek a range of quotes from relevant suppliers.

For a high-value purchase, you should generally run a more formal competitive tender process.

If the estimated whole-life cost of your contract is above the EU public procurement threshold, you must use an EU-compliant competitive tender process.

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