End of Seminar Project

Using GEMS to facilitate the review process

AMBA640 Section 1144

Nana Bonnie
December 12, 2009

Executive Summary
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 The publications department has currently recognized a problem with the review process

which directly impacts the departments’ rate and sales. Schwalbe (2009) takes on the definition

of a project from A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK) as a

“temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product, service or result.” The result we

would like to accomplish here is to reduce the length of the review process. In doing, so we hope

to increase the number of journals and books we publish in a year.

To solve this problem we implement our Geophysical Electronic Manuscript Submission

system (GEMS) to help facilitate the review process. To meet this goal, we will build a project

team that is to accomplish this project within a 12 month timeframe with a budget of $5000. The

project entails building a work breakdown schedule with assigned tasks. Furthermore we assess

operations and information’s management used in implementing the project.

In this project plan we will present a defined scope, a disciplined timeline, and adequate

processes, which address topics such as risk management and staffing needs critical to the

success of the project. The success of this project is critical to shortening the review process

without sacrificing quality. By completion of this project we predict a 5% increase in

publications by the year January 2011.

Table of Contents

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Contents

I. INTRODUCTION__________________________________________________4
II. PROJECT MANAGEMENT PLAN___________________________________4
III. PROJECT OVERVIEW_____________________________________________4
Project Goal ______________________________________________________4
Definitions and Acronyms ___________________________________________4
Stakeholder Analysis _______________________________________________5
Project Manager ___________________________________________________5
Project Team _____________________________________________________5
Team Contract ____________________________________________________5
Project Deliverables ________________________________________________5

IV. PROJECT ORGANIZATION________________________________________5

Organizational Structure_____________________________________________6
Organizational Boundaries and Interfaces_______________________________6

V. WORK BREAKDOWN STRUCTURE & SCHEDULE___________________6

Work Breakdown Structure __________________________________________7
Dependencies _____________________________________________________7
Resource Requirements _____________________________________________7
Budget Requirements _______________________________________________7
Schedule _________________________________________________________7
Project Responsibilities____________________________________________ 10

VI. MANEGERIAL PROCESS__________________________________________ 10

Assumptions, Dependencies, and Constraints ____________________________10
Risk Management __________________________________________________10
Monitoring and Controlling Mechanisms________________________________ 10
VII. OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT PLAN_____________________________11
Operations Strategy _________________________________________________11
VIII. INFORMATIONS MANAGEMENT PLAN__________________________ 11
Information System Objectives ________________________________________11
Hardware/Software Requirements__________________________________ ____11
Information Management Reports ______________________________________11
IX. CONCLUSIONS_____________________________________________________11
X. REFERENCES______________________________________________________12

Introduction

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 The publications department at American Geophysical Union (AGU) is one of the major
sources of revenue for the organization. Specifically the department contributes to 69% of the
organizations profits. (www.agu.org). Publication covers research in non-organic science which
is disseminated through journals and books. The peer review process is a necessary criterion for
all publications at AGU. Recently the process has been deemed lengthy and time consuming and
this in turn directly impacts the number of journals and books that are published in a year.
Geophysical Electronic Manuscript Submission System (GEMS) is used with the help of the
Editor’s Assistants (EA) to facilitate the review process. Submissions, reviews and decisions are
submitted respectively by authors, reviewers and editors, through the GEMS.
Our goal is to devise a plan that will enhance the review process with the help of GEMS and
as a result increase the publications of journals and books. By increasing our publication of
journals and books we expect to see an increase in sales and revenue.

Project Management Plan

I. Project Overview

Project Goal: The goal for this project is to increase publications of journals and books by 5% by
making the review process more efficient with the help of GEMS. Our time frame for assessing
GEMS will be one year, from January 4th ending December 20th.

Definitions and Acronyms:

Acronym Definition
AGU American Geophysical Union

GEMS Geophysical Electronic Manuscript Submission System

EA Editor’s Assistant: help facilitate GEMS
AE Associate Editors: assist editors in decision making process

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Stakeholder Analysis: Stakeholders for this project are reviewers, editors, associate editors,
assistant editors, and authors. Stakeholders are affected because changes to GEMS will increase
efficiency and ensure effective manuscript submission process. Due to changes in GEMS work
assignments may shift or be eliminated to allow ease of use.
Project Manager: Rochelle Odon

Project Team:
Senior Editor’s Assistant
Editor’s Assistant 1
Editor’s Assistant 2
Editor
Associate Editor
GEMS onsite personnel
GEMS Contractor

Team Contract: Our project team is governed by a structure of rules that encourage open
communication and progressive contributions, including constructive input where each
participant explores all plausible options in the pursuit of the successful completion of our agreed
objective. Additionally, each member agrees to continually contribute ideas for improving and
enhancing the functionality and utility of the project as needed.

Project Deliverables: Weekly reports would be used to identify and analyze the progress of the
project and any problems occurring within the project. The team members will meet weekly to
discuss the reports. At the conclusion of the project all necessary data such as lessons learned,
project summary and assessments will be assembled and made available to all members for
referral.

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II. Project Organization
Organizational Structure:
Project
Manager
Rochelle

Tamika

Senior
GEMS
Editor’s
Contractor
Assistant

GEMS Editor’s Editor’s

Associate Assistant 1 Assistant 1
Onsite Editor
Editor
Personnel

Organizational Boundaries and Interfaces: The organizational flow of duties reflects two team
members, the GEMS Contractor and the Senior Editor’s Assistant, reporting directly to the
project manager. These two team members are responsible for supervising the remaining team
members, managing the execution of duties and the progress in regards to the completion of the
project. With that feedback, they continuously synthesize the updated data and adjust outlined
objectives accordingly.

III. Work Breakdown Structure and Schedule

Work Breakdown Structure: In project management, a Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) is an

exhaustive, hierarchical (from general to specific) tree structure of deliverables and tasks that
need to be performed to complete a project. The Work Breakdown Structure is a very common
and critical project management tool. (Schwalbe, 2009) It is considered such a key part of project
management that many United States government statements of work require a WBS. Its
hierarchical arrangement allows for easy identification of the terminal elements
Work breakdown structure:

1 Evaluation of the current peer review system in GEMS

1.1 Analyze current review system
1.2 Define requirements for testing site
1.3 Develop a budget for IT software and hardware cost
2 Identify constraints
2.1 Analyze limitation on GEMS
2.2 Analyze resources necessities ( supporting software needs)
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 2.3 IT testing measures
3 Design Implementation Plan
3.1 Engage the Best Reviewers
3.2 Quality & Transparency of Review
3.3 Provide Balanced and Fair Reviews Across Scientific Fields and Career Stages
3.4 Continuous Review of Peer Review
4 Security & Test Site
4.1 Integrate security requirements
4.2 Set up test sites mimicking GEMS
4.3 Monitor test site and analyze results
4.4 Receive final approval on test site
5 Begin Phased Implementation of Selected Action
5.1 Use test site to analyze review system
5.2 Establish possible barriers
5.3 Establish solution to barriers
6 Peer Review Process and Changes
6.1 Enhanced Review Criteria
6.2 New 1-9 Scoring System
6.3 Scoring of Individual Review Criteria
6.4 Templates for Structured Critiques
7 Continuous Evaluation of Peer Review
7.1 On-line surveys of multiple audiences
7.2 New metrics to track key elements of peer review changes.
7.3 Data-driven mechanisms to evaluate review outcomes.
7.4 Peer review pilots and assessment of those pilots.
8 Close out
8.1 Meeting with management to review project and lessons learned
8.2 Compile data and provide a notebook of the project

Dependencies:
Tasks completed through GEMS are independent of order. However in the project analysis, the
first few phases will be a finish-to-start process where the forerunner task finishes, the successor
task starts. The last phases will be more of a task that continues only as long as another task is in
progress.

Resource Requirements:
Editor’s assistant will be in charge of testing so each will be assigned responsibilities that match
their skill area. Our onsite GEMS help desk personnel will assist EA’s with their responsibilities
and provide necessary feedback and suggestions requirements. Our onsite GEMS personnel will
also ensure that the necessary programs and software are in place to ensure effective testing and
analysis.

Budget Requirements: Cost for improvement should not exceed $5000. The Idea here is to
restructure GEMS to be more efficient without having to spend too much money on upgrades.
We established that some enhancements may cost more and these would be adopted on a
necessity basis.

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Schedule:

Schedule:

Completion Date Task

January 4 Evaluation of the current peer review system

in GEMS

January 6 Analyze current review system

January 11 Define requirements for testing site

January 15 Develop a budget for IT software and hardware

cost

Identify constraints

January 20 Analyze limitation on GEMS

January 31 Analyze resources necessities ( supporting

software needs)
February 10 IT testing measures

Design Implementation Plan

February 26 Engage the Best Reviewers

March 12 Quality & Transparency of Review

March 15 Provide Balanced and Fair Reviews Across

Scientific Fields and Career Stages
April 1 Continuous Review of Peer Review

Security & Test Site

April 14 Integrate security requirements

April 30 Set up test sites mimicking GEMS

May 6 Monitor test site and analyze results

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June 15 Receive final approval on test site

Begin Phased Implementation of Selected

Action

June 29 Use test site to analyze review system

July 10 Establish possible barriers

July 28 Establish solution to barriers

Peer Review Process and Changes

August 15 Enhanced Review Criteria

August 20 New 1-9 Scoring System

August 30 Scoring of Individual Review Criteria

September 1 Templates for Structured Critiques

Continuous Evaluation of Peer Review

November 2 On-line surveys of multiple audiences

November 10 New metrics to track key elements of peer

review changes.
November 18 Data-driven mechanisms to evaluate review
outcomes.
November 29 Peer review pilots and assessment of those
pilots.

Close out

December 11 Meeting with management to review project

and lessons learned
December 18 Collect data and provide a notebook of the
project

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Project Responsibilities: Team members are responsible for the completion of their assigned
tasks. The Project manager will supervise the progress of the each member’s tasks and will
support the team in completing all tasks within the agreed time frames. The GEMS help desk
will support and advice team members on assigned tasks.
IV. Managerial Process

Assumptions, Dependencies, and Constraints: This project relies on assigned duties being
completed on time. The project team will implement plan with full to complete time. The feat of
this project is dependent upon the corporation of the department’s manager and GEMS help desk
personnel. Constraints identified within this project relate to enhancements that may needed yet
due to limits on funds that will not permit upgrades. Both IT personnel and team members need
to work together as a team in order for project to be deemed successful. If a problem arises the
team will work to correct the problem efficiently.
Risk Management: The team will develop the availability of risk tools and practices such as
checklists, risk scorecard, change management processes, risk quantification sessions, and risk
response strategies. To evaluate identified risk, the project team will employ the Risk & Control
Matrix (RCM) to calculate the likelihood of the risk happening and the impact if the risk does
occur (Schwalbe, 2009)

Monitoring and Controlling Mechanisms: To ensure that projects are meeting organizational
objectives project managers will setup effective communication and controlling mechanisms that
is based on up-to-the-minute facts about the project. This will permit the project manager to
constantly improve and regulate to the varying needs of our department. In addition to progress
reports, Gantt chart and change requests will be implemented to improve project success.

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V. Operations Management Plan

Operations Strategy: “Operations management focuses on carefully managing the processes to

produce and distribute products and services.” (managementhelp.org). At my work place we will
implement Six Sigma methods to improve our electronic system used for submissions. We will
use DMAIC to analyze the effectiveness of our system, and improve our system by analyzing
data collected by team members. As discussed earlier the goal was to restructure GEMS to be
more efficient but plan to achieve this objective by limiting costs.

VI. Information Management Plan

Information System Objectives: The objective here is to use our Information’s System
department to help restructure GEMS to be more efficient. The IS department is responsible for
constructing a testing site that will mimic the actual GEMS site. This will enable EAs to
thoroughly analyze GEMS to identify problem areas.

Hardware/Software Requirements: All hardware and software needed for the success of the
project is currently available. If new equipments are needed, a request will be sent to the project
manager for approval.

Information Management Reports: The data analyst will compile and analyze other electronic
manuscript submission systems and present data to project manager

VII. Conclusion

The restructure of GEMS to make the review process more efficient was deemed successful.
Additionally by restructuring GEMS with the help of the information’s systems department and
the project members, we were able to eliminate problems that were not just related to the review
process but also to general tasks in GEMS that made the system much more efficient.

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 References

American Geophysical Union (2009) AGU Publications. Retrieved from www.agu.org

Baltzan, P., & Phillips, A. (2009). Business driven information systems. McGraw-Hill/Irwin
ISBN

Jacobs, F.R., & Chase, R.B. (2008). Operations and supply management: the core. New York:
McGraw Hill/Irwin

Operations Management. Free management library. Retrieved on December 10th, 2009 from
http://managementhelp.org/ops_mgnt/ops_mgnt.htm

Schwalbe, K. (2009). An introduction to project management (2nd ed.). Boston: Course

Technology.

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