Case Study Of The Olympic Village Welcome Center Optimization Project

The Olympic Games are one of the largest international sport events that in the past decades have gained a popularity across the world and have grown into an independent business project that raises social and political issues,solves them through setting humanistic priorities and arranging not only sports competitions but also various programs for athletes and sport fans,as well as supporting world eco-tourism and environmental programs.The Games have a complex structure and built of smaller sub-projects that are managed separately in accordance with their purpose.The subject of this research is the Olympic Village Welcome Center – a facility based on the premises of the Olympic Village,main purpose of which is to provide a smooth arrival and departure services to the Guests of the Village – Athletes,Team Officials and Olympic Family Members,and to facilitate luggage transportation and stock organization,informing and consulting the guests on any possible issues.The vibrant and constantly changing environment of the Welcome Center makes it is quite challenging to predict all possible risks or to provide planning that will allow a smooth implementation,however,there is a room for developing contingency plans through researching and taking in consideration of predicaments from the past.The research is aimed to create a project that will help to identify the problems and to optimize the existing process.The study presents a variety of methods,such as framework study,questionnaire,content analysis,expert group evaluation and brainstorming.At the beginning of the research,a review of the literature on the selected subject was conducted and further was used as theoretical basis of the study.According to the gained knowledge,the survey has been developed and distributed among the volunteers of the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro in 2016 and Sochi in 2014.Communication was established personally with each participant through social networks and communities,the meaning of collected information,the purpose of the study,and the meaninglessness of the distortion of information were explained.After received data was analyzed through the method of content analysis,all discovered problems were ranked in accordance with the frequency of their appearance.Next step was to create case studies based on the participants answers and to arrange an expert group meeting(using the on-line conferences)to receive their professional opinion on the ways of resolving the complexities that were found through the surveys.Experts were asked to participate in brainstorming in order to establish the best possible solutions.All the suggestions and recommendations were carefully collected and are presented in the study.Adding to the above,the possible risks of implementing the project that may occur were as well identified in attempt to provide guidance for those who will attempt putting the theoretical results into practice.The first part of the work is introductory and gives the insights into the topic.The second chapter discusses the literature on Project Management,International Management,International Team Management,Olympic Games and Olympic Projects,and theoretical backgrounds used in the study.Chapter three provides functional description of the Welcome Center,its functional areas,tasks and goals that management,and it gives consideration to the possible areas of optimization within the Welcome Center.Chapter four is a heart of the research: it explains the ways in which the obtained results were analyzed using actual samples,it discusses all five stages(initiating,planning,implementing,controlling and closing)under which the project for optimization was developed,giving the details on all the require steps that should be taken in order to obtain the results.Chapter Five is devoted to a short discussion on risk assessment and complicities that might take place during project development and its implementation.The research design presented in the paper can be applied to any future Olympic Games as using the same concept will help managers in charge gain the knowledge on the complications that had occurred in the previous projects and thus to find possible solutions and/or develop contingency plans.Besides that,the authors provide a list of obstacles that can be encored while trying to implement changes necessary for optimization.Analysis and solutions for the Welcome Center's problems should contribute to the process of the Welcome Center working efficiency improvement,leaving among the unresolved problems only unpredictable ones.