Project Management Exam

Contingency plan is developed after the risk has occurred whereas the mitigation plan is developed prior to the risk occurring.

• TEACUPSR
• Temporary
• Endeavor
• Achieving
• Creating
• Unique
• Product
• Service or
• Result

A temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product, service or result

Temporary - every project has a definite beginning and end

Unique product, service or result --- a project  creates unique quantifiable deliverables which are different in some fundamental characteristics from other products or services

• Projects are NOT ongoing efforts (temporary)
• Projects are undertaken to attain a set of objectives and are then terminated
• Ongoing operations are meant to sustain the business 
• Projects always require some budget or resource to meet stakeholders' needs and expectations

• Scope
• Schedule/Time
• Resources/Cost

• If the scope increases the time and costs will as well (think of triangle diagram)
• It is a risk in most projects
• Can occur when the scope of a project is NOT adequately defined, documented or controlled

• Things that limit your options
• Scope
• Time
• Cost
• Quality
• Resources
• Risk

The application of knowledge, skills, tools and techniques to project activities to meet the project requirements.

• It is accomplished through the application and integration of the project management processes of
• initiating
• planning
• executing
• monitoring and controlling
• closing

Projects are progressively elaborated which involves increasing the level of detail in the Project Management Plan as more accurate estimates become available.

A collection of related projects, sub-programs and program activities managed in a coordinated way to obtain benefits not available from managing them individually

A collection of projects, programs, sub-portfolios and operations managed as a group to achieve strategic objectives.

A management structure that standardises the project related governance processes and facilitates the sharing of resources, methodologies, tools and techniques.

• Organisational systems
• project based and non-project based
• Organisational cultures and styles
• shared values, beliefs, policies, procedures, work ethics
• Organisational structure
• structures constrains the availability of resources in a range from functional to projectised, with a variety of matrix structures in between

• CEO
• Functional Manager       - project coordination
• Staff
• Staff

• Each employee has one clear superior
• Independently managed functional departments, hierarchically organised

Team members report to their functional managers

• CEO
• Project Manager
• Staff
• Staff

• Team members report directly to their PM
• PM has a lot of authority and independence
• Team members are often co-located

• CEO
• Functional Manager
• Staff
• Staff
• Project Manager
• Functional Manager is in charge and therefore PM doesn't have power
• Recognises the need for a PM BUT doesnt provide the PM with full authority over the project and project funding

• CEO
• Functional Manager - Manager of PMs
• Staff                     - PM
• Staff                     - PM

Full-time PM with considerable authority and full-time project admin staff

• PM is in charge of all aspects of the project
• Including but not limited to:
• Develop PMP and component plans
• Acquire, develop and manage project team
• Keep project schedule and budget on track
• Identify, monitor and respond to project risks
• Identify stakeholders and manage their expectations
• Provide accurate and timely reporting of project metrics

• Area specific skills
• General management proficiencies
• Knowledge and performance
• Personal effectiveness

LOOK AT DIAGRAM IN NOTES

• Product
• Business plan - idea - product - operations - divestment - upgrading

• Project
• initial - intermediate - final

• Risk should drop as project proceeds - discover more about what you are doing over time
• Uncertainty is greatest at the start of the project
• Cost of staffing is low at the start, peak in the middle and drop rapidly as the project concludes
• Stakeholder influence is highest at the starts and drops as the project continues
• Cost of changes and correcting errors increases as the project progresses

Anyone that can influence and/or is affected by the project.

• Generally measured within the constraints of
• time, cost, scope
• quality
• resources
• risk 

Stakeholder satisfaction is a KEY project objective and will help determine the overall SUCCESS

• Initiating
• Planing
• Executing
• Monitoring and controlling
• Closing

• Please Acknowledge
• Enhancing Oral
• Presentation Skill Means
• Pushing Cameron
• Into Space

• Project assessment
• Environment and organisation
• Project selection methods
• Project charter
• Identify stakeholders

• Assessing the project.
• Want information about the desired outcomes.
• Understand the methods and tools used to select the project
• Must review - assumptions and constraints and Statement of Work(SoW)

• Statement of Work is a description of products or services.
• Information to evaluate feasibility of new products or services stated assumptions and/or constraints

• Market demand
• Organisation need
• Customer need
• Technological advance
• Legal requirement
• Ecological impacts
• Social need

• Organisational culture, structure and governance
• Government or industry standards
• Marketplace conditions
• Political climate
• Conditions that cannot be controlled by the project team

• Benefit-Cost Ratio (BCR)
• Payback period
• Scoring Model
• Present Value
• NPV

• Benefit to cost ratio is:
• BCR=expected revenue/total cost

• BCR>1 benefits>costs
• BCR=1 Break-even, benefits=costs
• BCR<1 costs>benefits not financially feasible

The amount of time periods it takes to get the project investment money back and start making money

time value of money is NOT considered

• AKA weighted score method
• Criteria - Weighting - Score - Weighted Score

Value of future work to be performed expressed in today's value

• Net Present Value is the present value of the total benefits minus the costs over many time periods
• NPV= PVs of all income - PVs of all costs

General ROT if NPV>0 investment is a good choice

• It formally authorises the existence of the project
• Appoints PM
• Issued by the project initiator or sponsor during the PROJECT INITIATION PHASE

• Provides a description of project objective and success criteria
• Provides high-level requirements and project description

• Specifies high-level risks
• Specifies schedule milestones and summary budget

• Project PURPOSE or JUSTIFICATION
• Project DESCRIPTION (summary-level)
• High-level project and product REQUIREMENTS
• Summary BUDGET
• Initial high-level RISKS
• Summary MILESTONES
• Project OBJECTIVES and SUCCESS CRITERIA
• ACCEPTANCE CRITERIA
• PM and AUTHORITY level
• APPROVALS

• Project Sponsor
• Project Manager
• Core Team
• Extended Team

• Core team - key personnel formed during the project initiation stage, involved with planning
• Extended team - specific skills, as required, involved in project execution

• Goals
• Broad, brief statements of intent or vision for planning
• Objectives
• Very clear with a definite, measurable outcome

• Specific - what exactly are we going to do?
• Measurable - is it measurable and can we measure it?
• Achievable - can it be done within the proposed time frame, environment and for this amoutn of money?
• Relevant - will this objective lead to the desired results?
• Time bound - when will we accomplish this objective?

• Customer/user
• Project sponsor
• PMs
• Portfolio managers
• Portfolio review board
• Functional managers
• Operations management
• Sellers and business partners
• Program managers

• 1) Identify stakeholder
• 2) Analyse potential impact or support
• look at matrix power vs interest
• 3) Classify stakeholders and develop management strategies

• I Saw Tom Cruise Questioning Hillary Clinton Real Problem Stop
• Integration
• Scope
• Time
• Costs
• Quality
• Human Resources
• Communications
• Risk
• Procurement
• Stakeholders

• Project complexity controls detail
• Defines how the project is executed, monitored and controlled and closed

• Product scope
• includes the features and functions that characterise a poduct, service or result
• Project scope
• includes all the work (and ONLY the work) that needs to be performed to deliver a product, service or result with the specified features and functions

• Product scope
• Features
• Functions
• Product specification

• Project scope
• All the work that needs to be done
• PMP

• A sufficiently detailed description of the projects deliverables and/or its components 
• so that deviations from the baseline can be measured

• INCLUDES
• Project scope statement
• Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)
• WBS dictionary

project sponsor or customer and project team must agree

Part of the PMP

• Provides guidance on how the project scope is:
• defined
• documented
• verified
• managed
• controlled

• Functional requirements define the WHAT'S
• non-technical
• what it is and does
• understandable
• customer orientated
• features and capabilities
• Technical requirements define the HOW'S
• Detailed components
• Particular technology
• Project team orientated
• Performance specifications

• Interviewing
• Focus groups (interactive discussions with
• moderator)
• Group creativity techniques (brainstorming, Delphi, mind mapping, affinity diagram, Multi Criteria Decision Analysis, Nominal Group Technique)
• Benchmarking
• Group activities
• Questionnaires and surveys
• Observations
• Prototypes

• Dictatorship - 1 person makes the decision
• Unamity - everyone agrees 
• Majority  - majority rules
• Plurality - largest block in a group decides

• Complete
• Consistent and Clear
• Acceptable
• Testable and Traceable

Need the requirements to develop the scope

• Detailed description of project's deliverables and the work required to create those deliverables
• Products scope description
• Deliverables
• Acceptance criteria
• Project exclusions
• Constraints 
• Assumptions

Work Breakdown Structure

A hierarchical breakdown of the scope of work for a project

Organises and defines the total scope of the project

Represents the work contained in the Scope Statement

• FORMATS
• Decomposition
• MUST code each item, use verb noun format
• Outline Indented format
• MUST code each item

• Work packages
• Lowest level items for which cost and duration can be estimated and managed
• Control accounts
• Level above work packages
• predetermined for management reporting and accounting purposes

Work Breakdown Structure Dictionary

• Includes work package descriptions and planning information
• such as schedules, budgets and staff assignments

• Updated Project Scope Statement
• WBS
• WBS dictionary

WORK BREAKDOWN STRUCTURE

• Phase - start to finish of a project
• Deliverables - deliverables broken down into components
• Project Management Process - deliverables associated with IPEMCC

• Decomposition
• Dividing work packages up into smaller more manageable components called Schedule Activities
• Rolling Wave Planning
• Form of progressive elaboration
• Work to be conducted in the future is planned in less detail than that to be undertaken soon 
• Milestone List
• IDENTIFIES significant points or events in the project
• INDICATES whether milestone is mandatory or optional
• Can ALSO be included as checkpoints

• Nodes (boxes) represent the activity
• Arrows connecting nodes show the dependencies

• 4 types of dependencies
• Finish-Start (FS)
• Start-Start (SS)
• Start-Finish (SF)
• Finish-Finish (FF)

• Finish to Start
• A must be completed before B starts

• Start to Start
• B can starts after A has started

• Start to Finish 
• A must start before B can finish

• Finish to Finish
• A must finish before B finishes

• BASE - 
• TASK - usual workday
• RESOURCE - every resource has its own availability

• ANALOGOUS
• Comparing your project to others
• Using historical data from similar activities or projects as the basis of estimating
• Top-down approach

• PARAMETRIC
• Estimate by multiplying the quantity of work by productivity ate
• Estimate time for one level and then the rest

3-point average of the optimistic, pessimistic and most likely

• Program Evaluation Review Technique
• (P+4ML+O)/6

• 1)FORWARD PASS (ES and EF)
• determine the earliest start and earliest finish for each activity
• 2)BACKWARD PASS (LS and LF)
• determine the latest start and latest finish for each activity
• 3)CALCULATE FLOAT
• LS-ES or LF-EF 
• 4)IDENTIFY THE CRITICAL PATHS
• Where float is 0 or negative
• Longest path through the network
• Shortest amount of time in which the project can be completed

• As you go forward use the largest number
• As you go backwards use the smallest number

Can have one or more critical paths but the more critical paths the greater the risk

• Resources smoothing
• Doesnt change completion date
• 10, 20 and 30 hours
• reschedule so 20 hrs per week

• Resource leveling
• Level the peaks and troughs use from other work periods
• Leveling results in increased costs and schedule slip

• Crashing
• Add more resources to finish work quick
• Have to be effort driven

• Fast tracking
• Do activities in parallel instead of sequentially for at least part of their duration
• May cause rework and increase risk

• Total budget
• Management reserve
• Cost baseline
• Contingency reserve
• Project level
• Control accounts
• Work packages
• Activities

• Contingency reserve
• for known unknowns
• 5-20% of total work activity and cost estimates

• Management reserve
• for unknown unknowns
• 2-5% of cost baseline

• Interactive - meeting, video conference, phone calls
• Push - memos, reports, emails, faxes
• Pull - intranet information repositries

• Developing plans for 
• increasing the likelihood and impact of positive events
• decreasing the likelihood and impact of negative events

• Determined using these methods:
• Risk management plan
• Identify risks
• Quantitative risk analysis
• Qualitative risk analysis 
• Plan risk responses

• An Event
• Probability
• Impact

• Business risk
• Pure/insurable risk

• Predictable risks 'known unknowns'
• Contingency reserve
• Unpredictable risks 'unknown unknowns'
• Management reserve