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What is Prj management and what are the chars that define a Prj?
Project management – the process of scoping, planning, staffing, organizing, directing, and controlling the development of an acceptable system at a minimum cost within a specified time frame.
Project – a [temporary] sequence of unique, complex, and connected activities having one goal or purpose and that must be completed by specific time, within budget, and according to specification.
Differentiate between Prj and process management?
Process management – the activity of documenting, managing, and continually improving the process of systems development.
List 4 criteria for Prj success.
The resulting information system is acceptable to the customer.
The system was delivered “on time.”
The system was delivered “within budget.”
The system development process had a minimal impact on ongoing business operations.
List 5 Prj mismanagement problems.
1. Failure to establish upper-management commitment to the project
2. Lack of organization’s commitment to the system development methodology
3. Taking shortcuts through or around the system development methodology
4. Poor expectations management
5. Premature commitment to a fixed budget and schedule
6. Poor estimating techniques 7. Over optimism
8. The mythical man-month (Brooks, 1975) 9. Inadequate people management skills
10. Failure to adapt to business change 11 .Insufficient resources
12. Failure to “manage to the plan”
What are scope creep and feature creep? How they impact Prj success?
Scope Creep: is the unexpected growth of user expectations and business requirements for an IS as Prj progresses. The schedule and budget can adversely affected by such changes.
Feature Creep: is the uncontrolled additional of technical features to sys under development without regard to schedule and budget.
What is PMBOK?
The Prj Management Ins. was created as a professional society to guide the development and certification of professional Prj managers. It created the “Project Management Body Of Knowledge” for education and certification of them.
Define 8 functions performed by every Prj management.
Scoping – setting the boundaries of the project
Planning – identifying the tasks required to complete the project
Estimating – identifying the resources required to complete the project
Scheduling – developing the plan to complete the project
Organizing – making sure members understand their roles and responsibilities
Directing – coordinating the project Controlling – monitoring progress
Closing – assessing success and failure
Compare and contrast Gantt and PERT charts.
PERT chart – a graphical network model used to depict the interdependencies between a project’s tasks.
Gantt chart – a bar chart used to depict project tasks against a calendar.
Gantt charts are more effective when you are seeking to communicate schedule. PERT charts are more effective when you want to study the relationships between tasks.
What is joint Prj Planning?
Joint project planning (JPP) – a strategy in which all stakeholders attend an intensive workshop aimed at reaching consensus on project decisions.
What role does a statement of work play in scope definition and why is important to Prj management?
Statement of work – a narrative description of the work to be performed as part of a project. Common synonyms include scope statement, project definition, project overview, and document of understanding.
What is a work breakdown structure?
Work breakdown structure (WBS) – a graphical tool used to depict the hierarchical decomposition of the project into phases, activities, and tasks.
What is milestone and why it does not have duration?
Milestone – an event signifying the completion of a major project deliverable. Milestones have no duration, they simply happen.
List 2 factors that impact task duration and estimation of task duration.
Estimate the minimum amount of time it would take to perform the task – the optimistic duration (OD).
Estimate the maximum amount of time “ – the pessimistic duration (PD).
Estimate the expected duration (ED) that will be needed to perform the task.
Calculate a weighted average of the most likely duration (D) as follows:
List 4 types of intertask dependencies. Why are they important to Prj planning?
Finish-to-start (FS)—The finish of one task triggers the start of another task.
Start-to-start (SS)—The start of one task triggers the start of another task.
Finish-to-finish (FF)—Two tasks must finish at the same time.
Start-to-finish (SF)—The start of one task signifies the finish of another task.
List 5 types of resources that can be assigned to a Prj and managed.
1. People – includes all the system owners, users, analysts, designers, builders, external agents, and clerical help that will be involved in the project in any way.
. Services – includes services such as a quality review that may be charged on a per use basis.
3. Facilities and equipment – includes all rooms and technology that will be needed to complete the project.
4. Supplies and materials – includes everything from pencils, paper, notebooks to toner cartridges, and so on.
5. Money – includes a translation of all of the above into budgeted dollars!
Differentiate forward and reverse scheduling.
Forward scheduling – a project scheduling approach that establishes a project start date and then schedules forward from that date.
Reverse scheduling – a project scheduling strategy that establishes a project deadline and then schedules backward from that date.
What is resource leveling? When must a Prj manager do it? 2 technologies.
Resource leveling – a strategy for correcting resource overall locations.
It is common to overalloacte resources when assigning them to tasks, that is assigning resources, more that available. Here Prj manager must use resource leveling which has 2 technologies :
1.task delaying 2.task splitting
What is a critical path for a project?
Critical path – the sequence of dependent tasks that determines the earliest possible completion date of the project.
What is a slack time and how does it related with critical path?
Slack time – the amount of delay that can be tolerated between the starting time and completion time of a task without causing a delay in the completion date of the entire.
The opposite of a critical path is one that has some slack of time.
What is change management?
A formal strategy in which a process is established to facilitate changes that occur during a project. |
