ASSIGNMENT

Subject code: MB0033

(3 credits)
Set 2
Marks 60
SUBJECT NAME : PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Answer the following questions. Each Question carries 10 marks

1. Write brief note on need for project management , project management knowledge
areas and relationships.

Need for project management

Project management is necessary because –

a) a project requires huge investments which should not go waste

b) a loss in any project would have direct or indirect impact on the society

c) prevent failures in projects

d) scope of the project activity may undergo a change

e) technology used may change during the course of project execution

f) consequences of negativity in project related problems could be very serious

g) changes in economic conditions may affect a project

Project Management Knowledge Areas and Relationship

It comprises of various techniques needed to manage projects, the practical methodologies

adopted in formulating a project and managing the resources which would affect the project
completion.

Relationship with other management disciplines is essential for a project to be successful.

Supporting disciplines includes law, strategic planning, logistics, human resource management
and domain knowledge.
 2. Explain the various estimation approaches and estimation tools.
Estimation Approaches – There are two types of estimation approaches:
a. Bottom up approach
The bottom up approach consists of the following –
i. Project manager first divides the product under development into major modules.
ii. Each module is subdivided into smaller units.
iii. Project manager defines a standard for manufacturing and self-testing as-
Identify modules in the system and classify them as simple, medium or complex.
As much as possible, use either the provided standard definitions or definitions from past
projects
If a project specific baseline exists, get the average build effort for simple/medium/complex
(S/M/C) programs from the baseline.
If a project specific baseline does not exist, use project type, technology, language and other
attributes to look for similar projects in process database. Use data from these projects to define
the build effort of S/M/C program.
If no similar project exist in the process database and no project specific baseline exist refine the
estimates based on project specific factors.

b. Top Down Approach

The top down approach consists of the following –
i. Get the estimate of the total size of the product in function points
ii. Using the productivity data from the project specific capability baseline from the general
process capability baseline, or from similar projects, fix the productivity level for the project.
iii. Obtain the overall effort estimate from the productivity and size estimates. Use effort
distribution data from the process capability baselines or similar projects to estimate the effort
for the various phases. Refine the estimates taking project specific factors into consideration.

Estimation Tools

The various estimation tools that may be used in managing a project are :
a. Algorithmic model – It consists of one or more algorithms that produce an effort estimate as a
function of a number of variables or cost drivers.
b. Expert judgment – It relies on one or more people who are considered experts in some
endeavor related to the problem at hand eg: The software application or effort estimation.
c. Analogy – Comparison of the proposed project to completed projects of a similar nature
whose cost are known. The organizations process database is a source for historical cost data.
d. Top down – An overall cost estimate for the project is derived from global properties of the
product. This estimate will usually be based on the previous projects and will include the costs of
all functions in a project like integration, documentation, quality assurance and configuration
management.
e. Bottom-up – Each component of the software product is separately estimated and the results
aggregated to produce an estimate for the overall job.
f. Automated estimation models – A number of computerized models are available which
estimate cost and schedule from user inputs of size and environmental cost factors. Most of these
are algorithmic models that use components as the measure of size.
3. What are the activities and approaches of monitoring a project and controlling the
project?
Project Monitoring and Control
Any project aimed at delivering a product or a service has to go through phases in a planned
manner in order to meet the requirements. It is possible to work according to the project plan
only by careful monitoring of the project progress. It requires establishing control factors to keep
the project on the track of progress. The results of any stage in a project, depends on the inputs to
that stage. It is therefore necessary to control all the inputs and the corresponding outputs from a
stage. A project manager may use certain standard tools to keep the project on track. The project
manager and the team members should be fully aware of the techniques and methods to rectify
the factors influencing delay of the project and its product. The various steps involved in
monitoring and controlling a project from start to end are as follows –

Preliminary work – the team members understand the project plans, project stage schedule,
progress controls, tracking schedules, summary of the stage cost and related worksheets. All the
member has to understand the tolerances in any change and maintain a change control log. They
must realize the need and importance of quality for which they have to follow strictly a quality
review schedule and frequently discuss on the quality agendas. They must understand the stage
status reports, stage end reports, stage end approval reports.

Project Progress – The members must keep a track of the project progress and communicate the
same to other related members of the project. They must monitor and control project progress,
through the use of regular check points, quality charts, and statistical tables, control the quality
factors which are likely to deviate from expected values as any deviation may result in changes
to the stage schedule. The project manager ensures that these changes are made smoothly and
organizes review meeting with the project management group.

Stage Control – The manager must establish a project check point cycle. For this suitable stage
version control procedures may be followed. The details are to be documented stage wise.
Project files have to be frequently updated with suitable version control number and revision
status should be maintained for each change. Team members are identified who will exercise
controls at various points of the project.

Resources – Plan the resources required for various stage of the project. Brief both the project
team and the key resources about the objectives of every stage, planned activities, products,
organization, metrics and project controls

Quality Control – This is very important in any project. Quality control is possible if the project
members follow the quality charts and norms very strictly.

Schedule Quality Review – It is recommended that quality review be scheduled at the beginning
of the stage and also ending of every stage.

Agenda for quality review – create and distribute a quality review agenda specifying the
objective, products, logistics, roles, responsibilities and time frame.
Conduct quality review – the quality review is to be conducted in a structured and formal
manner. Quality review should focus on product development and its quality factors. Focus on
whether it meets the prescribed quality standard.

Follow up - QR complete product status revised from ‘In progresses to ‘QR Complete’. Follow
up the actions planned in strict manner which ensures conformity to the standards.

Review quality control procedures – verify that the quality objectives for each product are
appropriate and that all participants are satisfied both with the process and its outcome.

3. Explain in detail the organizational evolutionary and revolutionary changes.

Organizational Change

Organizations will have structures, hierarchies, functions, communication patterns, decision

centre, and most importantly cultures – which define them and make them unique. To cope with
new challenges, to introduce new products or services, to take up new opportunities and to take
on competition the organizational members have to implement changed practices. We have
mainly two types of changes to contend with. The first is the evolutionary change which is
gradual, incremental and with a narrow focus on one or a few processes. These changes take
place as the organisation evolves and in an effort to ward off some impending problems, they are
implemented. The second occurs as a result of drastic structural changes, a new technology, a
new thrust for a huge increase in capacity, a new business acquisition, implementation of a new
strategy. We call this revolutionary change. The four important instruments are reengineering, E-
Engineering, restructuring and innovation.

Evolutionary Change

The following are a few cases of evolutionary change

a) Socio-technical changes take place as the organisation evolves over time. The managers need
to optimize both the technical and social systems for promoting effectiveness. They adjust both
the systems gradually so that group norms and cohesiveness are not disrupted. This also helps in
avoiding group-level resistance to change. However, changes in the way tasks are performed do
change perception among workers about their own groups which might have been disrupted
owing to technical requirements. The purpose of these changes is to bring in continuous
improvement in product quality.

b) Total Quality Management is an ongoing effort among members across functions to find new
ways to improve quality in products and services. This change process, though incremental
requires both workmen and managers to adopt new ways to viewing their roles in the
organisation.
c) Flexible workers and Flexible work teams – Each worker can substitute another worker and
can change his team depending upon the exigency. This means that all the workers are trained
for multiple tasking. This change has been found to promote quality because of the absence of
boredom – which may cause loss of quality. Thus, a flexible work team becomes a group of
workers who assume responsibility for performing all the operations necessary for a particular
portion of the project.

Revolutionary Change

The following are a few cases of Revolutionary Change

a) Reengineering – This is a process by which managers redesign a bundle of tasks into roles
and functions so that organizational effectiveness is achieved. By doing so dramatic
improvements in critical measures of performance like cost, quality and service are expected.
There will be a radical rethink about the business processes adopted.

A business process is any activity like inventory control, product design, orders processing,
delivery systems. No reference is taken to the existing process – ignoring it, an entirely new
process is adopted. The following rules for reengineering are effective

i) Make changes with the outcome in mind – not the tasks that result in them.

ii) Make the users of the results of the process effect the change

iii) Let the people on the spot decide on the solution – decentralize

b) E-Engineering – The term E-Engineering refers to the attempts of companies to make use of
all kinds of information systems, to make their functions efficient. New information systems are
installed for conducting all business processes in the organisation. The use of electronic
communication within the organisation enables frequent interactions between employees and
results in better communication. Meetings require their presence, but with teleconferencing a lot
of time is saved. Data have repositories which are accessible, transferable and updatable instantly
and used by all concerned. Cross-functional workflows make it easier to coordinate activities.
The increase in efficiency makes the organisation to meet customers’ requirements faster.

All these result in widespread utilization of knowledge in the organisation. It helps in creating
and making available high quality of information. The information system using intranet and
internet solutions carry on their regular activities on line.

c) Restructuring – This is attempted with change in authority and task relationships of

managers. The move from the functional form or a standard division structure, to combine or
divide areas of control and authority to facilitate better coordination and/or workflow can be
restructuring. In the process, a few jobs may not be there. A few people may have multi-
functional activities. The main purpose is reducing bureaucratic costs. This is because a change
in strategy is considered. Downsizing is a way of restructuring.
d) Innovation – it is the successful use of skills and resources in such a way that their response
to customers’ needs effective. Changes in technology have made computers cheaper, faster and
more users friendly. This has made a thorough change in the skills of employees and managers.
Every company needs to adopt new methods – find them – to make them relevant in the
changing world. The thrust in every department/function should be to do things better with new
methods. A culture that promotes this thought across the organisation is the best way to benefit
from it. For promotion, suitable people have to and be selected, trained, empowered and
rewarded. A thorough change in the way problems are solved is needed.
The Project Manager may have to initiate the change process to increase the effectiveness of his
team. Being a key person in the organisation, his actions are always under scrutiny. If he takes
initiative, whenever the opportunity arises, to effect incremental changes, the resistance both by
the top management and his team members will be non-existent.

4. Write a detailed note on Review templates and post review activities.

Review Templates
Each project Management Review meeting starts with an introduction of the face-to-face and
meet-me call participants and an opportunity for general comments. The remainder of the
Review meeting focuses on six categories of information – General overview, status of action
items from prior review, project status, product status, issues and risks, project unique
information.
Electronic templates are used to assist project staff in the preparation of the Project
Management Review briefings- First-Time Reviews, Ongoing Reviews, and Samples.
The templates serve as a means of standardizing the reporting requirements and enabling a
common set of criteria for evaluating the health and progress of the Department’s corporate
and major information systems.
Presenters may choose to develop their own set of slides as long as the requested information
is covered.
General Overview
This category sets the stage for the remainder of the information provided during the Review.
Four slides are included in this set. For the First Time Review, all four slides should be
covered. In subsequent reviews, the slides should be included only if any of the information
has changed. Slide 6 may need to be provided the first quarter of each fiscal year, since it
documents the Objectives by Year and is required in Ongoing Reviews, if information has
changed.

Status of Action Items from Prior Review

This slide provides accountability and closure for issues or action items that were raised
during the prior review. Issues and action items are listed in the Review report that
distributed after the Review by the Staff. The project manager is expected to check this list in
preparation for the current review, include all listed items on the slide, and provide the status
of each item. Issues and action items that are closed during the period from the prior review
to the current review should be reported in addition to any items that remain open.
Project Status
The project status category focuses on the management approach (e.g., schedule, cost,
decision, points, ROI funding status) used for the project. Information presented in this
category should cover: The project plan includes a logically laid out schedule with dates for
significant items and decision points over the current fiscal year as well as the out-years.

Work out details w.r.t to question asked -

What has occurred during the last quarter?
What was accomplished including any changes from previously identified project
deliverables (the baseline?)
Accelerated or slipped dates ?
Any significant newly identified/requested user requirements and their impacts on schedule,
costs, etc.
Dates planned to achieve the project objectives.
The First Time Review slides for the Project Status section should be reviewed at the start of
each fiscal year to determine if project changes warrant their inclusion in the first quarter
Ongoing Review
Project Schedule/Decision Points
The project plan and project schedule should demonstrate the inclusion of plans to address
known or likely obstacles, and identified points where decisions or involvement by the CIO
or the project manager’s management is necessary. It should include expected achievement
dates for the item/activity performance metrics (overall project performance metrics),
requirements, and review items.
Critical decisions are defined Program and project Management for the Acquisition of
Capital Assets, as formal determinations or decisions at specific points in a project stage that
allow the project to proceed to the next stage and commit resources. Include key decision
points such as when the project exits one stage and enters another; the contractor(s) comes
aboard, date the changes will be frozen for a particular phase of installation, when
deployment and/or conversion to the new system are to occur, and date that the new system
becomes the system of record.

An updated project plan with a work breakdown structure should be maintained that contains
the details for the next 12-18 months, and less detail for the out-years. The out-year
breakdown should contain the key/major items and decision points, as a minimum. Provide
the detailed work breakdown structure as background material for each review to handout as
part of the presentation and to be posted on the project management review information
repository.

Development Funding Status

If any portion of the project moves into production while modules are still under
development, the slide should also include funding status for the maintenance costs.

Estimated Total Cost

The standard requires capitalization of direct and indirect costs, including employee salaries
and benefits for employees who materially participate in the project. The CFO uses a Web
site data collection system for tracking and documenting costs. The program/project manager
is responsible for ensuring that capitalization costs are captured for the project. Capitalization
should be projected in the business case and then captured and tracked for each year of the
project thereafter. For more information contact the CFO’s office.

Maintenance Funding Status

This slide is used to identify the maintenance costs and funding sources for the project. The
intent of the slide is to help in forecasting, planning and justifying expenditures for
maintenance of new systems. Maintenance funding needs to be documented sand issues or
concerns rose as quickly as possible. Display projected maintenance costs beyond
development completion. Record the project maintenance funding by source for the next
seven years of the project.

ROI
Return on Investment (ROI) is the calculated benefit that an organization is projected to
receive in return for investing money (resources) in a project. Within the context of the
Review Process, the investment would be in an information system development or
enhancement project. ROI information is used to assess the status of the business viability of
the project at key checkpoints throughout the project’s life-cycle.

ROI may include the benefits associated with improved mission performance, reduced cost,
increased quality, speed, or flexibility, and increased customer and employee satisfaction.
ROI should reflect such risk factors as the project’s technical complexity, the agency’s
management capacity, the likelihood of cost overruns, and the consequences of under-or non-
performance. Where appropriate, ROI should reflect actual returns observed through pilot
projects and prototypes.

ROI should be quantified in terms of dollars and should include a calculation of the break-
even point (BEP), which is the date when the investment begins to generate a positive return.
ROI should be re-calculated at every major checkpoint of a project to se if the BEP is still on
schedule, based on project spending and accomplishments to date. If the project is behind
schedule or over budget, the BEP may move out in time; if the project is ahead of schedule or
under budget the BEP may occur earlier. In either case, the information is important for
decision-making based on the value of the investment throughout the project life-cycle.

Any project that has developed a business case is expected to refresh the ROI at each key
project decision point (i.e., stage exit) or at least yearly.

Exclusions
If the detailed data collection, calculation of benefits and costs, and capitalization data from
which Return on Investment (ROI) is derived was not required for a particular project, then it
may not be realistic or practical to require the retrofit calculation of ROI once the project is
added to the Review portfolio.

In such a case, it is recommended that a memorandum of record be developed as a substitute

for ROI. The memorandum should provide a brief history of the program, a description of the
major benefits realized to date with as much quantitative data as possible, and a summary of
the process used to identify and select system enhancements.

Some of the major benefits experienced by sites that installed the information system that
would be important to include in the memorandum are:

a) Decommissioning of mainframe computers

b) Reduction/redirection of labour

c) Elimination of redundant systems

d) Ability to more cost effectively upgrade all sites with one standard upgrade package.

In each case above, identify the specific site, systems, and labour involved in determining
the cited benefit. Identify any costs or dollar savings that are known or have been estimated.
The memorandum will be used as tool for responding to any future audit inquiries on project
ROI.

For the Project Management Review, it is recommended that the project leader replace the
text on the ROI document through –

(1) a note stating which stage of its-cycle the project is in;

(2) A bulleted list of the most important points from the memorandum of record; and

(3) a copy of the memorandum of record for the Review repository.

In subsequent Reviews of the information system, the ROI slide can be eliminated form the
package. There is one notable exception to this guidance. Any internal use software project in
the maintenance phase of its life-cycle that adds a new site or undertakes an enhancement or
technology refresh that reaches the cost threshold established by Standard will need to satisfy
capitalization requirements. It requires all agencies to capitalize items acquired or developed
for internal use if the expected service life is two or more years and its cost meets or exceeds
the agency’s threshold for internal use software. The standard requires capitalization of direct
and indirect costs, including employee salaries and benefits for both Federal and Contractor
employees who materially participate in the Software project. Program managers are
considered to be the source of cost information for internal use software projects. If
capitalization data is collected for the project in the future, the project would be expected to
calculate and track its ROI.

Product Status
The product status section focuses on the technical approach, e.g., system architecture,
project methodology and processes, product quality, and risks and issues. Product
measurements are used in quality assurance processes to project and measure product quality.
These include defect reporting, testing status, and customer satisfaction measurements.
Performance Measures – Performance measurements are used in project management and
quality processes to determine and communicate status and accomplishments measured
against specific objectives, schedules, and milestones. These measurements extend to include
delivery of desired products and services to customers, whether external or internal.

“Performance Measurement is the ongoing monitoring and reporting of program

accomplishments, particularly progress towards pre-established goals. It is typically
conducted by program or agency management. Performance measures may address the type
or level of program activities conducted (process), the direct products and service delivered
by a program (outputs), and or the results or those products and services (outcomes). A
“program” may be any activity, project, function, or policy that has an identifiable purpose or
set of objectives.”

Capital Planning and Investment Process must institute performance measures and
management processes that actual performance to expected results. Measurements c an be
reported at the program and project level and include resource and cost goals, schedule and
progress goals, trade-offs and risk outcomes product quality goals, and customer satisfaction
goals.

Basic categories of performance measurements include:

Measures of efforts: Efforts are the amount of financial and non-financial resources (in terms
of money, material, etc.) that are put into a program or process.

Measures of accomplishments: Accomplishments measures report what was provided and

achieve with the resources used. There are two types of measures of accomplishments –
outputs and outcomes. Outputs measure the quantity of services provided; outcomes measure
the results of providing those outputs.

Measures that relate efforts to accomplishments: Efficiency measures that relate efforts to
outputs of products or services. These indicators measure the resources used or cost (for
example, in rupees, employee-hours, or equipment used) per unit of output. They provide
information about the production of an output at a given level of resource use and
demonstrate an entity’s relative efficiency when compared with previous results, internally
established goals and objectives, generally accepted norms or standards, or results achieved
by similar entities.

Issues and Risks

Any external interests or issues should be covered by the project manager. Issues are
expected to be resolved during project team meetings or stage exits. Significant issues
whether resolved or not should be documented and discussed at the project Management
Review for lessons-learned purposes so that the same difficulties are not repeated during
subsequent enhancements or upgrades nor by other corporate or major systems, and solutions
are shared throughout the Department.
Any project unique items that the program or project manager feels should be brought to the
attention of management or senior management, e.g., the CIO. The issues or concerns need to
be addressed by the CIO as well as the status of other project issues or risks.
Concerns/Issues Requiring Attention presents the issues or concerns that need to be
addressed by management or senior management, e.g., the CIO. Bring to the awareness of
those concerns or issues either about the project or the proposed solution that may be
resolved. This information is typically identified and raised by the project manager.
Project Unique Information –
highlight any additional project information to be included in the Project Management
Review.
Overview of Project Status – Its purpose is to communicate a visually-oriented “thumbnail”
view of the project’s status. The status will be reported as Green, Yellow, or Red, using the
criteria documented below.
The data should be a cumulative representation of the project status. All parties present at the
review should reach consensus that this slide fairly represents the status of the project, as it
will be used for (upper) management reporting purposes.

Post-Review Activities
Once the Project Management Review has been conducted, follow up with program/project
managers on any issues or concerns requiring attention, the status of open items from the
review, and CIO reporting actions, e.g., reports to the CIO Council. The CIO may also
recommend quality assurance analysis be conducted.
Issues or Concerns Requiring Attention
The project manager is responsible for raising issues or concerns that require assistance or
guidance to the attention of the CIO. These items should be communicated whenever they
become known, and not held to the next Project Management Review. The CIO will assign
appropriate OCIO staff available to help resolve open items. The program / project manager
should communicate the status of these items in each quarterly review until the items are
resolved / closed.

Status of Open Items from Review

The program/project manager is responsible for tracking the open items from the review and
communicating the status in each quarterly review until the items are closed. The supporting
the scheduling of reviews will coordinate with the program/project manager after the
quarterly reviews to help ensure that new items have been captured for tracking and action by
the program/project manager.

CIO Reports
The staff supporting the CIO Quarterly Reviews will prepare a summary report after each
Project Management Review. The summary report will include the following information:
i) Summary Status
ii) Open Issues/Items
iii) Status Performance Objectives/Measures
iv) Status of Schedule/Cost
 5. Write a detailed note on the fundamentals of Application software and support
software.
Projection Management has become so complex in modern times that project teams have started
to realize the challenges of handling such a formidable mix of business processes – the sheer
volumes had earlier led to suspended animation of several large project till a number of leading
software firms, led by Microsoft, came up with an IT-integrated approach with well-designed
standardized software solution for Project Management – apart from breathing easy, project team
members sensed the opportunity to exhibit better efficiency and a greater level of adherence to
schedules when a bulk of their manual processes were automated to a great extent.

In this unit, therefore, students will understand the fundamentals of Project Management
Application Software through a cursory look at the features and capabilities of leading Software
Solution like MS PROJECT, ODETTE, INNOVATEUR, AGILE. While this just serves to
understand the concepts, students are advised to visit their websites & download demo versions
to understand how they work. Various sections & subsections of this unit would cover details of
the following:
PROJECT MANAGEMENT APPLICATION SOFTWARE:
ODETTE
ARIS Web Publisher
Microsoft Project 2002
AGILE PROJECT MANAGEMENT SYSTEM apart from Writing a Winning Business Plan

Introduction to Supply Chain Monitoring (SCMo )

It is possible today to establish a system aligned with an organizations supply chain. It can be an
add-on to existing ERP-systems. The main objectives are –
i) Prevention of stock-out and over supply
ii) Early warnings, elimination of bull-whip effect
iii) Optimized allocation in bottleneck situations due to network-wide inventory and demand
transparency

The main Principles behind is the Integration of supply chain participants, Exchange of demand
and inventory information, transparency & Visibility of inventories and demands for multi-level
supply chains. It also eliminates time lags in the information flow and ensures synchronization of
demand information.

SCMo set up (Initialization) – The main steps for the set up are:
a) Determination of the potentially critical part of the supply network Criteria:
b) Mapping of Structures a) high shortage risk and effect, long lead and reaction times, high total
inventory cost, frequent engineering changes.
Main Features – The main features of such system are –
i) Releases and Iterations planning – It is a simple way to create project plan.
ii) Dashboard- It is a quick project status reporting tool.
iii) To-Do lists – Identify and list the integrated assignments.
iv) Integrated QA -Bug Tracking, Test Cases management, user story-to-bugs traceability, QA
stats and charts.
v) Time Tracking – Create more accurate estimates of time.
A typical Iteration Plan methodology
a) Add Release (iterations will be generated automatically)
b) Add User Stories
c) Assign User Stories on Iterations (control team velocity)
d) To plan next iteration just assign required user stories and control remaining velocity units.
e) View assigned Tasks and Bugs
f) Change bug’s status
g) Add spent time
h) Spent time report could be added form To-Do list. To simplify time calculation today’s time
shown in the form.
i) Bug status could be changed right from the To-Do list as well. So developer spends less time
on frequent actions.