Project Selection and Project Charters

Project Selection and Project Charters

Subject: General Questions    / General General Questions
Question
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Projects and Project Management (graded)

This week, we will learn about project management as a discipline and a little history about the discipline. It is important to understand why projects and project management are important. How have you seen projects used in your company, organization, or personal life? What methods of project management does your company use? Do they work?

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Project Selection and Project Charters (graded)

As organizations set their business strategy or establish their goals, there are new needs identified. Recognizing organizations may have a number of different needs, there are many projects to consider. How are projects selected? Why do you think it is important to evaluate potential projects before proceeding with implementation?

PROJ586 Week 2 Discussion 1 & 2 Latest 2016 November

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Project Charter and Scope Statement (graded)

Why are the Project Charter and Project Scope Statement artifacts critical to the success of a project? Describe some of the key elements of these artifacts.

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Work Breakdown Structure and Resource Assignments (graded)

Assume you were appointed as project manager to lead a dozen of your classmates to write up an end-of-course summary guide that would be used to update all areas of the course (i.e., discussion questions, lectures, assignments, quizzes, and exams). You plan to form sub-teams to work each of these elements, each headed by a sub-team leader. How would you set up your WBS? What are some considerations you made when you decided on this structure?

PROJ586 Week 3 Discussion 1 & 2 Latest 2016 November

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Network Diagrams and Critical Path (graded)

This week in the lesson, we are learning about activity dependencies and task durations. Activities in a project are often dependent on the completion of another activity. Those activities can be in the project you are completing or from another project or process. Remember, dependencies can be mandatory, external, or discretionary. Understanding the concept of dependencies will help you build a network diagram to determine the critical path for the project. Why is it critical to the success of the project to understand the critical path? What is the value of the near critical path? How does slack and free slack enter into this discussion?

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Resource Utilization (graded)

Managing resources can be an interesting, and sometimes difficult, job. How have you managed resources on any of your projects? What do you find as the most difficult part? How have you learned to overcome these issues? If you haven’t managed a project before, have you ever been a resource on a project? If so, what are some of the techniques your manager(s) use to balance their resources? What seems to be the most effective for you?

PROJ586 Week 4 Discussion 1 & 2 Latest 2016 November

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Cost Planning (graded)

Cost planning starts with the proposal for the project, at which time project costs are estimated. And for budgeting purposes, it is best to keep the work packages or activities small in terms of scope and duration. What are some of the ways that a project manager can take these budgeting plans and track and compare them to actual data? In what sense is some cost reporting not reflective of the actual work performed? How can a project manager remedy this situation?

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Earned Value Analysis (graded)

Once your budget is planned and allocated across your work packages, it is critical to monitor and control your project’s cost. Why is monitoring and controlling the project cost important for the success of the project? What are some key components to monitor the health of the project, as it relates to earned value? How is earned value management different than straight financial accounting?

PROJ586 Week 5 Discussion 1 & 2 Latest 2016 November

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Risk Management (graded)

This week, we learned about risk management. Now let’s apply our learning to an example. Suppose you are the project manager of a team of software specialists working on a project to produce a piece of application software in the field of accounting. Identify some items that might go wrong and might go right during this type of project (i.e., what are some of the positive and negative risks in this project), and discuss how you, as the PM, would assess and respond to such project risks. Try to come up with as many positive risks as negative risks, as positive risks are just as important as negative risks to the success of a project!

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Contingency Planning (graded)

What is contingency planning? Why is contingency planning important?

PROJ586 Week 6 Discussion 1 & 2 Latest 2016 November

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Project Close Out (graded)

Why is it considered a best practice to properly close a project? What about a project that is abruptly terminated? What are some good approaches for documenting the entire project? How does this occur?

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Project Communications (graded)

How important is communications to project success? What are the features needed for effective communications? How do you determine who needs what communications and how?

PROJ586 Week 7 Discussion 1 & 2 Latest 2016 November

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Stages of Team Development (graded)

There are many theories for the stages/phases of team development. The five-stage model is one of them. This model is only valid in a few very precise team formations scenarios. Think of a team in which you have participated (project team at work, sport team, etc.). Think back on how the team formed from the first day until the end of the project, or sporting season. Describe what took place. How did you progress into the next stage/phase of team development? Which theory of team development most applied to your example? Why?

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Selecting an Organizational Structure (graded)

· Scenario: The hospital has extensive experience and capability in implementing medical systems and has some expertise in nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) scanners, as it currently operates one in the hospital. Your project is to evaluate, select, and install a new NMR scanner. In the past, the hospital normally involves five internal departments in the installation of a new system or piece of equipment. For this project, the hospital will likely need to bring in functional experts from five different technical specialties. It will use consulting companies to do this. The technology is very new, and there will be extensive coordination and communication requirements between the five consultants. This project is not all that important to the hospital and is relatively small compared to other projects it is currently doing.

· What organizational form (Functional, Pure Project, Strong Matrix, Balanced Matrix, or Weak Matrix) would you recommend to effectively manage a project for a major hospital to evaluate, select, and install a new nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) scanner?