5questions
qwer2668
5question.docxIt consists of five (5) essay questions. You are expected to answer all of them. You should read each question carefully and be sure to understand any details, constraints or qualifications which might be included in them.
• You are allowed to consult the course textbooks, lessons, pre-recorded and online session videos, and any notes you have taken.
• You may NOT lift entire sentences or paragraphs from texts or lesson materials!!!
• Questions may or may not focus on a single project management knowledge area. Remember what we’ve emphasized in class: work in one area is often influenced by that in another.
• You may contact the instructor with clarifying questions, or to ask if you are on the right track in formulating an answer. However, he will NOT review draft answers.
• You are to be bound by an honor code to abide by that commitment. Failure to do so will result in penalties to be determined by the instructor.
Answer each question as best as you can. Enter your answers directly below each of the questions. There are no minimum or maximum length requirements, or restrictions on formatting. Answers will be evaluated and graded on the basis of how well and completely they address the question asked, the logic and persuasiveness of the arguments expressed AND how well they apply the concepts and best practices provided in course materials. Students are advised NOT to try to answer the questions by inserting every scrap of knowledge available about a relevant project management knowledge area into their responses. That will lead to a lower, not a higher grade! While your content is expected to be legible and understandable, your answers will NOT be judged on the basis of spelling, grammar or English usage.
You do NOT have to provide citations for any sources which you use, or to provide a bibliography. It is, however, acceptable to say things like “PMBOK recommends…” if you like.
A final note: In each question, you are expected to pretend you are a credentialed Project Management Professional. I realize no student in the class is. The reason that constraint is imposed is because you are expected to answer as though you have received the project management training you’ve gotten in this class up until now. It is acceptable for you to venture opinions which are not endorsed by PMBOK, but you need to at least mention PMBOK’s view of the world and differentiate your views from that.
Question 1 (20 points) Your Score:
You are an experienced project manager and a Project Management Professional on a job interview for a project management position at a large company. You’ve completed the screening interview and have just been led to the office of the hiring manager for the position. After several minutes of casual conversation, she tells you she has a delicate question to ask.
“I feel it’s important for you to understand the environment you’ll be working in,” she begins. “We are undertaking a multi-million-dollar software development project involving several business units in our organization. We’re not a company which has taken project management seriously in the past, and we’ve paid for it with big cost overruns and schedule delays on similar systems we’ve built in the past.”
“I had to persuade some senior managers that our customary way of doing things wasn’t working, and it was time to embrace project management as a discipline. They authorized me to create this job opening, but I can tell you there’s a lot of skepticism about project management here. Whoever takes this job is going to have to be able to articulate its value to the project team and a lot of the key stakeholders.”
She nods in your direction, and says “You’re a PMP, so you tell me how we can justify the use of project management processes and best practices for this project to the people we’ll be working with? What’s in it for the organization as a whole, and what’s in it for them?”
How would you respond?
Question 2 (20 points) Your Score:
You are the same project manager described in Question 1. You make such a good impression during the job interview that the hiring manager hires you immediately. You hit the ground running and persuade a lot of skeptical team members to give the PMBOK-compliant predictive life cycle processes you recommended a shot. They include a well-developed integrated change management process which includes a Change Control Board (CCB). The CCB consists of the project sponsor, the functional managers involved with the project and you. The change management process requires all requests for requirement changes to be submitted to the CCB for evaluation and possible approval.
Two months have passed since the project requirements gathering was completed. The software construction is in full swing, a senior stakeholder who had some input into the requirements and is not a member of the CCB comes by your cubicle with a sour expression on his face.
“I was talking with one of the software developers on the project and happened to see some of the web pages she was putting together. I was the one who provided the requirements for the features she was working on. When I saw what she did, I realized that there were more details than I originally thought of to be considered. I told her she needed to change what was there, and she told me she couldn’t just do it on my say-so, that I had to fill out something called a ‘change request.’”
“What’s the big deal?” he complains. “These changes are essential, and I think she should just do them. Why do I have to go through all of this ‘change request’ nonsense to get this done?”
How would you respond?
Question 3 (20 points) Your Score:
You are an experienced project manager who has successfully led a number of large projects involving multi-disciplinary teams whose members were drawn from around your organization and even included some members from outside vendors. One afternoon, a junior project manager in your organization asks to speak to you about a project he has just been assigned to manage.
“I don’t know if you’ve heard, but I’ve just been assigned to manage Project Genesis. I’m happy to have the opportunity, as it’s the largest project I’ve been asked to lead so far in my career. I am a little concerned about leading the project team effectively and hoped I could get some advice from you.”
“So far, all of my projects have involved people who were all part of a single department and had worked with each other for at least a couple of years. Some of those projects involved months of work and thousands of hours of effort. We did have to deal with a lot of scope changes and a variety of other problems but were able to complete the projects successfully in the end. A large part of our success was due to the team members knowing each other for years and working quite well together. Actually, I felt blessed!”
“Project Genesis is a different story! Members of the team include technical specialists drawn from all over the company. Most have them don’t even know each other at all and have never worked with each other. They have different skill sets and levels of experience.”
“You’ve been in situations like this before yourself. What advice can you give me about managing and leading a team like this effectively?
What advice would you offer to the junior project manager?
Question 4 (20 points) Your Score:
You are an experienced project manager who is a Project Management Professional. You have been assigned to manage Project Overhaul, a multi-million dollar project of great strategic importance to your organization. Joanna, the project sponsor invites you to a meeting in her office soon after your assignment is announced.
“Welcome to Project Overhaul!” she exclaims. “It’s great to meet you! I’m looking forward to your stewardship on this initiative. I’ve been involved with some big projects in the past which have not produced the intended results, primarily due to a lot of pushback and friction from people affected by them.”
“There are a lot of different factions in this organization and some people outside it who will be touched by the outcome of this project. There are major customers whose accounts will be dramatically affected. Senior management is, as you would expect, deeply interested in progress. But there are also a lot of powerful managers here who aren’t going to be touched by what we do here. I’m a little unsure of how best to deal with them.”
“Of course, there’s an important group of employees whose day-to-day work will be changed dramatically by the reengineered business processes which are the focus of the project. I’m interested in your thoughts about how we should deal with them. I’ve even been getting a bit worried about employees and customers who aren’t directly included in this project, because some of them have been making noises about what we’re trying to do.”
Joanna looks at you with a pained expression and asks, “How can we systematically approach the way we interact with all of these people? Doing that and developing tactics to deal with them effectively would really help my team and give me peace of mind.”
How would you respond to Joanna?
Question 5 (20 points) Your Score:
You are an experienced project manager who is a Project Management Professional. You are renowned in your organization for being one of the few project managers able to consistently complete projects within their original budget.
Your friend Hans, who is a vice president in the organization and routinely sponsors projects which wind up needing additional funding, takes you to lunch one day.
“It’s too bad you’ve never been assigned to manage one of my projects,” he complains. “I seem to always have to beg for more money for them. It is frustrating and even embarrassing to ask my managing director and the CEO to authorize my revised funding requests. They have even started joking about it in senior management meetings, from what I’ve been told! Do you mind telling me your secret to staying within project budgets so I can pass it along to my newest project manager?”
What would you say to Hans?
