Deck 4 Flashcards
What is Project Float?
The amount of time that a project can be delayed without violating the project deadline imposed by the customer, or the delivery date committed to the customer.
What is Padding?
The amount of unreasonable extra time added to the estimate, just to feel confident with the estimate.
What is Program Management?
The application of knowledge, skills, and principles to a program to achieve the program objectives and obtain benefits and control not available by managing program components individually.
The application of knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to project activities to meet project requirements is known as ___________________.
The application of knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to project activities to meet project requirements in known as <u>Project Management</u>.
What is Project Management?
The application of knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to project activities to meet the project requirements.
What is a Procurement Strategy?
The approach by the buyer to determine the project delivery method and the type of legally binding agreement(s) that should be used to deliver the desired results.
What is the event that officially authorizes a project?
The approval of the Project Charter.
What is a Budget?
The approved (cost) estimate for a project, WBS component or a schedule activity.
What is a Cost Baseline?
The approved time-phased budget of the project (excluding any management reserves) that is used to compare actual costs to planned costs in order to determine variance and need for preventive or corrective action.
What is a Schedule Baseline?
The approved version of a schedule model that can be changed only through formal change control procedures and is used as a basis for comparison to actual results.
What is a Scope Baseline?
The approved version of a scope statement, work breakdown structure (WBS), and its associated WBS dictionary, that can be changed using formal change control procedures and is used as a basis for comparison to actual results.
What is a Baseline?
The approved version of a work product that can be changed only through formal change control procedures and is used as a basis for comparison to actual results.
What are Specification Limits?
The area on either side of the mean on a control chart that reflects the customer’s requirements for a product or service. This area may be greater than or less than the area defined by the control limits.
What are Control Limits?
The area within three standard deviations on either side of the mean on a control chart that reflects the expected variation in the data.
What is Planned Value (PV)?
The authorized budget assigned to scheduled work.
When is the Benefits Management Plan developed?
The Benefits Management Plan is developed prior to project initiation.
Which is the best form of power for a Project Manager?
The best form of power depends upon the situation and the maturity level of the project manager. Generally speaking, personal powers (such as Expert and Referent) are better than positional powers (such as Legitimate, Reward and Punitive).
What is Budget at Completion (BAC)?
The budget for all the work on the project. It is also the total planned value for the project.
What is Portfolio Management?
The centralized management of one or more portfolios to achieve strategic objectives.
Who can authorize the use of Management Reserves?
The change control process is used to obtain approval to move the applicable management reserve funds into the cost baseline.
What is the Deming Cycle?
The checklist of the four stages which you must go through to get from “problem-faced” to “problem solved”. The four stages are Plan-Do-Check-Act. It is also known as Shewhart Cycle. It is used for continuous improvement.
What is Schedule Data?
The collection of information for describing and controlling the schedule.
In which document would you find a glossary of common project terminology?
The Communications Management Plan
In which document would you find the template for project status reports?
The Communications Management Plan
What is Life Cycle Cost?
The cost of a product over its entire life (including cost of development, acquisition, operation, support and disposal), and not just the project cost.
What is To-Complete-Performance-Index (TCPI)?
The cost performance that must be achieved on the remaining work to meet a BAC (or EAC) target. It is the ratio of “remaining work” to the “funds remaining”.
What is Present Value (PV)?
The current value of future cash flow, discounted to reflect the time value of money and other factors such as investment risk.
Who defines the product scope?
The customer
Who defines the quality of a product, service or result of a project?
The customer
What is the role of the customer in XP?
The customer in XP provides the requirements, sets the priorities, and steers the projects.
What is a Finish Date?
The date of completion of a schedule activity, usually qualified by one of the eight following: actual, planned, estimated, scheduled, early, late, baseline, target, or current.
Give an example of Start-to-finish (SF) dependency.
The day shift worker (predecessor) cannot leave work until the night shift worker (successor) has taken over the command.
What is meant by Risk Appetite?
The degree of uncertainty an organization or individual is willing to accept in anticipation of a reward.
What is risk propinquity?
The degree to which a risk is perceived to matter by one or more stakeholders.
What is the definition of Quality?
The degree to which a set of inherent characteristics fulfills requirements.
What is risk controllability?
The degree to which the risk owner (or owning organization) is able to control the risk’s outcome.
What are Accepted Deliverables?
The deliverables that meet the acceptance criteria and have been formally signed off by the customer or sponsor through the Validate Scope process. These deliverables may be reviewed by the customer before giving a final sign-off on the entire project.
What is a Project Scope Statement?
The description of the project scope, including major deliverables, and exclusions. It provides a basis for making future project decisions and provides a common understanding of project scope among the stakeholders.
What is Variance?
The difference between the actual (measured) value (of scope, schedule, cost, quality, etc.) and the baseline value.
What is Float?
The difference between the time available for performing an activity and the time required to complete it. It is also known as Slack.
What is a Project Management Plan?
The document that describes how the project will be executed, monitored and controlled, and closed.
What is a Benefits Management Plan?
The documented explanation defining the processes for creating, maximizing, and sustaining the benefits provided by a project or program.
What is Product Scope Description?
The documented narrative description of the product scope.
What are Quality Control Measurements?
The documented results of Control Quality activities.
What are Procurement Documents?
The documents utilized in bid and proposal activities, including Invitation for Bid, Invitation for Negotiations, Request for Information, Request for Quotation, Request for Proposal and seller’s responses.
What is Earned Schedule (ES)?
The duration from the beginning of the project to the date on which the PV should have been equal to the current value of EV. On the EVM chart, it is the date on which the horizontal line through the current value of EV intersects the PV curve.
What is risk detectability?
The ease with which the results of the risk occurring, or being about to occur, can be detected and recognized.
What is risk manageability?
The ease with which the risk owner (or owning organization) can manage the occurrence or impact of a risk.
Who owns the code in XP?
The entire team collectively owns the code in XP.
What is a Sponsoring Organization?
The entity responsible for providing the project’s sponsor and a conduit for project funding or other project resources.
What is Earned Value (EV)?
The estimated (monetary) value of the work accomplished expressed in terms of the budget authorized for that work. It is also referred to as the budgeted cost of work performed (BCWP).
What is Estimate to Complete (ETC)?
The expected cost to complete all the “remaining work” on a project.
What is Estimate at Completion (EAC)?
The expected total cost of completing all the work on a project expressed as the sum of the actual cost to date and the estimate to complete.
What is risk connectivity?
The extent to which the risk is related to other individual project risks.
What are Enterprise Environmental Factors?
The external or internal factors, not under the immediate control of the team, that influence, constrain, or direct the project, program, or portfolio. Examples include organizational culture, industry standards, existing infrastructure and human capital, marketplace conditions.
What is Risk Premium?
The extra return in excess of (over and above) the risk-free rate of return of an investment (example, a project). It’s a compensation for the risk to the party (example, a contractor to whom the risk is transferred) that accepts the risk.
How does an Influence Diagram help in risk analysis?
The factors which influence a risk can be shown hierarchically in an influence diagram, to demonstrate their influence on key outcomes.
What is Product Scope?
The features and functions that characterize a product, service, or result.
How do you calculate the float of a network path in Critical Path Method?
The float of a path is the difference between the duration of the Critical Path and the duration of the (given) path.
Define Legitimate Power.
The formal authority or power derived from the position. Team members perceive the project manager as being officially empowered to issue orders. It is also known as Formal Power.
Define Governance.
The framework within which authority is exercised in organizations.
What is Project Governance?
The framework, functions, and processes that guide project management activities in order to create a unique product, service, or result to meet organizational, strategic, and operational goals.
Which is better - a project with higher NPV or a project with lower NPV?
The higher the NPV, the better.
What is Empiricism?
The idea that the best way of planning is to do work and learn from it. It is a fundamental for Scrum and agile approaches.
Which of the following are characteristics of a good information radiator?
The information should change over time and easy to view.
What are Lessons Learned?
The knowledge gained during a project which shows how project events were addressed or should be addressed in the future with the purpose of improving future performance. They can be identified at any point during the project.
What is Actual Duration?
The length of time between the actual start date and the data date for in-progress activities, or between the actual start date and the actual finish date for completed activities.
What is meant by Risk Threshold?
The level of risk exposure above which risks are addressed and below which risks may be accepted.
What is a Finish-to-Finish (FF) dependency?
The logical relationship where the successor (“to”) activity cannot complete until the predecessor (“from”) activity completes.
What is a Finish-to-Start (FS) dependency?
The logical relationship where the successor (“to”) activity cannot start until the predecessor (“from”) activity completes.
How can Risk Breakdown Structure (RBS) be used in Risk Identification?
The lowest level of the RBS can be used as a risk identification checklist.
What is Ceiling Price?
The maximum price that a buyer is willing to pay. It includes Target Price plus buyer’s share of the cost overrun.
What is the formula for Mean?
The mean of n values (x1, x2, x3, .. , xn) is: (x1 + x2 + x3 + .. + xn) / n
What are Bidder Conferences?
The meetings with prospective sellers prior to the preparation of a bid or proposal to ensure all prospective vendors have a clear and common understanding of the procurement. Also known as contractor conferences, vendor conferences, or pre-bid conferences.
What is a Project Management Team?
The members of the project team who are directly involved in project management activities.
What is Discounted Cash Flow (DCF) method of project selection?
The method of discounting future cash flows at an interest rate that reflects time value of money and a risk premium. DCF is the amount that someone is willing to pay today in anticipation of future cash flows (returns).
What is Development Approach in the context of project management?
The method used to create and evolve the product, service, or result during the project life cycle, such as predictive, iterative, incremental, agile, or a hybrid method.
What is Little’s Law?
The more things that you work on at any given time, the longer it is going to take for each of those things to finish.
Which estimate is weighed more heavily in the beta distribution estimating?
The Most Likely estimate. It has 4 times more weightage than the Optimistic and Pessimistic estimates using beta distribution. The formula for expected cost using beta distribution is: cE ( cO + 4*cM + cP ) / 6 where cE is the expected cost, cO the optimistic estimate, cM the most likely estimate and cP the pessimistic estimate of the activity.
Define Effort.
The number of labor units required to complete a schedule activity or work breakdown structure component, often expressed in hours, days, or weeks.
What is a Quality Management System?
The organizational framework whose structure provides the policies, processes, procedures, and resources required to implement the Quality Management Plan. The typical project Quality Management Plan should be compatible to the organization’s quality management system.
Who is a Buyer?
The owner of the final product, a subcontractor, the acquiring organization, a service requestor, or the purchaser.
Who are sideward stakeholders?
The peers of the project manager, such as other project managers or middle managers who are competing or sharing project resources.
What is Work Performance Information?
The performance data collected from controlling processes, analyzed in comparison with project management plan components, project documents, and other work performance information.
What is risk proximity?
The period of time before the risk might have an impact on one or more project objectives.
What is risk dormancy?
The period of time that may elapse after a risk has occurred before its impact is discovered.
What is risk urgency?
The period of time within which a response to the risk is to be implemented in order to be effective.
Who is a Project Manager (PM)?
The person assigned by the performing organization to lead the team that is responsible for achieving the project objectives.
Who is a Risk Owner?
The person responsible for monitoring the risks and for selecting and implementing an appropriate risk response strategy.
Define Customer.
The person(s) or organization(s) that will pay for the project’s product, service, or result.
What are Work Performance Reports?
The physical or electronic representation of work performance information compiled in project documents, intended to generate decisions, actions, or awareness.
What is a Threshold?
The point beyond which an event or risk becomes unacceptable and a response should be triggered.
What is risk strategic impact?
The potential for the risk to have a positive or negative effect on the organization’s strategic goals.
Define Referent Power.
The power derived from personality traits or charisma. It is also known as Charisma Power.
Define Expert Power.
The power derived from special knowledge or expertise.
What is Situational power?
The power gained due to unique situation such as a specific crisis.
What is Relational power?
The power gained through networking, connections, and alliances.
Define Reward Power.
The power of directly or indirectly rewarding the team member. Rewards may be in the form of salary, promotion, bonus or better work assignments.
Define Coercive Power.
The power to invoke discipline or negative consequences. It may be in the form of suspension, reprimand, unpleasant assignments, etc. It is also known as Punitive or Penalty Power.
What is the Determine Budget process?
The process of aggregating the estimated costs of individual activities or work packages to establish an authorized cost baseline.
What is the Develop Schedule process?
The process of analyzing activity sequences, durations, resource requirements, and schedule constraints to create the project schedule model for project execution and monitoring and controlling.
What is the Manage Stakeholder Engagement process?
The process of communicating and working with stakeholders to meet their needs and expectations, address issues, and foster appropriate stakeholder involvement.
What is the Plan Scope Management process?
The process of creating a scope management plan that documents how the project and product scope will be defined, validated, and controlled.
What is the Plan Cost Management process?
The process of defining how the project costs will be estimated, budgeted, managed, monitored, and controlled.
What is the Plan Risk Management process?
The process of defining how to conduct risk management activities for a project.
What is the Plan Resource Management process?
The process of defining how to estimate, acquire, manage, and utilize physical and team resources.
What is the Develop Project Management Plan process?
The process of defining, preparing, and coordinating all plan components and consolidating them into an integrated project management plan.
What is the Collect Requirements process?
The process of determining, documenting, and managing stakeholder needs and requirements to meet project objectives.
What is the Define Scope process?
The process of developing a detailed description of the project and product.
What is the Develop Project Charter process?
The process of developing a document that formally authorizes the existence of a project and provides the project manager with the authority to apply organizational resources to project activities.
What is the Plan Communications Management process?
The process of developing an appropriate approach and plan for project communication activities based on the information needs of each stakeholder or group, available organizational assets, and the needs of the project.
What is the Estimate Costs process?
The process of developing an approximation of the monetary resources needed to complete project work.
What is the Plan Stakeholder Engagement process?
The process of developing approaches to involve project stakeholders, based on their needs, expectations, interests, and potential impact on the project.
What is the Plan Risk Responses process?
The process of developing options, selecting strategies, and agreeing on actions to address overall project risk exposure, as well as to treat individual project risks.
What is the Plan Procurement Management process?
The process of documenting project procurement decisions, specifying the approach, and identifying potential sellers.
What is Total Quality Management (TQM)?
The process of ensuring that the end result will meet the quality expectations of the customer.
What is the Monitor Communications process?
The process of ensuring that the information needs of the project and its stakeholders are met.
What is the Control Resources process?
The process of ensuring that the physical resources assigned and allocated to the project are available as planned, as well as monitoring the planned versus actual utilization of resources and performing corrective action as necessary.
What is the Manage Communications process?
The process of ensuring timely and appropriate collection, creation, distribution, storage, retrieval, management, monitoring, and the ultimate disposition of project information.
What is the Plan Schedule Management process?
The process of establishing the policies, procedures, and documentation for planning, developing, managing, executing, and controlling the project schedule.
What is the Estimate Activity Resources process?
The process of estimating team resources and the type and quantities of material, equipment, and supplies necessary to perform project work.
What is the Estimate Activity Durations process?
The process of estimating the number of work periods needed to complete individual activities with the estimated resources.
What is the Close Project or Phase process?
The process of finalizing all activities for the project, phase, or contract.
What is the Validate Scope process?
The process of formalizing acceptance of the completed project deliverables.
What are Documentation Reviews?
The process of gathering a corpus of information and reviewing it to determine accuracy and completeness.
What is Market Research?
The process of gathering information at conferences, online reviews, and a variety of sources to identify market capabilities.
What is the Sequence Activities process?
The process of identifying and documenting relationships among the project activities.
What is the Define Activities process?
The process of identifying and documenting the specific actions to be performed to produce the project deliverables.
What is the Identify Risks process?
The process of identifying individual risks as well as sources of overall risk and documenting their characteristics.
What is the Identify Stakeholders process?
The process of identifying project stakeholders regularly and analyzing and documenting relevant information regarding their interests, involvement, interdependencies, influence, and potential impact on project success.
What is the Plan Quality Management process?
The process of identifying quality requirements and/or standards for the project and its deliverables, and documenting how the project will demonstrate compliance with quality requirements and/or standards.
What is Change Control?
The process of identifying, documenting, approving or rejecting changes to project documents, deliverables, or baselines (scope, schedule, cost, etc.).
What is the Implement Risk Responses process?
The process of implementing agreed-upon risk response plans.
What is the Develop Team process?
The process of improving competences, team member interaction, and overall team environment to enhance project performance.
What is the Direct and Manage Project Work process?
The process of leading and performing the work defined in the Project Management Plan and implementing approved changes to achieve the project’s objectives.
What is the Control Procurements process?
The process of managing procurement relationships, monitoring contract performance, making changes and corrections as appropriate, and closing out contracts.
What is the Control Quality process?
The process of monitoring and recording results of executing the quality management activities to assess performance and ensure the project outputs are complete, correct, and meet customer expectations.
What is the Monitor Stakeholder Engagement process?
The process of monitoring project stakeholder relationships, and tailoring strategies for engaging stakeholders through the modification of engagement strategies and plans.
What is the Monitor Risks process?
The process of monitoring the implementation of agreed-upon risk response plans, tracking identified risks, identifying and analyzing new risks, and evaluating risk process effectiveness throughout the project.
What is the Control Scope process?
The process of monitoring the status of project and product scope, and managing changes to the scope baseline.
What is the Control Costs process?
The process of monitoring the status of the project to update the project costs and manage changes to the cost baseline.
What is the Control Schedule process?
The process of monitoring the status of the project to update the project schedule and manage changes to the schedule baseline.
What is the Perform Quantitative Risk Analysis process?
The process of numerically analyzing the combined effect of identified individual project risks and other sources of uncertainty on overall project objectives.
What is the Conduct Procurements process?
The process of obtaining seller responses, selecting a seller, and awarding a contract.
What is the Acquire Resources process?
The process of obtaining team members, facilities, equipment, materials, supplies, and other resources necessary to complete project work.
What is the Perform Qualitative Risk Analysis process?
The process of prioritizing individual project risks for further analysis or action by assessing their probability of occurrence and impact as well as other characteristics.
What is Claims Administration?
The process of processing, adjudicating, and communicating contract claims.
What is the Perform Integrated Change Control process?
The process of reviewing all change requests, approving changes and managing changes to deliverables, organizational process assets, project documents, and the Project Management Plan, and communicating the decisions.
What are Proposal Evaluation Techniques?
The process of reviewing proposals provided by suppliers to support contract award decisions.
What is the Create WBS process?
The process of subdividing project deliverables and project work into smaller, more manageable components.
What is the Manage Team process?
The process of tracking team member performance, providing feedback, resolving issues, and managing changes to optimize project performance.
What is the Monitor and Control Project Work process?
The process of tracking, reviewing, and reporting overall progress to meet the performance objectives defined in the project management plan.
What is the Manage Quality process?
The process of translating the quality management plan into executable quality activities that incorporate the organization’s quality policies into the project.
What is the Manage Project Knowledge process?
The process of using existing knowledge and creating new knowledge to achieve the project’s objectives and contribute to organizational learning.
What is Configuration Verification and Audit?
The process of verifying the correctness of the product and its components in order to ensure conformance to requirements.
What is Verification?
The process to check whether the product (or deliverable) was built right. It is often an internal process.
What is Validation?
The process to check whether the right product (or deliverable) was built. It is usually an external process and involves customer acceptance.
What is the Closing Process Group?
The process(es) performed to formally complete or close a project, phase, or contract.
What is the Executing Process Group?
The processes performed to complete the work defined in the project management plan to satisfy the project requirements.
What is the Initiating Process Group?
The processes performed to define a new project or a new phase of an existing project by obtaining authorization to start the project or phase.
What is the Planning Process Group?
The processes required to establish the scope of the project, refine the objectives, and define the course of action required to attain the objectives that the project was undertaken to achieve.
What is the Monitoring and Controlling Process Group?
The processes that track, review, and regulate the progress and performance of the project against the Project Management Plan; identify any areas in which changes to the plan are required; and initiate the corresponding changes.
Who develops the Acceptance Criteria on agile projects?
The Product Owner
Who makes the final call on priority order in the Product Backlog?
The Product Owner
If you want to know the project purpose, which document would you refer to?
The Project Charter
Which project document grants formal powers to a Project Manager?
The Project Charter
What does a positive (+) Schedule Variance (SV) indicate?
The project is ahead of schedule.
What does a Schedule Performance Index (SPI) value of more than 1 indicate?
The project is ahead of schedule.
What does a negative (-) Schedule Variance (SV) indicate?
The project is behind schedule.
What does a Schedule Performance Index (SPI) value of less than 1 indicate?
The project is behind schedule.
What does a Cost Performance Index (CPI) value of less than 1 indicate?
The project is over budget.
What does a negative (-) Cost Variance (CV) indicate?
The project is over budget.
What does a Cost Performance Index (CPI) value of more than 1 indicate?
The project is under budget.
What does a positive (+) Cost Variance (CV) indicate?
The project is under budget.
What is the primary source of information for how the project will be planned, executed, monitored and controlled, and closed?
The Project Management Plan
Who can authorize the use of Contingency Reserves?
The Project Manager
Who has the ultimate responsibility for quality on a project?
The Project Manager
Who provides direction and vision of success for the project?
The Project Manager
Who are the change agents in an organization?
The Project Managers are the change agents in an organization.
Who develops the Definition of Done on agile projects?
The project team
What is the purpose of Portfolio Management?
The purpose of Portfolio Management is to ensure that projects and programs are reviewed to prioritize resource allocation, and are aligned to organizational strategies.
What is the definition of Tolerance?
The quantified description of acceptable variation for a quality requirement.
Responsibility Assignment Matrix (RAM) vs Responsible, Accountable, Consult, And Inform (RACI)
The RACI is just one type of RAM.
What is Percent Complete?
The ratio of the estimated amount of work completed to the total estimated work on an activity or a WBS component, expressed in percentage.
What is Sharing Ratio?
The ratio that describes how the buyer and the seller share cost savings or cost overruns. It is usually expressed as X:Y, where X is the percentage share of the buyer, and Y is that of the seller.
What is Work Performance Data?
The raw observations and measurements made while activities are being performed. It includes % work complete, technical performance measures, activity start and finish dates, actual costs and durations, no. of defects, etc. It is collected as part of the Direct and Manage Project Work process, and is input to most M&C processes. It is combined with forecasts to generate Work Performance Reports.
What are the benefits of using a Resource Breakdown Structure (RBS)?
The RBS is used for planning, managing and controlling project work.
What is Political Awareness?
The recognition of power relationships, both formal and informal, and also the willingness to operate within these structures.
What is Configuration Status Accounting?
The recording and reporting of all the changes to the configuration items.
The requirement to deliver the project within $500,000 is a __________ (Project or Product) requirement.
The requirement to deliver the project within $500,000 is a <u>Project</u> requirement.
The requirement to make an earthquake-proof structure in a construction project is a __________ (Project or Product) requirement.
The requirement to make an earthquake-proof structure in a construction project is a <u>Product</u> requirement.
Resource Histogram vs Resource Calendar
The Resource Histogram shows when resources are “needed” for the project, and the Resource Calendar shows when the resources are “available” for the project.
What are Procurement Audits?
The review of contracts and contracting processes for completeness, accuracy, and effectiveness.
What is Authority?
The right to apply project resources, expend funds, make decisions, or give approvals.
Which Enterprise Environmental Factors can influence the Plan Risk Management process?
The risk appetite, attitudes and tolerances of the organizations.
Residual Risks vs Secondary Risks
The risks that remain after risk responses have been implemented are called Residual Risks. New risks that emerge as a result of applying risk response strategies are called Secondary Risks.
Why is Scope Baseline an input to the Identify Risks process?
The scope baseline includes deliverables and criteria for their acceptance, some of which might give rise to risk. It also contains the WBS, which can be used for identifying risks at the project level as well as the work package or control account level.
Why is Scope Baseline an input to the Develop Schedule process?
The scope statement, WBS, and WBS dictionary (components of scope baseline) have details about the project deliverables that are considered when building the schedule model.
What is meant by Selected Sellers?
The sellers who have been selected to provide a contracted set of services or products.
Who is responsible for quality in the organization as a whole?
The senior management of the organization
