HR Expertise - People Flashcards
What are the three main factors project managers traditionally. have been expected to control while completing a project?
- Cost of the project = total amount of money on the project including raw materials, supplies, human capital, and other expenditures
- Time spent on the project = total amount of time spent by employees to complete the project tasks
- Scope of the project = refers to the requirements needed to complete the project in an appropriate fashion
What is Lean Six Sigma used for?
Lean Six Sigma is a data-driven, results oriented method for increasing speed and improving efficiency while solving problems, minimizing costs, and maximizing profits. Most often used in manufacturing, Lean Six Sigma streamlines processes and eliminates activities identified as waste (ie. defects, overproduction, waiting, non-utilized talent, transportation, inventory, motion, and extra processing)
What are the 5 basic processes of Lean Six Sigma?
- Identify general problems with efficiency.
- Map and measure current steps in a given process to gather data (ie. observations)
- Analyze the data, and identify a specific issue(s)
- Improve and standardize processes to solve the issue(s)
- Implement controls and procedures to maintain results
What is is an agile approach to project management?
Agile is a software development methodology that is known for developing code in small chunks in a collaborative, team environment. Developers continually work in cross-functional teams to review and adjust their development process to meet the project needs. The team is held accountable for completing the project on time while meeting quality and functionality requirements.
At the foundation of the project, there are development best practices that are adhered to.
What is the Kaizen approach to project management?
“Kaizen is everyday improvement, everybody improvement, everywhere improvement.” The word Kaizen combines the Japanese words for “Good” (zen) and “Change” (kai). Kaizen doesn’t tell organizations how to improve; instead, it presents a mindset that when adopted, will influence decisions and impact the culture. Its principals are:
Every process can be improved
Continuous improvement essential to competitiveness
Defects and errors are almost always the faults of flawed processes, not people
Every person in the organization must be involved in improvement
Incremental changes can have a significant impact
What are examples of project management processes?
- Initiating: grouped activities that define the charter, team, working rules, new phases, project authorization
- Planning: activities that create the project scope, objectives, and project work breakdown and schedule
- Executing: activities that perform the planned work in the environment
- Monitoring: processes that oversee the use of time, resources, quality, and change management
What is a critical chain form of project management?
Critical chain reduces the likelihood of the project’s completion being delayed. The project is scheduled backward from the date the deliverables are due, and time buffers are added to protect the tasks that ultimately drive the duration of the project. These tasks are known as the critical chain.
This form of project management is also known for identifying and mitigating bottlenecks, which helps expedite project completion.
What is a systems thinking approach?
Systems thinking is the discipline of seeing things as interrelated instead of looking at each in isolation.
A system is a group of interdependent, related parts that forma. unified whole designated to carry out a specific purpose. The system must maintain stability by getting regular feedback. Because parts of a system affect one another, feedback occurs in a loop.
What are Gantt charts used for?
A Gantt chart is a date and time-based bar chart that is frequently used for project management. It depicts critical deadlines for planning, scheduling and monitoring project timelines. It reflects all of the start and end dates of each element or tasks and measures the timeframes and relationships
Critical Path Analysis (CPA)
Critical path analysis is a project management scheduling and planning tool that allows project managers to track project goals and make course corrections as needed. CPA pinpoints which tasks must be finished on schedule for the project to meet its overall deadline.
CPA denotes which tasks are sequential and which are parallel. CPA shows PMs and stakeholders the minimum amount of time required to finish a project.
Project Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT)
PERT is another method of determining how much time is required to complete a specific project. The PERT process consists of breaking the larger project into a series of smaller, separate tasks and then organizing each of these smaller tasks into a chart.
Each task in the PERT chart is represented by a line or arrow drawn from a circle representing an event or goal to a circle representing the next event or goal. Each event/goal circle is assigned a number and the circles are arranged based on the order in which they are they are to be completed.
Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)
A work breakdown structure (WBS) is a method for breaking a project down into a series of separate, smaller tasks. It’s based on the 100 percent rule, which states that the smaller tasks must total 100 percent of the work necessary to complete the project
Why is outcome monitoring an important part of project management?
For a project to be successful, the project manager must constantly keep informed of the project’s status and monitor progress toward the desired outcome(s). If the project isn’t meeting pre-established key performance indicators (KPIs), the project manager must decide whether to stay the course or make adjustments to the project plan
Why is variance analysis critical after a completed project?
Often an organization’s actual performance will be difficult than its projected performance. When this occurs, it’s important for leadership to try and explain why the variance exists. Having this knowledge will enable a company to make course corrections so that they can get back on track with their goals and make more accurate projections going forward.
mission vs vision statement
A mission statement is intended to define only the broad declaration of the reason an organization exists. This is important in determining standards, values, strategies, and other organizational aspects and serves as a guideline for establishing the processes needed to achieve goals.
A vision statement is intended to declare the specific goals an organization hopes to achieve in the future. This is important in designing and implementing strategies necessary to meet the goals.
What are the three grand strategies identified by Michael Porter to maintain a competitive edge?
- Cost leadership: obtained by providing your goods at a lower cost than competitors. This is achieved by low-cost labor or production materials and implementing technological innovations that improve efficiency of operations (ie. Southwest or Walmart)
- Differentiation strategy: involves providing unique services or products that offer innovative designs, are of exceptionally high quality, and/or possess remarkably high brand image (ie. Apple or Porsche)
- Focus or niche strategy: targets either a cost advantage or a differentiation advantage in a narrow, niche market segment. This could be a select geographic location, a predefined channel of distribution, a particular end-user or a specific product
What is Michael Porter’s five forces model of competition?
The five forces model suggests that profit potential is a function of the interactions among suppliers, buyers, rival firms, substitute products, and potential entrants. Organizations can analyze these factors to determine profit potential and create a secure, competitive position
Explain how each of the five forces affect the competitive market
- Suppliers - organizations depend on the availability of suppliers to provide materials
- Buyers - buyers can be powerful if they purchase large quantities of a firm’s goods, are one of the firms potential customers, or have the ability to buy the firm
- Rival firms - competition is stimulated when one or more companies identify an opportunity to improve market position or a need to differentiate against mutually competitive pressure
- Substitute products - organizations compete against other businesses that sell similar, substitute products or services, which places a limit on the prices organizations can charge
- Potential entrants - new entrants may threaten existing companies by providing additional production capacity and shifting the market supply, resulting in less demand and price cuts
What are the steps of conducting a SWOT analysis?
SWOT analysis involves scanning both internal and external factors to identify potential sources of competitive advantage
- Define the org’s mission and objectives
- Analyze external environment for prospective opportunities or threats
- Analyze org’s resources for internal strengths or weaknesses. Unique skills that set the firm apart from others and support a competitive edge are called core competencies
- Combine both the external and internal analysis and formulate a stable strategy
- Establish trust in leadership and encourage involvement from all levels of the organization to implement the new strategy
- Evaluate and monitor organizational results to preserve the competitive advantage
PESTLE Analysis
PESTLE is an extension of the SWOT analysis and looks at how the following factors impact a business:
P - political - changes made by the government can affect a business in the form of tariffs, tax policy, and fiscal policy
E - economic - changes to inflation, interest rates, and foreign exchange rates can affect the firm’s finances and operations
S - social - cultural trends affect consumer purchases, which affect an organization’s revenue and profit
T - technological - tech used in a business can enhance or detract from a company’s innovation level and competitive advantage
L - legal - external laws and internal policies affect a firm’s day to day operations
E - environmental - climate, weather, and geographic location all have an impact on a company’s performance
Industry analysis
Industry analysis is a process in which a company figures out how it ranks among its competitors so that it can find a way to differentiate to gain a competitive advantage. Examination should be conducted in the context of the PESTLE analysis.
What are the steps involved in scenario planning?
Scenario panning makes assumptions what the future will look like, anticipates how the future will affect the company, and creates a strategic plan to address that impact.
- Forecast major societal, political, economic, and technological shifts (driving forces).
- Choose two of the most pertinent driving forces to work with.
- Create a conceivable range of potential situations it may face based on the selected driving forces.
- The potential impacts of those situations must be assessed, and the company must create a new business strategy that accounts for them
growth-share matrix
The growth-share matrix is a long-term planning tool used to evaluate a company’s products or services to determine if the company should continue investing in them. The matrix is a quadrant labeled market share long the x axis and market growth on the y
- Stars (top right - high market share, high growth)
- question marks (top left - low market share, high growth)
- dogs (lower left - low market share, low growth)
- cash cows (lower left - high market share, low growth)
