Project Management

Question 1

Projects

Answer 1

Unique, one-time operations designed to accomplish
a specific set of objectives in a limited time frame
Examples: (Olympic games, producing a movie, software development, product development, ERP implementation)

Question 2

Project Life Cycle

Answer 2

Definition
Planning
Execution
Delivery

Question 3

Project Manager

Answer 3

Project manager is ultimately responsible for the success or failure of the project

Must manage:
The work
the human resources
communication 
quality/time/costs

Question 4

Behavioral Issues

Answer 4

Behavioral problems can be created or exacerbated by decentralized decision making, stress of achieving project milestones on time & within budget, suprises

The team must be able to function as a unit
(interpersonal & coping skills are very important

Question 5

Avoiding Problems

Answer 5

Many problems can be avoided or mitigated by: 
-effective team selection 
– Leadership
– Motivation
– Maintain an environment of• Integrity
• Trust
• Professionalism
– being supportive of team efforts

Question 6

Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)

Answer 6

• a hierarchical listing of what must be done during a project
  -establishes a logical framework for identifying that required actives for the project
  (identify the major elements of the project, identify the major supporting activities for each of the major elements, break down each major supporting activity into a list of the activities that will be needed to accomplish it.

Question 7

PERT & CPM

Answer 7

PERT (program evaluation & review technique) & CPM (critical path method) are two techniques used to manage large scale projects

Question 8

Network Diagram

Answer 8

Network diagram
— Diagram of project activities that shows sequential relationships by use of
arrows and nodes
— Activity on arrow (AOA)
— Network diagram convention in which arrows designate activities
— Activity on node (AON)
— Network convention in which nodes designate activities
– Activities
» Project steps that consume resources and/or time
– Events
» The starting and finishing of activities

Question 9

Deterministic Time Estimates

Answer 9

Deterministic
– Time estimates that are fairly certain
• Probabilistic
– Time estimates that allow for variation

Question 10

Slack & Critical Path

Answer 10

slack can be computed one of two ways:
- slack= LS-ES
- slack= LF-EF
Critical Path
-the critical path is indicated by the activities with zero slack

Question 11

Using Slack times

Answer 11

Knowledge of slack times provides managers with information for planning allocation of scarce resources
— Control efforts will be directed toward those activities that might be most susceptible to delaying the project
— Activity slack times are based on the assumption that all of the activities on the same path will be started as early as possible and not exceed their expected time
— If two activities are on the same path and have the same slack, this will be the total slack available to both

Question 12

Time-Cost Trade-Offs

Answer 12

Activity time estimates are made for some given level of resources
• It may be possible to reduce the duration of a project by injecting additional resources
– Motivations:
• To avoid late penalties
• Monetary incentives
• Free resources for use on other projects

Question 13

Crashing

Answer 13

Crashing
– Shortening activity durations
• Typically, involves the use of additional funds to support additional personnel or more efficient equipment, and the relaxing of some work specifications
– Theprojectdurationmaybeshortenedbyincreasingdirect expenses, thereby realizing savings in
indirect project costs

Question 14

Crashing Decisions

Answer 14

To make decisions concerning crashing requires information about:
1. 2. 3.
Regular time and crash time estimates for each activity
Regular cost and crash cost estimates for each activity
A list of activities that are on the critical path — Critical path activities are potential candidates for crashing
— Crashing non-critical path activities would not have an impact on overall project duration

Question 15

Crashing: Procedure

Answer 15

General procedure:
1. 2. 3.
•
Crash the project one period at a time
Crash the least expensive activity that is on the critical path
When there are multiple critical paths, find the sum of crashing the least expensive activity on each critical path
If two or more critical paths share common activities, compare the least expensive cost of crashing a common activity shared by critical paths with the sum for the separate critical paths

Question 16

PERT: Advantages

Answer 16

Among the most useful features of PERT:

1. It forces the manager to organize and quantify available information and to identify where additional information is needed
2. It provides the a graphic display of the project and its major activities
3. It identifies
   a. Activities that should be closely watched b. Activities that have slack time

Question 17

Sources of Error

Answer 17

Potential sources of error:

1. The project network may be incomplete
2. Precedence relationships may not be correctly expressed
3. Time estimates may be inaccurate
4. There may be a tendency to focus on critical path activities to the exclusion of other important project activities
5. Major risk events may not be on the critical path

Question 18

Project Management Software Advantages

Answer 18

Advantages include:

• imposes a methodology & common project management terminology
• provides a logical planning structure
• may enhance communication among team members
• can flag the occurrence of constraint violations
• automatically format reports
• can generate multiple levels of summary & detail reports
• enables “what if” scenarios
• can generate a variety of chart types