ICT352 Project Management

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15-07-2021

Question:

As the project manager you are required to present an initial project report to the project sponsor that shows how you propose to implement this project. As the project manager you may make any assumptions you think are necessary.Case study Social Media Research Centre During a meeting with his boss (David Wright), Bruce has been asked to establish a researcher centre. The research centre, which will commence operations in February 2018 first as an informal research group, should be established by June 2017.

Alex decision to proceed with this major project is spurred by the fact that an associated organizational centre, which researches in a closely related area, has recently ceased operations. There is also a tremendous pressure from David senior executives to produce high quality research that is focused in nature. In fact one of senior executives comments was that Unit does not have a clear identity when it comes to its scholarly research output compared to the one in Australian National University.

After several meetings with subject matter experts (consultants) and a rigorous analysis of the current trends in research in the area of information technology it has been decided that the most appropriate research area for the proposed research centre to focus on is social media. Fortunately several of Unit staff are active researchers in this area. What made this direction even more attractive is that demand from Master and Doctoral students has been largely for programs in this area. Unit also enjoys a very good relationship with an international expert Craig Bamworth in the social media area who has kindly agreed to offer his expertise to Bruce (the program manager).One of the projects within the Social Media Research Centre larger project that Bruce has identified as important is the development of a web application for the proposed centre.

This application would include an internet website and section for members on the intranet. Bruce has appointed You as the manager of this project commencing work on 1 April 2017. team has conducted the feasibility study and financial analysis to confirm that project must go ahead and must commence as you join your role.

Answer:

Project Objectives

· Clear, concise reasoning for why the project is being performed:

o To build a market reputation

o Payback period is just above 3 years

o Social media is modern topic of research, because of which many student’s would be available to do the research

· Clear, concise definition of what the project’s activities will entail ( high level scope):

o Build a modern social media research centre

o Delivering user friendly atmosphere for the students to do their research work

o Onsite data uploading in server

· Brief description of primary deliverable(s):

o Signing of charter by 02-May-2017

o Form an informal group of researcher by 10-June-2017

o Delivery and installation of IT hardware by 10-October-2017

o Uploading information in website by 10-Dec-2017

· Clear description of the project’s benefits to the organisation:

o Surely bring modern and different identity in market being unique in nature

o Start making profit form 4^th year onwards

· Recognition and description of any limits that the project will not cover and address:

o Arranging the student strength for doing research work by enrolling

o Maintenance after 1 year of project operation

MOV - Measurable Organisational Value

Area of impact –

Rank	Area of Impact	Description
1	Strategic	most important is that clear identification for the organization will be obtained in market
2	Financial	If our company charges AU$ 1500 / student / year, then for a full strength batch of 10 students shall generate revenue of AU$ 15,000 per year. So, 50,000/15,000 = 3.33 years will be the payback period
3	Customer	As per expert survey, demand among students is there. So arranging customer shall not be a problem.
4	Social	social security will improve by obtain good market reputation
5	Operational	by providing user friendly website, operation shall become easy

Values with reference to your project:

· Better:

o This project is lacking a full time experienced application expert, by recruiting we can further improve the quality of service

· Cheaper:

o Cost cutting for first few years are important to attract students

o After the market reputation is developed we can increase our profit and business both

Metric:

· 1^st year (by 10-Feb-2018): let 10 nos. student enrolled, so 10 x AU$ 1,500 = AU$ 15,000 revenue generation

· 2^nd year (by 10-Feb-2019): let 10 nos. more student enrolled, so 10 x AU$ 1,500 = AU$ 15,000 + 15,000 (last year) = AU$ 30,000 revenue generation

· 3^rd year (by 10-Feb-2020): let 10 nos. more student enrolled for 3^rd year, so 10 x AU$ 1,500 = AU$ 15,000 + 30,000 (up to last year) = AU$ 45,000 revenue generation

· 4^th year (by 10-Feb-2021): let 10 nos. more student enrolled for 4^th year batch, so 10 x AU$ 1,500 = AU$ 15,000 + 45,000 (up to last year) = AU$ 60,000 revenue generation. Finally the break-even point crossed and started making profits

· 5^th year (by 10-Feb-2022): let 10 nos. more student enrolled for 5^th year batch, so 10 x AU$ 1,500 = AU$ 15,000 + 60,000 (up to last year) = AU$ 75,000 revenue generation. Profit before tax till date = 75,000 – 50,000 (invested) = AU$ 25,000

Acceptance Criteria

· Specific factors against which the project can be compared to determine success/failure:

o On time project completion: 30-Nov-2017

o Start of operation: 10-Feb-2018

o 10 students got enrolled by 10-Feb-2018

· Specific deliverables for the project as a whole:

o Gathering all required information by event manager for uploading of data

o Informal group of researchers to be formed by 10-Jun-2017

· Agency-specific deliverables:

o IT related network and hardware to be supplied and installed by 10-Oct-2017

· Inclusion of due dates for the deliverables:

o Submission and signature of charter: 02-May-2017

o Project completion: 30-Nov-2017

o Complete uploading data online by Ms. Sonia Reed: 10-Dec-2017

· Clear identification of milestone and milestone exit points:

o Start milestone: 01-April-2017

o Signing of charter: 02-May-2017

o Completion of project: 30-Nov-2017

o Start operation of Modern Social Media Research Centre: 10-Feb-2018

· Factors should include a specific metrical comparison:

o Best comparison to understand the success of the product is by calculating the number of student enrolled for the successive 3 years. It must be total of 30 students h=got enrolled by 10-Feb-2020

Assumptions and Constraints

· Assumptions made during the course of the project:

o 10 numbers of student shall enrol every year

o Presence of Zero market competitors

o Data gathering by event manager shall be smooth

· List of constraints that entail the limitations that are required to be addressed:

o Only competitor who ceased research centre recently may again start doing business & till our infrastructure gets ready, they may start doing business and grab our customer bank

o Unknown risk behind the reason of closing similar research centre in closely related area

Stakeholder List

Stakeholder No	Name and Signature	Role and Responsibility	Position
1	Alex	approval for start of project responsible to maintain positive working capital throughout the project life cycle	Sponsor
2	David Wright	Senior executive or Project Director, responsible for success of this project	Boss of Bruce
3	Bruce	Managing the international expert for providing input for our project	Program Manager
4	Student’s Name	Overall success of the project “Modern Social Media Research centre”	Project Manager
5	Ms. Sonia Reed	Updating the information required for research by prospective students	Application Manager
6	Xxx (Event Manager)	Collecting or gathering data required for uploading in server by Ms. Sonia Reed	Event Manager
7	Team Members of own company	Monitoring and controlling respective areas	Team Members
8	Craig Bamworth	Expert view on project and application implementation	Part time International Expert
9	Master and Doctorial students	Enrol as student and do research work	Customers

Lessons Learned

· Full time expert for overseeing proper project execution need to be recruited before start of project in future

· Information which needed to be uploaded online must be obtained well in advance for future project to avoid risk of not getting adequate quality documents

Charter Signoff

Mr. Alex (Sponsor of Modern Social Media Research Centre)

Comment: David, please see our project must generate clear identity in professional market

Communication Plan (PMI, 2013)

Plan purpose –

The purpose of developing the document is clear, that all team members must communicate with each other in proper method to maintain constant and equal flow of information from bottom to top and top to bottom levels. As the information flow from bottom to top will provide the clear message regarding health of project, ground realities to top management, similarly the flow of information from top to bottom will allow the employee to know the organisational decisions and policies which will help in maintaining motivational level among them and help in achieving better productivity. All communications with higher ups should be in the form of formal written and verbal and the discussions held must be maintained in some document like minutes of meeting, responsibility suffling matrix, etc.

Team members can communicate in formal or informal written and verbal among all, except with top management and outside vendors’ only formal written and verbal communication must be done. So that all the instructions received from top management can be documented and transfer to other team members too and communications with outside vendors can be documented for further action.

Change management –

The flow of information among project team for change control must follow below process

Above flow chart is to be maintained till all the change request is getting approved, in case it gets rejected, the process ends there itself. If change request is required few more clarification, the document again moves to the originator for providing further justification.

The changes either accepted or rejected must be documented in Change Log, to maintain a document with the entire change request raised and its status. The format for change log must be as below:

Sample Change Log
Project: Modern Social Media Research Centre						Date: DD-Mmm-YYYY
Change Request No.	Change Request Type	Description of Change Request	Requestor	Date Submitted	Date Approved	Status	Comments
CR-1	Scope	Internal Expert man-hour rate to be increased	Application team member	DD-Mmm-YYYY	DD-Mmm-YYYY	Rejected	This Change request is rejected and committed to accept for next project onwards

Meeting agenda –

Stakeholder	Information to be shared	Frequency of information exchange	Location of information exchange	Purpose of communication	Mechanism for communication
Who	What	When	Where	Why	How
Alex	Forecast reports, Status report, Trend analysis	weekly	Conference room	Updating project status for taking proper decision in any unforseen condition	Email Physical meeting, Group message
David Wright	Forecast reports, Status report, Trend analysis	weekly	Conference room	Updating project status for taking proper decision in any unforseen condition	Email Physical meeting, Group message
Bruce	Daily report, Forecast reports, Status report, Trend analysis	Daily & weekly	Conference room, other interactions	Updating ground condition for appraising to higher management	Email Physical meeting, Group message
Student’s Name	Daily, weekly and monthly report from different departments and external stakeholders like suppliers, experts	Daily Weekly monthly	My office, Conference room, Other interactions	Updating current status of different WBS items	Email Physical meeting, phone
Ms. Sonia Reed	Daily and weekly report	Daily Weekly	My office, Conference room, Other interactions	Updating current status of data uploading in server	Email Physical meeting, phone
Xxx (Event Manager)	Daily and weekly report	Daily Weekly	My office, Conference room, Other interactions	Updating current status of data collection for used by application manager	Email Physical meeting, phone
Team Members of own company	Daily and weekly report	Daily Weekly	My office, Conference room, Other interactions	Updating current status of data collection for used by application manager	Email Physical meeting, phone
Craig Bamworth	Progress report and issues with resolution	On requirement basis and weekly status	My office, Conference room, Other interactions	Provide any resolution of application or technical issue which needs to be addressed	Email Physical meeting, phone
Master and Doctorial students	Project status snapshot with pictorial presentations	Quarterly	News paper Online advertisement	To maintain interest level in project	Online advertisement