Instructions

You are allowed to consult the course textbooks, lessons and any notes you have taken. (You may NOT lift entire sentences or paragraphs from texts or lesson materials!!!), 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

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

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?"

Question 2

You are the same project manager described in Question 1. You ace the job interview, and the hiring manager gives you the job. 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

You are a project manager who has just been assigned to a software development project. Lisa, the project sponsor, calls you into her cubicle one afternoon. "Thanks for taking the time to speak with me," she says with a smile. "Before we discuss anything else about planning, I wanted to talk with you about the problem which has plagued every software project I've been involved with here - quality."

She shakes her head ruefully. "We ALWAYS face serious pushback from our user community after we release a new system. They complain bitterly that the software doesn't work well and often refuse to use it. We actually had to force people to use the last new system we did by shutting down the old system they had been using."

"We do conduct user acceptance testing before a release, and the testing team always gives me a report on the testing results before I approve the product. In spite of that, I always receive dozens of complaints from users after they start using the new system."

"You were recommended for this project because you are a PMP. Would you outline the approach you would advise us to take to ensure the new software we are going to build will work to everyone's satisfaction?"

What approach would you recommend for the project?