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project management
An Introduction To Project Management. 5th Edition Kathy Schwalbe - Solutions
Companies with more mature project management practices have better project performance. They deliver projects on time and on budget more often. Less mature companies often miss their schedule targets by 40 percent and their cost targets by 20 percent.
Firms have steadily and consistently moved up in levels of project management maturity between 2001 and 2014.
Most organizations (76%) have improved in PM maturity over the past five years with 33% moving from Level 1 to Level 2.
Organizations have seen considerable value by increasing the level of their project management maturity
There is a correlation between the length of time project management has been in place in a firm and its project management maturity and overall performance.
High-performing firms are much more mature in their project management practices than low performers.
There is a direct and strong correlation between the project management maturity of a firm and its overall performance.
A majority of firms (91%) have project management processes in place.
5. Sustained: Project management processes are continuously improved and are fully understood, and data is optimized and sustained
4. Integrated: Program management is used, and project management data and processes are integrated and quantitatively analyzed, measured, and stored
3. Managed: Formal project planning and control systems and data are managed
2. Planned: Project management processes, problem areas, and data are informally defined, identified, collected
1. Ad-hoc: No project management processes or practices are consistently available, and data is not consistently collected or analyzed
They are managing more strategic projects and understand strategic goals. When asked “Is your primary project considered highly strategic to your organization,” the average alpha response was 60% vs. 41%.
They can get consensus and handle conflicts. When senior managers and customers were asked “How would you rate this project manager’s ability to identify, understand, and satisfy your individual goals for the project,” the average alpha response was 92% vs. 64%. When asked a similar question
They think it is important for the project manager to be a handson manager and a domain expert. When asked to “Rank the importance of the project manager being a domain expert as a contributor to overall project success,” the average alpha response was 94% vs. 68% for the non-alphas.
Formally close the project: Every project should be closed to make sure that all work ceases, that lessons are learned, and that remaining resources are released for other purposes.
Manage the project control cycle. Monitoring should focus more on the future than on the past. Project managers must continuously check that the project plan is still fit for the purpose of the project and likely to deliver the business benefits on time.Project changes must be managed to ensure
Monitor against the plan. Everyone working on projects must have guidance, training, and support in creating plans and making project-related decisions. Organizations must develop and follow control techniques for managing risks, issues, scope changes, schedule, costs, and project reviews.
Ensure success by planning for it. To help projects succeed, the balance of power often needs to be tipped toward the project and away from line management.
Engage your stakeholders. Ignoring stakeholders often leads to project failure. Be sure to engage stakeholders at all stages of a project, and encourage teamwork and commitment at all times.
Use a staged approach. You can rarely plan a project in its entirety. Use progressive steps or stages to project planning, and use the same generic stages for all types of projects. Have gate reviews before starting each stage to revalidate a project and before committing more resources and funding
Look everywhere. Go far afield. Think of the whole world as your laboratory for learning
Help everyone in your organization become a professional.Empower people to manage themselves through benchmarks and standards based on best practice exchange.
Reach high. Stretch. Raise standards and aspirations. Find the best of the best and then use it as inspiration for reaching full potential.
Wikipedia (2015) had the same definition as it did in 2012, and it added that “a ‘best’ practice can evolve to become better as improvements are discovered. Best practice is considered by some as a business buzzword, used to describe the process of developing and following a standard way of
Wikipedia (2012) defines a best practice as “a method or technique that has consistently shown results superior to those achieved with other means, and that is used as a benchmark.
Wikipedia (2009) defines a best practice as “the most efficient(least amount of effort) and effective (best results) way of accomplishing a task, based on repeatable procedures that have proven themselves over time for large numbers of people…The idea is that with proper processes, checks, and
Webster’s Dictionary (2007) defines a best practice as “a practice which is most appropriate under the circumstances, especially as considered acceptable or regulated in business; a technique or methodology that, through experience and research, has reliably led to a desired or optimum
Read final advice about project management
Discuss best practices described in this text
Describe research on project management maturity
Explain how improving project management maturity can improve project and organizational performance
Summarize best practices in project management for individuals
Define best practices in general and best practices in project management for organizations
4. Perform the closing tasks for one of the case studies provided in Appendix C. If you are working on a real team project, create relevant closing documents, such as a final project report and lessons-learned report, using the templates and samples in this chapter as guides.Present your results to
3. Using the information you developed in Team Project 1 or 2, role-play the final project meeting, at which you present the final project presentation to key stakeholders. Determine who will play what role(project manager, team member from a certain department, senior managers, and so on). Be
2. You are part of a team in charge of a project to help people in your company (500 people) lose weight. This project is part of a competition, and the top “losers” will be featured in a popular television show. Assume that you had six months to complete the project and a budget of $10,000.
1. Your organization is about to complete a project to raise money for an important charity. Assume that there are 1,000 people in your organization. Also, assume that you had six months to raise as much money as possible, with a goal of $100,000. With just one week to go, you have raised $92,000.
5. Watch the videos mentioned in the Video Highlights for this chapter about the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster and lessons learned from it. (See www.intropm.com for the direct links.) Research other articles and videos about the lessons learned from the Challenger and space travel since then.
4. Find an article or video that provides a good example of closing a project. See the What Went Right? passage for ideas, but find your own unique example. Document your findings in a one-page paper, citing your references.
3. Compare the lessons-learned template on the companion Web site and the one available from Microsoft as shown in Figure 8-6. Search for at least one other example of lessons-learned report or template.Summarize their similarities and differences in a one-page paper, citing your references.
2. Using the lessons-learned template on the companion Web site or the one available from Microsoft as shown in Figure 8-6, write a lessonslearned report for a project you worked on. If you cannot think of one, interview someone who recently completed a project and write a lessons-learned report on
1. Find an example of a large project that took more than a year to complete, such as a major construction project. You can ask people at your college, university, or work about a recent project, such as a major fundraising campaign, information systems installation, or building project. You can
6. What advice about project closing is most useful to you? What other advice would you add?
5. What are the main closing outputs created as part of procurement management?
4. What is a post-mortem?
3. What are the main topics included in a lessons-learned report?
2. What are the main closing outputs created as part of integration management? Why is it important to create a final project report, presentation, and lessons-learned report?
1. What is involved in closing projects? Why should all projects be formally closed?
On a smaller scale, Allegheny College put together a five minute video of their senior project celebration. Many colleges require senior projects, so why not have a formal celebration when the projects are completed and document the event in a video?
Many viewers got tears in their eyes watching the last few minutes of Extreme Home Makeover episodes. Ty Pennington and his team of designers, builders, volunteers, friends, family, and neighbors gathered to see the new home built quickly for a family in need.Everyone enjoyed the tradition of
Popular television shows likes American Idol and The Voice have great closing shows. For example, in 2015, several famous celebrities(John Fogerty, Kelly Clarkson, Sheryl Crow, etc.) performed with contestants before ending the eighth season of The Voice and announcing the new winner, Sawyer
Project managers should take time to thank their team and other project stakeholders and have some type of closing celebration.Just having a team lunch or informal gathering with refreshments might be appropriate. If it was a big, highly successful project, a more formal celebration and rewards
It will be much easier to close a project if the project team captures lessons learned and other important information required for closing as soon as possible. For example, the project team should have some type of log where everyone can document lessons learned as they occur. A simple blog would
It is important to plan for project closing. There should be deliverables in the WBS and resources allocated to perform project closing. For example, someone should be assigned the activity of reviewing lessons learned and creating one final lessons-learned report. Resources should be assigned to
9. Documentation/video/audio artifacts are the starting point for discovery and productive conversation; it is vital to put the people with the learning needs and the people who have the experience together to enable transfer.10. To facilitate discovery of best practices, leverage communities
8. Facilitation is critical to the process - both the role and the capability.
7. Uncover success stories, communicate the stories, and assist the learning and adaption processes.
6. Peer assistance is a critical tool to begin, and even conclude, the process.
5. Do something, see what works, then broaden the scope.
4. Focus on general, broadly applicable practices first, rather than choosing highly specialized practices.
3. The learner is important, and making learning easy is critical or people will recreate "good enough."
2. As Jack Welch said, "You don't have a better or best practice until someone else is using it."
1. "Best" or "better" practices are not adopted; they're adapted.
The main lessons learned on the project
Main changes that occurred during the project and how they were addressed
The success criteria and results in achieving them
The scope, time, and cost goals and outcomes
9. Complaining about your job
8. Posting while you’re supposed to be working
7. Making fun of your boss / team.
6. Making fun of clients or donors
5. Talking smack about a job before you’ve even accepted it
4. Blowing your own cover
3. Revealing company secrets
2. Sexual oversharing
1. Posting something embarrassing on the corporate Twitter feed
Were the project goals attained? If not, what changes need to be made to meet goals in the future?
What project circumstances were not anticipated?
What surprises did the team have to deal with?
What needs to be done over or differentlya?
What worked well—or didn’t work well—either for this project or for the project team?
4. Starvation: A project can also be terminated by decreasing its budget or suddenly ending funding. This approach is also known as withdrawal of life support. The reason for starving a project is generally to shadow the failure of non-accomplishment of the goals. Management sometimes uses this
3. Extinction: A project may end because it was successful and achieved its goals, and there is no need for further work. Another form of extinction is when a project is stopped because it was unsuccessful or superseded. A special case of termination by extinction is called termination by murder,
2. Addition: A project creates a new product or service that results in a new unit in the organization, such as a department, division, or company. Project staff and other resources move into the new unit.
1. Integration: A project is completed, and products and services created are integrated into operations, as was done in the Just-In-Time Training project. This is the most common approach.Project staff and other resources are released and distributed into the organization.
Describe advice on closing projects
Explain the process of closing procurements performed as part of project procurement management, and describe the contents of a written notice of a closed contract
Discuss the process of closing a project or phase performed as part of project integration management, explain the importance of a project close-out meeting and knowledge transfer, and describe the contents of a customer acceptance/project completion form, final project report, and lessons-learned
List several processes and outputs of project closing
Describe common ways to close or terminate projects
5. Perform the monitoring and controlling tasks for one of the case studies provided in Appendix C. If you are working on a real team project, create relevant monitoring and controlling documents, such as performance reports or quality assurance-related charts using the templates and samples in
4. Brainstorm two different quality related problems that you are aware of at your college or organization. Then review the charts found in the section of this chapter on the seven basic tools of quality and create two charts to help analyze the quality problems. Prepare a one- to two-page paper or
3. Using the information you developed in Team Project 1 or 2, role-play a meeting to brainstorm and develop strategies for solving problems with key stakeholders. Determine who will play what role (project manager, team member from a certain department, senior managers, and so on). Be creative in
2. You are part of a team in charge of a project to help people in your company (500 people) lose weight. This project is part of a competition, and the top “losers” will be featured in a popular television show. Assume that you have six months to complete the project and a budget of $10,000.
1. Your organization initiated a project to raise money for an important charity. Assume that there are 1,000 people in your organization.Also, assume that you have six months to raise as much money as possible, with a goal of $100,000. List three problems that could arise while monitoring and
e. Sketch the earned value chart for this project, using Figure 7-4 as a guide. Assume the data for month 1 is half of the values given for PV, EV, and AC at the end of month 2.
d. Use the SPI to estimate how long it will take to finish this project.
c. Use the CPI to calculate the estimate at completion (EAC) for this project.
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