Which of the following statements describes a project termination by extinction?
Why is it important to define the project governance and management framework?
Scenario:
Leute is a low-cost airline, headquartered in Wien, Austria. The company aims to offer passengers optimal options regarding its services and gain the lead role among other competitors in the airline industry. Recently, Leute experienced a major drop in revenue due to negative reviews from customers in various online platforms. To increase its profit and enhance customer satisfaction, the company decided to expand its in-flight services by offering entertainment, such as movies, audio books, and games, food for purchase in economy and full meals in premium cabins, and comforts, such as blankets and pillows. For the implementation of this project and future projects of the airline, the CEO of Leute, Michaele Wagner, decided to follow the guidelines of ISO 21502 on project management.
Initially, Allison, the project manager, created a short document in which she justified and summarized all project aspects, including: the nature and purpose of the project, the objectives of the project, key milestones of the project and the time needed to complete the project, and the audience that the project targets.
Afterward, Allison held a meeting with Michaele during which she presented this document and briefly explained each of its points. After a considerable amount of analysis and discussions, the project initiation was approved by Michaele. In addition, a team of eighteen members was authorized to start with the project activities.
While undertaking the project activities, Allison ensured that each work package takes longer than 8 hours, but less than 80 hours, so that they would be completed in 1 to 10 working days. In addition, during this phase, several changes were made in the predefined aspects of the project, which were approved by Nick Todd, the project sponsor. For instance, initially, the project delivery was set to be completed after six months. However, considering how the project was implemented and the time required for the completion of each phase, the deadline for the project completion was postponed for another two months. These changes were also reflected in the business case, which was updated accordingly.
A month after the project execution began, Allison conducted an earned value analysis to measure the progress of the project up to that stage. She measured how efficiently the work was being performed with regard to its budgeted cost, after which she concluded that it was going according to the plan. Moreover, she organized a meeting with relevant project stakeholders in order to communicate the progress report to them.
Question:
According to scenario 3, the business case was updated to reflect the changes made regarding the project delivery. Is this acceptable?
What should the project manager do, among others, to avoid exceeding the project budget?
Scenario:
Headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, DND is one of the largest worldwide automakers. It first gained global recognition after introducing a sports car, which quickly became highly demanded by sports car lovers around the world. Alec Law, the CEO of DND, and his management team recently decided to embark on a new project, i.e., the production of alternative fuel cars, which would use an alternative fuel source instead of traditional petroleum fuels, as the other cars of the company do, in order to promote sustainable and low-carbon transportation. For the implementation of this project, the company decided to follow the guidelines of ISO 21502 on project management.
During the development of the project governance framework, the company took into account several factors, including, among others, the legal context of stakeholders. In the project governance, the company also included oversights on the management frameworks and the project life cycle. In order to determine the project life cycle, the external environment was considered, including information on studies that related to similar projects. In addition, the company decided to separate this project governance from its overall governance.
Moreover, the company developed a project organization, where the roles, responsibilities, and authorities in the project were defined. In addition, the responsibilities of the project office and project assurance, among others, were defined. The project organization also included a customer representative. Once the project organization was developed and approved by the project board, it was communicated only to the project team.
As the project was entering its design stage, the project board made a change in the structure of the project organization since one of the work package leaders had resigned from the project in order to be involved in another project of the company.
Question:
During the development of the project governance framework, DND considered the legal context of stakeholders. Is this acceptable?
Scenario:
Tricko is a clothing manufacturer headquartered in Milano, Italy. The company was founded in 2010 by Mario, a famous Italian fashion designer. Over the last few years, the company has seen immense growth and now has a chain of stores across multiple European cities. Following industry trends, the top management of Tricko concluded that the company should establish an online store. As such, they required Lily, an experienced IT engineer, to develop a brief for this potential project. After several meetings and discussions, the top management approved the project brief and assigned Lily as the project manager. For this project, she was instructed to use the guidelines of ISO 21502 on project management.
Lily initiated the project by mobilizing the project team, which included four web developers, two network engineers, and one systems analyst. In order to ensure that every team member is fully aware of their roles and responsibilities, Lily developed team performance domains which would link each project activity with the individuals responsible for undertaking it. She explained to the team members that it is important to clearly understand their roles and responsibilities, considering that the team composition cannot be reassessed or revised once the project plan is authorized to be executed. In addition, Lily defined in a document the project’s contribution to the overall objectives of Tricko, which reflected the relevant project requirements and their associated acceptance criteria.
Following that, Lily worked with the project team to discuss project costs. She suggested the team initially establish cost estimates only for the first phase of the project and then for the entire project. In addition, she required cost estimates to be expressed in currency valuations and in labor hours. One of the network engineers suggested that each team member should provide an estimate, and then the team should reach an agreement for a joint estimate. On the other hand, one of the developers suggested establishing an estimate for the costs after the closure of the project, such as advertising and promotion costs. Lily agreed with their suggestions and asked them to provide a total estimate as soon as possible.
Based on the total estimate provided by the project team, Lily developed the project budget and created a list of project activities, divided them into smaller items, and assigned a budget for each item.
Question:
Scenario 5 states that Lily required them to express the costs in labor hours and currency valuations. Is this acceptable?