Posted: April 8th, 2015

Project Management

Project Management

Paper details:
Please refer to uploaded doc for details.
Task is broken down into 2 parts. Task 1 have 6 different questions to answer. Task 2 is a report. both tasks will be based on the short scenario given.

Instruction.

Given below is the scenario, which is the source in which you are to;

1.    Answer the six different questions in Task 1.
•    Total word count for the whole task should range between 500 to 600.
•    Some of the questions will refer to the case study, which is based on the scenario
•    Hints are highlighted in red to give you more guidance on how to address the questions.
•    It is very important that you need to provide you answers from the stand point of Project Management theoretical principles as they are testing if you understand the concept of Project Management or not.

2.    Produce a report based on the scenario – see task 2 section for more details. Word count totals around 2500.

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•    You need to at least include charts or tables in either/both tasks since the task is covering topic in Project management.
•    You also need to provide argument, analysis, logical explanation in your work, esp dealing with part 2.
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Scenario

Parker Ltd is a consultancy company specialising in the sport  and physical activity sector. The organisations they are commissioned by includes: local authorities, charities, and private sector organisations. The company was founded in 2002 and has shown steady growth over the past thirteen years. They trade from office accommodation (80 square metres) in a major city in England. At present the company employs IGeneral Manager, 5  Lead Consultants,  3 Administration  staff, and 2 Marketing Officers.

Parker Ltd has provided a project manager — to a local authority – relating to a one off special project. This project is concerned with the ensuring the initial opening and operational requirements of the new leisure facility are identified. Please note this new leisure facility will already be built to a 21st Century standard. The provision includes: swimming pool, sports haIl, dry and wet changing facilities, two dance studios with additional health and fitness provision in the form of a state of the art fitness centre.

Task 1  (Around 500 to 600 words)

1)    What are the core principles/characteristics of any project and why are they important?  You need to provide valid underpinning theories and examples. Keep short.

2)    How would you have defined the scope of the project in the case study? This is a practically oriented question, which will need to be answered in terms of what you see as the scope of the project in the case study.  I would try and combine in your answer an awareness of what project scope means and includes and what that means for how the scope of the project in the case study might be defined.  You also need to support your argument.

3)    Using the Information below, plot out a full project Gantt chart and identify the critical path? How many days does it take to complete the project? 3)    Gantt charts are of course techniques available for project scheduling. While critical paths are most normally associated with network diagrams, you can identify a critical path from a gantt chart as well. Good answers to this question may include brief definitions of the two key terms i.e. gantt chart and critical path but I would keep those pretty short- though maybe say a tiny bit in your definition of the latter about  how you can derive it from the gantt chart.

Tasks    Precedence    Time ( Days)
A    –    5
B    –    4
C    a    6
D    a    2
E    b    8
F    c    5
G    e    4
H    f    3

4)    What method(s) would you employ for cost management and why?
your answer to this question will be brief, but do remember to address the ‘and why?’ bit of the question at the end by giving one or more reasons for the cost management method or methods you choose. Support your argument.

5)    How would you have assessed and managed the risks on the project in the case study?
you will need to be pretty brief in setting out how you would have assessed and managed the risks in this project.  The case says nothing really about risks within it so I suggest you assume you are addressing fairly standard risks for a project of this sort,

6) What quality Methods (project evaluation, monitoring and control) would you introduce to ensure this project is completed successfully.First you need to answer which one and define why. second you need to provide argument why is one superior than the other.

Task 2 ( around 2500 words count)

As Project Manager you are responsible for the ensuring the initial opening and operational requirements of the new facility are identified. You are required to prepare a report concerning the main issues to be addressed from a project management perspective From a project management perspective outline the activities required to successfully implement this new initiative, ensuring that it can open on-time, and within budget. Again you should note that  you  are taking possession of a purpose  built building and have to address the issues that would allow the building to be operated by your client. You should note that the emphasis should be concerned with you communicating your knowledge of project management.

Although you have been  appointed as the Project Manager, your analysis should include the skills and competencies that you already posses and which are required by a Project Manager to manage this type of major project. Use examples of the Project Management Process, for example concerns, stages, processes, leadership, administration and control problems associated with managing the lifecycle of this major project.

This task basically requires you to identify good practice in project management. One way of structuring your answer might be to use the project cycle and to make sure you identify what is important at every stage of the cycle, although, as the project is already due to go ahead, you might want to suggest that any stage(s) before planning in the cycle are not that important on this occasion. Were you to take that approach.. Other equally good ways of structuring your answer exist, which you can obviously adopt, though, whatever approach to structure you decide on, be sure you cover the different issues listed in the assignment brief as best you can. In my view there is potentially some overlap between those and some of the issues you have been asked about in task one- notably in questions 4,5 and 6.

You are not given much information about the specific project you are managing.  It is important that you do not attempt to make up additional details yourself.  Instead you should focus on general principles and practice of good project management but apply them to the particular case in the question where you can -and really as often as the amount of detail in the case realistically allows. For example you can relate issues of project control to the kind of tasks that are likely to be going on e.g purchasing equipment, fitting out areas of the facility etc  Such broad example based references to the scenario in the question are quite important.  In your approach try both to be quite practical e.g. give examples of specific practical techniques and of activities relevant to the case  but also try and show evidence of wide reading ( properly referenced using Harvard) and a good conceptual/theoretical understanding of what you are writing about. you also need to be comparing what different sources say about issues as much as you can e.g. Bloggs ( 2013) sees the use of earned value analysis as key to project control whereas Smith ( 2011) stresses the use of the more people-centred approach of regular feedback meetings and report.