Pmi Global Congress Short Simplified Class Assig
PJM480 MOD4 Peer Discussion Responses
Please reply to both POST1: and POST2: in at least 200 words
Initial Post:
You have been handed a new project. The first step is to develop a Work
Breakdown Structure (WBS) and the appropriate work packages. How can the
WBS be used as a control and monitor tool for the project? Frame your
response in the context of your current or recent position.
Message from the professor:
Class,
Sometimes creating a WBS or converting a WBS to a schedule by adding
task duration forecasts and precedence relationships between tasks are
seen as technical skills associated with Project Management. But the PM
needs to draw upon technical skills (understanding what a WBS is, how a
schedule is different from a WBS, and how to use software to create
both), as well as interpersonal skills and problem-solving/ conceptual/
decision-making skills to effectively create a WBS or a schedule.
For example, to accurately capture all of the tasks, it is important
for the PM to engage the right people and facilitate brainstorming
sessions. But he or she needs to be wise about scheduling these
sessions. It doesn’t make sense to have everyone associated with every
element of a large and complex project in the room at the same time, for
example. This will be difficult to manage, could waste the time of a
lot of people, and may result in a lot of confusion.
Similarly, when it is time to determine precedence relationships
between tasks, it will be important for the PM to have the right
combination of people in the room to discuss this, but that is probably a
variety of combinations of people in separate meetings. The PM must
also pay close attention to the dialogue between the SME’s in these
meetings and probe into what precedence relationships are being proposed
due to technical, physical, or logical constraints and what precedence
relationships are being proposed out of spoken or unspoken concerns
about risk or ethics.
For example, if there is a project to procure a fleet of 50 corporate
vehicles and someone suggests that an offer for the vehicles cannot be
made to the dealer until the financing is approved, the PM needs to
probe into whether this is truly the case if, for example, the company
has the capacity to purchase the vehicles for cash but has chosen to
finance them. The PM, needing to ensure that tasks are not scheduled
needlessly in series, which extends the total duration of the project,
cannot take the SME’s precedence relationships recommendations at face
value without asking further questions and fully understanding the
rationale for the recommendations.
Also, different SME’s will have different ideas about how long tasks
will take. Ultimately, the PM has to bring the team to a decision or
time will slip away and the schedule will not get completed.
These are just some illustrations of why it is important to recognize
that the creation of a WBS or a schedule requires far more than
technical project management skills.
Dr. Keogh
POST1:
The
WBS represents the work in the project scope statement (PMI, 2017).
Specifically, the WBS breaks down deliverables into controllable parts,
which aids the project team in organizing and defining the project
scope. A detailed WBS is useful for identifying, measuring, and
estimating project expenses. It is also a foundational step in planning
and starting the project. The WBS is comprised of activity unit levels
called work packages.
The number of levels in the WBS is often suggestive of the level of
control required to effectively manage the project. A WBS can be used to
monitor and control projects for this reason, allowing the project
scope to be broken down to the lowest activities for which costs are
associated (Verveniotis, 2008). Using a WBS for this purpose contributes
to cost containment. Costs can be controlled because all activities are
allocated to a control account and a cost code assigned to each work
package.
For example, Verveniotis (2008) theorized that the WBS for
megaprojects could be used to monitor/control them by assigning
universal codes to clarify scope activities rather than assigning dummy
codes. He concluded that when cost control is automated, the WBS
activity status gives workers greater control over eliminating certain
project activities. The downside of creating an exhaustive WBS is that
it is time consuming as it relies on historical data and requires
original cost estimates (He, 2014). The time we will expend in creating a
comprehensive WBS is a small price to pay for the value created by
having a visual tool that fully depicts the project objectives.
Verveniotis (2008) studied a large, R&D project executed in the
U.S. The challenge was to deliver it within an aggressive timeframe. The
project team needed to develop a useable WBS that supported quick
project deployment. Early configurations of the WBS contained over fifty
divisions of the Construction Specifications Institute’s 2004
Masterformat with detailed levels broken out for each division. The
team’s initial WBS contained over 6,000 tasks. Once cost management was
complete, the WBS was reduced to 400 tasks. The actual levels used for
cost tracking were determined by the company’s overall objectives.
References:
He, W. (2014). A framework of combining case-based reasoning with a
work breakdown structure for estimating the cost of online course
production projects. British Journal of Educational Technology, 45(4),
595–605. https://doi-org.csuglobal.idm.oclc.org/10.1111/bje…
Project Management Institute (PMI). (2017). A guide to the project
management body of knowledge® (PMBOK® Guide) (6th ed.). Newtown Square,
PA: PMI Publications
Verveniotis, P. (2008). Mega-Project Control: Effective Program, Project, and WBS Granularity Decisions. AACE International Transactions, PM21-PM25
POST2:
A Work
Breakdown Structure (WBS) is a crucial part of any project because it
provides a visual representation of all the tasks that need to be
completed for a project, broken down by the types of tasks that need to
be completed (Zecheru & Olaru, 2016). A Work Breakdown Structure can
easily be used as a control and monitor tool because it provides a list
of all the different activities that need to be completed, in the order
in which they need to be completed, so everyone involved in the project
can know where the project stands at any given time. Though a Work
Breakdown Structure will not have the timeline that would be listed on a
project schedule, the WBS does provide a general understanding of the
order in which the tasks need to be completed and can be used to ensure
that no task begins before the required prerequisite is completed
(Brotherton, Fried, & Norman, 2008). Because in order to create a
project schedule the team first needs to identify all of the required
tasks of a project, and to understand in what order those tasks need to
be completed, a Work Breakdown Structure is the logical precursor to a
full project schedule. In my current position we utilize the Work
Breakdown Structure on all new projects to clearly layout all of the
required tasks that need to be completed, in what order, and what
vendors or third-party organizations will need to be kept in the loop
for different types of tasks. Because we work with more than a dozen
different vendors for each restaurant project it is important to create a
Work Breakdown Structure for the fact that it keeps all of our tasks in
the correct order and organized by the correct vendors.
References
Brotherton, S. A., Fried, R. T., & Norman, E. S. (2008). Applying
the work breakdown structure to the project management lifecycle. Paper
presented at PMI® Global Congress 2008—North America, Denver, CO.
Newtown Square, PA: Project Management Institute.
Zecheru, V., & Olaru, B. (2016). Work breakdown structure (WBS)
in project management. Revista De Management Comparat International,
17(1), 61-69.