Work Breakdown Structure - Midterm Project Management

Question # 1

1. A potential client wants you to be project manager for the development of a new training course in project management, but she is vague about the details. List a few questions you could ask her to gain a better understanding of the scope of the project.

Project Management is needed to implement the project successfully. It has three pillars (Time, Budget and Resources, & Quality; however some argue that there’s a fourth pillar – that being Scope). Scope refers to the detailed set of features a project requires, it is having a broader vision and a better understanding of what is required and what isn’t in order to make the decision of what work will be completed during the lifecycle of a project, and allows it to control what gets added or removed as the project is executed.

As the project manager, it is my responsibility to ensure that only the required work (the scope) will be accomplished and that each of the deliverables can be completed in the time and budget given in order to deliver a project.

[pic 1]Ambiguity or vagueness in scope leads to unnecessary work; thus the scope needs to be clearly defined and established. The list of questions I would ask is the following:

I would have to define the needs, establish a project timeline, and allocate resources and set goals and objectives. Once that is done, as the project manager I would be able to give them the direction they need to follow and the resources that needs allocation to deliver a project in the given time and budget. Then I would understand the project objectives for the development of a new training course. Then I would set the following parameters: the goals, the sub-phases, the tasks, resources, budget, schedule and the limitations.

Some of the other questions I would ask would be about; the deliverables (a measure of quality that can be used to monitor and take corrective action), how to allocate resources and manage the project, how will success be measured (allows the project manager to steer the project through the inevitable challenges ahead after defining the objectives), what potential is there to negotiate on actual deliverables (when difficult decisions have to be made- the amount of flexibility). I would also make sure there are no legal or market constraints that could have an impact on the project, therefore I would ask about the constraints. I would need to know who is involved (the team, sponsor, stakeholder) and if there’s any previous work related to this project that I need to know about, what are my start and completion dates? if there are any deadlines for the final completion or for certain phases, and what are the major risks associated with this project. Finally, the most important question to ask is what the customer wants, as the project manager I have to listen carefully to what they say and make sure I get feedback on different phases of the project.

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