Project evaluation and control – Flashcards

Iron triangle/ triple constraints: - Time - Budget - Performance To this should be added - Client acceptance

- Project efficiency (meeting budget and schedule) - Impact on customer (meeting specifications, client acceptance) Business success (commercial success?) Preparing for the future (was project good investement?)

- System quality (build quality) - Information quality - Use (superficial customer acceptance) - User satisfaction - Individual impact (what value is added) - Organizational impact

1. Setting a goal 2. Measuring progress 3. Comparing actual with planned performance 4. Taking action

- Project S-curve - Milestone analysis

Represents the typical form of the relationship between time passed and budget expended.

Benefits - Simplicity - Provides a way to show real-time tracking information Drawbacks - Do not allow us to make reasonable assumptions as to the cause of the variance between planned and actual.

An event or stage of the project that represents a significant accomplishment on the road to the project's completion.

1. Signal the completion of important project steps. 2. Can motivate the project team. 3. Offer points at which to reevaluate client needs and any potential change requests. 4. Help coordinate schedules with vendors and suppliers. 5. Identify key project review gates. 6. Signal other team members when their participation is expected to begin. 7. Can delineate the various deliverables developed in the WBS and thereby enable the project team to develop a better overall view of the project.

Are only a form of reactive control.

Allows the project team to constantly update the project's status by linking task completion to the schedule baseline.

Benefits - Easy to understand - Easy to assimilate and interpret - Can be updated very quickly Drawbacks - Don't identify the underlying source of the problems - Does not allow for future projections of the project's status

Recognizes that it is necessary to jointly consider the impact of time, cost and project performance on any analysis of current project status. This method inks all three primary project success metrics (cost, schedule, and performance).

A cost estimate of the budgeted resources scheduled across the project's life cycle (cumulative baseline).

This is the real budgeted cost, or "value," of the work that has actually been performed to date.

The cumulative total costs incurred in accomplishing the various project work packages.

The earned value to date divided by the planned value of work scheduled to be performed (EV/PV). This value allows us to calculate the projected schedule of the project to completion.

The earned value divided by the actual, cumulative cost of the work performed to date (EV/AC). This value allows us to calculate the projected budget to completion.

This represents the total budget for a project.

1. The WBS is used to identify the individual work packages and tasks. 2. The time-phased budget allows us to determine the correct sequencing and the points in the project when budget money is like to be spent.

1. Clearly define each activity or task that will be performed on the project, including its resource needs as well as a detailed budget. 2. Create the activity and resource usage schedules. 3. Develop a "time-phased" budget that shows expenditures across the project's life. 4. Total the actual costs of doing each task to arrive at the actual cost of work performed (AC). 5. Calculate both a project's budget variance and schedule variance while it is still in process.

The expected total cost of the project to completion based on performance across the various tasks up to the status date.

Depends highly on accurate and up-to-date information on the project.

1. 0/100 rule 2. 50/50 rule 3. Percentage complete rule

1. Project mission 2. Top management support 3. Project plans and schedules 4. Client consultation 5. Personnel 6. Technical tasks 7. Client acceptance 8. Monitoring and feedback 9. Communication 10. Troubleshooting

a structured process designed to help people understand the causes of past problems to prevent recurrence.

1. Define the problem 2. Create a causal understanding of the problem 3. Identify solutions that act on known causes of the problem 4. Implement the best solutions Focus on implementing effective solutions, not labeling a root cause.

1. Based on business goals develop threshold criteria for initiation of RCA. 2. Precisely define each major problem and quantify the business impact. 3. Allocate adequate time and resources for each RCA that are in line with the associated risk. 4. Complete each RCA consistently. 5. Don't categorize problems or their causes. 6. Institute a rigorous validation process that uses evidence to verify causes and weed out uncertainty. 7. Based on the causes, use the talents of people, to help identify the best solutions. 8. Prioritize solutions based on criteria. 9. Develop solutions that are clear and descriptive enough to be implemented by a third party. 10. Focus monitoring metrics on implementation timing and effectiveness of the solutions and report regularly on your RCA's successes.