FINAL EXAM for MA 450

Which estimating technique uses historical data from a similar project as a starting point for creating a time or cost estimate?

analogous estimating

Which of the following accurately describes risk in project management?

A risk may impact the project in a positive or negative way.

Project partnerships offer which of the following advantages to both clients and vendors?

Ability to explore new technologies

Which of the following is a pre-condition that must be met in order for a project kick-off meeting to be successful?

An atmosphere of trust and relationship building should be set by all.

All of the following factors must be in place in order to develop an analogous estimate effectively EXCEPT:

An organization must know details behind the time value of money.

During which DMAIC phase would you find the objectives of identify possible root causes, collect data, and confirm root causes through data analysis?

Analyze

All of the following describe the appropriate application of Perform Quantitative Risk Analysis in project management EXCEPT:

Brainstorming techniques are used by the team and other stakeholders to identify as many project risks as possible

This Agile project reporting tool is useful to Scrum Masters as it projects how close to plan the team is within a given time box, by providing a graphical representation of work effort remaining in an iteration versus the days left in an iteration

Burndown chart

Project partnerships offer all of the following advantages to vendors EXCEPT:

Buyer gains at the vendor's expense

Good project management practice suggests a need to include a _______ within the cost baseline in order to cover identified risks that are accepted, and for which responses have been developed.

Contingency reserve

Which of the following contracts is riskiest for a buyer?

Cost-Plus-Fixed-Fee

Under normal conditions, which of these contract types poses the greatest risk to the buyer?

Cost-Plus-Fixed-Fee (CPFF)

On Agile projects, detailed risk management activities may occur during all of the following times EXCEPT:

During early risk planning at the start of the project

Which of the following statements accurately describe supply chain management.

It addresses the flow of products, information and funds. It is a system approach to managing the entire flow of physical products. It spans across suppliers, resellers, project organizations and consumers.

The cost management plan provides guidelines to the project manager and other stakeholders and serves all of the following purposes EXCEPT:

It documents how the project statement of work and business case should be created.

All of the following are benefits that can be attributed to the effective use of a risk management plan EXCEPT:

It enables the project manager to identify and eliminate all risks

All of the following accurately describe earned value management EXCEPT:

It is good for performance reporting but not for forecasting

All of the following statements accurately describe special cause variation EXCEPT:

It is inherent in the system and is predictable

After completing detailed planning for a project, it is often helpful for the project manager and team to apply a sanity test to the project plan. Which of the following accurately describes the application of a sanity test?

It should include questions to ensure budgets, schedules and resource plans are reasonable and achievable.

_______________ is the work required to move and position inventory throughout a supply chain

Logistics

A milestone is a typical measuring point used when establishing cost control. Which of the following DOES NOT accurately describes the use of cost control milestones?

Milestones are developed during risk planning

In regard to Project Work, which activity refers to "reviewing the progress and capturing project performance data with reference to the project pan, developing performance measures, and communicating performance information?"

Monitoring

Which quality control tool is a special type of vertical bar chart that is used to identify the primary (vital few) sources that are responsible for causing most of a problem's effects, often referred to as the 80/20 rule?

Pareto Diagram

_______________________________ is a method for transforming contractual arrangements into a cohesive, collaborative project team with a single set of goals and established procedures for resolving disputes in a timely and cost-efficient manner?

Partnering

You are a project manager for a project that has been baselined and is now under way. When a customer approaches you and asks to increase the project's scope, Your response should be to __________:

Perform integrated change control

One output of the Plan Procurement Management process is the ________, a document that describes the item to be procured "in sufficient detail to allow prospective sellers to determine if they are capable of providing the products, services, or results".

Procurement statement of work

Complex projects such as research and development for new products often employ rolling wave planning to estimate costs. Which of the following best describes "rolling wave" planning?

Project managers render a definitive estimate for the first stage and an order of magnitude estimate for the remainder of the project.

All of these describe contemporary methods of risk prioritization in project management EXCEPT:

Results of quantitative risk analysis are used for clarification purposes and are typically not documented in the risk register.

A ________ presents a hierarchical organization of risks based on categories such as operational, strategic, finance, external, and project management

Risk Breakdown Structure (RBS)

Which of the following measures is best suited for determining whether the project is on, ahead or behind schedule?

Schedule Variance (SV)

Work to be performed can come from the work package level of the work breakdown structure as well as other sources. Which of these is NOT a source of authorized work to be performed?

Scope creep

Which of the following quality management thought leaders is generally credited with contributing the insight that team learning is necessary to improve quality?

Senge

Which of the following quantitative risk analysis techniques is used to determine which risks have the most powerful impact on the project, with results displayed in the form of a tornado diagram?

Sensitivity Analysis

DMAIC is a disciplined process that includes five phases: Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve and Control. DMAIC is most typically associated with which of the following quality improvement approaches?

Six Sigma

All of the following items are among the key areas covered by the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award EXCEPT:

Team Learning

Which of the following describes the activities appropriately performed by the project team during Perform Qualitative Risk Analysis?

Team members assess the probability of occurrence and severity of impact for identified risks.

Which of these would NOT typically be found in a Quality Management Plan?

Team selection criteria

Which of these is NOT a reason to design quality into processes rather than to find problems later through inspections?

The best inspectors can find every variation and defect

Which of the following activities are typically included in a project kick-off meeting?

The project manager outlines the project goals.

All of the following accurately describe the features and characteristics of a contract EXCEPT:

The project organization is always a buyer in a contract arrangement

Which of the following activities is not appropriate upon completion of risk response planning?

The risk register should be baselined after planning is completed, and should not be updated once the project is underway.

All of the following accurately apply to project performance reporting EXCEPT:

The same report format should be used for all stakeholders

Which of the following describes how the team uses a cause-and-effect diagram to support project risk analysis?

The team lists the risk as the "effect" in a box at the head of a fish, then names the big bones.

"Unknown unknowns" are unexpected events which can occur when the project is underway. All of the following accurately describe an implication associated with unknown unknowns EXCEPT:

They are usually discovered during risk identification

A __________________ contract that is often used for staff augmentation or any outside support in which a precise statement of work cannot be defined, and which often includes a not-to-exceed value and time limit to prevent unlimited cost growth?

Time and material

Which of the following statements is consistent with the ideas that W. Edwards Deming promoted regarding quality management?

Understanding variation is essential to improving quality.

All of the following items describe an aspect of life cycle costing EXCEPT:

Variation occurs in all work processes and the novelty associated with most projects creates many opportunities for variation

There are many causes of variation in project costs. Which of the following accurately describes the nature of this variation?

Variation occurs in all work processes and the novelty associated with most projects creates many opportunities for variation

With respect to performance reporting, which of these are the actual and raw observations and measurements gathered during execution of project activities?

Work performance data

All of the following items contribute to developing empowered performance in an organization EXCEPT:

accepting the fact that the project manager has total decision making authority

Risk is often considered in terms of impact to project success. Which of the following is NOT a valid measure of project success?

achieving efficiencies in ongoing operations

Change control is a process wherein change proposals to various project planning elements are:

acknowledged, formally documented, and either approved or declined after review.

Which of the following factors should be considered in a make-or-buy decision?

advantages and disadvantages of outsourcing in terms of time, cost and performance control

One useful method of process improvement involves consideration of how another organization performs a process, identifying and analyzing best practices for improvement ideas. This method is known as:

benchmarking

Which estimating technique decomposes the work into detailed pieces for which estimates are prepared and then aggregated into a total quantity for the project?

bottom-up estimating

Some organizations rely upon a formal group authorized and responsible for reviewing, evaluating, approving, delaying, or rejecting any changes to any aspect of the project plan by following a formal communication method of documenting the decision process. This group is typically known as a:

change control board

Normal or random variations that are considered part of operating the system at its current capability are ______:

common cause variation.

Which of the following activities illustrates a risk response strategy designed to research a threat or an opportunity?

construct a prototype to learn more about a potential solution

The __________ is the approved time-phased project budget, excluding any management reserves, which can be changed only through formal change control procedures and is used as a basis of comparing actual results.

cost baseline.

Which of the following types of contracts involves payment to the seller for the seller's actual costs plus a fee typically representing the seller's profit?

cost-reimbursable contract

The procurement management plan:

describes how a project team will acquire goods and services from outside the performing organization.

The decision process for developing relevant quality standards on a project includes all of the following activities EXCEPT:

design work systems

All of the following methods have proven to be useful techniques to help project teams identify the risks that might impact the project EXCEPT:

documenting lessons learned

Joseph Juran provided guidance regarding how to control quality. Which of the following items is consistent with his quality control guidance?

establish measurement systems

The process of developing an approximation of the cost of the monetary resources needed to complete project activities is known as:

estimate cost.

Costs that repeat as project work continues such as writing code are appropriately classified as _____________ .

executive salaries, utilities and insurance

Projects often include indirect costs that are not associated directly with one specific project. Which of the following items are most typically considered to be indirect costs?

executive salaries, utilities and insurance

What type of cost is incurred when a project must be conducted faster than normal, and overtime for workers and / or extra charges for rapid delivery from suppliers are necessary?

expedited costs

During schedule and cost control, when comparing performance to the schedule and cost baselines, if schedule or budget has changed these changes should be ______________ .

formally recommended and managed through the integrated change control system

In which of the following tools would a normal or bell-shaped curve be expected if no special conditions are occurring?

histogram

Events discovered during Identify Risks that may or may not occur are often categorized as:

known unknowns

The documentation of a project cost estimate generally requires substantial supporting detail to include all of these EXCEPT:

management reserve needs

All of these are factors that could lead to a decision to buy or outsource rather than make or perform in-house, EXCEPT:

more control over quality and time

Activity based costing allocates indirect costs to fixed costs based on different types of cost drivers. Which of the following is one of the cost drivers that serve as a basis of cost allocation?

number of units produced

Which estimating technique uses an algorithm or a statistical relationship to calculate cost or duration based on historical data and other project parameters?

parametric estimating

Evaluation criteria used to rate proposals and other supplier characteristics might include all of these EXCEPT:

personal relationships with senior management

The ________ documents the portion of work to be purchased, in enough detail so potential suppliers can decide if they feel they are capable of and interested in providing it

procurement statement of work

All of the following items are generally considered when selecting the right type of contract EXCEPT:

project organization's accounting system

Evaluations of prospective suppliers by project teams often involve all of the following approaches EXCEPT:

prototyping

All of the following entities are typically included in the supply chain EXCEPT:

public relations

All of the following activities illustrate a risk response strategy designed to exploit an opportunity EXCEPT:

purchase insurance

Which of the following documents describes how the project team will implement the performing organization's quality policy?

quality management plan

Which of these is a measurement used to ensure customers receive acceptable products or deliverables?

quality metrics

Which of the following terms best describes extra money in the project budget to be used if necessary - usually if a risk event occurs?

reserve

Project teams can often identify risks by conducting any of several types of reviews. Which of the following illustrates a valuable type of risk review?

review the communication plan to determine where poor communications could cause a problem

__________ is not a classic risk response strategies.

share a threat

Often a project team will start the selection process by establishing a list of potential suppliers. All of the following information sources are frequently used to identify these potential suppliers EXCEPT:

stakeholder register

The four core project quality concepts include which of the following?

stakeholder satisfaction

Fact-based management includes four key ideas. Which of the following is among the key ideas associated with fact-based management?

the need to understand variation

Which party to a contract absorbs the preponderance of cost risk when a Firm-Fixed-Price (FFP) contract is used?

the seller

The Budget at Completion (BAC) is the sum of all budgets established for the work to be performed on a project. As such it is equivalent to:

the total planned value of the project.

Which of the following activities illustrates a risk response strategy designed to mitigate a threat?

train a team member to cover for a potentially unavailable key resource

When a project team elects to purchase insurance, or adopts a fixed price contract with a vendor, or hires an expert, it is demonstrating which of the following risk response strategies?

transfer a threat

All of the following criteria can be used to categorize project risks EXCEPT:

whether the risk is a known known

Joseph Juran provided guidance regarding how to conduct quality planning, quality control, and quality improvement. Which of the following items is NOT part of Juran's Quality Trilogy?

work to identify root causes, not just symptoms