MIS 4310 - Chapter 5

33. A(n) _____ is a deliverable-oriented grouping of the work involved in a project that defines the total scope of the project.

work breakdown structure

26. _____ involves defining and documenting the features and functions of the products produced during the project as well as the processes used for creating them.

Collecting requirements

27. _____ involves reviewing the project charter, requirements documents, and organizational process assets to create a scope statement, adding more information as requirements are developed and change requests are approved.

Defining scope

16. Given the project management software that is available, it is relatively easy to create a good WBS.

FALSE

17. The tasks in a WBS must be developed as a sequential list of steps.

FALSE

18. The executing tasks of the WBS remain constant from project to project.

FALSE

2. Deliverables are only product-related, such as a piece of hardware or software.

FALSE

8. The scope of a project is clear and specific from the start.

FALSE

49. _____ uses highly organized and intensive workshops to bring together project stakeholders—the sponsor, users, business analysts, programmers, and so on—to jointly define and design information systems.

JAD

50. _____ includes the processes involved in defining and controlling what work is or is not included in a project.

Project scope management

54. _____ refer to "conditions or capabilities that must be met by the project or present in the product, service, or result to satisfy an agreement or other formally imposed specification."

Requirements

67. _____ is the tendency for project scope to keep getting bigger and bigger.

Scope creep

45. _____ involves formal acceptance of the completed project scope by the stakeholders.

Scope validation

1. Scope refers to all the work involved in creating the products of the project and the processes used to create them.

TRUE

10. The project scope statement should reference supporting documents, such as product specifications that will affect what products are produced or purchased, or corporate policies, which might affect how products or services are produced.

TRUE

11. The project scope statement, stakeholder requirements documentation, and organizational process assets are the primary inputs for creating a WBS.

TRUE

19. Many organizations provide different guidelines and templates for developing WBSs.

TRUE

20. Mind mapping allows people to write and even draw pictures of ideas in a nonlinear format.

TRUE

48. _____ is a process for identifying and modeling business events, who initiated them, and how the system should respond to them.

Use case modeling

72. _____ is a process for identifying and modeling business events, who initiated them, and how the system should respond to them.

Use case modeling

28. _____ involves formalizing acceptance of the project deliverables and during this phase the key project stakeholders, such as the customer and sponsor for the project, inspect and then formally accept the deliverables.

Validating scope

46. _____ refers to the difference between planned and actual performance.

Variance

70. _____ is the difference between planned and actual performance.

Variance

57. A(n) _____ is a deliverable-oriented grouping of the work involved in a project that defines its total scope.

WBS

31. Generating ideas by comparing specific project practices or product characteristics to those of other projects or products inside or outside the performing organization is known as _____.

benchmarking

41. In the _____ approach, team members first identify as many specific tasks related to the project as possible and then aggregate the specific tasks and organize them into summary activities, or higher levels in the WBS.

bottom-up

34. The main technique used in creating a WBS is _____, which involves subdividing project deliverables into smaller pieces.

decomposition

58. Subdividing the project deliverables into smaller pieces is known as _____.

decomposition

24. The term ______ describes a product produced as part of a project.

deliverable

68. The main tool for performing scope validation is _____ and group decision making techniques.

inspection

62. A work package is a task at the _____ level of the WBS.

lowest

29. Creating the WBS is a subprocess associated with the _____ process in project scope management.

planning

56. The main outputs of scope definition are the _____ and project document updates.

project scope statement

55. A(n) _____ is a table that lists requirements, their various attributes, and the status of the requirements to ensure that all are addressed.

requirements traceability matrix (RTM)

60. Tasks in a WBS that are decomposed into smaller tasks are called _____ tasks.

summary

44. Scope creep refers to:

the tendency for project scope to keep getting bigger and bigger.

42. Mind mapping can be used for developing WBSs using

the top-down or bottom-up approach

25. Scope refers to:

the work involved in creating the products and the processes used to create them.

38. The _____ approach for constructing a WBS involves refining the work into greater and greater levels of detail.

top-down

53. Creating the _____ involves subdividing the major project deliverables into smaller, more manageable components.

work breakdown structure (WBS)

66. A(n) _____ is a document that describes detailed information about each WBS item.

WBS dictionary

64. In the _____ approach to creating a WBS, team members first identify as many specific tasks related to the project as possible.

bottom-up

40. The _____ technique for creating a WBS uses branches radiating from a core idea to structure thoughts and ideas instead of writing down tasks in a list or immediately trying to create a structure for tasks.

mind mapping

73. List and briefly describe the six main processes involved in project scope management.

1. Planning scope management involves determining how the project's scope and requirements will be managed. The project team works with appropriate stakeholders to create a scope management plan and requirements management plan. 2. Collecting requirements involves defining and documenting the features and functions of the products produced during the project as well as the processes used for creating them. The project team creates stakeholder requirements documentation, a requirements management plan, and a requirements traceability matrix as outputs of the requirements collection process. 3. Defining scope involves reviewing the project charter, requirements documents, and organizational process assets to create a scope statement, adding more information as requirements are developed and change requests are approved. The main outputs of scope definition are the project scope statement and updates to project documents. 4. Creating the WBS involves subdividing the major project deliverables into smaller, more manageable components. The main outputs include a work breakdown structure, a WBS dictionary, a scope baseline, and updates to project documents. 5. Verifying scope involves formalizing acceptance of the project deliverables. Key project stakeholders, such as the customer and sponsor for the project, inspect and then formally accept the deliverables during this process. If the deliverables are not acceptable, the customer or sponsor usually requests changes. The main outputs of this process, therefore, are accepted deliverables, change requests, work performance information, and updates to project documents. 6. Controlling scope involves controlling changes to project scope throughout the life of the project—a challenge on many information technology projects. Scope changes often influence the team's ability to meet project time and cost goals, so project managers must carefully weigh the costs and benefits of scope changes. The main outputs of this process are work performance information, change requests, and updates to the project management plan, project documents, and organizational process assets.

35. A(n) ____ is a task at the lowest level of the WBS.

work package

43. Which of the following is recommended for the creation of a good WBS?

A unit of work should appear at only one place in the WBS.

74. What is a work breakdown structure? What are the inputs and tools used for creating one?

A work breakdown structure (WBS) is a deliverable-oriented grouping of the work involved in a project that defines the total scope of the project. Because most projects involve many people and many different deliverables, it is important to organize and divide the work into logical parts based on how the work will be performed. The WBS is a foundation document in project management because it provides the basis for planning and managing project schedules, costs, resources, and changes. Since the WBS defines the total scope of the project, some project management experts believe that work should not be done on a project if it is not included in the WBS. Therefore, it is crucial to develop a good WBS. The project scope statement, stakeholder requirements documentation, and organizational process assets are the primary inputs for creating a WBS. The main tool or technique is decomposition, that is, subdividing project deliverables into smaller pieces. The outputs of the process of creating the WBS are the WBS itself, the WBS dictionary, a scope baseline, and project document updates.

12. The scope baseline in a WBS consists of the requirements documentation and enterprise environmental factors.

FALSE

13. The WBS is organized solely around project phases.

FALSE

14. A work package represents one component of the product that the project aims to deliver.

FALSE

15. A work package must always represent less than 80 hours of work.

FALSE

21. The format of the WBS dictionary is essentially the same for all projects.

FALSE

5. The project's size, complexity, importance, and other factors do not affect how much effort is spent on collecting requirements for scope planning.

FALSE

7. Project scope statements must include the project boundaries, constraints, and assumptions.

FALSE

65. _____ is a technique that uses branches radiating out from a core idea to structure thoughts and ideas when creating a WBS.

Mind mapping

47. _____ refers to the process of developing a working replica of the system or some aspect of the system.

Prototyping

71. _____ involves developing a working replica of the system or some aspect of the system.

Prototyping

51. _____ refers to all the work involved in creating the products of the project and the processes used to create them.

Scope

69. _____ involves controlling changes to the project scope while keeping project goals and business strategy in mind.

Scope control

76. Describe the process of scope verification.

Scope verification involves formal acceptance of the completed project scope by the stakeholders. This acceptance is often achieved by a customer inspection and then sign-off on key deliverables. To receive formal acceptance of the project scope, the project team must develop clear documentation of the project's products and procedures to evaluate if they were completed correctly and satisfactorily. To minimize scope changes, it is crucial to do a good job of verifying project scope. The scope management plan, scope baseline, requirements documentation, requirements traceability matrix, validated deliverables, and work performance data are the main inputs for scope validation. The main tools for performing scope validation are inspection and group decision-making techniques. The customer, sponsor, or user inspects the work after it is delivered and decides if it meets requirements. The main outputs of scope validation are accepted deliverables, change requests, work performance information, and project documents updates.

23. Scope creep if not managed well can lead to the failure of information technology projects.

TRUE

3. Project scope management includes the processes involved in defining and controlling what is or is not included in a project.

TRUE

4. The scope management plan can be informal and broad or formal and detailed, based on the needs of the project.

TRUE

6. Information from the project charter provides a basis for further defining the project scope.

TRUE

9. Many information technology projects also require detailed functional and design specifications for developing software, which also should be referenced in the detailed scope statement.

TRUE

37. In the _____approach for constructing a WBS, you use a similar project's WBS as a starting point.

analogy

63. Some organizations prescribe the form and content for WBSs for particular projects. These are known as _____.

guidelines

30. The ______ documents how project needs will be analyzed, documented, and managed.

requirements management plan

32. A(n) _____ is a table that lists requirements, their various attributes, and the status of the requirements to ensure that all are addressed.

requirements traceability matrix

59. The _____ includes the approved project scope statement and its associated WBS and WBS dictionary.

scope baseline

52. The main outputs of _____are the project scope statement and updates to project documents.

scope definition

36. The _____ should list and describe all of the deliverables required for the project.

scope statement

61. PMI uses the term "_____" to describe each level of work in the WBS.

task

39. The _____ approach for constructing a WBS starts with the largest items of the project and breaks them into subordinate items.

top-down

22. A unit of work should appear at only one place in the WBS.

TRUE

75. List and briefly describe five approaches for creating work breakdown structures.

*Using Guidelines If guidelines for developing a WBS exist, it is very important to follow them. Some organizations—the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) for example—prescribe the form and content for WBSs for particular projects. Many organizations provide guidelines and templates for developing WBSs, as well as examples of WBSs from past projects. At the request of many of its members, the Project Management Institute recently developed a WBS Practice Standard to provide guidance for developing and applying the WBS to project management. Project managers and their teams should review appropriate information to develop their unique project WBSs more efficiently. *The Analogy Approach In the analogy approach, you use a similar project's WBS as a starting point. Some organizations keep a repository of WBSs and other project documentation on file to assist people working on projects. Viewing examples of other similar projects' WBSs allows you to understand different ways to create a WBS. *The Top-down and Bottom-up Approaches Most project managers consider the top-down approach of WBS construction to be conventional. To use the top-down approach, start with the largest items of the project and break them into their subordinate items. This process involves refining the work into greater and greater levels of detail. After finishing the process, all resources should be assigned at the work package level. The top-down approach is best suited to project managers who have vast technical insight and a big-picture perspective. In the bottom-up approach, team members first identify as many specific tasks related to the project as possible. They then aggregate the specific tasks and organize them into summary activities, or higher levels in the WBS. The bottom-up approach can be very time-consuming, but it can also be a very effective way to create a WBS. Project managers often use the bottom-up approach for projects that represent entirely new systems or approaches to doing a job, or to help create buy-in and synergy with a project team. *Mind Mapping Mind mapping is a technique that uses branches radiating out from a core idea to structure thoughts and ideas. Instead of writing tasks down in a list or immediately trying to create a structure for tasks, mind mapping allows people to write and even draw pictures of ideas in a nonlinear format. This more visual, less structured approach to defining and then grouping tasks can unlock creativity among individuals and increase participation and morale among teams. After discovering WBS items and structure using the mind-mapping technique, you could then translate the information into chart or tabular form. Mind mapping can be used for developing WBSs using the top-down or bottom-up approach.

77. What are some of the suggestions for improving the requirements process?

1. Develop and follow a requirements management process that includes procedures for initial requirements determination. 2. Employ techniques such as prototyping, use case modeling, and Joint Application Design to understand user requirements thoroughly. Prototyping involves developing a working replica of the system or some aspect of the system. These working replicas may be throwaways or an incremental component of the deliverable system. Prototyping is an effective tool for gaining an understanding of requirements, determining the feasibility of requirements, and resolving user interface uncertainties. Use case modeling is a process for identifying and modeling business events, who initiated them, and how the system should respond to them. It is an effective tool for understanding requirements for information systems. Joint Application Design (JAD) uses highly organized and intensive workshops to bring together project stakeholders—the sponsor, users, business analysts, programmers, and so on—to jointly define and design information systems. These techniques also help users become more active in defining system requirements. 3. Put all requirements in writing and keep them current and readily available. Several tools are available to automate this function. For example, a type of software called a requirements management tool aids in capturing and maintaining requirements information, provides immediate access to the information, and assists in establishing necessary relationships between requirements and information created by other tools. 4. Create a requirements management database for documenting and controlling requirements. Computer Aided Software Engineering (CASE) tools or other technologies can assist in maintaining a repository for project data. A CASE tool's database can also be used to document and control requirements. 5. Provide adequate testing to verify that the project's products perform as expected. Conduct testing throughout the project life cycle. 6. Use a process for reviewing requested requirements changes from a systems perspective. 7. Emphasize completion dates. 8. Allocate resources specifically for handling change requests.