Intro to Project Management Chapter 4

planning

Often the most difficult and unappreciated process in project management

bottom-up estimate

Type of estimate that can be very accurate but also very expensive to create

parametric

Type of estimate that uses project characteristics in a mathematical model, such as number of square feet of a house

analogous or top-down

Type of estimate that uses the actual costs of a similar project as its basis

requirement

a condition or capability that must be met or possessed by a system, product, service, result, or component to satisfy a contract, standard, specification, or other formal document

requirements management plan

a plan that describes how project requirements will be analyzed, documented, and managed.

project buffer

The additional time added before a project's due date to account for unexpected factors.

slack / float

The amount of time an activity may be delayed without delaying a succeeding activity or the project finish date.

scope baseline

The approved project scope statement and its associated WBS and WBA dictionary

discretionary dependencies

The dependencies that are defined by the project team.

mandatory dependencies

The dependencies that are inherent in the nature of the work being performed on a project.

external dependencies

The dependencies that involve relationships between project and non-project activities.

analogous estimates / top-down estimates

The estimates that use the actual cost of a previous, similar project as the basis for estimating the cost of the current project.

Critical path

The series of activities that determine the earliest by which the project can be completed; it is the longest path through the network diagram and has the least amount of slack or float

node

The starting and ending of an activity-on-arrow network diagram.

Scope Creep

The tendency for project scope to continually increase

work breakdown structure (WBS)

A deliverable-oriented grouping of the work involved in a project that defines the total scope of the project.

team contract

A document created to help promote team work and clarify team communications.

work breakdown structure (WBS) dictionary

A document that describes detailed information about WBS tasks.

feeding buffers

Additional time added before tasks on the critical path that are preceded by non-critical path tasks.

buffer

Additional time to complete a task, added to an estimate to account for various factors.

cost budgeting

Allocating the overall cost estimate to individual tasks over time

three-point estimate

An estimate that includes an optimistic, most likely and pessimistic estimate.

burst

An occurrence when two or more activities follow a single node on a network diagram.

dynamic or flexible

As opposed to static, project management plans should be this

bottom-up estimates

Cost estimates created by estimating individual activities and summing them to get a project total.

duration

The actual amount of time spent working on an activity plus elapsed time.

team contract

Document created to help promote teamwork and clarify team communications (a ________ contract)

85-90%

EI accounts for ______ of the difference between outstanding leaders and their more average peers.

"you plan to fail?"

End of the saying, "If you fail to plan..."

gets managed

End of the saying, "What gets measured..."

project management plan

Plan that coordinates all other project plans

Organizational process assets

Policies and procedures related to project management, past project files, and lessons-learned reports from previous, similar projects

activities

Process in project time management that seems more like a scope task - defining ________

critical

Shows the shortest time in which a project can be completed; also the longest path through a network diagram - the ______ path

multitasking

When a resource works on more than one tasks at a time.

emotion

When dealing with people, remember you are not dealing with creatures of logic, but creatures of ______

Parkinson's Law

Work expands to fill time allowed.

scope management plan

A document that includes descriptions of how the team will prepare the project scope statement , create the WBS, verify completion if the project deliverables, and control requests for changes to the project scope.

project management plan

A document which is a deliverable for the project integration management knowledge area, used to coordinate all project planning documents and to help guide a project's execution and control.

Theory of Constraints (TOC)

A management philosophy that states that any complex system at any point in time often has only one aspect or constraint that is limiting its ability to achieve more of its goal.

chain

A method of scheduling that considers limited resources when creating a project schedule - critical ____ scheduling

critical chain scheduling

A method of scheduling that takes limited resources into account when creating a project schedule and includes buffers to protect the project completion date.

Program Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT)

A network analysis technique used to estimate project duration when there is a high degree of uncertainty about the individual activity duration estimates

activity-on-arrow (AOA)

A network diagramming technique in which activities are represented by arrows and connected at points called nodes to illustrate the sequence of activities.

arrow diagramming method (ADM)

A network diagramming technique in which activities are represented by arrows and connected at points called nodes to illustrate the sequence of activities.

precedence diagramming method (PDM)

A network diagramming technique in which boxes represent activities.

critical path method (CPM) / analysis

A networking diagramming techniques used to predict total project duration.

fast tracking

A scheduling compression technique where you do activities in parallel that you would normally do in sequence.

network diagram

A schematic display of the logical relationships among or sequencing of project activities.

milestone

A significant event on a project

milestone

A significant event on a project.

merge

A situation when two or more nodes precede a single node on a network diagram.

Gantt charts

A standard format for displaying project schedule information by listing project activities and their corresponding start and finish dates in a calendar format.

baseline

A starting point or measurement that can be used for future comparison

baseline

A starting point, a measurement, or and observation that is documented so that it can be used for future comparison; also defined as the original project plans plus approved changes.

requirements tractability matrix (RTM)

A table that lists requirements, various attributes of each requirement, and the status of the requirements to ensure that all of them are addressed.

activity list

A tabulation of activities to be included on a project schedule.

work package

A task at the lowest level of the WBS.

crashing

A technique for making cost and schedule trade-offs to obtain the greatest amount of schedule compression for the least incremental cost.

parametric modeling

A technique that uses project characteristics (parameters) in a mathematical model to estimate project cost.

baseline

A time-phased budget that project managers use to measure and monitor cost performance - a cost ______

cost baseline

A time-phased budget that project managers use to measure and monitor cost performance.

SMART

Acronym for creating milestones that are specific, measureable, assignable, realistic, and time-framed

Self-awareness Self-management Social-Awareness Relationship Management

Four Dimensions to Emotional Intelligence

Murphy's Law

If something can go wrong, it will.

activity attributes

Information that provides schedule-related information about each activity, such as predecessors. successors, logical relationships. leads and lags, resource requirements, constraints, imposed dates, and assumptions related to the activity.

work package

Lowest level of the WBS

work breakdown structure

Meaning of the acronym WBS

all of them

Number of knowledge areas that include planning processes

subsidiary plans

Other plans that the project management plan refers to, such as the scope management plan, risk management plan, etc. are called ________ plans

scope

The _____ management plan involves defining and controlling what work is or is not included in the project

meeting

The ______ guidelines section of a team contract describes items like arranging telephone or video-conferencing, developing and following agendas, etc.

variable

The length of a project management plan is ______.

guide project execution

The main purpose of project planning is to

Execution

The main purpose of project planning is to guide ______.

effort

The number of workdays or work hours required to complete a task.

statement

The project scope ______ defines the scope of a project

dependency / relationship

The sequence of project activities or tasks.

mind mapping

approach for creating a WBS that that uses branches radiating out from a core idea to structure thoughts and ideas

Mindfulness

being aware of our own inner experience (attuned to self), and paying attention to what is happening around us (attuned to others and the world around us).