Project Management in Practice

Seventh Edition

Chapter 3

Project Activity and Risk

Planning

Copyright © 2020 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

 Two Extremes Approaches to
Planning
• “Ready, fire, aim”
– Tom Peters
• However, careful planning is strongly associated
with success
• “Paralysis by analysis”
– Planning can be overdone
• There is a happy medium that everyone
would like to strike
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 Project Charter > Proje Şartnamesi

From the Project Charter to the

Project Plan
• Primary function of a project plan is to
serve as a roadmap
• Should include the business case, financial
benefits, and strategic reasons for the
project
• Should contain sufficient information to
know the status of the project at any time
• Also needs the project’s history to date
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Categories of Elements to Include in
Project Charter
• The business need for the project
• The assumptions underlying the project
• Key constraints
• Customer requirements
• Identification of high-level risks
• Key project milestones
• A high-level budget
• A list of key stakeholders
• The PM assigned to the project
• The boundaries of the project
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Elements of a Proper Project Plan
• The process for managing change
• A plan for communicating with and
managing stakeholders
• Specifying the process for setting key
characteristics of the project deliverable
• Establishing the cost baseline for the project
and developing a plan to manage project
costs
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Elements of a Proper Project Plan
continued
• Developing a plan for managing the human
resources assigned to the project
• Developing a plan for continuously
monitoring and improving project work
processes
• Developing guidelines for procuring project
materials and resources

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Elements of a Proper Project Plan
continued
• Defining the project’s scope and
establishing practices to manage the
project’s scope
• Developing the Work Breakdown Structure
• Developing practices to manage the quality
of the project deliverables
• Defining how project requirements will be
managed
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Elements of a Proper Project Plan
concluded
• Establishing practices for managing risk
• Establishing the schedule baseline and
developing a plan to manage the project’s
schedule

When all stakeholders have signed off on the

plan, it becomes an operational Project Charter

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 The Planning Process-Overview
1. Develop and evaluate the concept of the project
2. Carefully identify what project deliverables must
have to be successful
3. Create a system (to build a prototype deliverable)
4. Test the prototype (Cycle back to Step 3 until the
deliverable meets the preset requirements)

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 The Planning Process-Overview
5. Integrate the deliverable into target system
6. Validate the deliverable (Does it still work
properly?)
7. Let client test it (If the client cannot operate the
system, instruct the client)
8. Make sure client understands operating and
maintenance requirements

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 The Planning Process-Nuts and
Bolts
• Once approved, project should have a launch
meeting
• New project manager should review project
objectives
1. Make sure they understand
2. Identify important senior managers
3. Determine if anything is atypical
• Senior manager introduces project to group
– Project manager chairs launch meeting

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 Results of the Launch Meeting
1. The project’s scope is understood
2. Various functional managers understand
their responsibilities and have committed
to develop an initial task and resource plan
3. Any potential benefits to the organization
outside the scope are noted

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 Sorting Out the Project-The Work
Breakdown Structure (WBS)
• Inadequate up-front planning is a primary
contributor to the failure of a project
• A primary purpose of the WBS is to ensure
that no task is overlooked
• Every task, no matter how small, should be
listed
– Along with material and human resources
• This is a non-trivial task

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 A Sample (Partial) WBS

Figure 3-1
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 Notes on WBS
• Microsoft Project (MSP) will make a WBS list at the touch
of a key
– But not a tree-chart
• At any given level, the “generality” or “degree of detail” of
the tasks should be roughly at the same level
• The breakdown of level 1 tasks should be delegated to
someone who will carry out the level 2 tasks
• The job of planning should be delegated to the lowest
competent level

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Extensions of the Everyday WBS
• WBS generally oriented towards deliverables
• Can be reshaped with some additional data often
not included in the WBS
1. Estimates of resources for each task
2. Estimates of the time for each task
3. Who has responsibility for each task
4. Sequence information for each task
• Increases it orientation toward planning and
administration

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 More on the Work Breakdown
Structure and Other Aids
• RACI Matrix is a table
• Project tasks derived from the WBS listed
in rows and departments and individuals in
the columns
• Helps organize the project team

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 The RACI Matrix

Figure 3-5
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A Whole-Brain Approach to Project
Planning
• Mind mapping is a visual approach that closely
mirrors the way the human brain records and
stores information
• In addition to its visual nature, this methodology
has the advantage of tapping in to the creative
potential of multiple team members
• Mind mapping is an entertaining approach that
helps generate enthusiasm and involvement

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 Sample Mind Map

Figure 3-9
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 The Design Structure Matrix
• The Design Structure Matrix (DSM) can address
the issue of information flow as well as
precedence relationships of tasks

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Example DSM for Project with
Six Activities

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 Project Planning with Scrum
• Traditional approaches place emphasis on
upfront planning including process used to
manage (discourage) changes
• Emphasis with Agile approaches is on
flexibility
– Roots in lean management result in more JIT
approach to planning
• No less planning done with Agile
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 Scrum yapılarınn desteklenmesi

Scrum Artifacts Supporting

Project Planning
• Product Backlog
– Complete list of product requirements
– Fields can be customized
• Spring Backlog
• Product Increment

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Example Product Backlog

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 Scrum Events for Project
Planning
• Sprint
– Both an event and a container of the other
events
• Sprint Planning Meeting
• Daily Scrum
• Sprint Review
• Sprint Retrospective

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Sequence of Scrum Planning
Events (Fig. 3.12)

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 Risk Management
1. Risk Identification
2. Risk Analysis
3. Response to Risk

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 Breakdown into Sub-processes
1. Risk management planning
2. Risk identification
3. Qualitative risk analysis
4. Quantitative risk analysis
5. Risk response planning
6. Risk monitoring and control

Slide on each
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 Risk Management Planning
• Like any other planning process
• Must ensure that the necessary resources
can be applied in a timely manner
• It is a continuous process
• The factors that cause uncertainty change
over time

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 Risk Identification and Qualitative
Risk Analysis
• Steps 2-3 often carried out together
• Scenario analysis
– Well-known method for identifying risk
– Involves envisioning likely scenarios and resulting outcomes
• Failure mode and effect analysis (FMEA)
1. List ways project might fail
2. List consequences and evaluate its severity
3. List cause and likelihood
4. Estimate the ability to detect each failure
5. Calculate the risk priority number
6. Sort the potential failures by their risk priority number

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 Quantitative Risk Analysis
• State outcomes as probability distribution and use
distributions to evaluate the desirability of certain
decisions
• Objective is to illustrate the risk profile of the
outcomes
• Risk profiles are one factor to consider in making
the decision
• Techniques for analysis include:
– Expected value:
– Simulation

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Calculating Expected Value

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 Risk Response Planning
• Deciding on which risks to prepare for and which
to ignore
• Main preparation is a risk response plan
• Risk response plan includes contingency plans and
logic charts detailing what to do
– Contingency plan is a backup for some emergency or
unplanned event (“plan B”)
– Logic chart shows the flow of activities once a backup
plan is initiated

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 Risk Monitoring and Control
• Monitoring and control are tasks for the
parent organization
– As well as the project
• Must keep records for future projects
• Also must continue to search for new risks

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