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Project Management

Prepare a Business Case / Project Proposal
o Use knowledge of PRINCE 2 (Project Management) for this assignment.
o Submit as a single MS Word Document.
o Word limit: 2000 words (excluding the Appendix and Table of Contents and references)
o Properly label and figures and diagrams.
o Chole a unique name for your business case.
o Follow the Rubric attached to see how this assignment will be marked.
o All statements must have legitimate references.
Follow the below structure for your assignment. Construct the assignment as per the below 12
sections and properly label all paragraphs, sub paragraphs and diagrams.
1. Title Page
a. Project title (Chose a unique title for your business case)
b. Name of assignment
2. Table of Contents
3. Executive Summary (Briefly describe a high-level summary or contents of the business)
4. Reasons for Doing the Project (Background of the project or challenge you are facing, and you want to do that for the project.
Remain competitive. Don’t confuse reasons and benefits.)
5. Objectives
a. Identify two objectives.
b. Develop a SWOT analysis (Minimum four in each category). You can do a mind map as well.
6. Quantitative Analysis
a. Use the following techniques to quantify the viability of the project:
a. Weighted scoring model
b. NPV
c. Payback
d. ROI
b. Identify the expected benefits.
7. List the Business Options
8. Project Requirements
a. List and describe the requirements needed to carry out this project.
b. List and describe the possible assumptions for this project.
c. List and describe the constraints for this project.
9. Costs
a. Estimate how much does it will cost. (Do research of similar project, estimation not accurate, find price and add
them.)
b. Explain how you estimated costs.
10. Major Risks
a. Identify five (5) risks and quantify their potential likelihood and severity.
b. Indicate how each of the above-mentioned risks will be managed
11. Timescale
a. How long is the estimated time to complete the project?
b. List and describe the major milestones.
12. Conclusion and References

Assignment will me marked based on these factors:

Criteria
Fail

(<50%) Pass

(50% – 64%)
Credit

(65% – 74%)
Distinction

(75% – 84%)
High Distinction

(85% – 100%)

Structure (0.25 pt.):
How is the structure

of the proposal?

• Structure & physical
layout detract from

work

• Many inaccuracies

• Considerable lack of
detail in presentation

• Poor attempt at
structure and

physical layout

• Many
inaccuracies in
presentation of

work

• Fair attempt at structure and physical
layout

• Some inaccuracies in presentation

• Very good logical
structure, physical

layout, and attention
to detail

• Work presented in
coherent and

accurate manner

• Excellent logical structure, physical layout, and
appropriate attention to detail

• The work is presented in an accurate, concise,
and coherent fashion

Grammar / spelling
(0.25 pt.): Are there

grammar and/or
spelling errors?

• Numerous spelling
mistakes and/or

grammar errors detract
from work

• Writing is not sufficient

• Multiple spelling
mistakes and/or

grammatical
errors

• Errors make
reading difficult

• Occasional spelling mistakes and/or
grammatical errors

• Errors distract from reading

• Minimal spelling
mistakes and/or

grammatical errors
• No spelling mistakes and/or grammatical errors

Conclusion and
References (0.5 pt.):
Have all statements
been referenced?

Has referencing been
done properly? How

is the structure of
conclusion?

• Failures to
appropriately

acknowledge the work
of others

• Several errors in
referencing or

bibliography formatting

• No

references

• Unattributed
statements

• Plagiarised statements

• Incomplete conclusion

• Poor use of
referencing

• Multiple errors in
referencing

and/or
bibliography
formatting

• Poor attempt to
acknowledge the

work of others.  

• Most statements
are

unsubstantiated.

• Poor conclusion

• Fair use of references

• Errors in referencing and/or reference
list

• Mostly acknowledges the work of
others

• Many statements are unsubstantiated.

• Satisfactory conclusion

• Good use of
references

• Appropriate
referencing style with
a correctly formatted

reference list

• Appropriately
acknowledges the

work of others

• Many statements are
substantiated with

references

• Concise and well
written

• conclusion

• Excellent use of references

• Appropriate referencing style with a correctly
formatted reference list

• Appropriately acknowledges the work of others

• All statements are substantiated with valid
references

• Excellent conclusion

Executive Summary
(0.5 pt.): Does the

summary address the
whole proposal?

• Summary is unclear

• Poorly written

• Contains many errors

• Missing details

• Incomplete

• Plagiarised

• Poorly written

• Lacking details

• Wordy

• Satisfactorily written

• Missing details
• Concise and well
written

• Addresses all or most
sections within the

business case.

• Concise, detailed and very well written

• Addresses all sections within the business case.

Reasons for doing
the project (0.5 pt.):

What are the reasons
for doing this project

• Unclear

• Poorly written
• Contains many errors
• Missing details
• Incomplete
• Plagiarised
• Poorly written
• Lacking details
• Wordy
• Satisfactorily written

• Missing details
• Concise and well

written
• Concise, detailed and very well written

Objectives (1 pt.)

• Unclear
• Poorly written
• Contains many errors
• Missing details
• Incomplete
• Plagiarised
• Poorly written
• Lacking details
• Wordy

• Satisfactorily written
Missing details

• Concise and well
written
• Concise, detailed and very well written

Quantitative Analysis
(2 pt.)

• Unclear
• Poorly written
• Contains many errors
• Missing details
• Incomplete
• Plagiarised
• Poorly written
• Lacking details
• Wordy
• Satisfactorily written
• Missing details
• Concise and well
written
• Concise, detailed and very well written

List the Business
Options (1pt): What

are the Business
Options?

Project Requirements
(1.5 pt.): What are

the requirements to
carry out this

project?

• Project requirements
are not accurately

identified

• Omitted

• Unclear, shows lack of
understanding

• Plagiarised

• Some project
requirements are

accurately
identified;

• Most project requirements are
accurately identified

• Project requirements
are accurately

identified

• Project requirements are accurately identified
and presented in an excellent manner

Costs (1.5 pt.): How
much does this
project cost?

• Estimate is unrealistic
and inaccurate

• Missing evidence to
substantiate costs

• Omitted
• Unclear, shows lack of
understanding
• Plagiarised

• Most estimates
are unrealistic

• Most estimates
lack

substantiation

• A somewhat accurate and realistic
estimate of the project is given.

• Missing some evidence to back up
costs

• An accurate and
realistic estimate is
given with evidence
to back up the cost

• A very accurate and realistic estimate of the
project is given with evidence up the cost

Risk (1.5 pt.): What
are the risks

associated with the
project?

• Risks are not correctly
identified

• Omitted
• Unclear, shows lack of
understanding
• Plagiarised

• Few risks are
correctly

identified nor
discussed in a
clear manner

• Missing details

• Irrelevant or
vague

• Most risks are correctly identified

• All risks are correctly
identified

and discussed in a
detailed manner.

• All risks are correctly identified and discussed in
an excellent manner.

Timescale (1.5 pt.):
How long is the

project?

• Missing most
important milestones

• Missing out evidences
to back up estimates

• Omitted
• Unclear, shows lack of
understanding

• Missing many
important
milestones

• Missing evidences
to back up
estimates

• Some milestones are correctly
identified

• Unrealistic time estimates

• Includes most crucial
milestones

• Segments are well
written

• Realistic time
estimates

• All necessary milestones are correctly identified
and included.

• Realistic time estimates

ProjectManagement Assignment

Page 1 of 3

Prepare a Business Case / Project Proposal

o Use knowledge of PRINCE 2 (Project Management) for this assignment.
o Submit as a single MS Word Document.
o Word limit: 2000 words (excluding the Appendix and Table of Contents and references)
o Properly label and figures and diagrams.
o Chole a unique name for your business case.
o Follow the Rubric attached to see how this assignment will be marked.
o All statements must have legitimate references.

Follow the below structure for your assignment. Construct the assignment as per the below 12

sections and properly label all paragraphs, sub paragraphs and diagrams.

1. Title Page

a. Project title (Chose a unique title for your business case)
b. Name of assignment

2. Table of Contents

3. Executive Summary (Briefly describe a high-level summary or contents of the business)

4. Reasons for Doing the Project (Background of the project or challenge you are facing, and you want to do that for the project.
Remain competitive. Don’t confuse reasons and benefits.)

5. Objectives

a. Identify two objectives.
b. Develop a SWOT analysis (Minimum four in each category). You can do a mind map as well.

6. Quantitative Analysis

a. Use the following techniques to quantify the viability of the project:
a. Weighted scoring model
b. NPV
c. Payback
d. ROI

b. Identify the expected benefits.

7. List the Business Options

8. Project Requirements
a. List and describe the requirements needed to carry out this project.
b. List and describe the possible assumptions for this project.
c. List and describe the constraints for this project.

9. Costs

a. Estimate how much does it will cost. (Do research of similar project, estimation not accurate, find price and add
them.)

b. Explain how you estimated costs.

10. Major Risks
a. Identify five (5) risks and quantify their potential likelihood and severity.
b. Indicate how each of the above-mentioned risks will be managed

11. Timescale

a. How long is the estimated time to complete the project?
b. List and describe the major milestones.

12. Conclusion and References

Project Management Assignment

Page 2 of 3

Task: This assignment is to prepare a business case which should be in Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia. This
assignment should relate to your study which is Bachelor of Information Technology. Use your knowledge of Information
technology to think of a topic and work on it.

Example: One student thought of a Mobile tech assistance in Darwin. This project will provide Darwin’s Australians an

effective and easy way to save money on tech related issues. Will create local jobs as this business will be able to
travel around Darwin and offer tech solution and fix hardware/software related problems for local Darwin
business also personal users. Will save money and time for all small and newly opened Darwin businesses
because they will be able to get all the services from the local people and won’t need to wait for someone from
down south of Australia and charge big amount of fees. You can think of something like this.

Background Scenario

Australia – Northern Territory’s Charles Darwin University is offering a small business grant for a deserving
student’s entrepreneurial endeavour. It has been left up to the University Lecturer to oversee the business case
submissions and ascertain whether they are indeed viable and worthy of funding.

To receive the funding, the project must meet the following criteria:

• It must benefit a community – either a community or a select segment of the population

• It must be in Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia

• It must be a unique endeavour

• It must be completed within one (1) year

• It must have a budget between $50,000 AUD and $100,000 AUD

• It can generate income (though not necessarily break even in the first year). If it does not generate

income it must provide significant benefit to a community, which must be quantified by a high score

using a weighted score model

• It must relate to your area of study which is Bachelor of Information Technology

• Your tutor from Charles Darwin University is your project sponsor

Project Management Assignment

Page 3 of 3

Appendix A

CHOOSING YOUR PROJECT

a. Area of Study – You must do something that is related to your degree program which is Information
Technology. The reasoning behind this is that we want you to focus on Project Management and how it will
relate to your area of interest.

b. Business case does NOT mean a business
Consider hosting an event. There are thousands of charities out there that undertake some sort of clever
fundraising initiatives. Google away.

c. If you’re still stuck on ideas, consider

Example:
Jane is studying business and works part-time as an assistant at a law practice. Ideally, she would choose a
project that incorporates her studies and takes advantage of her working knowledge of the legal system (she’s
not a barrister so can’t provide actual legal advice.)

Most likely, while in that office, she has come across a few areas that she has found to be lacking in support or
in need of a bit more attention. (Think, “If only we had….”). Well, besides a coffee and muffin delivery service,
she’s not having any waves of inspiration.

Now, outside of work, Jane’s interests include basketball, reading and painting. She even volunteers by teaching
arts and crafts classes once a week at the local senior centre. While teaching, she hears about the woes that
some of the elderly attendees have encountered with legal issues related to estates, medical bills, wills, etc.
Hmmm, maybe she could work with some first-year barristers to get them to come in and provide reduced fee
services. It’ would be a business and she know the legal system. “Ok”, she thinks, “There’s an idea.”

But, as she is walking around the senior centre’s craft room, she notices that several the students want to take
their work outside, but because of their mobility scooters, it’s proving a difficult task. If only there was a device
that would allow them to attach an easel to their scooters or walkers. Hmmm, there’s an idea.

Looking further, she sees that some of those scooters are looking a little worse for wear. Wouldn’t it be funny if
some of them were painted like V-8 race cars?

d. Choosing a less than ideal project for your assignment

Example
Jane also considers herself a pseudo-environmentalist. She recycles – but still isn’t quite sure if pizza boxes
can go into the recycling bins. She understands the benefit of a compost pile, but since she’s in a city
apartment, this isn’t really feasible. She had fans installed around the unit so she could do without air
conditioning. She’s heard about solar farms and wonders if she could get something like that established in
one of the rural senior centres she regularly visits. First though, she needs to figure out exactly what a solar
farm entail.

Bottom line: Jane has great intentions, but let’s face it, in the amount of time it will take her to learn all about
solar farms – the logistics, the legalities, the zoning – she could have written a business plan for something of
which she already has working knowledge.

CRICOS

Provider No. 00300K (NT/VIC) I 03286A (NSW) | RTO Provider No. 0373

Week 1

Introduction to

Project Management

PMO201: Introduction to Project Management

By Dr Hooman Mehdizadeh-Rad

Recognition of Traditional owners

and Indigenous cultures

Charles Darwin University acknowledges the traditional

custodians of the land on which we’re meeting and pays
respect to Elders both past and present and extends that

respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

• The definition and characteristics of a project
• What is project management
• Which are the main elements of

PRINCE2

• What are the benefits of using

PRINCE

• The seven themes of PRINCE2
• The seven processes of PRINCE2
• The seven principles of PRINCE2

Chapter objectives

• Demand for projects continues to increase. Employers will need 87.7 million
individuals working in project management-oriented roles by 2027.

• About 25% of the world’s GDP (gross domestic product: the total value of
goods produced and services provided in a country during a specific
time period) is spent on projects.

• Organizations waste $97 million for every $1 billion spent on projects.
• In 2015, the average salary for someone in the project management

profession in the U.S. dollars was $108,200 in U.S. and $134,000 in
Switzerland.

Interest in Project Management

Project Management Institute:

Temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product, service or
result

Association for Project Management:

A unique, transient endeavor undertaken to achieve planned objectives

PRINCE2

A temporary organization that is created for the purpose of delivering
one or more business products according to an agreed Business Case.

etc., etc., etc….

What exactly is a project?

Projects IN Controlled Environments (PRINCE2) and

Project Management

We will frequently reference PRINCE2 STUDY GUIDE

 Lists every step required for formal project management
 Good Practice
 Common Language

• PRINCE2 was derived from PRINCE, a method created in
1989 as a project management approach for the UK

government’s Central Computer and Telecommunications
Agency (CCTA). PRINCE2 took the common-sense ideas of

PRINCE and widened the method so that it could be used

across all industries.

PRINCE2

• PRINCE2 is a project management approach. It can be used on
any type of project in any type of environment.

• Since its creation in 1996, PRINCE2 has become one of the
most widely adopted project management methods in the
world and is currently used in more than 50 countries. More
than one million people have taken the PRINCE2 examinations.
The exams are available in

languages, including English,
French, Dutch, German, Chinese, Polish, Danish, Italian, and
Spanish. More than 1

training organizations provide PRINCE2
training in more than 17 languages.

PRINCE2

Project Attributes

• Change The organization will be different after the project.
• Temporary Projects don’t go on forever. They should have a start point and

an end point. The end point occurs when the desired change has been
implemented.

• Cross-functional Cross- functional projects often involve a collection of
people drawn from many different sets of skills, different departments, and
sometimes even different organizations.

• Unique To some extent, all project work is unique.
• Uncertainty The previous four characteristics introduce a great deal of

uncertainty into project work. It is not quite clear how things will turn out.

• Business as usual is any work that is part of an organization’s
normal operations—for example, supporting a company’s IT
systems or cleaning the rooms of a hotel

• Project work often leads to business-as-usual work. For
example, if there is a project to build a hotel, once that

hotel opens, there will be a lot of business-as-usual work.

What Is Business as Usual?

Exercise

• List a number of projects that you have been involved in, either in your
personal or work life (e.g. painting your room).

• List some projects then pick one and explain how it meets the definition given.

 is temporary
 is the mean by which we introduce change
 Is unique
 is cross-functional and involves a team of people with different skills working

together

 involves uncertainty

What exactly is project management?

Cambridge Dictionary defines project management as:

The activity of organizing and controlling a project

PMI defines project management as:

The application of knowledge, skills, tools and techniques to project activities to meet

project requirements

PRINCE2 defines project management as:

The planning, delegating, monitoring and control of all aspects of the project, and the

motivation of those involved, to achieve the project objectives within the expected performance

targets for time, cost, quality, scope, benefits and risks.

Project Management in PRINCE2
There are four main areas of Project Management:

Measuring Project

Performance

Optimal

Project

Performance

Scope

Time

Quality

Risk

Benefits

Cost

The Six Aspects of

project performance

1. Time

2. Quality

3. Risk

4. Benefits

5. Cost

6. Scope

Six aspects of project performance

How much money it spends; this relates to a project’s costs.
How ahead or behind schedule it is; this relates to a project’s timescales.
How well the project’s products meet the required specification; this relates to
a project’s quality.
How many of the required products have been delivered and whether any
products have been delivered that were not asked for; this relates to a
project’s scope.
How much uncertainty the project has that might lead to the project being
negatively impacted; this relates to the level of project risk.

How much value a project has delivered to the organization either during or
after the project; this relates to a project’s benefits.

The Triple Constraint

Impact on Quality*

Cost

Time Scope

QUALITY is……
subjective and

determined by your

stakeholders

Typical Project Constraints

Exercise

• Referring back to the project you listed in the previous exercise, write the Time,
Cost and Scope aspects of project performance.

Four (4) parts of PRINCE2 (integrated elements)

PRINCE2

7 Principles

7 Processes

Themes

Project

Environment

Seven (7) Principles of PRINCE2

• Principles – guiding concepts
1. Continued Business

Justification

2. Learn from Experience

3. Defined Roles and

Responsibilities

4. Manage by Stages

Managing

by Exception

6. Focus on Products

7. Tailor to Suit the

Environment

PRINCE2

7 Principles

7
Processes

7
Themes

Project
Environment

Seven (7) Processes of PRINCE2

Starting Up a Project

2. Directing a Project

3. Initiating a Project

4. Controlling a Project

5. Managing Product

Delivery

6. Managing a Stage

Boundary

7. Closing a Project

PRINCE2
7 Principles
7
Processes
7
Themes
Project
Environment

• Starting Up a Project covers the activities you use to investigate whether to
start the

project.

• Directing a Project covers the activities of the project board, which is the
main decision-making body on a PRINCE2 project.

• Initiating a Project covers the planning activities done at the beginning of
the project.

• Controlling a Stage covers the project manager’s day-to-day work, such as
delegating work, reporting, and dealing with issues and risks.

• Managing Product Delivery covers the day-to-day work of the people
creating products in the project.

Seven (7) Processes of PRINCE2

• Managing a Stage Boundary covers the work of the project
manager at the end of a major part or stage of the project.

• Closing a Project covers the work that the project manager
does to prepare for the end of the project. It involves work

such as preparing the end project report, handing the

products to the operational teams, and archiving project

documents.

Seven (7) Processes of PRINCE2 (Continue)

• Themes – how PRINCE2 recommends carrying out various aspects of project
management

Business Case

2. Organization

3. Quality

4. Plans

5. Risk

6. Change

7. Progress

Seven (7) Themes of PRINCE2

PRINCE2
7 Principles
7
Processes
7
Themes
Project
Environment

• Business Case The business case theme describes how to ensure the project has a solid justifiable
reason to exist, not just at the outset of the project, but throughout its life.

• Organization The organization theme defines the project management team structure.
• Quality The quality theme describes how to ensure that the project’s products are fit for the

purpose for which they will be used.

• Plans The plans theme describes how to plan which products to create and which activities are
needed to build those

products.

• Risk The risk theme describes how to manage potential threats and opportunities to the project.
• Change The change theme describes how to control and manage changes to the project’s

products.

• Progress The progress theme describes how to track the progress of a project, which mechanisms
to use to keep the project on track, and what to do when things go astray.

Seven (7) Themes of PRINCE2

Project Environment of PRINCE2

PRINCE2
7 Principles
7
Processes
7
Themes
Project
Environment

Four (4) main part of PRINCE2
• Principles
1. Continued Business

Justification
2. Learn from Experience

3. Defined Roles and

Responsibilities
4. Manage by Stages

5. Manage by Exception

6. Focus on the Products

7. Tailor to Suit the Project

Environment

Processes

1. Starting up a

Project
2. Directing a Project
3. Initiating a Project

4. Controlling a

Project

5. Managing Product

Delivery

6. Managing a

Stage

Boundary
7. Closing a Project
Themes

1. Business Case

2. Organsation

3. Quality
4. Plans
5. Risk
6. Change

7. Progress

Environment

The structure of PRINCE2

• In addition to the four main integrated elements of
PRINCE2 (processes, themes, principles, and the project

environment), there are two other main parts to PRINCE2:

the roles and the management products.

Other parts of PRINCE2

PRINCE2 Roles

PRINCE2 Study Guide

Project Management Team Structure

• Corporate, Programme Management, or the Customer This level
sits outside and above the project management team.

• Directing Level The project board is responsible for this. It is the
top level of the project management team.

• Managing Level The project manager is responsible for this, the
middle level of the project management team.

•

Delivering

Level The team manager and their teams are
responsible for this. It is the bottom level of the project
management team.

PRINCE2 Roles

• Management products are things that help the project
management team manage the project, such as plans,

registers, logs, and reports.

Management Products

• In addition to the management products, there is another
type of product called specialist products. These are the

deliverables from the project.

Specialist Products

• Tried and tested approach that can be used on any type of project
• Common vocabulary of project terms
• Clear project roles and responsibilities
• Focuses attention on the outputs from the project
• Provides a range of reports, plans and other management

documents to meet the needs of different levels of management

• Provides a management by exception approach which ensures
efficient use of management time

• Ensures the justification for the project is clearly documented and
used as an input into decision making

• Provides consistency of project work and a way of developing
management skills

Benefits of Using PRINCE2

• There are different ways to define project success:
• The project met scope, time, and cost goals.
• The project satisfied the customer/sponsor.
• The project produced the desired results.

Project Success

• A program is:
– “a group of related projects managed in a

coordinated way to obtain benefits and control not

available from managing them individually”*

What is a Program?

*Project Management Institute, Inc., A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge
(PMBOK® Guide, Fifth Edition) (2013)

Program Management

PROGRAM

Project Project Project Project

Each building is a project.

Benefits to manage these project under one program:

A) get planning approval for all at once. B) advertise them together. C) purchase common

materials in bulk to earn discounts.

Programs and Mega

projects

• A program is “a group of related projects managed
in a coordinated way to obtain benefits and
control not available from managing them
individually.”

 A megaproject is a very large project that typically
costs over US $1 billion, affects over one million
people, and lasts several years.

Portfolio Management
A portfolio is defined as “projects and programs managed as group to achieve strategic
objectives.

PORTFOLIO

Project Program Project Program

Project Management Compared to Project
Portfolio Management

• Indeed.com, a popular job search site, listed over 354,000 jobs
in the U.S. when searching for project manager in March 2017.

Project Management Careers

• There are hundreds of different products available today:

• M.S project
• Wrike.
• Clarizen.
• Zoho Projects Online.
• Mavenlink.
• Workzone.
• CoConstruct.

Project Management Software

• David Hinde, PRINCE2 Study Guide, Second Edition, John
Wiley and Sons Ltd.

• Schwalbe, K. An Introduction to Project Management,
Sixth Edition Kathy Schwalbe LCC.

References:

CRICOS Provider No. 00300K (NT/VIC) I 03286A (NSW) | RTO Provider No. 0373

Week 2

End to End Walkthrough of PRINCE2; Business Case

PMO201: Project Management

By Dr Hooman Mehdizadeh-Rad

Learning Objectives

• End to end walkthrough of PRINCE2
• The purpose of the Business Case theme
• Outputs, outcomes, benefits and dis-benefits
• The Business Case management product
• Summarize the various methods for investment appraisal

and demonstrate how to calculate net present value, return
on investment, payback, and the weighted score for a project

3
Four (4) main part of PRINCE2
• Principles
1. Continued Business
Justification
2. Learn from Experience
3. Defined Roles and
Responsibilities
4. Manage by Stages
5. Manage by Exception
6. Focus on the Products
7. Tailor to Suit the Project
Environment
Processes
1. Starting up a
Project
2. Directing a Project
3. Initiating a Project

4. Controlling a stage

5. Managing Product
Delivery

6. Managing a Stage

Boundary
7. Closing a Project
Themes
1. Business Case
2. Organsation
3. Quality
4. Plans
5. Risk
6. Change
7. Progress

Environment

The steps in pre-project:

Step 1: Corporate, Programme

Management, or the Customer

Creates a Project Mandate

Step Two: Corporate, Programme

Management, or the Customer

Appoints the

Executive

Step Three: The Executive

Appoints the

Project Manager

Step Four: The Executive and the

Project Manager Create the

Project Brief and Recruit the

Project Management Team

Step Five: The

Project Board

Authorizes Initiation

Project Mandate

Project Mandate answers the basic questions:

• What is the project all about? What is it creating?
• Who will be involved in the project? Who will be using the project’s

products after the project?

• Where will the project happen? Where will the products be built?
• When will the project start and finish? When will there be any return from

this project?

• How will the project be done? How will the products be built?
• Why do this project? What is the justification for it?

• The project mandate needs to be reviewed, and if necessary,
the information needs to be expanded so as to provide enough

details to form the basis of the decision of whether to

commission the project. The output of this work goes into a

new management product called the project brief.

project brief

The steps in Initiation Stage:

Step Six: The Project

Manager Creates the

Project Initiation

Documentation

Step Seven: The Project

Manager Creates a Plan for

the First

Delivery Stage

Step Eight: The Project

Board Authorizes the

Project and the First

Delivery Stage

• A set of approach documents that set out how the project will be managed
with regard to such areas as risk, change, quality, and communication

• A detailed business case
• Information on the project management team
• Information on how the project will be delivered (project approach)
• A project definition, giving information on areas such as the background to

the project, the project’s objectives, and the project’s scope
• Information on how the project will be controlled, such as how to monitor

the progress of the project and what reports are required

• Information on how PRINCE2 will be tailored for the project

PID contains the following information:

The steps in Subsequent delivery stage(s):

Step Nine: The Project Manager

Manages a Delivery Stage

Step Ten: The Teams Create the

Stage’s Specialist Products
Step Eleven: The Project

Manager Plans the Next Stage

Step Twelve: The Project Board

Authorizes Another Delivery

Stage

Steps Nine, Ten, Eleven, and

Twelve Again and Again and . . .

The steps in Final Delivery Stage(s):

Step Thirteen: The Project

Manager Manages the Final

Delivery Stage (the same as

step nine)

Step Fourteen: The Teams

Create the Specialist Products

of the Final Stage (the same as

step ten)

Step Fifteen: The Project

Manager Prepares for the End

of the Project

Step Sixteen: The Project

Board Authorizes the Project

to Close

Now that we know what a project is,

how do organizations choose which

one to pursue?

The purpose of the business case theme is to set up a series of mechanisms to
ensure that the project remains desirable, viable, and achievable.

■A desirable project is one where the positives that a project will bring to an
organization, such as increased sales or decreased operating costs, outweigh
the costs and risks of carrying it out.

■A viable project is one where, given any technical, time, and/or resource
constraints, it is actually possible to deliver the project’s products.
■An achievable project is one where the end result is that people are able to
the use the products as intended and achieve the predicted benefits.

What Is the Business Case Theme?

Output

• Project’s specialist product (can be tangible or
intangible)

Outcome

• Result of the change derived from using the
project’s output

Benefits

• Measurable improvement

Business case

Outputs, outcomes and benefits

•A project’s output is any of the project’s specialist products
• An outcome is the result of the change derived from using the project’s outputs
• A benefit is the measurable improvement resulting from an outcome that is perceived as
an advantage by one or more stakeholders

• A dis-benefit is an outcome perceived as negative by more than one stakeholder

The Development Path of the Business Case

Develop The business case document is created in the develop activity.

Verify At various times, the business case is reviewed to see if the project is still a worthwhile initiative.

Maintain As the project progresses, things will change. Costs might rise, new competitors might enter the

marketplace, or work might overrun. All these changes might have an impact on the business case, so the

business case needs to be regularly updated in the maintain activity.

Confirm The purpose of the confirm activity is to determine whether the benefits predicted were achieved.

• The Executive creates the outline Business Case in the Starting up a
Project

• The Project Manager refines the Business Case in the Initiating a
Project process

• The Project Board approve and re-affirm the Business Case during
the Directing a Project process

• When a new risk or issue is discovered, the project manager will
review how it will affect the project objectives, including the
business case.

• The Project Manager reviews and updates the Business Case during
the Managing a Stage Boundary and Closing a Project processes

The Development Path of the Business
Case

Business Case Management Product

Business Case

– Executive Summary

– Reasons

– Business options

– Expected benefits

– Expected dis-benefits

-Timescale

-Costs

-Major risks

-Investment appraisal

Documents the justification for the project.

• Executive Summary
Every PRINCE2 business case should start with a high-level summary of the

contents

of the business case.

• Reasons
The reasons section of a PRINCE2 business case should explain the background of

the project, such as a challenge you are facing or an opportunity that has arisen.

• Business options
The business options show different ways of responding to the challenges and

opportunities set out in the reasons section. Be careful not to confuse these
business options (which explain how you will meet the business challenge) with the

project approach (which explains how you will deliver the chosen business option).

• Expected Benefits
The expected benefits are the ultimate aim of the project.

• Expected Dis-benefits
PRINCE2 defines a dis-benefit as “an outcome that is perceived as negative by
one or more project stakeholders.” Be careful not to confuse this with a
risk. Risks are uncertain events—they may or may not happen. Dis-benefits have
happened or will happen.

• Timescales
Various timescales need to be reviewed. Over what period will the project run?

When will the project’s benefits occur? Over what period will the benefits from this
project be tracked?

• Costs

The benefits need to be weighed against the cost of the project and the operational
costs of running the products. Also, you need to set out how the project will be

funded.

• Major Risks
It is important with any investment decision to weigh the risk.

• Investment Appraisal
The investment appraisal section compares the expected benefits with the project

and
operational costs over a period of time.

The Benefits Management Approach

Defines how and when a measurement of the achievement of

project’s benefits can be made. Created by the Project Manager in

the Initiating a Project process and updated at the end of each stage

• Corporate, programme management or the customer is
responsible for the The Benefits Management Approach

• The Executive is responsible for the Business Case during
the project

• The Senior User(s) are responsible for specifying the
benefits and providing evidence that these benefits have
been achieved

• The Project Manager prepares and updates the Business
Case on behalf of the Executive

The Main Responsibilities Relevant to the
Business Case

• Most organizations cannot undertake most of the
potential projects identified because of resource

limitations and other constraints

• An organization’s overall business strategy should guide
the project selection process and management of those

projects

Aligning Projects with Business Strategy

• SWOT analysis involves analyzing Strengths, Weaknesses,
Opportunities, and Threats.

• It can help you identify potential projects.
• Strengths: attributes of the organisation that help achieve the project

objective (track record (similar successes), Resource avaibality, Skiles
level) .

• Weaknesses: attributes of the organisation that stop achievement of
the project objective (Gaps in knowledge and expertise, Budget).

• Opportunities: external conditions that help achieve the project
objective (Market demand).

• Threats: external conditions that could damage the project (Economy,
Competitor activity).

SWOT Analysis

Let’s say you own a homemade bakery. You want to conduct a SWOT
analysis for your overall business.

https://smallbusiness.patriotsoftware.com/swot-analysis/

• Some people like to perform a SWOT analysis by using
mind mapping.

•

Mind mapping

is a technique that uses branches radiating
out from a core idea to structure thoughts and ideas.

• By putting those ideas down in a visual mind map format,
you can often generate more ideas than by just creating

lists.

Mind mapping

Mind map of an SWOT analysis (example).

https://www.biggerplate.com/mindmaps/Qfr9Z6BU/swot-analysis-template

• Financial considerations are often an important aspect of
the project selection process

• Three important methods include:
• Net present value analysis
• Return on investment
• Payback analysis

Performing Financial Projections

• Net present value (NPV) analysis is a method of calculating
the expected net monetary gain or loss from a project by

discounting all expected future cash inflows and outflows

to the present point in time

• Projects with higher NPVs are preferred to projects with
lower NPVs if all other factors are equal

Net Present Value Analysis

• The discount rate can vary, based on the prime rate and
other economic considerations (such as inflation).

• You can enter costs as negative numbers instead of
positive numbers, and you can list costs before benefits

• Project managers should check to see which approaches
their organizations prefer when calculating NPV

NPV Considerations

1. Determine the estimated costs and benefits for the life of the
project and the products it produces.

2. Determine the discount rate. A discount rate is the rate used
in discounting future cash flows. The annual discount factor is
a multiplier for each year based on the discount rate and
year (calculated as 1/(1+r)t, where r is the discount rate, and
t is the year).

3. Calculate the net present value by subtracting the total
discounted costs from the total discounted benefits.

Steps for Calculating NPV

•Example
For the following cash flows calculate the NPV and ROI (discount rate r=8%).

Time Today Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year

Outflow $1000 $800 $700 0

Inflow 0 $500 $800 $2000

• Return on investment (ROI) is the result of subtracting the
project costs from the benefits and then dividing by the costs.

• For example, if you invest $100 today and next year your
investment is worth $110, your ROI is ($110 – 100)/100, or 0.10
(10 percent)

• Note that the ROI is always a percentage, and the higher the
ROI, the better

• Many organizations have a required rate of return for projects—
the minimum acceptable rate of return on an investment

Return on Investment

• Payback period is the amount of time it will take to recoup—in
the form of net cash inflows—the total dollars invested in a
project

• Payback analysis determines how much time will lapse before
accrued benefits overtake accrued and continuing costs

• Payback occurs in the year when the cumulative benefits minus
costs reach zero

• The shorter the payback period, the better
40

Payback Analysis

Charting the Payback Period

• A weighted scoring model is a tool that provides a systematic
process for selecting projects based on many criteria

• To create a weighted scoring model:
• Identify criteria important to the project selection process
• Assign a weight to each criterion (so they add up to 100 percent)
• Assign numerical scores to each criterion for each project
• Calculate the weighted scores by multiplying the weight for each

criterion by its score and adding the resulting values

Weighted Scoring Models

Sample Weighted Scoring Model for
Project Selection

Criteria Weight Trip 1 Trip 2 Trip 3

Trip 4

Total cost of the trip 25% 60 80 90 20

Probability of good weather 30% 80 60 90 70

Fun activities nearby 15% 70 30 50 90

Recommendations 30% 50 50 60 90

Weighted Project Scores 100% 64.5 57.5 75 66.5

0 20 40 60 80

Trip 1

Trip 2

Trip 3

Trip 4

Weighted Score by Project

Suppose your family was to take a trip to one of the following

cities:

• Sydney
• Kakadu
• Gold Coast
Provide a Weighted Scoring Model to choose one of the cities

to travel.

Example:

• David Hinde, PRINCE2 Study Guide, Second Edition, John
Wiley and Sons Ltd.
• Schwalbe, K. An Introduction to Project Management,
Sixth Edition Kathy Schwalbe LCC.

References:

CRICOS Provider No. 00300K (NT/VIC) I 03286A (NSW) | RTO Provider No. 0373

Week 3

Starting a Project

PMO201: Project Management

By Dr Hooman Mehdizadeh-Rad

• Discuss Starting up a Project process, including pre-initiating
tasks and initiating tasks

• Create a Project Brief to formally start a project
• Discuss the Initiating a Project process
• The Project Initiation Documentation

2
Learning Objectives

Four (4) main parts of PRINCE2
• Principles
1. Continued Business

Justification
2. Learn from Experience
3. Defined Roles and
Responsibilities
4. Manage by Stages
5. Manage by Exception
6. Focus on the Products
7. Tailor to Suit the Project
Environment
Processes
1. Starting up a
Project
2. Directing a Project
3. Initiating a Project
4. Controlling a stage
5. Managing Product
Delivery
6. Managing a Stage
Boundary
7. Closing a Project
Themes
1. Business Case
2. Organsation
3. Quality
4. Plans
5. Risk
6. Change
7. Progress

Environment

Process:

 A process is a series of actions directed toward a particular result

Starting Up a Project

 Provides information to answer the question, “Is this project worthwhile and
viable?”

 Pre-project process; the activities occur before the project starts

The Activities of Starting Up
a Project

• Corporate, programme management or the customer
appoints the executive.

• The executive appoints the project manager.
• The project manager creates the daily log recording

personal action and informal issues (until the initiating

process, it will record risks and issues).

• The daily log is sometimes referred to in PRINCE2 as the
project manager’s diary.

Appoints the Executive and the Project Manager

• Executive creates the outline business case
• The project manager liaise with senior user and senior

suppliers to create the project product description

• This document will be a high-level description of the main products that the project
will deliver. It should specify the product(s) that are capable for delivering the

returns set out in the outline business case.

(The senior users are senior-level people who represent those who will use the final outputs of the

project.

The senior suppliers are senior-level people who control the resources that will create the outputs of the

project.)

Prepare the outline Business Case

• 2 sections of this documents are: Customer quality expectation and
acceptance criteria:

The customer presents their customer quality expectations to indicate
what they require. In the hotel example, the client might say that their
expectations are for a luxury hotel.

In order to avoid disputes at the end of the project about what should
have been created, the project manager, the senior users, and the
senior suppliers review the customer quality expectations and define a
set of measurable specification criteria for the project’s products. In
PRINCE2, these are called acceptance criteria.

Project Product Description

• The lessons could come from different sources such as:
 Looking at Lesson Reports from previous projects

 Running workshops or talking to people with relevant experience

 Seeking lessons from the corporate or programme management level in the organization
or from the customer

 Talking to external organizations

• During this activity, the project manager creates the lessons
log, which acts as a repository for any lessons learned.

Capture Previous Lessons

• The executive and the project manger appoint members to the team

Design and appoint the project management team

• The Project Manager creates the project approach.
• It answers how the project’s products will be delivered

and how they will be brought into the operational

environment, if there is one.

• PRINCE 2 sometimes refers to the project approach as the
delivery solution.

Select the project approach and assemble
project brief

• The project manager creates the project brief.

Project brief

The only section that needs to be created at this

point is the project definition, which describes

the project’s background, objectives, scope, and
the amount of flexibility for the delivery dates

and budgets.

• Project manager creates the stage plan for initiation.
• This plan shows the Project Board what resources, money

and time would be needed to carry out the next step, the

initiation stage.

• The project board review the initiation plan and authorize
the next stage

Plan the initiation stage

• Once all the activities of the Starting up a project Process
are finished, the Project Manager will send a request to

initiate a project to the Project Board.

• The Project Board considers this request in the Directing a
Project Process.

Authorizing initiation

Initiating a Project
The main focus of the activities of Initiating a Project is to plan the project

• For example for a small project you may not need a very
comprehensive and formal Business case. It might be

sufficient to provide just some simple business justification.

Agree the Tailoring Requirements

• Prepare the Risk Management approach
• Prepare the Quality Management Approach
• Prepare the Change Control Approach
• Prepare the

Communication Management Approach

The next four activities in Initiating a Project create four approaches
(An approach provides all the information needed to describe how
to manage a particular area of project management), as follow:

• Project manger creates the Risk Management Approach, which
defines how the risks will be managed during the project

• It describes how to decrease the likelihood and/or the impact
of potential threats to the project and how to increase the
likelihood and/or impact of potential opportunities to the
project

• This approach also specifies the threshold of risk that
corporate, programme management, the customer, or the
project board are willing to accept.

• project support creates the risk register. You learn how to
compose this management product in Chapter 7.

Prepare Risk Management Approach (more details
in Chapter 7)

• In the next step, the project manager creates the quality
management approach, which describes how the project

management team will ensure that the end result of the

project will be a product (or products) that are suitable for

their intended purpose.

• Project support creates an empty quality register. The
quality register records information on the quality activities

that take place during the project.
21

Prepare Quality Management Approach (more
details in Chapter 6)

• Creating the change control approach is also the job of the
project manager. This approach describes how the project

team will manage and control any proposed changes to the

project’s products as well as how to manage and control issues
that arise during the project.

• Project support creates the project’s issue register at this point.
Some issues may have already been recorded in the daily log; if

so, these will be transferred to the issue register.

Prepare Change Control Approach (more details in
Chapter 8)

• Next, the project manager creates the communication
management approach, which describes how the project

will manage communication between the people on the

project management team as well as between the project

and stakeholders outside the project team.

Prepare

Communication Management

Approach (more details in Chapter 3)

• Anything that ensures that the project is heading toward its
objectives is a project control.

• For example, the project board controls the project manager by
giving them only one stage of the project to manage at a time,
setting specific objectives for that stage in terms of the
products that must be built and the time and money that are
available for that stage. So one of the controls established in
this activity is how the project plan will be divided into stages
and when the end stage assessment meetings between the
project board and the project manager will occur.

Set Up the Project Controls

• Next, the project manager creates the project plan. It shows
how the major products in the project will be delivered. It

covers the time directly after the initiation stage to the end of

the project and will probably be fairly high-level.

• There are many ways of presenting the information in a plan,
including the popular Gantt chart format (a graphical way of

showing a schedule), spreadsheets, or purely text-based.

Create the Project Plan

• The project manager creates the benefits management
approach. The project manager uses this approach to

specify how achievements of the project’s benefits will be
measured and what management actions will be

needed—probably post-project—to ensure that the
benefits are achieved.

Prepare the Benefits Management Approach

The Project Initiation Documentation defines and scopes the project and forms

a “contract” between the Project Manager and the Project Board

Assemble the Project Initiation Document

• Project stakeholders are the people involved in or affected
by project activities

Identifying Stakeholders

• Identify some of the stakeholders of your project

Exercise 1

• Without top management commitment, many projects
will fail

• Some projects have a senior manager called a champion
who acts as a key proponent for a project

• Projects are part of the larger organizational environment,
and many factors that might affect a project are out of the

project manager’s control

The Importance of Top Management
Commitment

How Top Managers Help Project
Managers Succeed

• Provide adequate resources

• Timely approval on unique needs

• Deal with other departments

• Leadership development

• A project management office (PMO) is an organizational
entity created to assist project managers in achieving

project goals

• A PMO can help development standards and
methodologies, provide career paths for project

managers, and assist project managers with training and

certification

Project Management Office (PMO)

Growth in the Number of PMOs

Source: PM Solutions, “The State of the PMO 2010” (2010)

• Collect, organize, and integrate project data for the entire
organization

• Research, develop, and share best practices in project management
• Develop and maintain templates, tools, standards, and

methodologies

• Develop or coordinate training in various project management topics
• Provide project management consulting services
• Provide a structure to house project managers while they are acting

in those roles or are between projects

Possible Goals of a PMO

• Experienced project managers know that it is crucial
to get projects off to a great start

• A kick-off meeting is a meeting held at the beginning
of a project so that stakeholders can meet each other,
review the goals of the project, and discuss future
plans

• Often used to get support for a project and clarify
roles and responsibilities

Holding a Project Kick-off Meeting

• David Hinde, PRINCE2 Study Guide, Second Edition, John
Wiley and Sons Ltd.
• Schwalbe, K. An Introduction to Project Management,
Sixth Edition Kathy Schwalbe LCC.

37
References:

CRICOS Provider No. 00300K (NT/VIC) I 03286A (NSW) | RTO Provider No. 0373

Week 4
Organization Theme

PMO201: Project Management

By Dr Hooman Mehdizadeh-Rad

• The purpose of the organization theme
• The three project interests
• The four levels of management
• The PRINCE2 project management structure
• The Communication Management Approach

2
Learning Objectives

3
Four (4) main parts of PRINCE2
• Principles
1. Continued Business
Justification
2. Learn from Experience
3. Defined Roles and
Responsibilities
4. Manage by Stages
5. Manage by Exception
6. Focus on the Products
7. Tailor to Suit the Project
Environment
Processes
1. Starting up a
Project
2. Directing a Project
3. Initiating a Project
4. Controlling a stage
5. Managing Product
Delivery
6. Managing a Stage
Boundary
7. Closing a Project
Themes
1. Business Case
2. Organization

3. Plans

4. Quality

5. Risk
6. Change
7. Progress

Environment

Three Project Interests

First are those who are looking at the project from a business point of view,

thinking about whether the project gives good value for money or, in other words, a

good return given the money invested. Next are those who will be using the

project’s products and services on an ongoing basis after the project has finished.
Finally, there are those who will be supplying resources and people to create the
project’s products.

Project Management Structure

The Four Levels of Management

• Corporate or programme management, or customer is the
top management level in PRINCE2.

• They instigate the project by creating the project mandate
• After that they will appoint the Executive.
• After that the Executive is responsible for taking the

project forward.

Corporate, Programme Management, or the
Customer

• Corporate or programme management, or customer will
set certain boundaries that the Executive need to keep the

project within (Project Tolerances).

• If the Executive or the whole Project Board think the
tolerances will be breached, they no longer have authority

to continue the project.

• The directing level is the responsibility of the Project Board.
• The Board makes the important project decisions, such as

authorizing the beginning of the project, the beginning of each

stage and finally, the end of the project.

• The Project Board delegates the day-to-day management of the
project to the Project Manager. They do this by authorizing the

Project manager to manage a stage of the project on their

behalf within the tolerances (usually in terms of cost and time).

Directing

• The Project Manager is responsible for managing the project
within the tolerances that have been given to him/her by the
Project Board.

• He/she focuses on ensuring that the project creates the
required products by planning, delegating and monitoring all
the activities that need to be done.

• He/she regularly updates the project management team and
external stakeholders on the progress of the project.

• Only one project manager should be assigned to each project.
If more than one project manager were assigned, there would
be a risk that work on the project would lack coordination.

Managing

• The Team mangers are responsible for the delivering level.
• They manage the team who are creating the Project’s product.
• In some circumstances, such as a small project, there may be

no need for separate people to take on the team manager
role. In this case, the project manager will manage the teams
directly. When there are team managers, the project manager
delegates work to them, who, in turn, delegate work to their
teams.

11
Delivering

12
Project Management Team Structure

• The project board consists of three main roles: the
executive, the senior users, and the senior suppliers.

• The project board as a whole is accountable for the
success or failure of the project, although the key

accountability rests with the executive who leads the

project board.

13
Project Board

• Ultimately responsible for the project, supported by the

Senior User

and

Senior Supplier

• Chief decision maker
• There should be only one Executive in a project
• During the life of the project, the Executive is focused on ensuring that the

project can deliver products that are capable of delivering forecast benefits

• Ensures that the project gives value for money
• During the life of the project, the Executive is responsible for the Business

Case

• The executive is also responsible for securing the funding for the project.

14
Executive

• The senior users are responsible for representing those who will
ultimately use the project’s products.

Types of users in PRINCE2:

1) Users who will directly use the project’s products (such as the
people who might stay in the hotel)

2) Users who might maintain or support the products when they
go into their operational life (such as the people who might
maintain the hotel’s heating system or the booking software)
3) Users for whom the project will achieve an objective or a
benefit (such as the marketing director of the leisure company,
who will use the hotel to increase his sales figures)

4) People who will be impacted by the hotel (such as a local
government or neighbourhood group)

15
Senior User

• The senior users should be in a position to have authority over
the people who will be using the products.

• Having multiple senior users and senior suppliers ensures that
a broader range of perspectives is represented on the project
board. However, it might take longer for the project board to
come to a decision.

• They are responsible for forecasting the project’s benefits and
then demonstrating that those benefits have occurred. This
may involve a commitment beyond the end of the project

• The senior suppliers represent those who will be delivering the project’s
specialist products.

• The senior suppliers have authority over the resources used to create the
project’s products.

• May be represented by more than one person in order to represent all
suppliers

• May be from a different commercial organization or may be an internal
supplier

• One of the common challenges for the project manager is that they often
have to delegate work to teams over whom they have no authority. Senior
suppliers are useful for overcoming this problem.

Senior Supplier

• Project assurance is a role that checks and monitors that the project is being run
correctly and is capable of delivering the project’s objectives in terms of time, cost,
quality, scope, risks, and benefits.

• Each of the project board roles is responsible for a project assurance role that aligns to
their area of interest. So the executive, senior users, and senior suppliers are responsible
for business, user, and supplier assurance, respectively.

• What does this checking and monitoring entail? A project assurance role could involve a
range of activities, such as meeting with the project manager and team managers and
discussing their activities, auditing project documents, or observing project meetings
and quality reviews.

• Who assumes the project assurance roles? If they have enough time, the project board
members might choose to do so themselves. Otherwise, they might delegate the day-to-
day assurance activities to other people. The project board will still be accountable for
the project assurance actions aligned to their area of interest, even if they delegate
them to separate individuals.

Project Assurance

• There are three Project Assurance roles aligned to the
Project Board roles; that of business, user and suppler

assurance.

• The business assurance role checks that the project is
providing value for money and that the project’s products
are capable of delivering the benefits forecast in the

business case. They are interested in things such as the

amount of money being spent, how realistic the project’s
business case is, and whether risks are being managed

effectively.

• The user assurance role checks that the project is creating products
that will be fit for their ultimate purpose. They are interested in
whether all the user perspectives were represented when the
products were specified, whether the requirements for the
products have been captured in the project documentation,
whether suppliers are using the correct specifications to carry out
their product-creation work, and whether there is an effective user
acceptance process for signing off the products when they are
finished.

• The supplier assurance role checks the project from a delivery
perspective. They look at whether the supplier resources are
capable of delivering the project on time and on budget. They
consider the technical feasibility of the products.

• As part of their role, project assurance will be expected to provide
advice and guidance to the project manager, project support, team
managers, and the teams, however, they are independent.

• The project board is the usual authorization body for requests for
change. However, on a project where there may be many requests
for change, the project board can delegate part of this authority to a
group called the change authority.

• The change authority is allowed to authorize changes within certain
limits.

• The project manager might also be given some authority to authorize
changes.

• A project might have a number of levels of change authority: The
project board authorizes large changes; the change authority
authorizes medium-sized changes; and the project manager
authorizes smaller changes.

Change Authority

• Has the authority to run the project on a day-to-day basis within the constraints laid
down by the Project Board

• There should be only one Project Manager in every project

The Project Manager will carry out the following roles:

• Delegate work to the teams using Work Packages.
• Deal with issue and change control management.
• Deal with reporting
• Track the status of the products that are being created, the project costs, the

schedule, and the scope of the project.

• Ensure that the project is being managed in line with the risk management
approach, the quality management approach, the change management approach
and the communication management approach.

22
Project Manager

• The project support role is the responsibility of the project manager. The
project manager can delegate the work of project support to a separate
person or people.

• The project support role supports the project manager and the team
manager(s) in their day-to-day management work.

Their responsibilities can consist of the following:

• Providing administration services, including maintaining the project’s logs
and registers

• Providing guidance on the use of project management or change
management tools

• Providing specialist management functions, such as planning or risk
management

• Maintaining the change management procedure

Project Support

• The

Team Manager

reports to and takes direction from the Project
Manager

• Team Manager is an optional role. It may be required in large
complex projects, when teams are involved in highly specialist work
or when teams work in a different location to the Project Manager

• Team managers might be required for a variety of reasons. If the
team were in another town or even another country from the
project manager, it might make sense to have a team manager at the
same location as the rest of the team. Another reason is that the
project manager might not fully understand the technical nature of
the team’s work.
24

Team Manager

• Accepting work on behalf of the team via a work package from the
project manager. A work package is a management product that tells
the team what is expected of them.

• Planning, delegating, monitoring, and controlling the team’s work
• Reporting to the project manager on a regular basis (as defined in

the work package) by creating checkpoint reports. A checkpoint
report is a report on the progress of the team’s work.

• Escalating any forecast breach of work package tolerances to the
project manager

The Team Manager is responsible for:

1. Which PRINCE2 role is responsible for securing the funding for the project?

A. Corporate, programme management, or the customer

B. Executive

C. Business sponsor

D. Project manager

2. Which of the following statements is true of project assurance?
A. Project assurance has three focuses aligned to the three interests of the project board.

B. Project support can be assigned project assurance responsibilities.

C. The project manager can be assigned project assurance responsibilities

D. Project assurance creates the communication management approach.

3. Which level of management would authorize any deviation that exceeds stage tolerances?

A. Corporate, programme management, or the customer

B. Directing

C. Managing

D. Delivering
26

Exercise

Communication Management

Approach

• The communication management approach describes how the project
management team and the external stakeholders will communicate with

each other.

Communication Management Approach

-Introduction

-Communication procedure

-Tools and techniques

-Records

-Reporting

-Timings of communication activities

-Roles and responsibilities

-Stakeholder analysis

-Information needs for each interested party

• It states the purpose, objectives and scope of the document
and identifies who is responsible for the approach.

• Example:
“This document outlines how the project to build a new hotel in
Shanghai will ensure that all stakeholders in the project are

informed of all relevant project information. The Executive of this

project, the Asian business development manager, is responsible

for effective communication.”

Introduction

• Contains any communication methods to be used during
the project (things to do).

• Example:
“All project communication issued to external parties to be
checked by the communication department. A copy of all

external communication to be filled in the communication

folder in the project file.”

Communication procedure

• Contains specific techniques that might be used in the steps
highlighted in the Communication Procedure section.

• Example:
“The project might use email, Zoom,…”
“Daily project conference calls to take place to update all teams
on the project progress and issues.”
“Formal press releases to be issued regarding major project
milestones.”

Tools and techniques

• This section states how the project will store information
on the communication that has taken place.

• Example:
“ Keep a log of all communication sent to external parties.
The log should state who the communication was sent to,

the format of the communication, the date issued, and a

description of the content of the communication.”

Records

• This section specifies any reports that will be created to
track the implementation of the communication procedure.

• Example:
“ Send a report to the Project Board at the end of each stage
detailing all the communication that has been sent from the

project management team to any external third party.

Reporting

• This section specifies when communication activities
should take place.

For example, the Timing of Communication Activities section

for the hotel project might include the following entry:

“The communications department to carry out a
performance audit on the way communication has been

managed at the end of each stage.”

Timings of communication activities

• This section describes who will be responsible for the
various steps set out in the process section.

• For example, the Roles and Responsibilities section for the
hotel project might include the following entry:

“Project Support to file all external communication.”

Roles and responsibilities

• This section contains a list of all parties who have been
identified as having an interest in the project. These can
include people who are advocates of the project and/or those
who are against it.

For example, the Stakeholder Analysis section for the hotel
project might list the following stakeholders:

• Trade union representative for the building firm
• Global business development director
• Shanghai tourist board

Stakeholder analysis

• This section describes the type of information that needs to be
provided to the stakeholders. Stakeholders might be interested
in a variety of types of information about the project, such as
up-to-date progress information or information on particular
project risks or issues. It will also show what information the
project needs from stakeholders.

• For example, the hotel project might include the following
entry in this section:

“The human resource manager for Asia to be sent details of all
risks and issues related to personnel.”

Information needs for each interested party

• The Project Brief
The project management team structure section describes the various roles of the

project and how they interrelate. The role descriptions section describes the

responsibilities for each role.

• The Project Initiation Documentation
The project manager will copy the project management team structure and the roles

and responsibilities sections from the project brief into the project initiation

documentation and add more detail.

Other Management Products Used by the
Organization Theme

Responsibility Assignment Matrices
A responsibility assignment matrix (RAM) is a matrix that maps the work of the

project to the people responsible for performing the work.
RACI charts are a type of RAM that show Responsibility (who does the task),

Accountability (who signs off on the task or has authority for it), Consultation
(who has information necessary to complete the task), and Informed (who
needs to be notified of task status/results) roles for project stakeholders

Column chart:

• shows the number of resources required for or assigned to a project
over time.

Resource Histograms

• David Hinde, PRINCE2 Study Guide, Second Edition, John
Wiley and Sons Ltd.
• Schwalbe, K. An Introduction to Project Management,
Sixth Edition Kathy Schwalbe LCC.

41
References:

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