Life Cycle
This is the first stage, where a problem is identified and the project's goal is established.
What is initiation?
This is a temporary effort undertaken to create a unique product, service, or result.
What is project management?
This project constraint refers to the amount of money available to complete the work.
What is the budget, or cost constraint?
This person coordinates project activities, manages resources, and guides the team toward its goal.
Who is the project manager?
A manager identifies possible problems before they happen and plans how to reduce their impact. What is this process called?
What is risk management?
A team identifies its tasks, creates a timeline, estimates costs, and assigns resources before beginning work. Which stage is this?
What is Planning?
These are the people or groups affected by a project or who have an interest in its outcome.
Who are stakeholders?
A team has only two weeks to finish a project. This is an example of which constraint?
What is time, the schedule, or the deadline?
Two team members disagree about how to complete an important task. What should the project manager do to address the conflict constructively?
What is encourage communication, understand both perspectives, and help the team reach a workable solution?
This term describes the people who work together to complete a project's tasks.
What is the project team?
The team begins completing its assigned tasks and creating the project's deliverables. Which stage is this?
What is Execution?
This is the specific product, service, or result a project is expected to produce.
What is a deliverable?
A project requires ten volunteers, but only six are available. Which project component is limited, and what should the manager consider doing?
What are resources? The manager could recruit more volunteers, redistribute tasks, or adjust the plan.
A manager assigns the graphic design task to the team member with the strongest design skills. What management action is being demonstrated?
What is assigning tasks based on skills, or resource management?
The acronym to determine the strengths, threats, opportunities, weaknesses.
What is SWOT analysis?
Halfway through a project, the manager discovers that expenses are too high and several tasks are late. The manager compares actual progress with the plan and makes changes. Which stage is this?
What is Monitoring and Controlling?
This term describes everything included in a project's work and the boundaries of what it is expected to accomplish.
What is project scope?
A team finishes a project on time and under budget, but the final product does not meet the client's requirements. Which important factor was not adequately managed?
What is quality, or meeting the project's requirements and intended outcome?
A supplier announces that an important delivery will arrive three days late. The delay could affect the project's deadline. What should the manager do first, and why?
What is assess the impact on the schedule and other tasks, then develop a corrective action plan?
A school project is to create an online tutoring program. The team launches the website on time and under budget, but no students sign up. Use evidence from the situation to explain why the project may not be successful.
The team met time and cost targets, but failed to achieve the intended outcome. It may not have identified students' needs, communicated effectively, or created a useful and accessible program.
A team completes its project, evaluates the results against its original goal, documents lessons learned, and identifies an unmet need. Which stage is this, and how could it affect a future project?
What is Closing?
A school fundraiser starts with a plan to sell snacks. The team later adds a raffle, a dance, and a silent auction without adjusting the budget or deadline. What is this uncontrolled expansion of the project called?
What is scope creep?
A project is behind schedule because a key employee is absent, a supplier is late, and the team has discovered an unexpected technical problem. Identify two risks or challenges and recommend two actions the manager could take to help the project succeed.
Acceptable responses include identifying and prioritizing the risks, reallocating available resources, finding an alternate supplier, adjusting task assignments, developing a revised schedule, or implementing corrective actions. Students must explain how their actions address the challenges.
A project sponsor requests three additional features, but the project has a fixed budget and deadline. Explain how the manager should respond without automatically accepting or rejecting the request.
What is evaluate the change's impact on scope, time, cost, resources, and quality, communicate the trade-offs to stakeholders, and seek an informed decision?
A business wants to open a second location. The manager discovers that the budget is insufficient, demand has not been researched, and the proposed opening date is unrealistic. Recommend three actions the manager should take before moving forward, and explain how each action supports project success.
Acceptable responses include researching demand and stakeholder needs, revising the budget, adjusting the schedule, identifying required resources, defining the scope and deliverables, and assessing risks. Students must connect each action to a specific problem.