Integration
Which of the following statements is NOT true regarding the project charter?
A. The project charter justifies why the project is being undertaken.
B. The project charter assigns the project manager.
C. The project charter specifies any high-level schedule milestones.
D. The project charter specifies what types of contract will be used.
D. The project charter specifies what types of contract will be used.
A contract with your customer would have been an input into the Develop Project Charter process, and any contracts you may use during procurement won’t be identified until later in the project. “A” is incorrect because the project charter does specify why the project is being undertaken and often even includes a business case. “B” is incorrect because the project charter is the place where the project manager is named. “C” is incorrect because the project charter specifies any known schedule milestones and a summary level budget.
What is the function of the project sponsor:
A. To help manage senior management expectations.
B. To be the primary interface with the customer
C. To fund the project and formally accept the product.
D. To help exert control over the functional managers.
C. To fund the project and formally accept the product.
Choice “A” is really the project manager’s job. “B” is for the project manager’s job as well. It is not a clearly defined job for the sponsor. “D” is not a function of the sponsor. If more control were needed over the functional managers, that would be the role of senior management.
The amount of time that an activity may be delayed without extending the critical path is:
A. Lag.
B. Grace period.
C. Free factor.
D. Slack.
D. Slack.
The slack (or float) is the amount of time an activity may be delayed without affecting the critical path.
If the CPI is 0.1 this indicates:
A. The project is performing extremely poorly on cost.
B. The project is costing 10% over what was expected.
C. The project is only costing 90% of what was expected.
D. The project is performing extremely well on cost.
A. The project is performing extremely poorly on cost.
The terrible cost performance index indicates that we are getting ten cents of value for every dollar spent; thus the project is doing very poorly on cost performance.
The BEST tool to use to look for results that are out of control is:
A. Pareto chart.
B. Control chart.
C. Ishikawa diagram.
D. Statistical sampling.
B. Control chart.
That is how a control chart is used. It visually depicts whether a process is in or out of control. Choice “A” is used in Control Quality to rank problems by frequency. Choice “C” is used in Control Quality to anticipate problems in advance. Choice “D” is used in Control Quality to pick random samples to inspect.
Which of the following represents the project manager’s responsibility regarding change on a project?
A. Influence the factors that cause project change.
B. Ensure all changes are communicated to the change control board.
C. Deny change wherever possible.
D. Prioritize change below results.
A. Influence the factors that cause project change.
This is one of the key tenets of monitoring and controlling processes in general and Perform Integrated Change Control in particular.
The main point of Create WBS is to:
A. Decompose the scope of the product.
B. Decompose the scope of the project.
C. Create a baseline of the entire scope.
D. Define all of the scope to be performed.
C. Create a baseline of the entire scope.
The clue here is the words “main point” which would be found in the main output. The scope baseline represents three documents: the scope statement, the WBS, and the WBS dictionary, and this is the point of the process Create WBS. “B” would be a better choice than “A” but it is only a component of the scope baseline. “D” would happen in the process Define Scope and not in Create WBS.
Crashing differs from fast tracking because crashing:
A. Usually increases value.
B. Usually increases the cost.
C. Usually saves more time.
D. Usually saves more money.
B. Usually increases the cost.
Crashing adds more resources to an activity. This usually increases the cost due to the law of diminishing returns which predicts that 10 people usually cannot complete an activity in half the time that 5 people can. The savings from crashing are rarely linear. “A” is incorrect because crashing does not directly affect the project’s value. “C” is incorrect because crashing may or may not save more time than fast tracking – depending on the situation. “D” is incorrect because crashing usually costs more money than fast tracking.
Based on the following Benefit Cost Ratios, which project would be the best one to select?
A. BCR = -1
B. BCR = 0
C. BCR = 1
D. BCR = 2
D. BCR = 2
With Benefit Cost Ratios, the bigger the better! BCR is calculated as benefit / cost, so the more benefit, and the less cost, the higher the number.
You are a project manager with limited resources on the project. Several quality defects have been discovered, causing the stakeholders concern. You wish to begin by attacking the causes that have the highest number of defects associated with them. Which tool shows defects by volume from greatest to least?
A. Pareto chart.
B. Control chart.
C. Ishikawa diagram.
D. Cause-and-effect diagram.
A. Pareto chart.
Pareto charts rank defects from greatest to least, showing you what should get the most attention.
The project management plan is made up of:
A. The other planning outputs.
B. The other planning outputs, tools, and techniques.
C. The aggregate outputs of approved software tools.
D. The business case, key value justifications, and the GANTT chart.
A. The other planning outputs.
The project management plan consists of many things, but the only one from this list that matches is the outputs from the other planning processes, such as risk, cost, time, quality, etc. “B” is incorrect because the other tools and techniques do not form part of the project plan.
The project scope statement should contain:
A. The work packages for the project.
B. A high level description of the scope.
C. The level of effort associated with each scope element.
D. A detailed description of the scope.
D. A detailed description of the scope.
The project scope statement needs to include a detailed description of the scope of work to be performed. Choice “A” is incorrect as the WBS is created later as part of the Create WBS Process. “B” is tricky, but it is incorrect. The preliminary scope statement contains high level description of the scope, but the project scope statement is detailed. “C” is incorrect, because the level of effort is estimated after the scope has been defined.
Which of the following is the BEST description of the critical path:
A. The activities that represent critical functionality.
B. The activities that represent the largest portions of the work packages.
C. The activities that represent the highest schedule risk on the project.
D. The activities that represent the optimal path through the network.
C. The activities that represent the highest schedule risk on the project.
It is a non-traditional definition of the critical path. The critical path is the series of activities, which if delayed, will delay the project. This makes these activities the highest schedule risk on the project. “A” is incorrect because the critical path has no relationship with functionality. “B” is incorrect because the size of the work packages does not directly correlate to the critical path. “D” is incorrect because the critical path does not represent the optimal path through the network.
As a project manager, your BEST use of the project cost baseline would be to:
A. Measure and monitor cost performance on the project.
B. Track approved changes.
C. Calculate team performance bonuses.
D. Measure and report on variable project costs.
A. Measure and monitor cost performance on the project.
The cost baseline is used to track cost performance based on the original plan plus approved changes.
Which of these quality standards is the highest?
A. It is impossible to determine without further information.
B. 99% quality.
C. Three sigma quality
D. Six sigma quality.
D. Six sigma quality.
Six sigma represents that 99.99966% of all work results will be of acceptable quality in the manufacturing process. This is higher the 99% or 3 sigma, which represents 99.73% quality rate.
The person or group responsible for evaluating change on a project is:
A. The change control board.
B. The sponsor.
C. The project team.
D. The program manager.
A. The change control board.
The change control board is responsible for evaluating changes to the project.
The project has completed execution, and now it is time for the product of the project to be accepted. Who formally accepts the product?
A. The project team and the customer.
B. The quality assurance team, senior management, and the project manager.
C. The sponsor, key stakeholders, and the customer.
D. The project manager, senior management, and the change control board.
C. The sponsor, key stakeholders, and the customer.
The project manager verifies the product with the key stakeholders, the sponsor, and the customer.
Which Develop Schedule tool inserts non-working buffer time to be managed by the project manager?
A. Critical chain method.
B. Critical path method.
C. Resource leveling.
D. Schedule modeling.
A. Critical chain method.
The critical chain method provides a buffer to be used by the project manager to protect the critical path. Typically, the team is not aware of this buffer.
If a project has a CPI of .95 and an SPI of 1.01, this indicates:
A. The project is progressing slower and costing more than planned.
B. The project is progressing slower and costing less than planned.
C. The project is progressing faster and costing more than planned.
D. The project is progressing faster and costing less than planned.
C. The project is progressing faster and costing more than planned.
A schedule performance index greater than 1 means that the project is progressing faster than planned. A cost performance index that is less than 1 means that the project is costing more than planned. Therefore choice “C” is the only one that fits.
Mind mapping techniques are most closely related to:
A. Lateral diagrams.
B. Affinity diagrams.
C. Seven Basic Quality tools.
D. Plan Quality Management.
B. Affinity diagrams.
Affinity diagrams are closely related to mind mapping. “A” is a made up term. “C” has nothing to do with mind mapping. “D” might have seemed like a good choice since it is an actual process name, but mind mapping has no relationship with Plan Quality Management.
Each time that the project sponsor requests a change to the project, the project manager calls a meeting of the change control board. Which of the following is TRUE?
A. This represents a collaborative style of management.
B. This represents withdrawal by the project manager.
C. This represents Perform Integrated Change Control.
D. This represents the lack of a project management information system.
C. This represents Perform Integrated Change Control.
They do this during the process of Perform Integrated Change Control.
Complete the list of group decision-making techniques: Unanimity, Majority, Consensus, Plurality…..
A. Agreement.
B. Dictatorship.
C. Solidarity.
D. Coalition.
B. Dictatorship.
These are all group decision-making techniques. Although “A”, “C”, and “D” may sound like good choices, you need to know these five (Unanimity, Majority, Consensus, Plurality, and Dictatorship) before sitting for the exam.
Which of the following choices best fits the description of a project manger applying the technique of what-if scenario analysis?
A. Using project management software to build three versions of the project schedule.
B. Using Monte Carlo analysis to identify what would happen if schedule delays occurred.
C. Using critical path method to analyze what would happen if the critical path actually occurred.
D. Discussing with the functional managers what they would do if certain project team members quit the project early.
B. Using Monte Carlo analysis to identify what would happen if schedule delays occurred.
What-if analysis can take on many forms, but the form you are most likely to see on the exam is Monte Carlo analysis, which throws a large number of scenarios at the schedule to see what would happen if one or more bad scenarios occurred.
The value of all work that has been completed so far is:
A. Earned value.
B. Estimate at complete.
C. Actual cost.
D. Planned value.
A. Earned value.
The value of all work completed to this point.
Which of the following is NOT a part of the Plan Quality Management process?
A. Benchmarking.
B. Audits.
C. Cost-benefit analysis.
D. Design of experiments.
B. Audits.
Audits are part of Perform Quality Assurance. Choices “A”, “C”, and “D” are all part of Plan Quality Management.