Project Management (Sept 2015) Assignment

50% of final grade.

Assignment due: by 12am Friday 17 November 2015
The Public Works Department (PWD) found that its computer systems for managing
public clients is obsolete and needed replacing. A business case was prepared for funding
the replacement and a total budget of $2.3 million was requested. However, only $1.5
million was approved by the government and was accepted by PWD.
The details of the project are as follows

Project scope

implementing hardware and software at 100 PWD

offices in Malaysia

Projected
date

30th June 2010

Project governance

A project steering committee was established. The

sponsor was the Director General of PWD with
representation from influential managers with
differing outcome needs to suit their particular
work environment.

Risk identification

Loosely identified

Commencement date

July 2009

completion

As the project did not have sufficient funds, PWD Finance Manager had to act as the
Project Manager at the same doing his normal duties.
PWD contracted Best Solutions SdnBhd (BSSB) to supply the software and assist in the
implementation. BSSB offered, free of charge, many more features that were not in the
original scope, with the condition that PWD allow BSB to advertise their products in the
provided solution. Initially, the steering committee met regularly, but as new versions of
the resulting software were being implemented regularly, meetings became less frequent
and only BSSBdid more and more of the day to day management of the new version
implementations. These new versions were developed after consultation with the various
individual managers to accommodate requested new features with little consultation
amongst all of the managers. All PWDand its steering committee had to do was to
identify problems with the software and to make the system testers available for new
versions. However, the effect was an unanticipated overhead for PWD.
Sometime after the original project was scoped and commenced, both the
originalDirector General of PWD and finance manager had been moved out of the
department and new officers have been appointed.At this time, the new Director General
(DG) of PWD has been advised that about $185,000 more is needed for the project,
which is not in his current budget. The original project has not been signed off, indeed, it
is evident that it has not been completed. The new DG of PWD is not sure of the original
scope of the project, what aspects have been implemented, nor what has been spent for
which parts. There do not seem to be any reliable reports available as to original scope,
scope changes, schedule or budget.The DG of PWD is concerned that the project has
become more of a career than a project, with version 16.5 of the client management
system now being tested with yet more features. In addition, there are some past
software problems that are still outstanding. BSSB have promised that problems will be
fixed in the next version.

The DG of PWD has asked you, asenior consultant with PM Consultancy, a project
management consulting companyto provide the following:
1. Report your assessment of the current project status (using project management
practices) (15 Marks)
2. Recommend steps to bring the project to a close.(15 Marks)
3. Recommend improvements to the PWD future project management practices
including the selection of agood project manager. (15 Marks)
4. What other advice would you give to the DG of PWD? (5 Marks)
Project software, hire a project vendor if no experience internal),carry out the
project charter properly, benchmark with other similar projects or follow
similar,maintain the current steering committee for the prroject