Week-5 Course Project Assignment Overview Last week we did some more analysis and made changes to your resource allocations of your project efforts. Each of you: • • • • Reviewed your Resource and Overallocated Resource Reports, and decided what to do about any overallocated resource situations Made appropriate changes (as needed) to your project and submitted the latest version for review Wrote a brief essay exploring the techniques we use for handling overallocated resources, and how you handled the problem in your project Created a fully populated RAM chart for your effort This week we will begin our work with Earned Value Analysis. • • • To do so we need to manufacture some level of progress, and some level of expenses (as opposed to budget) in your project. The process to do that is explained in the details below. Having forced some scheduling and cost issues you will perform Earned Value Analysis on your updated project and write a project status memo explaining your results. Over in the File Section is a template I want you to use for this week’s Status Communication Essay. PROJ592 Professor DP George Page1 Week-5 Course Project Assignment Week-5 Assignment Descriptions Assignment 1 Simulate schedule and cost issues in your plan. This week you will have an opportunity to work with Earned Value Analysis. This is a straightforward mathematical technique for evaluating both your cost and progress against completing your scope. There are some things we need to do in order to allow Microsoft Project to calculate the earned value numbers for us. • • • We need to show actual progress on tasks in our plan or there is no earned value to evaluate. We need to have a baseline established to have something to compare against. We need to indicate a reporting period for which MSP can generate earned value numbers. Over in Doc share, I have provided a video showing how we can accomplish these tasks in managing our Microsoft project plan, and how we can view the resulting Earned Value Analysis. It is called “5C Simulating Project Scenarios in MSP Video.“ You definitely need to watch that tutorial hopefully building your own version of that example Microsoft project plan for practice before you dig into your own. My wife loves those cooking shows where they mess with the contestants as they are cooking some kind of meal (like swapping cooking implements or adding a new ingredient like chocolate ants to your muffin mix?!) We are going to do something like that to your carefully crafted project. Sorry. Trust me it’s for good reasons. We need to build certain conditions so we can discuss how they are handled in the real world. So • • • To begin with we are going to set the baseline for your project. o Select the Project tab at the top of the screen then select the Set Baseline down arrow o Click on Set Baseline then click okay. Now we are going to simulate some schedule overruns. o Let’s shoot for a 20% schedule slippage o When you look at your Gantt Chart with the Entry table showing (the default view table) it should show you the number of weeks duration of your project in the Duration Column of your Level Zero Task (or maybe days if you haven’t changed the default duration). Let’s say its 89 weeks for example. Well 89 x 1.2 = about 106. So we need to extend the project duration to 106 weeks to force a schedule slippage of 20%. To do THAT we need to set the View/Filer to Critical (So only critical path tasks show) and then increase the task durations of those tasks (longest ones first) until the Project duration is increased to 106 weeks (in my example). When you are done remember to reset the Filter to No filter Next, we are going to simulate cost overruns. o Select View/Tables to display the Table Selection Context Menu o Select the Cost Table o The Gantt view will be updated and a new set of columns will be displayed one of which is Fixed Cost PROJ592 Professor DP George Page2 Week-5 Course Project Assignment o For each of your fixed cost values, multiply the value by 1.2 (to increase the cost by 20%) (I copy/pasted the entire Fixed cost column to Excel applied a formula to the column to create a new column of costs, and then copy/pasted the new column of numbers back – but I do stuff like that with Excel all the time) o Also, it looks like salary inflation has finally hit your organization. Select the View tab again and then Tables and reselect Entry. Then select View/Resource Sheet to bring up your Resource Sheet. For each of your variable resources in your Resource Sheet, give those hard-working folks a 20% rate increase. So, if the rate was $25 an hour, for example, that would be (25 x 1.2= $30.00 an hour). At this point, we have modified your project plan to include a 20% slippage in the schedule with a 20% increase in fixed cost and a 20% increase in variable costs. • • • • • Now we are going to simulate that your project is 40% complete. o Select the View tab at the top of the screen o Select the Tables down arrow button and the Tables List context window will be displayed o Select the Tracking Table from the list o The Gantt view will be updated and a new set of columns will be displayed one of which is Percent Complete (% Comp) o Overtype the percent complete cell on your level 0 task, replacing 0% with 40 o Your Tracking Table will be immediately updated and several tasks will show 100% complete. Having told MSP that we are 40% complete with all of your tasks, we are now we are going to use the time machine functionality of Microsoft Project to set the status date to tell MSP that we have used 60% of your scheduled time. To do THAT you need to calculate what the date would be if 60% of your allotted schedule had passed. You can do this manually (for example, if you had a 12-month project starting October 3, 2016 (a Monday) that would be 12 x .6 = 7.2 months. So, if the project started in October then 7.2 months later would be May 10th 2017. However, I’ve written a utility program for Windows and Mac to calculate the status date for you if you just enter the Project Start and Project End dates. Just download “StatusDateCalc.zip” follow the instructions included therein. To set the status date in MSP: o Select the Project tab at the top and then select the Project Information button o The Project Information window will pop up o Now you just need to overtype the Status Date. In the example above, I would type in 5/10/17 into the status date field and click Okay. DONE! REMEMBER to set the status date to the 60% done date whenever you mess with your plan going forward. Do a Save As for this version of your project with a new version number! That way you can always go back if something went South. PROJ592 Professor DP George Page3 Week-5 Course Project Assignment FYI…Here is what all this manipulation of your project plan has done to you 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. It’s had a 20% increase in total fixed costs It’s had a 20% increase in variable costs It’s has a schedule slippage of 20% We are off and running! 40% of the project has been completed You are 60% through your scheduled project duration When we changed the fixed and variables costs we messed with the CV and CPI statistics going forward, not so much the SPI stuff. 7. When we set the Status Date at “60% through the effort” we messed with the SV and SPI numbers for the project going forward. Not so much the CPI stuff. Having said all that... Now you need to look at the earned value data that has been calculated for you by Microsoft Project. • To do THAT we: o Select View then Tables again o Then from the resulting table list select More Tables o Now we have a HUGE list of tables to deal with. The good news is you just have to press the “E” key to be positioned in the list with all the E-tables (tables starting with E) o Take a look at the three Earned Value tables one by one. Just select a table and click the Apply button. • Submit your latest version of your project plan (.MPP file) as: o Week5_MSProjectPlan With baseline_yourlastname_vn.mpp (Where “vn” is your version number as in – Week5_MSProjectPlan with basleline_George_v2.mpp”) • Point value 30 points So, what does all those earned value numbers mean? YOU TELL ME! See the next assignment PROJ592 Professor DP George Page4 Week-5 Course Project Assignment Assignment 2 Project Status Communication What we have done here is set you up! Despite your hard work and planning, you are apparently 40% complete having used 60% of your time, with both schedule slippage and overruns on fixed and variable costs! Now you have a bunch of earned value results, the exact numbers depend on your unique project. However, what Plan Value or your Schedule Variance or your CPI, etc., means conceptually is the same no matter what the project. • • • • • • • • • You will be writing a Project Status Communication Memo You will be explaining to your professional (but not project management educated) stakeholders in some detail what EV, PV, AC, SV, CV, SPI, and CPI, mean conceptually and why they are important. You will also include your actual earned value numbers for your project as of our (forced) status date, and explain what those numbers are saying about your effort currently. You will be using a template named “add your name hereProject Status Communication Memo” for your memo. Next week we will be dealing NOTE: by now it should go without saying that there is no way you can with how we can use these write this memo on EVA without references to referred sources, the numbers to forecast future absence of which will result in a loss of points at a minimum. progress and the things we can At least three pages or longer in length. do to get things back on track. Formatting: o Double-space (no additional space between paragraphs) o One-inch margins o Times Roman12-point font size o Left justified At least two different reference sources are required. • Point value 30 points PROJ592 Professor DP George Page5 Week-5 Course Project Assignment Hey Don, what would an outstanding assignment look like (meaning, what I will have to do to get an “A”)? Yes, yes, I know … As always…Check the Grading Rubric on the next page. An excellent submittal would have: • • PROJ592 An updated Microsoft Project plan for Week-5 with: o Total project cost increased 20% o The project end date extended 20% o A project status 60% through the new project duration o 40% of the project completed. o My previous project feedback implemented A completed essay (Project Status Communication Memo): o Explaining to your stakeholders exactly what the “alphabet soup” of earned value current status analysis means both in terms of the definition of terms and what those terms mean conceptually. o Explaining your particular project numbers, what they are, and what they imply for your project at this point. o Your essay will be written with the clarity and precision of language appropriate for a Master’s level University course, and use appropriate references to refereed sources. Professor DP George Page6 Week-5 Course Project Assignment Week-5 Grading Rubric Assignment Updated MSP Plan with simulated schedule and cost issues Project Status Communication Memo Requirements Student provides an updated MSP Project Plan file with the appropriate changes made to set a project baseline, simulate 40% completion at 60% of schedule time, with 20% increases in variable and fixed costs. All tasks will be auto scheduled. Student will ignore overallocated resources (if any), we will handle them later. Student submits a memo explaining to the stakeholders in detail what EV, PV, AC, SV, CV, SPI, and CPI, mean conceptually and why they are important. Student will include their actual earned value numbers for the project at the (required) status date, and explain what those numbers indicate for the project effort. Point Value 30 30 60 As always, the quality of writing will be appropriate for a Master’s level University course, with suitable tone and clarity expected of communication to corporate executives, and appropriate references to refereed sources. PROJ592 Professor DP George Page7 DeVry University Keller Graduate School of Management [name of your project] Project Status Communication Memo Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Course Requirements for PROJ592 Professor D.P. George By: [place name here] Date: [place date here] Project Status Communication Memo [add your 3 page + memo on EVA and your project status text here] 2 References [add your reference list here] 3 PM592 Week 5 Earned Value Analysis Graded Assignment Problem #1 Your project has four activities. Below is the current status of each activity. • • • • Task A was to have cost $150,000 when complete. Its costs so far are $45,000. It is 35% complete. The activity has completed 5 weeks of a planned 15-week schedule. Task B is at the end of week 2 of a planned 4-week effort. It is 45% complete. It was to cost $100,000 when finished. Its costs to date are $50,000. Task C is finished. It finished 2 weeks late. It cost $100,000. And it was planned to have cost $110,000. Task D is beginning its fourth of a planned 6-week schedule. It has cost $200,000 so far. It was estimated to cost $450,000 when finished. It is approximately 55% complete. Using this data, calculate the following. 1. What are the PV, EV, and AC for each of the activities and the complete project? (5 points) PV AC EV Task A B C D Project 2. What are the SV, CV, SPI, and CPI for each of the activities and the complete project? (15 points) SV CV SPI CPI Task A B C D Project 3. Assess the project performance to date? Do you get to have the celebration? (5 points) PM592 Week 5 Earned Value Analysis Graded Assignment Problem #2 Your project has four activities. Below is the current status of each activity. • • • • Task A was to have cost $250,000 when complete. Its costs so far are $165,000. It is 50% complete. The activity has completed 7 weeks of a planned 15-week schedule. Task B is at the end of week 2 of a planned 4-week effort. It is 65% complete. It was to cost $190,000 when finished. Its costs to date are $150,000. Task C is finished. It finished 2 weeks late. It cost $200,000. And it was planned to have cost $250,000. Task D is at the end of its fourth of a planned 6-week schedule. It has cost $350,000 so far. It was estimated to cost $500,000 when finished. It is approximately 55% complete. Using this data, calculate the following. 1. What are the PV, EV, and AC for each of the activities and the complete project? (5 points) PV AC EV Task A B C D Project 2. What are the SV, CV, SPI, and CPI for each of the activities and the complete project? (15 points) SV CV SPI CPI Task A B C D Project 3. What is your assessment of the project at this time? (5 points)
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