Project Management MidTerm



Project Management Mid-Term

Sample Solution as of 10-21-06

Fall 2006 – 150 points

Congress has decreed that five sections of reinforced fencing -- most probably a double fence with stadium lighting -- will be built along a third of the border with Mexico for a total of 700 miles, in California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas for an estimated cost of $2 billion. The biggest section is planned from east of Calexico stretching more than 300 miles to west of Douglas, Ariz. In some regions along the border, the nearest main road is as far as 80 miles away. So to build the barrier, roads will also need to be created.

In the mid-1990s San Diego was awash in illegal immigrants. Hundreds would gather by a soccer field near Otay Mesa, east of San Diego, and rush into the United States on what the Border Patrol termed "banzai runs." During those years, Border Patrol agents routinely apprehended 200,000 illegal entrants a year in the sector. Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) got funding to build a fence and thousands more Border Patrol officers were dispatched to the area. The fence in San Diego forced illegal traffic into the deserts to the east, leading thousands of migrants to their deaths. In response, the Border Patrol shifted thousands of agents to Arizona to deal with the flow. But many of those agents came from the San Diego and El Centro sectors. So once again, the numbers of crossers in San Diego and El Centro are increasing.

But the fence, originally estimated at $14 million, incurred huge cost overruns and logistical and legal hurdles. It took $39 million to build the first nine miles and the fence has yet to be finished. For a decade, litigation has delayed construction of 3.5 miles of the structure because environmental groups have opposed a federal plan to lop the tops off two mesas and pour 5.5 million cubic feet of dirt into a valley, called “Smuggler’s Gulch,” to flatten the terrain. Environmental groups lost the case when the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) invoked a law exempting it from federal and state regulations in the interest of national security. DHS recently appropriated an additional $35 million to complete the fence – for a total of $74 million or more than $5 million a mile.

It is important to note that shortly before Congress adjourned, the House and Senate gave the Bush administration leeway to distribute the $2 billion allocated to build the fence to other projects, including roads, technology and other infrastructure items to support the Department of Homeland Security's border security plan.

By John Pomfret (with some additions/deletions for class)

Washington Post Staff Writer

Tuesday, October 10, 2006

You have been authorized by the Secretary of Homeland Security to manage the building of a 700 mile fence along the U.S. and Mexican border in order to achieve the following project objectives.

1. Reduce the number of border guards required to monitor and control the border between the U.S. and Mexico by 30%.

2. Reduce the number of illegal aliens in the U.S. by 10% no later than the end of the project in 2008 from approximately 13 million today to 11.7 million in October of 2008.

3. Complete this project no later than October 1st of 2008.

4. Do not exceed your budget of $2 billion.

In order to answer this question, please provide the following as part of your answer: 120 points

1. Project scope

2. Measurable objectives

3. Project assumptions

4. Project risk

5. Roles and responsibilities

6. Other items as you see fit (explain why they are included)

Sample Solution:

Background: From the article provided, it is already clear that building a wall will not solve the immigration problem facing the United States. The combination of a wall and thousands more border patrol agents pushed immigrants into the desert and for many to their deaths. So even this combination didn’t work; the illegal aliens still found their way around the fortifications. In addition 9 miles of fence took $39 million to build or more than $4 million per mile of fence. The $2 billion which has been allocated provides for less than $3 million per mile and can be diverted to other projects which have not been specified but are related to border security.

This project is a symbolic one that is politically driven. It is naïve to think you can change these politics, but you have been given flexibility in how the money can be spent on border controls. Take advantage of this in project execution.

Approach: As the project manager and an employee of the Department of Homeland Security, it is clear to me that this project not only will be very difficult to accomplish as conceived (within time and budget), but is most likely not even a viable solution to the problem I am being asked to help solve. For this reason, I will spend the first six to eight weeks meeting with interested stakeholders, reviewing examples of other border solutions (within the U.S. and from around the world) and developing a plan that I feel can be both executed and that will have a material impact on the problem being addressed. Note there are many borders around the world that don’t seem to have the same problems we do. In addition our border with Canada is wide open and for the most part trouble free.

In-Scope:

• Slow the flow of illegal immigrants entering the United States from Mexico between California and Texas (specifically between **** city and **** city)

• Design and construction of any buildings, fencing, infrastructure, power, roads, technology, utilities necessary to build and support the border control system.

• Identify and contract for all necessary labor, materials and equipment to design and build the new border control system.

Out-of-Scope:

• Immigration policy

• Maintenance of any buildings, roads, power lines and any other kinds of structures built for the project

• Points of entry that do not cross where the project will design and implement border controls

• Border patrol training, staffing, deployment, layoffs and anything else to do with border patrol activities

• Public relations

• Negotiating with Mexico regarding border disputes, justification for border controls and safety of illegal aliens crossing the border.

• Reduce the number of illegal aliens already in the United States because increased border security will keep illegal aliens already in the U.S. here

• Safety of illegal aliens crossing into the United States

Project Objectives:

• Reduce number of illegal aliens crossing into the United States from Mexico by 50% only where the project will deploy border controls no later than October of 2008. This will be measured by benchmarking the top 20 border crossings in terms of numbers of illegal aliens crossing at the beginning of the project and comparing these figures to the top 20 border crossing spots at the end of the project. These locations may be different because these people will be pushed to other locations that they believe are easier to cross. Monitor these shifts throughout the project and feed back into the project plan (of course this is different than what you were asked to do, so you will have to meet with the Secretary of Homeland Security to negotiate this change)

• Complete this project by October 1st of 2008

• Do not exceed the project budget of $2 billion U.S. dollars

Project Manager Authority: Since this is such a high risk project, the project manager must be given significant authority which would include the following.

• PM has the authority to negotiate all contracts with suppliers, contractors, local authorities and any other party necessary to get the project done.

• The PM does not have to go through the normal Government contracting methods and can approve the contracts herself without monetary limit, multiple bids, or any other limits normally encountered in the Government.

• PM has the authority to identify and hire her own team as necessary for this project

• PM has the authority to allocate the $2 billion budget as she sees fit in order to accomplish the project objectives

Risks:

• A wall doesn’t address the real problem of why illegal aliens are entering the United States, nor can it stop them from coming into the U.S. So building a wall will probably not work. Risk impact is High and likelihood is High. Mitigation: Do research on what border control strategies have worked elsewhere in order to incorporate them into our plan.

• It’s highly likely that by building a wall or some other forms of border controls will create a higher chance of illegal aliens getting seriously injured or dying during the journey. Risk impact is High and likelihood is High. Mitigation: The real answer is working with Mexico, Central American and South American countries where these immigrants are coming from to create better jobs, educational systems, health care, etc. that these individuals are seeking in the United States. This is a long term project that will cost much more than $2 billion dollars to implement, but one that makes economic and political sense for our country to do. This is out-of-scope, but the project manager should raise this with the Secretary of Homeland Security for inclusion in the next cabinet meeting.

• The new border control system will shift illegal entry to other locations. Risk impact is High and likelihood is High. Mitigation: As part of the planning process, do some analysis on where and how many illegal aliens would move to other locations. Monitor this during the course of the project as each new section is completed. Determine if this will keep the project from achieving a 50% reduction in inflows and adjust accordingly.

• The $2 billion allocated can be diverted to other projects or for other border security measures. Risk impact is High and likelihood is High. Mitigation: Make sure to develop a detailed project budget which may include other technologies beyond simply building a wall. This specific budget needs to be approved by the Secretary of Homeland Security and the money allocated to the project accounts.

• The project costs will increase beyond our budget due to increases in labor and materials costs over the 2 year project. Risk impact High and likelihood is High. Mitigation: This is not a 100% solution, so ways to adjust quality and scope should be found to make sure project stays within budget. Make sure contractor’s contracts include value engineering options so they can help you be creative while saving money on the project. Wherever possible develop hedging strategies for project materials and supplies. (This project will require significant amounts of gasoline, steel, wood, asphalt, etc.) This budget may have to be revisited early in the project life-cycle.

• The border controls cannot be designed and built in the timeframe allotted because for more than 4 months out of the year the area is either too hot to work in or too wet due to heavy rains. Risk impact is High and the likelihood is High. Mitigation: Once the design has been determined, identify and hire multiple contractors by slicing the border up into much smaller pieces as small as 10 miles, depending on the location and associated challenges. Develop a schedule that is reasonable using knowledge from people who have done similar projects and revisit the schedule if necessary.

• October of 2008 is one month before Presidential elections, so your due date is before any executive office change would be made, but could significantly influence the race. Your project will probably get pushed and pulled by politicians. Risk impact is High and likelihood is High. Mitigation: Be honest; make sure you are communicating with both sides of the aisle. Keep the project profile as low as possible

• Because there are so many different stakeholders to communicate with, this communication will be ineffective and create additional difficulties for the project. Risk impact is High and likelihood is High. Mitigation: Develop a communications plan identifying all key stakeholders, schedule a monthly meeting with representatives from these groups and hire a PR firm to help design and coordinate these communications.

• The new controls can be sabotaged by illegal aliens, Americans opposed to the controls, drug smugglers, etc. Risk impact is High and likelihood is High. Mitigation: Look to utilize technologies that would be difficult to sabotage such as satellite observation, unmanned aircraft, or sensors that can be buried or camouflaged ….

And on and on…..

Project Assumptions:

• The Mexican Government is interested in helping us solve this problem and will participate in a constructive manner

• The team will include people who were involved in the fence along San Diego’s border

• The team will have access to people who have dealt with similar issues successfully elsewhere in the World

• The U.S. Government will be working simultaneously to identify other methods of addressing this immigration issue to help reduce the pressure at the border

• The cost to maintain the new border controls could cost more than it cost to build or to simply retain a larger number of border patrol officers

Roles and Responsibilities:

• Secretary of Homeland Security – Project Sponsor is responsible for funding the project, help set project priorities, approve project scope and objectives and provide guidance as needed throughout the project.

• Project Manager is responsible for making sure the customer is satisfied that the work scope (no more or less) has been completed to the level of quality agreed, within budget and on-time. This includes communicating issues as they occur which could keep the project from achieving its objectives (reduce immigration at border with Mexico to 50% of current numbers) within time and budget. The PM should also produce a communications plan which will include a regularly scheduled meeting with key project stakeholders.

• Project teams – (includes engineering and design, road building, power distribution, buildings, fence, technology, support…) are responsible for completing their work as determined by the project plan. The project will be broken into multiple teams each tackling a smaller section of the fence simultaneously in order to finish the project on time.

• Border patrol is responsible for providing protection to the project teams during the course of the project.

• State Department is responsible for communicating with the Mexican Government regarding the new border controls in order to get their buy-in and support.

• Local authorities are responsible for providing assistance needed in communicating with locals living along the border (on the U.S. side), providing information regarding any site hazards, places for the workers to live while construction is under way.

• Public Relations Firm hired by the Secretary of Homeland Security is responsible for all communications except for the project team, the Department of Homeland Security, Congress, Border Patrol, local authorities and the Department of State.

Deliverables:

• Project plan (including a charter, WBS, risk, schedule, budget, communications plan, HR plan, procurement plan, and quality plan)

• Border crossing analysis including best practices, lessons learned, and how new border controls might divert traffic and to where

• Border crossing benchmark (before, during and after border controls are implemented)

• Border infrastructure

• Border controls

Multiple Choice Questions: 3 points each (total of 30 points)

1. All the following statements about a WBS are true except __?

A. provides a framework for organizing and ordering a project's activities

B. can be similar in appearance to an organizational chart

C. breaks down a project into successively greater detail by level

D. is a scheduling method

E. is a planning tool

2. Each project process is marked by completion of one or more deliverables. The deliverable for the initiation phase of a project is the __________.

A. project plan

B. contract terms and conditions

C. statement of work

D. project charter

E. resource spreadsheet

3. A clear, concise scope definition serves several purposes. Which of the following is not an objective of scope definition?

A. Improving the accuracy of cost, time, and resource estimates

B. Defining the baseline for performance measurement and control

C. Developing the scope management plan

D. Communicating clear definition of project responsibilities

4. As applied to projects, temporary means that __________.

A. projects are short in duration

B. every project has a definite beginning and end

C. the undertaking will end at an undetermined time in the future

D. projects can be canceled at any time

5. At a minimum, the project charter should __________.

A. describe the responsibilities and authority of the project manager

B. discuss the risks and constraints of the project

C. designate the organizational structure of the project

D. state the business goals of the performing organization

6. The greatest degree of uncertainty is encountered during which phase of the project life cycle?

A. Initiation

B. Planning

C. Execution

D. Closing

E. All phases involve uncertainty to the same degree

7. The input to project initiation consists of __________.

A. the product or service description

B. the company's strategic plan

C. the project selection criteria

D. historical data

E. All the above

8. The 80-hour rule states that __________.

A. each task should be broken down into work packages that require no more than 80 hours of work to complete

B. no one should be assigned to the project unless able to work on it for at least 80 hours

C. a budget should be established for any task of 80 hours or more

D. performance should be measured on all tasks of least 80 hours or more

9. The triple-constraint consists of which of the following:

A. time, scope, expense, requirements

B. scope, time, cost, quality

C. time, cost, quality, requirements

D. scope, time, expense, requirements

10. The project charter is an output from ___ and an input to ____?

A. planning, execution

B. scope, planning

C. initiation, planning

D. planning, initiation

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