Project ManagementChapter 11 Project Control

Master student: Marius Miron2014

“Man does not plan to fail, he just fails to plan.”Anonymous

Murphy’s law: “If anything can go wrong, it will.”

The aim of this presentation is to answer the following questions:1 .W hat i s the purpose o f con t ro l ? To what i s i t

d i r ec ted?

-the purpose: the regulation of results through the alteration of activitiesthe stewardship of organizational assets

-control is the act of reducing the difference between plan and reality, hence it is in relation to physical assets, human and financial resources from initial planning and further to termination of a project.

Control

Performance

Cost Time

2.What are the three main types of control system? What question would a control system answer?

A. Cybernetic system control-negative feedback

loop

-path for correctionof deviation P from S

B. Go/no-go control system

A & B are directed to ongoing projects

Checkpoints

plan budget schedule

control

Pass=GO No pass=No-go

C. Postcontrol- applied after the fact-may become a problem if the specification of a

project have not being met-risk: “locking the barn after the horse has been

stolen”

-directed to improving the chances for future projects to meet their goals

OBS: whatever work is planned,

will also have to be controlled

3.What tools are available to the PM to use in controlling a project? Identify some characteristics of a good control system.

source: PMBOK

Tools: Critical ratio control chart(actual progress/scheduled progress) x

(budgeted cost/actual cost)

Tools: Critical ratio control limits

Tools: Cost/time chart

Tools: Cost control chart

Tools: Pareto-diagrams

4.What is the mathematical expression for the critical ratio? What does it tell a manager?(actual progress/scheduled progress) x

(budgeted cost/actual cost)“good” or “bad”?

5.Describe the relationship between motivation and control.

Control systems have a close relationship to motivation and should be well-balanced:

cost-effectiveappropriate to the desired end results not overdone.

6.How is creativity control?The approaches to the control of creativity are:process reviewpersonnel reassignment control of inputs.

7.What are go/no-go gauges?

-are tools that tell to an inspector if an object’s dimension is within certain limits.

-can be any measure that allows a manager to decide whether to continue, change, or terminate an activity or a project.

8.What is a champion?ChampionA person with organizational clout who takes on personal responsibility (though not usually

day-to-day management) for the successful completion of a project for the organization.

9. Describe a cybernetic control system.

10.What should the postcontrol report include?- Project objectives–Milestones and budgets–Final project results–Recommendations for improvement

11.How should change be controlled?

Acknowledge

Assess

Accept

Approve

12.Describe the quality(or phase)-gate process

“If you are solving problems faster than they are arriving to be solved, you have the project under

control. If not, you haven’t.”