Unknown Practice Test Flashcards
Total Quality Management (TQM)
Quality improvement method. A core definition of total quality management (TQM) describes a management approach to long-term success through customer satisfaction. In a TQM effort, all members of an organization participate in improving processes, products, services, and the culture in which they work.
Six Sigma
Quality improvement method. A set of management techniques intended to improve business processes by greatly reducing the probability that an error or defect will occur.
Lean Six Sigma
Quality improvement method. Lean Six Sigma is a method that relies on a collaborative team effort to improve performance by systematically removing waste[1] and reducing variation.
Lean Manufacturing
Quality improvement method. Lean manufacturing attempts to make obvious what adds value, through reducing everything else (because it is not adding value).
Plan-do-check-act
Quality improvement method. PDCA is an iterative four-step management method used in business for the control and continuous improvement of processes and products. It is also known as the Deming circle/cycle/wheel, the Shewhart cycle, the control circle/cycle, or plan–do–study–act.
Design for X
Design for X (DfX) is a set of technical guidelines that may be applied during the design of a product for the optimization of a specific aspect of the design. DfX can control or even improve the product’s final characteristics. The X in DfX can be different aspects of product development, such as reliability, deployment, assembly, manufacturing, cost, service, usability, safety, and quality. Using the DfX may result in cost reduction, quality improvement, better performance, and customer satisfaction.
Directions of Influence
Classifies stakeholders according to their influence on the work of the project or the project team itself. Stakeholders can be classified in the following ways:
Upward (senior management of the performing organization or customer organization, sponsor, and steering committee)
Downward (the team or specialists contributing knowledge or skills in a temporary capacity),
Outward (stakeholder groups and their representatives outside the project team, such as suppliers, government departments, the public, end-users, and regulators)
Sideward (the peers of the project manager, such as other project managers or middle managers who are in competition for scarce project resources or who collaborate with the project manager in sharing resources or information).
Prioritization
Prioritizing stakeholders may be necessary for projects with a large number of stakeholders, where the membership of the stakeholder community is changing frequently, or when the relationships between stakeholders and the project team or within the stakeholder community are complex.
Brain Writing
A refinement of brainstorming that allows individual participants time to consider the question(s) individually before the group creativity session is held. The information can be gathered in face-to-face groups or using virtual environments supported by technology.
Power/Interest Grid
Power/interest grid, power/influence grid, or impact/influence grid. Each of these techniques supports a grouping of stakeholders according to their level of authority (power), level of concern about the project’s outcomes (interest), ability to influence the outcomes of the project (influence), or ability to cause changes to the project’s planning or execution. These classification models are useful for small projects or for projects with simple relationships between stakeholders and the project, or within the stakeholder community itself.
Stakeholder Cube
This model combines the grid elements into a three-dimensional model that can be useful to project managers and teams in identifying and engaging their stakeholder community. It provides a model with multiple dimensions that improves the depiction of the stakeholder community as a multidimensional entity and assists with the development of communication strategies.
Salience Model
Describes classes of stakeholders based on assessments of their power (level of authority or ability to influence the outcomes of the project), urgency (need for immediate attention, either time-constrained or relating to the stakeholders’ high stake in the outcome), and legitimacy (their involvement is appropriate). There is an adaptation of the salience model that substitutes proximity for legitimacy (applying to the team and measuring their level of involvement with the work of the project). The salience model is useful for large complex communities of stakeholders or where there are complex networks of relationships within the community. It is also useful in determining the relative importance of the identified stakeholders.
Simulation
Simulation. Simulation models the combined effects of individual project risks and other sources of uncertainty to evaluate their potential impact on achieving project objectives. The most common simulation technique is Monte Carlo analysis, in which risks and other sources of uncertainty are used to calculate possible schedule outcomes for the total project.
Cultural Awareness
Cultural awareness is an understanding of the differences between individuals, groups, and organizations and adapting the project’s communication strategy in the context of these differences. This awareness and any consequent actions minimize misunderstandings and miscommunication that may result from cultural differences within the project’s stakeholder community. Cultural awareness and cultural sensitivity help the project manager to plan communications based on the cultural differences and requirements of stakeholders and team members.
Political Awareness
Political awareness helps the project manager to plan communications based on the project environment as well as the organization’s political environment. Political
awareness concerns the recognition of power relationships, both formal and informal, and also the willingness to operate within these structures. An understanding of the strategies of the organization, knowing who wields power and influence in this arena, and developing an ability to communicate with these stakeholders are all aspects of political awareness.
Change Control Board(CCB)
A formally chartered group who has the responsibility of approving, rejecting, or deferring changes to the project
Virtual Teams/Distributed Teams
Teams that work on the same project but are not colocated at the same site.
Self Organizing Teams
The increase in using agile approaches mainly for the execution of IT projects has given rise to the self-organizing team, where the team functions with an absence of centralized control. In projects that have self-organizing teams, the project manager (who may not be called a project manager) role provides the team with the environment and support needed and trusts the team to get the job done.
Schedule Network Analysis
Schedule network analysis is the overarching technique used to generate the project schedule model. It employs several other techniques such as critical path method, resource optimization techniques, and modeling techniques
Resource Breakdown Structure
The resource breakdown structure includes information on the composition of the team and may help to understand what knowledge is available as a group and what knowledge is missing.
Agreements
Agreements are used to define initial intentions for a project. Agreements may take the form of contracts, memorandums of understanding (MOUs), service level agreements (SLA), letters of agreement, letters of intent, verbal agreements, email, or other written agreements. Typically, a contract is used when a project is being performed for an external customer.
Resource Assignment Matrix(RAM)
A RAM shows the project resources assigned to each work package. It is used to illustrate the connections between work packages, or activities, and project team members. On larger projects, RAMs can be developed at various levels. For example, a high-level RAM can define the responsibilities of a project team, group, or unit within each component of the WBS. Lower-level RAMs are used within the group to designate roles, responsibilities, and levels of authority for specific activities. The matrix format shows all activities associated with one person and all people associated with one activity. This also ensures that there is only one person accountable for any one task to avoid confusion about who is ultimately in charge or has authority for the work. One example of a RAM is a RACI (responsible, accountable, consult, and inform) chart. A RACI chart is a useful tool to use to ensure clear assignment of roles and responsibilities when the team consists of internal and external resources.
Stakeholder Engagement Assessment Matrix
The stakeholder engagement assessment matrix, displays gaps between current and desired engagement levels of individual stakeholders, it can be further analyzed in this process to identify additional communication requirements (beyond the regular reports) as a method to close any engagement level gaps.
Ground Rules
Ground rules, defined in the team charter set the expected behavior for project team members, as well as other stakeholders, with regard to stakeholder engagement.
Metrics
The direct and indirect measurements used to show the benefits realized.
Quality Metric
A quality metric specifically describes a project or product attribute and how the Control Quality process will verify compliance to it. Some examples of quality metrics include percentage of tasks completed on time, cost performance measured by CPI, failure rate, number of defects identified per day, total downtime per month, errors found per line of code, customer satisfaction scores, and percentage of requirements covered by the test plan as a measure of test coverage.
Lessons Learned Register
The lessons learned register can include the category and description of the situation. The lessons learned register may also include the impact, recommendations, and proposed actions associated with the situation. The lessons learned register may record challenges, problems, realized risks and opportunities, or other content as appropriate.
Prompt List
A prompt list is a predetermined list of risk categories that might give rise to individual project risks and that could also act as sources of overall project risk. The prompt list can be used as a framework to aid the project team in idea generation when using risk identification techniques. The risk categories in the lowest level of the risk breakdown structure can be used as a prompt list for individual project risks. Some common strategic frameworks are more suitable for identifying sources of overall project risk, for example PESTLE (political, economic, social, technological, legal, environmental), TECOP (technical, environmental, commercial, operational, political), or VUCA (volatility, uncertainty, complexity, ambiguity).
Assumption Log
The assumption log is updated with assumptions regarding the types and quantities of resources required. Additionally, any resource constraints are entered including collective bargaining agreements, continuous hours of operation, planned leave, etc.
Cost Plus Award Fee (CPAF)
The seller is reimbursed for all legitimate costs, but the majority of the fee is earned based on the satisfaction of certain broad subjective performance criteria that are defined and incorporated into the contract. The determination of fee is based solely on the subjective determination of seller performance by the buyer and is generally not subject to appeals.
Cost Plus Incentive Fee(CPIF)
The seller is reimbursed for all allowable costs for performing the contract work and receives a predetermined incentive fee based on achieving certain performance objectives as set forth in the contract. In CPIF contracts, if the final costs are less or greater than the original estimated costs, then both the buyer and seller share costs from the departures based upon a prenegotiated cost-sharing formula, for example, an 80/20 split over/under target costs based on the actual performance of the seller.
Cost Plus Fixed Fee(CPFF)
The seller is reimbursed for all allowable costs for performing the contract work and receives a fixed-fee payment calculated as a percentage of the initial estimated project costs. Fee amounts do not change unless the project scope changes.
Interactive Communication
Between two or more parties performing a multidirectional exchange of information in real time. It employs communications artifacts such as meetings, phone calls, instant messaging, some forms of social media, and videoconferencing.
Push Communication
Sent or distributed directly to specific recipients who need to receive the information. This ensures that the information is distributed but does not ensure that it actually reached or was understood by the intended audience. Push communications artifacts include letters, memos, reports, emails, faxes, voice mails, blogs, and press releases.
Pull Communication
Used for large complex information sets, or for large audiences, and requires the recipients to access content at their own discretion subject to security procedures. These methods include web portals, intranet sites, e-learning, lessons learned databases, or knowledge repositories.
Functional Organization
An organizational structure in which staff is grouped by areas of specialization and the project manager has limited authority to assign work and apply resources.
Organic or Simple Organizational Structure
An organic organizational structure is characterized by an extremely flat reporting structure within an organization. In this organization, the span of control of the typical manager encompasses a large number of employees. Interactions among employees tend to be horizontally across the organization, rather than vertically between layers of managers and their direct reports.
Performance Measurement Baseline (PMB)
Integrated scope, schedule, and cost baselines used for comparison to manage, measure, and control project execution.
Stakeholder Engagement Plan
A component of the project management plan that identifies the strategies and actions required to promote productive involvement of stakeholders in project or program decision making and execution.
Communications Management Plan
A component of the project, program, or portfolio management plan that describes how, when, and by whom information about the project will be administered and disseminated.
Risk Data Quality Assessment
Technique to evaluate the degree to which the data about risks is useful for risk management.
Multi-Divisional Organization
Multi-divisional form refers to an organizational structure by which the firm is separated into several semi autonomous units which are guided and controlled by targets from the center
Regression Analysis
An analytical technique where a series of input variables are examined in relation to their corresponding output results in order to develop a mathematical or statistical relationship.
Variance Analysis
A technique for determining the cause and degree of difference between the baseline and actual performance.
Trend Analysis
An analytical technique that uses mathematical models to forecast future outcomes based on historical results.
Configuration Management Plan
A component of the project management plan that describes how to identify and account for project artifacts under configuration control, and how to record and report changes to them.
Fixed Budget
The fixed-budget method requires disclosing the available budget to invited sellers in the RFP and selecting the highest-ranking technical proposal within the budget. Because sellers are subject to a cost constraint, they will adapt the scope and quality of their offer to that budget. The buyer should therefore ensure that the budget is compatible with the SOW and that the seller will be able to perform the tasks within the budget. This method is appropriate only when the SOW is precisely defined, no changes are anticipated, and the budget is fixed and cannot be changed.
Sole Source
The buyer asks a specific seller to prepare technical and financial proposals, which are then negotiated. Since there is no competition, this method is acceptable only when properly justified and should be viewed as an exception.
Least Cost
The least cost method may be appropriate for procurements of a standard or routine nature where well-established practices and standards exist and from which a specific and well-defined outcome is expected, which can be executed at different costs.
Qualifications Only
The qualifications only selection method applies when the time and cost of a full selection process would not make sense because the value of the procurement is relatively small. The buyer establishes a short list and selects the bidder with the best credibility, qualifications, experience, expertise, areas of specialization, and references.
Quality Based/Highest Technical Proposal Score
The selected firm is asked to submit a proposal with both technical and cost details and is then invited to negotiate the contract if the technical proposal proves acceptable. Using this method, technical proposals are first evaluated based on the quality of the technical solution offered. The seller who submitted the highest-ranked technical proposal is selected if their financial proposal can be negotiated and accepted.
