International Guidance and Controls (CARV) Project (Case Study Analysis)
Introduction
The $ 20 million project of Confined Aquatic
Recovery Vehicle had to be completed in
the coming 10 months. Hence, the main
issue was meeting the deadline of the project with many considerable portions
of the software not fully developed. This situation brought different
alternatives to the PM that exhibited either to focus on the software
development or to invest in the hardware development or to re-evaluate the
situation at the end of the five months. In these situations all the possible
solutions and the possible outcomes have to be considered to evaluate each
alternative separately. For sure always
the optimal scenario will be to minimize the total costs of the project
completion and maximize the profit at the expected time.
Problem
The general problem can be based on different
scenarios:
1- Poor requirement analysis from the beginning
were the customers are not fully involved.
2- Not
Involving the users when analyzing the requirements or designing the phase.
3- Underestimating
the complexity of the project especially if it is a new project.
4- Lack of change control by not expecting or planning
for any degree of scope creep, therefore not
designing a process to manage scope creeps from the beginning and knowing what is the (process, approvals,
resources, implementation)
5- Structural
design: Issues that lead to (lack of integrity - lack of communication - lack
of feedback control – lack of training )
Specifically, the mentioned problems might led to the
original problem in the case which was the under designed hardware that
resulted in a critical difficulty developing the software and was time
consuming than planned.
Alternative
Solutions
Before going further with any of the mentioned
solutions it is recommended to re- evaluate the whole situation starting from
the (executive decisions-structure-planning-designing-training-strategy-scope-resources-transparency
and communication level) and based on the results decide which option to go
with or come up with a new solution.
While evaluating the alternatives and deciding which solution to go
with; the intangible costs that relates to the reputation have to be
considered.
Solution 1 :
To invest in the software development as planned for the next 10 months.
In this solution the project
team have to work full force and increase the count of full-time workers
assigned to the project.
Risk Evaluation
:
1- High development
cost will reach $300,000 per month which is over 25% of the project budget.
Thus, it's not possible to increase the head count or software development rate
if it requires.
2- Excluding the hardware
from development might delay the software development progress.
Solution 2 : To
begin a hardware expansion and development immediately for the next 5
months.
In the solution part of the difficulty to develop the
software was the original design for the hardware. Therefore, to eliminate schedule risks the choice can be to expand
and develop the hardware immediately.
Risk Evaluation
:
1- Expansion effort
requires a $1.5 million total cost to the project.
2- Reduce software
development effort and cost to the point of $200,000 per month for the
remaining 10 months. Thus, software might not be fully developed on time.
Solution 3 : To
delay the hardware expansion and development and continue with software development for the next 5 months.
In this situation and based on the software progress
after 5 months it was assumed to have a better and a clear idea of the chances
to complete on time, and because the hardware expansion could be completed in 5
months, it was suggested to continue with the software development as planned for
the first 5 months and expand the hardware after that. Of course the software development will continue but
with a less pressure.
Risk Evaluation
:
1- 30% possibility that the 5 months progress
will lead to the same position again with nothing new.
2- To be consistent
based on the 30% possibility the chances to complete on time from a favourable
progress point of view after 5 months will be 56% and 14% based on a
unfavourable progress.
3- By excluding the 30%
possibility, then based on a favourable progress completing on time will
be 90% and 40% based on a unfavourable
progress after 5 months.
Solution 4 : Request
time extension from the client after explaining the current situation.
In this situation, asking for time extensions should
be rare in contract of these type, as it might sink the relationship with your client entirely! and the
project might request a new deadline again.
Risk Evaluation
:
The PM have to mollify the client with bonuses and or
discounts which can be time consuming and add extra cost that might defeat the
purpose of moving towards the deadline.
Recommended Solution
We should note that any decision will be based on
the assumed alternatives and there will be no certain way to estimate the true
value of each one. Based on the intended input and the expected output together
with the evaluation process for each option and the impact on the reputation
that might be caused, we believe that the third option to continue with the
development of the software and the delay in the hardware will be the most
appropriate option. Because much of the software will be developed and usable
in the first five months the benefits with this alternative would be that the
company could save money from its project by dropping the software development
cost to $150,00 per month and the risk of the damage to the company’s
reputation would also be minimized.
Evaluation
Satisfaction of the efforts
and how well the processes worked out,
and whether the project did meet the deadline or not; effective formative
evaluation can always help to back up the whole situation. Even by using simple
techniques such as notebook keeping and recording problems can make a
systematic process. Most projects will use formal or informal feedback from
different groups to judge their success.
Feedback
We may want to feed our results back to interested parties. However, we
have to focus on the internal aspects of feedback, because the most important
value of incorporating a good evaluation is in providing information that can be
used to improve the professional practices.
Results
} Unsuccessful results means that the project was not able
to develop both the software and hardware on time and missed the deadline and
failed to meet the client requirements under any mentioned alternative and
faced a severe damage to the reputation of the company.
} Unsuccessful results means that if the
project was completed after the schedule the client will deduct a 2.5% from the
contract price on each extra month.
} Unsuccessful results means that the project was set up
to deliver the wrong outcome even if everything was delivered on time within the
recommended budget, and with the required quality.
} Unsuccessful results means poor project implementation
and evaluation through unmanaged feedback, risks, issues, scope and weak
communication with stakeholders.
} Successful results means that all the project outputs and inputs are with the
benefits of the project in terms of cost and revenue. Also the strategic value
of the successful project was reflected in the overall structure.
Conclusion
If the solutions do not
prove to be accurate then the expected outcome values are subject to change. However, the final
decision has to be made from the mentioned alternatives and after evaluating
all the risks and returns involved. The decision of whether to continue with
the planned software development or to do some expensive equipment changes to
eliminate the risk of missing the deadline contains a compound solution that
requires a sensitive analysis to handle all the uncertain costs of the missing
time. The situation here can be slightly different in terms of cost and profit,
especially when working under contracts
and due dates. Meaning, we might choose a high cost alternative and expect less
profit to avoid reputation damage and business
failure.
