ITP-2i – Project Work Breakdown Structure with Durations

Project Work Breakdown Structure with Durations

ITP-2i – Project Work Breakdown Structure with Durations

The objective of this assignment is for each member of the team to individually determine the tasks that will be required to build the IT project for the client organization and to put these tasks into a format that will facilitate your team’s efforts (next week) to build a single WBS for the next ITP assignment.    

Please post your ITP WBS assignment in your Assignment Folder; please include your last name and “ITP-2” as part of the file name (example: Jones – ITP-2 – WBS).

There are three parts to this assignment:

1.  Assignment for the ITP-2 Project Deliverable – Part 1 – WBS

Review your project charter and the overview of the ITP posted in the Syllabus and in the previous project assignment.

Then, individually, develop and submit a project work breakdown structure (WBS) as described in the textbook and LEOConferences (and other valid sources, such as www.pmi.org)and submit in MS Project .mpp format.  If it is more convenient for you, then you may also start it in MS Word (e.g., as an outline) or some other software packages and copy or port it to MS Project.

The discussions in the Lectures in our weekly Content will help with our assignments, including this assignment.

To use MS Project, you may now load the Microsoft Project demo onto your computer.Note that subsequent ITP deliverables will be in MS Project, so if you have not yet loaded Microsoft Project, please do so now. The software is somewhat similar to Excel, but it would still be a good idea to be familiar with MS Project features.  You will find that there are MANY ways to add information to your MS Project project.  If you find yourself struggling with the software, please consider:

• Using MS Project’s Help feature
• Using the tutorials at Microsoft.com
• Checking out online tutorials on YouTube
• Looking for other on-line help
• Considering using the library or a bookstore for supplemental texts
• Asking me for help

The WBS should list all tasks necessary to complete the project, in the approximate estimated order in which you think they will probably be done.  At this stage, this deliverable should not yet include predecessor-successor linkages, time or duration, dates, or resource (cost, staff, etc.) data. ONLY include the durations.  This is because Microsoft Project performs a complex algorithm with each project element that is added.  To SEE the impact of each project element, we need to add them one at a time.  For this assignment, after the WBS is completed, we will add ONLY durations in this assignment.

• These project tasks should include all work necessary to complete the scope of the project, specifically including the technical IT work of the project, but also including the project management work as well.Some suggested tasks might include those listed here:

• Tasks regarding design of the IT System
• Tasks regarding ordering, delivering, and receiving hardware
• Tasks regarding ordering, delivering, and receiving software
• Tasks regarding ordering, delivering, and receiving networking
• Tasks regarding installing hardware
• Tasks regarding installing software
• Tasks regarding installing networking
• Tasks regarding managing, controlling, and monitoring the project and the team
• Project meetings
• Defined end of the project

 

To reiterate, there is a lot more to the WBS than this.

Don’t spend too much time getting “down into the weeds”.  A good size for this class would be at least 10 major tasks and between 30-60total tasks, including subordinate subtasks and sub-subtasks.  Similarly, don’t break it down more than 3 or 4 levels deep (not counting the project header / project name task itself).