UNIVERSITY EXAMINATIONS: 2018/2019
EXAMINATION FOR THE DEGREE OF BACHELOR OF SCIENCE IN
INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
BIT 2305: ICT PROJECT MANAGEMENT/ BBIT 204: IT PROJECT
MANAGEMENT/BAC
FULL TIME/PART TIME/DISTANCE LEARNING
DATE: AUGUST, 2018 TIME: 2 HOURS
INSTRUCTIONS: Answer Question One & ANY OTHER TWO questions.
QUESTION ONE (Compulsory)
a) The success of an IT project is often judged on its closeness to the originally agreed
scope, cost and duration.
i) What is the difference between project and business success? (2 Marks)
ii) Give THREE common project success criteria (3Marks)
b) Suggest TWO reasons why it is considered that accurate estimating for IS projects is
difficult. (4Marks)
c) Explain how you would use a Work Breakdown Structure to develop an estimate
showing effort and cost, for a Project. (4 Marks)
d) Describe FOUR differences between “management” and “leadership”. (4Marks)
e) If the scope of a project increases, what decisions would a project manager have to
consider about the other elements of the Project Triangle? (4Marks)
f) The constraints governing the jobs are as fo1lows:
A and B are start jobs; A controls C, D and E; B controls F and J; G depends upon C; H
depends on D; E and F control I and L; K follows J; L is also controlled by K; G, H, I and
L are the last jobs. Draw the network, (6 Marks)
g) Define the term project management (1 Mark)
h) Why do we carry out monitoring and control on a project? (2 Marks)
QUESTION TWO
a) Describe THREE warning signs that might indicate to the project manager that there may
be potential problems with the project team. (6 Marks)
b) Using an example briefly explain the concept of project crashing (2 Marks)
c) Describe the importance of the following in project management (12 Marks)
i)Software quality assurance
ii) Software risk management
iii) Software configuration management
iv) Supplier management
QUESTION THREE
a)
i) Construct the project network and calculate the forward and backward pass. (5Marks)
ii) Find the expected duration and the variance of each activity. (8 Marks)
iii) Find the critical path and the expected project completion time. (2 Marks)
b) Compare and contrast network techniques and Gantt charts (5 Marks)
QUESTION FOUR
a) At a given point in a project, the budgeted cost of work performed was £250,000, the actual
cost of work performed was £370,000 and the budgeted cost of work scheduled was
£225,000.
i) What would be the schedule variance? (3 Marks)
ii) What would be the cost variance? (3 Marks)
iii) Briefly explain the purpose of performing the above calculations. (4 Marks)
a) There is a marketing-research project containing a focus group interview and a questionnaire
survey with 200 responders. The survey is based on the analysis of the focus group results.
For the focus we have to gather the participants (7 days), organize the event (place, time,
equipment etc. – 2 days), implement the interview (1 day), record the interview (2 days),
analyse it (3 days) and write a brief research report for the client/sponsor (1 day).For the
survey we have to construct the questionnaire (2 days),test and modify it (1 day), do the
sampling (2 day), train the interviewers (1 day), fieldwork (2 days), record the data (1 day),
analyse the data (2 days) and write the final study (3 days). The project manager wants to
keep a 5 days buffer time for safety at the end of the project.
i) Draw a work breakdown structure (5 Marks)
ii) Formulate a statement of work from the description (5 Marks)
QUESTION FIVE
a) You have been appointed as project manager for a successful company creating online
training courses. The software infrastructure for the company is crucial to its future
growth. Until recently the company has outsourced its software development work to a
number of consultants. Your appointment represents a decision to carry out all future
development in-house. You have been asked to recruit four other people to create a team
that will be responsible for identifying business opportunities and developing the IT
infrastructure to support the company. Identify a role for EACH of the FOUR people you
will recruit. This will include a job title, a brief description of the role and the skills
required to fulfil it (10 Marks)
b) Using examples, explain the project management techniques that could be used to:
(6 Marks)
record the activities required for a given IT project and how they are broken down;
record the dependencies between the activities required for a given IT project, and how
such relationships affect the overall timescale of a project;
record the schedule of activities for an IT project and the staff resources required to
undertake such activities.
c) Describe the purpose of the following activities in project management (4 Marks)
i. Communication management
ii. Conflict management
