The Department of Education and Training - Essay Example

PRINCE 2 Table of Contents Table of Contents 2 Background 3 PRINCE2 4 Now concerning Fig 23.1, i.e. the change control steps, the execution of the sub-processes can be correctly assessed and proper actions can be taken in case of exception reports by escalating project issues to higher levels. The sequence of sub-processes can also be determined by evaluating their priorities and accordingly executing them for desired results. As far as Process Map Format is concerned, proper symbols need to be used for sub-processes as these would act as identifiers from the time they are logged into the system.

Proper identification would help in tracking processes, generating exception reports in case of failures, taking corrective actions for corresponding sub-processes and rendering appropriate feedback to authors. Proper format would also help in logging in explanations for different sub-processes, understanding the relationships between them and thereby determining what inputs and outputs each process requires. 6References 11BackgroundThe Department of Education and Training (DET) is one of the largest departments of the Queensland Government.

The prime objective of this department is to enrich the lives of the people of Queensland by involving them in a lifelong learning process using education and training. The department wants to be renowned among Queenslanders as the prime service provider. The department also wishes to provide more advanced and attractive service to the people and wants to become the first point of contact for students, parents, job seekers, employers and community support organizations. The Department of Education and Training, to achieve all the above-mentioned objectives, has selected online media to introduce all its services and to provide all required information to the people of Queensland.

The main objective of choosing online media is department wants to provide an integrated view of all its activities and priorities to the Internet clients. Currently, the department’s websites provide all the information regarding the old Department of Employment and Training. Presently there are two websites of the department. These are http://web.archive.org/web/20020926093202/http://www.det.qld.gov.au/ and http://web.archive.org/web/20021122174416/http://www.tafe.net/. To modify and change this web presence department has decided to invest a lot in technology, to improve the usability, and functionality of the websites.

A project board has been established; where the practice manager of the department Jason Kennelly is the executive. The department has chosen Accenture as the partner, and Greg Timbrell as the senior supplier. The draft of the final report has already been submitted but an ‘off specification’ has been identified in the quality review process. The report has touched all the points but unfortunately, it missed the ‘resource requirement’ point. To address this ‘off specification’ PRINCE 2 subprocesses would be followed.

PRINCE2PRINCE2 stands for Projects In Controlled Environment. It is a simple method of project management. PRINCE2 was first developed by the UK government to manage various IT projects for central government. It was designed as a standard approach for IT project management. Today it is used by almost all private and public organizations. It is generic and tailorable. The PRINCE2 method is very effective as it helps the project manager to organize, manage and control the project to deliver the product successfully on time and within the limited budget.

The major characteristics of PRINCE2 are as follows. Continued business justificationLearning through various experiences and responsibilities are defined and is managed by different stages and mainly focuses on products and their qualityPRINCE2 includes various processes. These are Starting up a projectDirecting a projectInitiating a projectControlling a stage-managing stage boundariesClosing a project (PRINCE2, n.d.).A process map including all the processes required in the current scenario is presented below.

( DSDM and Prince2 - perfect marriage or strange bedfellows? n.d.)Now concerning Fig 23.1, i.e. the change control steps, the execution of the sub-processes can be correctly assessed and proper actions can be taken in case of exception reports by escalating project issues to higher levels. The sequence of sub-processes can also be determined by evaluating their priorities and accordingly executing them for desired results. As far as Process Map Format is concerned, proper symbols need to be used for sub-processes as these would act as identifiers from the time they are logged into the system.

Proper identification would help in tracking processes, generating exception reports in case of failures, taking corrective actions for corresponding sub-processes and rendering appropriate feedback to authors. Proper format would also help in logging in explanations for different sub-processes, understanding the relationships between them and thereby determining what inputs and outputs each process requires. Request for ChangeA request for change refers to recording a proposed modification about the user requirements.

This requires an analysis to determine the work involved with the senior management team members, part of this is called impact analysis which involves the configuration library. The first step involves costing the identified work and analysing its impact on the stage plans budget followed by awarding a priority rating. They can be as follows-HighMediumLowCosmeticIn order to implement the request for change approval is required from the project manager. The decision depends on whether it is a change to a configuration item that has already been baselined and if the work can be done with the tolerances of the current plan, this would help the project manager in making decisions about implementing, if not it can be referred to the project board.

The project manager can only implement a small change without asking for extra time or money if relevant work is yet to start on the project and inclusion of the change will not cost any additional revenues to the country. The project board must decide if there is a change to one or more items of the configuration that have been told by the project board are complete. If the work for undertaking a change request cannot be done by the tolerance levels of the current stage plan, then the decision has to come from the project board which may lead to a request for an exception plan depicting the cost and new schedule for the rest of the stage.

To address the present ‘off specification’ i.e. resource requirement, the above processes are required to follow. In the start-up phase brief of the project is prepared. In the present case, a brief of resource requirements is prepared. Then in the planning phase required resources are identified and analyzed. After that, the brief of the resource requirement project is transformed into a business case in the ‘initiating project’ phase. Then in the directing phase, the project board made by the department would control the resource requirement project.

In managing stage process end processes of each of the stages are controlled. Off SpecificationAn off specification is defined as a reference to any omission or error of a product or its specifications with the requests that it is now being added or corrected. It is used as a document to depict a situation where a product is failing or its forecast is expected to fail or meet its expectations. Input and output details of the sub-processesOff specifications can be recorded as a part of the CS3 Capturing project issues The required steps are included in CS3 Capturing project issues.

CS3- Capturing project issueThe main aim of the project manager here is to first capture the project issues and then assess whether it is a change request, an off-specification or a general issue. In this case, it would be evaluated as an off-specification. The input here would be “New Project Issue” and the output would be the issue log after it was updated by the new project issue and its status to be examined in a process called Examining Project Issue CS4.CS4- Examining Project IssueThe project issue needs to be assessed for its impact and the alternative actions, which might be on product workload, risk and cost schedule.

The input is the updated issue log and the output would be the impact analysis of the off specifications to determine whether it is in the stages tolerance or not, if found positive they would be passed onto CS7 and if not then it is brought to the project boards attention using the CS8 to be addressed in DP4- Giving ad hoc Direction.CS7- Taking Corrective ActionThe objective here is to first select and then implement the actions to resolve deviations from the plan. Here the actions are small and can be remedied without changing the plan or changing the work package.

The inputs here are the off-specifications analysis project board guidance and the request for advice to DP4- Giving Ad Hoc Direction Process.CS8- Giving Ad Hoc DirectionThe inputs, in this case, are the project issue “off-specification” and the project board decision from DP4 and the outputs are the “Exception Report” obtained from the DP4 process in addition to the “Approved Exception Report” to “SBG Producing an Exception plan”.DP4- Giving Ad Hoc DirectionThe inputs here are the " Exception Report " from CS8 Escalating Project Issues and " Request for advice " from CS7 Taking Corrective Action, and the outputs are " Project Board Guidance" to CS7 Taking Corrective Action and "Project Board decision" to CS8 “Escalating Project Issues”.

SB6- Producing an Exception PlanThis plan should start from the present time to the end of a plan such that it has been preceded by an Exception Report. The Approved Exception Report forms the input of this stage.