Any Co is a medium-sized company that manufactures small plastic toys. You may have seen some of them the last time you bought a Happy Meal for a child. It has about 1,000 employees that have full-time benefits, including healthcare. Jay Mante is the company owner. He is interested in making sure he has the best employees he can find - and keep. Jay knows that one way to do this is to offer competitive salaries and good benefits. But of course, that can have an impact on operating expenses, and the bottom line. Nevertheless, Jay thinks there are things that can be done to help reduce overall employee costs and keep the troupes happy. Malinda Dibbert is Jay's head of finance, who knows more about keeping the accounting books than about keeping employees, but she generally agrees with Jay. Her concern now is the recent news about major increases in health insurance plans, and wonders how that might impact profitability. She and Jay have been talking to Clarabelle Waters, who heads up the Human Resources department, about how to decrease those costs. Clarabelle has been looking into insurance discounts for companies with "employee wellness" programs. It looks like Employee premiums could be reduced by $80 per month per employee over the next four years if the program has the expected results. If AnyCo can put one into place, with all the right reporting, it could have not only a positive impact on healthcare premiums, but also on absenteeism and employee retention. AnyCo could actually make it fun for employees to live a healthier lifestyle!

 

Clarabelle has done her research and recommended a new system that will support the program. It should include:

• Allow employees to register for company-sponsored recreational programs, like soccer, softball, bowling, etc.
• Allow employees to register for company-sponsored classes and programs, like stress reduction, healthy cooking, or yoga
• Help match employees with similar interests who want to share healthy activities, like power walking at lunch, or weekend bike trips
• Track data on employee involvement in these activities.
• Offer incentives for people to join the program, and for achieving personal health goals like weight loss or smoking cessation.
• Track the cost of operating the program and compare this to its benefits over time.

Jay sees a big win in this one. Here is a program that he thinks his employees can get excited about, and will save him money in the long run. He and Brennan Zemlack, his CIO, have met to open up a new project to create the web-based information system to support the program. Jay, jolly guy that he is, came up with the name "Healthy is Happy".

Jay and the managers came up with an initial budget of $200,000 and a timeline of 6 months to get the software in place to support the program. Brennan says the application should be able to run on the existing company infrastructure, and he thinks he has the resources to do the work without impacting other initiatives. He recommends his best Project Manager, Jenny Dasch, to manage the effort.

Assignment 1:

Prepare a Project Charter for Healthy is Happy. You may use the template provided by the author, or research another template on your own, and adapt it to fit the size of this project. Choose a methodology ( waterfall, agile, prototyping, etc.) for the project and document the reasons for this choice in the "approach" or an "assumptions" section of the charter. Include scope only at a high level - you will create more scope details in Assignment 2.

Assignment 2:

Create an initial Scope document for Healthy is Happy. Be as specific as possible in describing the software product characteristics and requirements. Include all deliverables, including testing and training. Use the scope statement to develop a WBS in list form. Try for 3 or 4 levels of decomposition. Remember to use verb-object format for items at the Work Package level.