Australians Speleological App Project

Speleology is the scientific study of caves and other karst features, their make-up, structure, physical properties, history, life forms, and the processes by which they form (speleogenesis) and change over time (speleomorphology). The term speleology is also sometimes applied to the recreational activity of exploring caves, but this is more properly known as caving.

Australian Speleological Federation (ASF) Inc. is an environmental organisation, registered by the Department of the Environment and Heritage in Canberra, with the primary objective of protecting the cave and karst environment of Australia. The ASF is also the national body that represents the interests of 28 caving clubs, over 700 members throughout Australia and represents Australia on the International Union of Speleology.

ASF Inc., is managed by director, John Cugley. Cugley believes in hiring highly talented and motivated professional organisations that specialise in virtual team processes. You have been working for Go- Virtual Inc. casually for the last three months in their mobile app development department. As a virtual team specialist, your company has applied for a tender to develop an app for ASF. Due to the importance of this project, the CEO of Go-Virtual Inc, Danielle Taylor, and the Director of Mobile Development William Shannon have both made this project a priority.

The initial investment in the project is estimated to be $200,000 in year 0, $20,000 in year 1, $25,550 in year 2, $26780 in year 3 of the project. Go-Virtual Inc. requires a discount rate of 8.5%. It is anticipated project future cash inflow as follows (Years 0 to 3): $0, $100,000, $180,000, and $200,000.

ASF Inc wants an app that helps cavers to explore Australias underground cave systems safely and responsibly by promoting effective exchanges of information between cave enthusiasts and other speleologists and maintaining a close liaison with cave diving training bodies. It is hoped features and tools, in the app should help cavers to understand the impact of caving on the fragile environments that exist within cave systems, assisting the Australian Cave Rescue Commission.

The goal of the project is to develop an app, which is optimised for iPhone and Android devices. The app should allow cavers to enrol and pay membership fees, subscribe to ASF publications, in particular the Caves Australia magazine, receive updates, register for all Australian caving, speleological and related events, expeditions and conferences. Cavers should be able to access safety and risk management guidelines, as well as basic first aid and rescue training. The app should provide cavers with an overall ranking of caves in terms of attractions, safety aspects, wildlife and environmental issues. Cavers should be able to view comparison between caves. Senior managers believe it will take about five months for this important project.

Danielle Taylor and William Shannon have formed a search committee to find the best candidate for managing the ASF App Development Project. After reviewing many strong candidates, they decided

to appoint your team, to put together the business case for this critical project. Since this is a high priority project that should be completed in five months, they felt it was appropriate to get the best candidate to put together a quality business case and project management plan.

Taylor and Shannon propose to be joint project sponsors, and have handpicked Malcolm Wallace, to be the main internal IT liaison and Skye Tate to be the ASF liaison. They will let you as the new project manager form the rest of the project team if the tender bid is successful.

The plan is to roll out detailed storyboards, a prototype and final version of the app. The project will be considered a success, if it comes in on time, on budget, within scope and key stakeholders have been pleased with the communication and reporting processes.

To monitor and control the project success, Prepare a weekly status report of the project. One report per team member is required. This report must be in the context of the case study and assume your group is part of the development team.