Case study:

You are working for EduSmart., an international firm with over 50, 000 employees located in several different countries. A strategic goal is to help improve education while increasing revenues and reducing costs. The School Educational Program just started, and the VP of Operations, Natalie, is the program sponsor. Jad is the program manager, and there is a steering committee made up of ten senior executives, including Natalie, overseeing the program. There are several projects underneath this program, one being the Smart school Project. The CIO and project sponsor, Mark, has given this project high priority and plans to hold special interviews to hand-pick the project manager and team. Mark is also a member of the program steering committee. Before coming to

We Are EduSmart., Mark sponsored a project at an engineering firm to improve energy saving efficiency. This project, however, is much broader than that one was. The main purpose of the Smart school Project is to build equip the school with It applications of green operation and smart education

including:

• Smart educational IT systems
• IT management Systems for Overall Building Energy efficiency
• IT management Systems for Overall Building Water efficiency
• IT Systems for Overall Building Resource efficiency

The budget for the project was $2,000, 000, and the goal was to plan for a smart school. You need to plan for this project including detailed financial analysis and recommendations on what smart school solution to implement. Official project request forms for the recommended solutions would also be created as part of the project.

Mark wanted to personally be involved in selecting the project manager and have that person help him to select the rest of the project team. Mark wanted to find people already working inside the company, but he was also open to reviewing applications for potential new employees to work specifically on this project as long as they could start quickly. Since many good people were located in different parts of the world, Mark thought it made sense to select the best people he could find and allow them to work virtually on the project. Mark also wanted the project manager to do more than just manage the project. He or she would also do some of the estimation, planning, controlling, and the like required to produce the desired results. He was also open to paying expert consultants for their advice and purchasing books and related articles, as needed.

Project Justification:

With the change in technology and its effect on students and the learning mechanisms, implementing the EduSmart Project will improve the students and teachers experience by providing a digital teaching and learning tools that are developed with the focus on STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathletics). This project will deliver to the end user the ability to build and use STEM problem-solving activities, better environment for teachers to collaborate on a unified platform rather than the distributed and paper-based ones, enhance the classroom experience without disrupting the current classroom practices, and most importantly being cost-effective solution, which green schools can afford.

Product Characteristics and Requirements:

1. This is a one structured platform that meets the schools needs where the end user does not have to use multiple platforms to access all the courses documents, activities and reports.
2. The administrator can collect different data points, build reports and do analysis based on the different deliverables and functionalities of the platform.
3. EduSmart can address theoretical and practical learning styles which support STEM.
4. Teachers and students can take notes during the class and collaborate in different activities and projects, whether its in-class or not.
5. A shared library is provided to the end users which its content is controlled by the administrator assigned in school.
6. The content is downloadable and can be accessed online, however the activities and collaboration requires internet access.
7. User friendly experience on desktop, tablets and mobile browsers.
8. The platform is accessible remotely and does not require the user to be in school ground or network.
9. The product is only a software and requires hardware connected to the internet from the end user in order to access it.

Summary of Project Deliverables

Project management-related deliverables:

1. Business case conveying the essentials, describing the vision of the project and estimating the cost of development and implementation against the risks.
2. Project charter providing the objectives, goals, roles and responsibilities, identifying the stakeholders and the authority of the project manager.
3. Project Management Plan and subplans, including communication plan, risk management plan and change management plan.
4. Team contract and contact information.
5. Scope statement detailing the deliverables, characteristics and objectives.
6. WBS with a hierarchical breakdown of the activities to be executed by the team and the WBS dictionary.
7. Cost baseline detailing the cost estimated to be spent and when and how it will be spent.
8. Monthly status reports highlighting the performance to measure the progress against the timeline, the difficulties faced; meetings details and minutes and change logs record.
9. Final project report including the lessons-learned.

Product-related deliverables:

1. Research report on why green schools need EduSmart.
2. User Interface design.
3. Software code and manuals on how to build different features in the platform.
4. Structural document highlighting the product features.
5. User manual on how to use the platform as an end user.
6. 24/7 support for administrators.
7. Free webinars and brief trainings on new features and upgrades.
8. Pre-built user logins for the staff and assigning their roles based on an agreed structure.
9. Two global system administrator accounts which will have access to the whole backend configuration.

Project Success Criteria:

1. Delivering the project on time and budget agreed on (September 1, 2019 - $400,000).
2. Covering the scope agreed on without continuous or uncontrolled growth in the scope (scope creep).
3. Meeting the customers expectations after the final testing.
4. Accessing the platform through the schools network without having issues with any installed firewalls.

Project Cost Management

Your project sponsor has asked you and your team to refine the existing cost estimate for the project so that there is a solid cost baseline for evaluating project performance. Recall that your schedule and cost goals are to complete the project in 3 years or less for under $3,000, 000. Initial estimates suggested that about $700,000 for this project would go toward internal labor.

Question:

1. Prepare and print a one-page cost estimate for the project. Use the WBS categories, and be sure to document assumptions you make in preparing the cost estimate. Assume a burdened labor rate of $2000/day for the project manager, $1500 for Teresa, James, and Le, and $1200/day for Matt. Assume about $100/day for outsourced labor.