Project Plan For Developing A Knowledge Management System By Company X

Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)

The company X, a Sydney based IT service providing company is nominated for this report. This report depicts development of a detail project plan for a knowledge system gathering expertise. Complexity of the project plan is reduced by breaking the entire project into small 5 phases-initiation, planning, execution, monitoring and control and project closure. The total time allocated to complete the knowledge system is 4 months. in order to complete the project total $150,000 budget will be needed. The project is expected to be initiated on 15^th March, 2021.

WBS is defined as a project management technique, used by the project team members widely to reduce the project complexity. In order to make the project simpler and easy manageable, the WBS technique is used. WBS is known as deliverable based project structure. It presents the hierarchical structure of the project. WBS helps to define and organize the work required. It helps to facilitate the work requirements and generates visuals of the overall project scope. An accurate WBS helps to reduce the possibilities of risk occurrences. For this project a WBS is developed.  The work breakdown structure of the project is presented here-

 

Figure 1: work breakdown structure for the project

(Source: created by author)

The project team will take 4 months to complete the project activities considering fixed Saturday and Sunday off and 5 days with 8 hrs working period.

The project duration is calculated using the MS project software. Once the duration for each activity is allocated based on project requirements the total duration comes automatically. For this project a critical path is shows below-

 

Figure 2: Critical path for the project

(Source: created by author)

The red line shows the critical path. after calculating the critical path value arrives as 120. Critical path is the longest path that, a project manager and team can follow to complete the project. For this project, the critical path value is 120 days. For this project, the

According to PMBOK, critical path is a method used to model projects where the project manager can input all essential factors. In other words, it is the longest path or time that, a project team may take to complete a project. Critical path method is a technique, where project manager and team can identify necessary activities for project completion and also determine scheduling flexibilities. For this project CPM is used to improve future opportunities, facilitate more active resource management and assist the project team to avoid probable bottlenecks. The critical path for this project is calculated using 4 steps. These stages are mentioned in the below section-

Critical Path Method (CPM)

Step 1- the start and end time next to each activity should be placed

Step 2: The connection among the activities should be shown with arrows.

Step 3- After that, depending on the end time of the last activity in the activity sequence to calculate the duration of the complete sequence

Step 4- The sequence of activities with maximum duration is determined as the critical path. For this project, the value of the longest path is 120.

Gantt chart is a bar chart which illustrates project schedule and also display the activities with respect to time. It also shows the dependencies among the dependencies among the activities and duration for each activity. For designing he knowledge management system, gantt chart is used to improve team collaboration, manage tasks, manage probable resources, plan and track the project progress more easily and effectively.  

The overall budget and resources are allocated depending on the expertise, skills and area of interest of each resource. For this project 8 human resources and 2 physical resources (software cost and testing cost) are considered. Calculating which the total budget has become $150,000. The overall project gantt chart is shows in the below section-

WBS	Task Name	Duration	Start	Finish	Resource Names	Cost
0	Knowledge system project schedule	120 days	Tue 15/03/22	Mon 29/08/22		$150,000.00
1	Initiation	6 days	Tue 15/03/22	Tue 22/03/22		$4,712.00
1.1	Feasibility analysis	1 day	Tue 15/03/22	Tue 15/03/22	Project manager	$520.00
1.2	Specify project constraints	1 day	Wed 16/03/22	Wed 16/03/22	Project coordinator	$464.00
1.3	Analyze triple constraints	2 days	Wed 16/03/22	Thu 17/03/22	Project manager	$1,040.00
1.4	Current productivity analysis	1 day	Thu 17/03/22	Thu 17/03/22	Project coordinator	$464.00
1.5	Current technical platform analysis	1 day	Fri 18/03/22	Fri 18/03/22	Project coordinator	$464.00
1.6	Identify project resources	2 days	Fri 18/03/22	Mon 21/03/22	Senior network consultant	$800.00
1.7	Performance evaluation	1 day	Mon 21/03/22	Mon 21/03/22	Senior system engineer	$440.00
1.8	Allocating team	1 day	Tue 22/03/22	Tue 22/03/22	Project manager	$520.00
1.9	Milestone 1- PID handover to CTO	0 days	Tue 22/03/22	Tue 22/03/22		$0.00
2	Planning	24 days	Wed 23/03/22	Mon 25/04/22		$12,048.00
2.1	Feasibility analysis	1 day	Wed 23/03/22	Wed 23/03/22	Project coordinator	$464.00
2.2	Azure cloud system specification	3 days	Thu 24/03/22	Mon 28/03/22	Project manager	$1,560.00
2.3	quality planning	2 days	Tue 29/03/22	Wed 30/03/22	Project coordinator	$928.00
2.4	schedule planning	2 days	Thu 31/03/22	Fri 01/04/22	Project coordinator	$928.00
2.5	Design questionnaire	3 days	Mon 04/04/22	Wed 06/04/22	Project manager	$1,560.00
2.6	Conduct primary survey	1 day	Thu 07/04/22	Thu 07/04/22	Senior system engineer	$440.00
2.7	Gathering information	1 day	Fri 08/04/22	Fri 08/04/22	Seniors DevOps consultant	$416.00
2.8	Effective data interpretation	2 days	Fri 08/04/22	Mon 11/04/22	Senior system engineer	$880.00
2.9	Management training planning	2 days	Tue 12/04/22	Wed 13/04/22	Project coordinator	$928.00
2.10	Administrative training	1 day	Thu 14/04/22	Thu 14/04/22	Project coordinator	$464.00
2.11	Network monitoring	3 days	Fri 15/04/22	Tue 19/04/22	Project manager	$1,560.00
2.12	Intranet monitoring and analysis	2 days	Wed 20/04/22	Thu 21/04/22	Project manager	$1,040.00
2.13	System design setup	2 days	Fri 22/04/22	Mon 25/04/22	Senior system engineer	$880.00
2.14	M2- completion of project planning	0 days	Mon 25/04/22	Mon 25/04/22		$0.00
3	Design and execution	72 days	Tue 26/04/22	Wed 03/08/22		$82,456.00
3.1	Deployment planning	5 days	Tue 26/04/22	Mon 02/05/22	Senior network consultant	$2,000.00
3.2	Setup	3 days	Tue 03/05/22	Thu 05/05/22	Project manager	$1,560.00
3.3	Server	5 days	Fri 06/05/22	Thu 12/05/22	Project manager	$2,600.00
3.4	Networking equipment	6 days	Fri 13/05/22	Fri 20/05/22	Project coordinator	$2,784.00
3.5	Intranet infrastructure	4 days	Mon 23/05/22	Thu 26/05/22	Senior network consultant	$1,600.00
3.6	Acquisition	8 days	Fri 27/05/22	Tue 07/06/22		$53,880.00
3.6.1	Software	3 days	Fri 27/05/22	Tue 31/05/22	Project manager, Software cost[1]	$51,560.00
3.6.2	Other required platforms	5 days	Wed 01/06/22	Tue 07/06/22	Project coordinator	$2,320.00
3.7	Perquisite’s verification plan	6 days	Wed 08/06/22	Wed 15/06/22	Senior system engineer	$2,640.00
3.8	Email verification	5 days	Thu 16/06/22	Wed 22/06/22	Senior network consultant	$2,000.00
3.9	Inventory management plan	4 days	Thu 23/06/22	Tue 28/06/22	Senior network consultant	$1,600.00
3.10	Hardware and software deployment	5 days	Wed 29/06/22	Tue 05/07/22	Project manager	$2,600.00
3.11	UX/UI design	5 days	Wed 06/07/22	Tue 12/07/22	Seniors DevOps consultant	$2,080.00
3.12	System customization	2 days	Wed 13/07/22	Thu 14/07/22	Senior system engineer	$880.00
3.13	Easy navigation	2 days	Fri 15/07/22	Mon 18/07/22	Azure cloud consultant	$864.00
3.14	Final Mockup design	3 days	Tue 19/07/22	Thu 21/07/22	Azure engineer	$1,272.00
3.15	Front end design done	4 days	Fri 22/07/22	Wed 27/07/22	Azure engineer	$1,696.00
3.16	Backend connectivity to cloud server	5 days	Thu 28/07/22	Wed 03/08/22	Principle cloud consultant	$2,400.00
3.17	M3- Complete running website execution	0 days	Wed 03/08/22	Wed 03/08/22		$0.00
4	Monitoring and controlling	14 days	Thu 04/08/22	Tue 23/08/22		$47,696.00
4.1	Unit testing	4 days	Thu 04/08/22	Tue 09/08/22	Principle cloud consultant	$1,920.00
4.2	integrated testing	3 days	Wed 10/08/22	Fri 12/08/22	Senior network consultant	$1,200.00
4.3	security testing	2 days	Mon 15/08/22	Tue 16/08/22	Senior system engineer	$880.00
4.4	Functional testing	2 days	Wed 17/08/22	Thu 18/08/22	Azure engineer	$848.00
4.5	System testing	3 days	Fri 19/08/22	Tue 23/08/22	Project coordinator, testing cost[1]	$41,808.00
4.6	Acceptance testing	2 days	Fri 19/08/22	Mon 22/08/22	Project manager	$1,040.00
4.7	Milestone 4- Knowledge system testing completion	0 days	Thu 18/08/22	Thu 18/08/22		$0.00
5	Closure	4 days	Wed 24/08/22	Mon 29/08/22		$3,088.00
5.1	Progress monitoring	1 day	Wed 24/08/22	Wed 24/08/22	Project manager	$520.00
5.2	Stakeholders signoff	1 day	Thu 25/08/22	Thu 25/08/22	Project coordinator	$464.00
5.3	collecting all warranty manuals	2 days	Fri 26/08/22	Mon 29/08/22	Senior system engineer	$880.00
5.4	releasing resources	1 day	Fri 26/08/22	Fri 26/08/22	Azure engineer	$424.00
5.5	Continuous improvement program	2 days	Fri 26/08/22	Mon 29/08/22	Senior network consultant	$800.00
5.6	Milestone 5- Project closeout	0 days	Mon 29/08/22	Mon 29/08/22		$0.00

 

Figure 4: Resource graph for the project

(Source: created by author)

 

Figure 5: Cash flow chart

(Source: created by author)

Cost, time and quality are collaboratively known as triple constraint. Constraints are the limitation or boundary, that restricts project. In other words, for avoiding risks related to quality, cost and time, any project manager should consider triple constraints. The project success can be impacted by the cost, quality and time. Project manager should control the triple constraints through trade-offs. In project management, triple constraint is important because it helps to recognize competing demand in each project. For every project, the assigned project manager must decide the most essential demand. If any sudden changes occur, then the project team can easily adopt those changes with the help of triple constraints.

The triple constraints considered by the company X are quality, cost and time. These constraints can also be interpreted as budget, minimum performance and acceptance criteria and deadline. Proper analysis of the constraints is focused on benefits of affordability, maintainability, scalability and availability. Before considering the standards for knowledge areas, exact three areas of influence that are cost, time and quality must be considered. In order to gain competitive advantages and sustainable growth in IT service delivery all three constraint should be highlighted. Before preparing the knowledge management system effective feedback and adequate information should be available. For gathering information questionnaire has to be developed considering triple constraints.

Gantt Chart

After conducting interviews and gathering adequate information regarding time, cost and quality, it is determined that for this project quality is the most important constraint. Quality is defined as a knowledge area that ensures the project manager team is consistent and successful to deliver quality IT services to their customers. For both technical and business success quality is very essential. It not only satisfies the customers but the stakeholders as well. effective quality will reduce the probability of rework, higher the business efficient and productivity. Quality constraint can satisfy both the team and customers.

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