Assignment

In this assignment, start the process of building or buying your own dream home (this is a theme that we will carry on throughout this course) – why a dream home? A dream home is a concept that we can all relate to and it has all of the elements of a project according to the PMBOK® Guide: ‘A project is a temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product, service, or result’. Let’s assume you inherited sufficiently large amount of money or won a lottery and now you are in position to fulfil your dream- to build the house, to buy a house, condo, cottage, mansion, summer home…name it. You do not want to build anything but rather to buy- just fine for this assignment. Make your dream wish and draft a project charter for the project team you will engage in this project.

Assignment Purpose

In this assignment you will create your dream home’s project charter. According to the PMBOK® Guide: A project charter is a document issued by the project initiator or sponsor that formally authorizes the existence of a project and provides the project manager with the authority to apply organizational resources to project activities.

To prepare for this assignment, read the following sections of the PMBOK® Guide:

  • Section 4.1. Develop Project Charter
  • Section 5.3. Define Scope
  • Section 4.1.1.1 Business Documents
  • Section 4.1.3. Develop Project Charter: outputs
  • Sections 5.2 Collect Requirements
  • Sections 13.1. Identify Stakeholders

Assignment Objectives

Your personal learning objectives for this assignment are to:

  • Develop an understanding of how a project charter is used within a project environment.
  • Demonstrate a practical understanding of the information content needed within a project charter.
  • Describe a project using project management terminology, concepts and industry best practices as outlined in the PMBOK® Guide.

Dream Home Charter” Background

One of the objectives of this assignment is for you to demonstrate appropriate information content that would be provided in a project charter. As such, the amount of information provided to you is limited – you are expected to ‘make up’ information where gaps exist in the provided information, and present what information you feel would be appropriate to complete the assignment. (Note: You are not expected to be an expert in house design, and you will not be assessed on the accuracy of the information provided – only on the appropriateness of the information and how the information is presented.)

Dream Home Details

  • For this project, you take on the role of the homeowners (project sponsor) creating a project charter (as defined in section 4.1. of the PMBOK® Guide) to define your dream home.
  • Let’s assume that you won a lottery, or inherit huge amount of money, or the bank has approved you for a $1,000,000 loan to build or buy and remodel your dream home, mansion, condo, or whatever is your dream on a lakefront (or ocean, river, or ranch) property or in a town/city of your choice.
  • The work on the project can be divided up into several main areas (let your imagination drives you through the assignment):
    • 1) Landscaping (excavation, foundation, grading, driveway);
    • 2) House Construction (frame, roof, siding);
    • 3) Inside Work (floors, ceilings);
    • 4) Infrastructure (electrical, plumbing and mechanical);
    • 5) Management (management activities); and
    • 6) Other (inspections and milestones).

With this minimal, high-level information, you can now begin the journey to your dream home by defining the project charter for a project team to tell them what they have to deliver to you as the project sponsor.

Alternate Topic for the assignment– if you prefer to work on a topic of your interest rather than on “Dream Home”, feel free to do so. Please consult with the course facilitator about the alternate topic of your choice. The “Content of Your Assignment” will guide you through the assignment items/sections to cover.

Project Charter Template

For this assignment you will be creating a project charter loosely based on the template (content) introduced in the PMBOK® Guide section 4.1. However, you can simply follow this assignment outline and address topics outlined below (you do not need to use any “template” from open source, simply follow the assignment outline below and format your report as you wish).

Length: This assignment should be approximately 6 pages (not including cover page, Table of Contents or bibliography), however there is no page limit with regards to minimum or maximum number of pages.

Marks Allocation: The following grading scheme will be used to assess the assignment:

SectionMaximum Mark
FORMAT: (Professional, business-quality document)3
GENERIC CONTENTS: (title page, Table of Contents, bibliography)3
PRESENTATION / GRAMMAR AND SPELLING: (Articulate, clear, concise, well developed (avoid verbose and excessive prose)3
Project Charter Sections 
Project Background6
Project Purpose (Goal)6
Project Objectives6
Out-of-Scope Items3
High-Level Assumptions7
High-Level Constraints7
Known Problems, Anticipated Issues, and Potential Risks7
High-Level Requirements7
Deliverables7
High-Level Milestones7
Project Stakeholders7
Project Manager’s Responsibilities and Authority7
Payment Schedule7
Approval Statement and Sign-off7
Total100

Please note: There is a project charter writing guide below that provides detailed and specific instructions as to what information content needs to go into each section. The writing guide and the instructions contained within it are to be considered essential and are part of this assignment.

Project Charter Writing Guide1

This writing guide provides critical background information for the project charter assignment. What follows are some general guidelines and then specific section-by-section guidance on how to approach the assignment.

  • Your Objective: Your objective on this project is to demonstrate your knowledge of the project management related tools and techniques covered in the course notes and the PMBOK® Guide. While creative

writing can be fun, it should not distract you from demonstrating the PMBOK’s® learning objectives.

  • Individual or Team assignment: If you wish, you can team up with one or more other students and work as a group on this and/or any other course assignment. Please let the facilitator know if you have a teaming arrangement in place, and make sure that all group members’ names appear on your assignment.

Follow the assignment outline, namely “Content of Your Assignment” starting at next page:

  • When creating your assignment, be sure to attempt each section, as grades have been allocated to each section. No marks can be awarded for a missing section, and marks cannot be awarded for information that is not called for in the template. You can refer to the Frequently Asked Question post on the course page, for some questions raised by your peers in previous classes.

What follows is a section-by-section guide as to the type of information that needs to appear in your assignment.

Content of Your Assignment

  1. Title Page: You can have fun with your title page (illustrations and graphics), but at a minimum, the title page must have the following information on it:
  • Your name (or the names of all members of your group),
    • The course name,
    • The project name (have fun and think up a name for your project!)
    • The date submitted, and
    • The following statement: All material prepared for this assignment was produced by the author(s), and material from a third party (such as the internet) has been cited and referenced.
  • Table of Contents: The Table of Contents should be generated using your word processor’s built-in ‘Table of Contents’ generation feature (found within the [Reference] Tab of Microsoft Word). If you have not worked with the Table of Contents feature in the past, then this is a good chance to learn some of Microsoft Word’s additional features.
  • Project Background: In this section you can provide relevant project-related information that would have been previously published and used as an input to the project charter. This information has not been provided for you; instead, feel free to ‘make up’ appropriate background information, how did you come with this project. Examples of the types of information that you can present in this section include:
  • Statement of Work (PMBOK® Guide section 5.3.): Consider the type of information that would have been previously published in the project’s statement of work.
  • Business Case (PMBOK® Guide section 4.1.1.1): Consider the type of information that would have been previously published in the project business case (for example, desired project outcomes or project justification information).
  • Project Purpose (Goal): Assume that the reader is unfamiliar with this project and provide a short (one or two sentences), concise statement as to what the project’s purpose (or goal) is. In this section you will be evaluated on your understanding of the term ‘project purpose’ and on how well you can practically demonstrate the use of that term as it relates to this project.
  • Project Objectives (PMBOK® Guide Glossary): In this section, you should state what your project’s objectives are. You should demonstrate between 3 and 5 objectives for this project. For this section you will be evaluated on your understanding of the term ‘project objectives’ and on how well you can practically demonstrate the use of that term.
  • Project Exclusions (Out-Of-Scope Work): Identify examples of work that would be commonly associated with a project of this nature, but will not be completed as part of the project. In this section, you should list several out-of- scope items to demonstrate your understanding of this concept.
  • High-Level Assumptions: Provide 3 to 5 examples of high-level project assumptions that would impact the project planning. For this section you will be evaluated on your ability to demonstrate the appropriate assumptions that would be relevant to the planning process.
  • High-Level Constraints: Provide examples of 2 to 3 external constraints that would have a direct impact on the project planning. Also provide a very brief description of their impact. (Note: The project’s budget and schedule would be considered internal constraints and cannot be used in this section.)
  • Known Problems, Anticipated Issues, and Potential Risks (PMBOK® Guide Glossary): Identify any problems, issues or risks that will need to be overcome, or that might be encountered as part of this project. Ensure that you clearly indicate which of your examples you consider to be problems, issues or risks – you will be evaluated on your understanding of these terms.
  1. High-Level Requirements are “conditions that are required to be present in a product, service, or result to satisfy a contract. There are many types of requirements – in this section you are to provide examples of requirements as a typical customer would define them. Essentially, give examples of how a

customer might describe what features, style, functionality or elements they would like to have as part of this project (keep in mind your project scope, and restrict your requirements to only those that are relevant to the project’s scope).

  1. Deliverables (PMBOK® Guide Glossary): List five examples of deliverables that would result as part of fulfilling the project’s stated requirements (see previous section).
  1. Project Milestones: Review the definition of a project milestone and then complete the following milestone table with 4-6 examples of milestones that would be appropriate for a project of this nature.
Milestone NameMilestone DescriptionMilestone Date
   
   
   
   
   
   

Of most importance to the milestone section is your supporting description of why the milestone candidate should be considered a milestone for this project and what impact the proposed milestone will have on the overall project planning process.

  1. Project Stakeholders (PMBOK® Guide section 13.1.): Identify four project stakeholders who would be appropriate for a project of this nature. Consider the following types of information when describing your stakeholders:
  • Your first stakeholder should represent your project’s voice of the customer.  The ‘voice of the customer’ is defined in the PMBOK® Guide Glossary. Support this selection by providing a brief explanation as to why you feel this person should be the voice of the customer, and ensure that you demonstrate your understanding of the role that they will play on the project.
  • Identify four stakeholders (for this assignment, identify them by the title or role that they play in the project).
    • What elements of the project are they involved in?
    • How do they contribute to the project?
    • What do they need from the project? (Information? Or otherwise?)
    • Who do they report to?
    • What are their needs and expectations for this project? Ensure that you provide enough information so that the project manager can accommodate these stakeholders as part of their communication management planning.

Key to the stakeholder section is to consider what information the project manager would need to know about these stakeholders to be able to proceed with the planning of this project. It is important that you only provide examples of stakeholder information that would be useful and beneficial in the project planning stage.

  1. Project Manager Responsibilities and Authority Level: In this section, you need to define the following:
  • Identify who the project manager will be for this project;
    • What the main responsibilities of the project manager are; and
    • What authority has been assigned to the project manager to carry out their responsibilities?
  1. Payment Schedule (or high-level summary budget): Develop a spending framework for the project that conveys the project sponsor’s funding priorities. Keep in mind that this is a high-level budget and it is not to the same level of detail as there would be in the project plan budget.

Your summary budget should be in table format and convey how much the project’s sponsor is willing to pay per deliverable and/or milestone achieved. Do not worry about accuracy of the budget figures- the cost estimation is art itself and it is not in the scope of this course.

  1. Document Approval Section: Create an approval section for the overall document that shows that the main stakeholders agree to the charter. This section should contain an appropriate approval statement and corresponding signature blocks. In this section you need to not only demonstrate an appropriate approval statement, but also demonstrate your knowledge of who needs to approve the project charter. It can be as simple as name of person prepared charter, name of person who review it and who approves it. Make up some dates.
  1. Bibliography: Provide proper citation of all open-source resources that you have used in preparing your assignments. You will most likely need to do some research to complete this assignment – research is greatly encouraged, but drawing information directly from third-party material is not. You should minimize the use of third-party material, and if you need to use it, then it is important that you cite it within your work. At a minimum, any section that is found to contain any amount of uncited third-party material will receive a grade of zero. The College can impose additional sanctions, if deemed to be warranted.

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