In a perfect world, every project would be characterized by clear project requirements that never changed:
1) Motivated and capable team members; 2) proven technologies; 3) more than adequate budgets in terms of time, money, and resources; 4) responsible, knowledgeable stakeholders; and 5) seamless, effective communication so when a problem arises it is communicated and dealt with quickly. However, we do not live in a perfect world!
Respond to the following in a minimum of 175 words:
In your opinion, which 3 of the 5 common project hazards described in the book have the potential to be the costliest? Explain your reasoning (make sure you explain your reasoning for each).
Reminder to avoid quotes unless needed in your responses. I am looking for original work. Also, make sure you share your references at the end of your post. At a minimum, you use the text to learn about the 5 common project hazards. Plus, any outside reading you may do. A reference is not just meant for quotes (although this is mandatory if you quote), but to share where you learned about the topic you are discussing (this is typical because you summarized what you read in your own words, so a quote or paraphrase is not used but the content of your response comes from what you learned from that existing work and is not common knowledge)
Week 3 Discussion
The assumptions regarding the time taken to complete a phase are purely based on approximations of clear project requirements that won’t change; motivated/capable team members; proven technologies; more than adequate budgets in terms of time, cost, and resources; responsible/knowledgeable stakeholders; and seamless, effective communication. But the problem is that all ideal situations don’t occur and unforeseeable situations do occur which can be a consequence of any of the situations (Leonidou et al. 2020, p.245).
According to me, the following 4 have proven to be the costliest hazards in the development phase of the project:
Changing Project Requirements: The first and foremost hazard in project development is changing project requirements. Prototyping and thorough requirement analysis and gathering do help in reducing the pain involved with project requirements, but rarely do these activities (prototyping & requirement gathering, and analysis) eliminate the hazard. This problem becomes more sophisticated once a module/part is completed and tested and the change comes in that module only. At times, changes are so drastic that the whole effort needs to be repeated which not only increases time but also affects the cost and motivation of the development team. This hazard is more profound in agile software development methodologies in which each module is required to be built as per the user and the user needs to approve it (or specify changes) then the process goes on with the development.
Budget: It is the IT industry that has utilized its applicability to the best. Now companies can outsource a software product from any other continent or country without much difficulty. Consequently, this has resulted in the global rivalry becoming fiercer. This means companies not only have to deliver a product, superior in quality but also in less time & with a tight budget. So, this eventually comes down to the development involving less time and cost (Krismawanto & Kurniawan, 2019, p.5). Tight deadlines, at times, cause the project to suffer greatly in terms of quality and hence reliability. Moreover, with newer technologies coming up, it is becoming more important to develop scalable and secure systems as well which further adds to the impedance.
Stakeholders: The role of stakeholders in concern with the project can’t be overlooked to any extent. Stakeholders are the ones that affect the project directly or indirectly. Most teams are headed by competent managers who not only monitor the project considering the deadlines but also provide the team with the required motivation and key areas of the project to look upon with intense care. In some cases, managers come from a non-technical background which may lead to them providing impractical or unfeasible deadlines which put undue pressure on the team under them and consequently affect the project quality and completion time. Stakeholders can be anyone involved in the project be it developer to team leads, project leads, support team, testing team, or business analysts to customers. Loophole of irresponsibility at any level can lead to the suffering of the project in terms of time, cost, or quality.
Too-large projects: The one thing that can be considered hazardous is the too-large project to work on. It can be considered as one the hazardous because due to the too large project more time consumption takes place and with that, more risk in the project will also take place as well (Restrepo et al. 2020, p.5). It can be considered riskier as there are chances that due to certain uncertainties, the work cannot be completed in the proper time.
References
Krismawanto, A., & Kurniawan, F. (2019). Comparative Analysis of the Costs (RAB) Budget Development Project in Surabaya. IJIEEB International Journal of Integrated Education, Engineering and Business eISSN 2615-1596 pISSN 2615-2312, 2(1), 1-9.
Leonidou, E., Christofi, M., Vrontis, D., & Thrassou, A. (2020). An integrative framework of stakeholder engagement for innovation management and entrepreneurship development. Journal of Business Research, 119, 245-258.
Restrepo, C. I., Chen, P. T., Sostaric, R. R., & Carson, J. M. (2020). Next-generation NASA hazard detection system development. In AIAA Scitech 2020 Forum (p. 0368).
