Assigned Readings:
Chapter 9: Risk response and Treatment Options
Chapter 10: Risk Monitoring and Control
Project Quality Conference Paper:
Project Quality Conferecne Paper:
Six Sigma Conference Paper:
Initial Postings: Read and reflect on the assigned readings for the week. Then post what you thought was the most important concept(s), method(s), term(s), and/or any other thing that you felt was worthy of your understanding in each assigned textbook chapter.Your initial post should be based upon the assigned reading for the week, so the textbook should be a source listed in your reference section and cited within the body of the text. Other sources are not required but feel free to use them if they aid in your discussion.
Also, provide a graduate-level response to each of the following questions:
Background: Elevate Tech is a mid-sized IT solutions provider that specializes in custom software development for clients in healthcare, education, and logistics. The company recently secured a high-profile project: developing a patient data integration platform for a major hospital network. Although Elevate Tech is known for innovative solutions, the leadership team has faced recent criticism from past clients about product reliability, delayed delivery, and inconsistent documentation. Determined to improve, the companys executive team has committed to a comprehensive Total Quality Management (TQM) approach and is developing a detailed Project Quality Plan (PQP) for this initiative. As part of the planning phase, the project manager has also been tasked with conducting a risk analysis to identify potential failure points and ensure contingency resources are properly budgeted. You have joined the team as a Quality and Risk Management Consultant, responsible for guiding both the quality planning and risk elimination strategies for this critical project. Your insight will help determine how much time, budget, and workforce Elevate Tech should allocate toward ensuring both quality and risk control across the project lifecycle.
Discussion Questions:
What is Total Quality Management (TQM), and how can it help Elevate Tech improve both product reliability and customer satisfaction in this healthcare IT project? Provide examples of TQM principles such as continuous improvement, customer focus, and employee involvement, and explain how they apply to project environments.
What are the key components that must be included in a Project Quality Plan (PQP), and why are they critical to project success? Consider areas such as quality objectives, standards, roles/responsibilities, quality control processes, documentation, and audit criteria.
What does the term Cost of Quality (CoQ) refer to, and how can understanding its components (prevention costs, appraisal costs, internal failure costs, and external failure costs) help Elevate Tech allocate resources effectively? Use project examples to illustrate how poor quality impacts both short-term and long-term costs.
What is Six Sigma, and how could Elevate Tech use it to identify defects and minimize variability in the development process? Describe tools such as DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control) and explain how they could be applied in a software development context.
Compare and contrast Quality Control and Quality Assurance in the context of a complex software development project. Which functions or team members are typically responsible for each, and how do they complement each other in achieving project quality?
[Your post must be substantive and demonstrate insight gained from the course material. Postings must be in the student’s own words – do not provide quotes!]
[Your initial post should be at least 450+ words and in APA format (including Times New Roman with font size 12 and double spaced). Post the actual body of your paper in the discussion thread then attach a Word version of the paper for APA review]
Assigned Reading (s):
Chapter 9: Risk response and Treatment Options
Chapter 10: Risk Monitoring and Control
Project Quality Conference Paper:
Project Quality Conference Paper:
Six Sigma Conference Paper:
Overview:
Chapters nine and ten of the text provide an overview of risk treatment options, risk responses, and risk controls. Following risk identification and assessment, risk treatment options for each risk are considered. Negative risks can be avoided, mitigated, transferred, or accepted. The avoidance option involves removing the elements of the project that are associated with the risk. This may entail removing certain work packages; however, when doing so the project manager must ensure that the project scope is not impacted. Mitigation involves taking steps to reduce the probability and impact of the risk. Transference involves shifting the burden of the risk to a third-party such as a contractor or by means of insurance. Acceptance involves taking no action and being prepared to bear the brunt of the risk, should it occur. Positive risks, also referred to as opportunities, also have treatment options. Positive risks can be enhanced, shared, exploited, or accepted. Enhancement (the opposite of mitigation) involves taking actions that would increase the likelihood and impact of the positive risk occurring. Exploitation (the opposite of avoidance) involves adding or modifying work packages to capitalize upon the opportunity. Sharing involves allowing a third party or other project team to also benefit from the opportunity. As with negative risks, acceptance of opportunities involves taking no action and hoping that the opportunity will occur. When weighing risk treatment options, it is important to consider the organizations risk controls, which delineate the level of risk the organization is willing to accept.
Total Quality Management (TQM) involves striving to seek continuous improvement and requires collective input from individuals from all levels within the organization. The Six Sigma approach to quality management involves setting benchmarks and standards for quality, tolerance levels, and then measuring the current state to triage the situation. If the goal is to complete a 5K run in 25 minutes and the runner is currently clocking in at a 30-minute run time, the runner can clearly see that they must improve their performance by 5 minutes and must take actions to do so. Identifying that the runner has a 5-minute gap is known as the “analysis of variance”, as the variance from the standard is 5 minutes. In business, if a certain quality standard is determined to be a 95% rate of accuracy in record keeping and the current level of accuracy is 60%, through the analysis of variance, it can be determined that the organization is 35% away from meeting the standard. Once the severity of the issue is determined, the Six Sigma team works to determine the root cause of the issue and implement solutions. Once solutions are implemented, measurement is needed once again to ensure the solutions are effective. to monitor and control the process to close the variance gap. When there is a large variance, sometimes improvement must be completed in increments. For example, 10% improvement by the end of Q1, 20% by Q2, and compliance with the standard by Q3. Metrics are essential in Six Sigma because variance cannot accurately be tracked and measured when standards are not numerically defined. Instead of stating an item must be “strong”, the standard can be quantified by stating it must be able to sustain 80 mph of wind force and 2,000 psi of pressure. When measured, the item either meets these standards or it does not, and the level of variance can be precisely defined.
Learning Objectives:
At the end of this unit of instruction, the student should be able to:
- What is project quality?
- How does the Project Management Book of Knowledge Define it?
- Explain a methodology to track quality within a project.
Supplementary Readings:
Use this Risk Management Template to Prevent Project Problems
Managing risk in the project portfolio
Quality management system standards
Welcome back, quality … from a project management perspective
Total quality management
Six sigma method and its applications in project management
Requirements: 450 + words
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