You are the senior project manager for a Web development company with upwards of 100 current client projects. You have been assigned to evaluate two upcoming projects

Question

One project is to develop a time- tracking solution that would allow your 20 freelancers to submit daily time sheets and would report on the time spent on each project. The other project is to redesign the client interface to the company extranet to make it easier to use. The extranet allows clients to log in and view their current Web sites under development, as well as view project statistics, documents, and progress reports. Compare the two projects in terms of risk factors.

Answer 1

Student answers will vary but should include an understanding of the main risks factors: size, structure, and technical expertise. An example answer is:
The main risk factors are size, structure, and technical expertise.
• Size. The time-tracking project is a larger project: It involves creating new programming that may interface with back-end systems and will immediately influence payment and cost. It also affects business processes. Redesigning an interface for the client extranet may simply be designing one or two pages that will be replicated for each client once the initial design is done.
• Structure. It may be easier to define the requirements of the time-tracking software, as this process is relatively straightforward. Understanding what makes the user interface problematic and defining ways to make it easier to use is somewhat of a less tangible quality than reporting on time, so this may be a concern in the second project.
• Technical expertise. Since the time-tracking project is a new application, there may be some issues of making sure any in-house staff has the appropriate level of expertise. The user interface involves working with existing programming that will not change. However, there may be a need to make sure that an expert who understands usability is present.