Part 1: Project Charter Elements

A project charter is defined as an overall basic plan for an upcoming project that serves as the predecessor to the full project plan and emphasizes on some of the basic but critical components of the project plan. In a project charter, there are a number of different elements that are discussed below with specific reference to literature.

Project Scope and Objectives

According to Kerzner and Kerzner (2017), project scope refers to the set of goals and the overall boundary that has to be successfully fulfilled at the end of the project. On the other hand, project objectives represent the deliverables of the project and must be defined before proceeding with the rest of the project.

Project Business Case

Project business case is defined as a set of various factors related to the project (Harrison and Lock 2017). These factors include the purpose of project, possible benefits of the project, appropriate reasoning for conducting the project and others.

Project Schedule, Milestones and Deliverables

Project schedule is the total estimated time period that is required to complete all the work in the project. The deliverables represent the work requirements of the project and milestones represent specific points within the project that reflects the end point of a particular phase or a group of work in the project (Sharp, Peters and Howard 2017). The deliverables of the project are assigned with several work packages that are required to fulfill the deliverables. These work packages are considered for developing the estimated schedule for the project.

Risk Identification

Risk identification is a customary project activity that is conducted to identify the main risks associated with the project (Crawford 2014). Identification of the risks early helps to develop appropriate mitigation plan that will be used to neutralize the impacts of the risks on the project.

Project Assumptions and Constraints

As per Flyvbjerg (2014), project assumptions refer to some assumptions that are made during planning the project. These assumptions are required when there are chances or possibilities of occurrence of certain impactful events that may or may not occur during the course of the project. Assumptions are also required during estimation of schedule and budget of the project. Project constraints are the factors that can hinder the progress of the project. These constraints must be identified during planning of the project so that possible modifications can be made on the project to avoid the constraints.

Estimation of Resources

Any project requires various resources for execution. Again, resources are of two types – human resource and material resource (Schwalbe 2015). Estimation of resource refers to the identification of the quantity of the resources (both human and material) that will be required for successful execution of the project.

Stakeholder Identification

For successful management of a project, it is important to identify the main stakeholders associated with the project (Mir and Pinnington 2014). Stakeholders are the personnel who have control over specific parts of the project and their duties include ensuring each of the parts are executed as per the plan.

Team Operating Principles

Any project team requires a number of operating principles that each project team member must follow throughout the course of the project (Marcelino-Sádaba et al. 2014). These operating principles must be defined before the team members are allocated with tasks for the project.

Lessons Learned

This section allows the project team members to reflect on the success of their own works and how they have learnt throughout the course of planning of the project.

Charter Closing and Signatures

This is the final section of the project charter that includes a list of signatures of all the stakeholders associated with the project (Nicholas and Steyn 2017). After the signatures are received, the project charter is officially closed and forwarded to management for verification and approval.

Project Charter for Given Project

Letter to Sponsor

To

The CEO

Barrier Reef Insurance Company

Dated: 28/03/2019

Subject: Regarding Office Relocation

Madam,

I hope you are already updated about the ending of our current lease in the office space we are using. However, I am disappointed to inform you that the owner does not want to increase the duration of the contract and has requested us to find a new office space. As a gesture of goodwill, the landlord has allowed us 2 months of time within which, we need to vacate the office premises. Accordingly, we have conducted a search for a new office space and we found a suitable one near the Kingston Suburb. We have also analyzed that we will require a budget of around $70,000 in order to complete the relocation process. I have attached the project charter with this letter and I would request you to please go through it and make a decision regarding approval of the budget that we have developed.

Thanks & Regards,

Name:

Branch Manager,

Barrier Reef Insurance Company.

Project Scope and Objectives

The main scope of the project is to relocate the insurance office to the new selected office space without affecting the daily operations of the company. The preparations of the project need to be made throughout the month and the relocation process has to be completed within a weekend so that the operations need not be stopped at any point of time.

The objectives of the project are determined using SMART technique as follows:

Project Business Case

This project is required because the current office space cannot be further used and must be vacated within two months period. The benefit of the project is that the new office space will be rented for a long term contract and the new location will allow the company to attract new customers from a new suburb.

Project Schedule, Milestones and Deliverables

The main deliverable of the project is to relocate the office from one location to another. This is to be achieved by renting a new office space and relocating all the office materials including workstations, furniture and utilities.

The milestones of the project are specified as follows.

Finally, the complete schedule of the project is shown in the following table.

Risk Identification

There are some risks associated with the project that are listed in the following table along with mitigation plan.

Project Assumptions and Constraints

The assumptions and constraints of the project are as follows.

• It has been assumed that maximum budget of $100,000 is sufficient for the relocation process.
• It has been assumed that the relocation process can be successfully completed over one weekend.
• Contractual agreements with the owner of the new office space can be a constraint as it can take a significant amount of time.
• The office shifts pose as a significant constraint as they cannot be stopped due to relocation process.

Estimation of Resources

The following table shows the resources required (both human and material) for executing the project.

These resources are allocated to the work packages and the overall estimated budget for the project is determined and shown in the following table.

Stakeholder Identification

The main stakeholders required for the project are as follows.

Team Operating Principles

The project team will have to abide by the following operating principles.

• The team will have to cooperate with each other throughout the course of the project.
• The team will have to exhibit professional behaviour throughout the course of the project.
• Any issues faced during project must be immediately reported to Manager of Supervision and Project Administration.

Lessons Learned

From the development of this project charter, a lot of knowledge has been gained regarding the planning for a project. It has given insight on determining scope, schedule and budget for a project as well as prepare the plan so as it to avoid the risks and constraints associated.

Charter Closing and Signatures

References

Conforto, E.C., Salum, F., Amaral, D.C., Da Silva, S.L. and De Almeida, L.F.M., 2014. Can agile project management be adopted by industries other than software development?. Project Management Journal, 45(3), pp.21-34.

Crawford, J.K., 2014. Project management maturity model. Auerbach Publications.

Flyvbjerg, B., 2014. Megaproject planning and management: Essential readings (Vol. 2). Edward Elgar Publishing.

Harrison, F. and Lock, D., 2017. Advanced project management: a structured approach. Routledge.

Kerzner, H. and Kerzner, H.R., 2017. Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and controlling. John Wiley & Sons.

Marcelino-Sádaba, S., Pérez-Ezcurdia, A., Lazcano, A.M.E. and Villanueva, P., 2014. Project risk management methodology for small firms. International journal of project management, 32(2), pp.327-340.

Mir, F.A. and Pinnington, A.H., 2014. Exploring the value of project management: linking project management performance and project success. International journal of project management, 32(2), pp.202-217.

Nicholas, J.M. and Steyn, H., 2017. Project management for engineering, business and technology. Routledge.

Papke-Shields, K.E. and Boyer-Wright, K.M., 2017. Strategic planning characteristics applied to project management. International Journal of Project Management, 35(2), pp.169-179.

Schwalbe, K., 2015. Information technology project management. Cengage Learning.

Sharp, J.A., Peters, J. and Howard, K., 2017. The management of a student research project. Routledge.

Špundak, M., 2014. Mixed agile/traditional project management methodology–reality or illusion?. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 119, pp.939-948.