Project Management Fundamentals and Practices

This document provides an overview of project management fundamentals and practices. It covers topics such as the project life cycle, different project life cycles, and work breakdown structure. The document also includes a literature review and discusses risks and mitigation strategies.

Running head: PROJECT MANAGEMENT FUNDAMENTALS AND PRACTICES
Project Management Fundamentals and Practices
[Name of the Student]
[Name of the University]
[Author note]

1PROJECT MANAGEMENT FUNDAMENTALS AND PRACTICES
Project Charter:
1 Introduction
The light rail transport system would be associated with providing a comfortable, frequent as
well as reliable journey for the commuters through the city as well as to the south eastern
suburbs. Besides this it is also expected that this project would be helping in the reduction of the
congestion at the central business district and this would be done by means of cutting down the
dependency upon the nus services.
The line would also be including the major interchanges taking place at the ferry rail, and the bus
stations as well as in the routes which in turn would be associated with providing a 1 KM
pedestrian zone between the two streets Hunter and Bathurst along with the George Street.
2 Project and Product Overview
The New project of the light railway would be a 12KM long rail between the CBD and the South
East Light Rail (CSELR) project. This particular project would be helping Australia in extending
from Circular Quay and would be passing through the Central station and would lastly be
connecting the Moore Park sporting and the entertainment precinct, Randwick Rececourse, the
University of New South Wales and Prince of Wales Hospital at Randwick.
This project has received its approval for the entire plan from the Government of New South
Wales. This project has been developed with a PPP or Public-Private Partnership, which would
be put forward to the entire world along with being operated as well as being maintained by the
Connecting Sydney consortium Some of the major partners of the consortium included the
Australasian Railway Association or the ARA, and the ARA members mainly includes the
Transdev Sydney, Alstom Transport Australia Action Infrastructure Australia and Capella
Capital.
3 Justification
The project would be also be benefitted by means of making improvements in the access
to the major sporting and the entertainment facilities and this would be including the Football
Stadium of Sydney, The Cricket ground of Sydney as well as the Randwick Racecourse and
Moore Park’s Entertainment Quarter. Some of the other reason behind conducting this project is
that it is associated with providing some other facilities such as the including of the stabling
facility in Randwick along with a maintenance depot in Rozelle. This project would also be
associated with the creation of an urban experience which would be improved along with a
reduced congestion and the sustainability would be promoted. Public would be provided with a
better public transport associated with more connections for more people. The economy would
be highly boosted by means of taking the key shopping and the entertainment districts.
4 Objectives
The major objective of this project includes the following:
Deploy the railway service which would be operating with a fleet of electric powered
light rail vehicle which would be fully air-conditioned featuring a low-floor design and would be

2PROJECT MANAGEMENT FUNDAMENTALS AND PRACTICES
powered by around 12 substations. The new project is also aimed at completion of a project
which after completion would be capable of carrying up to 9000 passengers every hour in each
direction.
5 Risks
Risk Mitigation
Site Risk This type of risk can be mitigated by starting the project
after all the procurement of the land I completed and is
handed over by the government. This can also be
mitigated by sending of letter of acquisition of the land to
the respective owner (Halpin, Lucko and Senior 2017). A
DPR or a Daily project Report system can be used and
this DP should be consisting of the site photograph along
with daily consumption of the materials, used manpower,
amount of work done and many more.
Material Risk This is one of the major risk that is likely to be faced.
This is generally faced in the Design and survey phase
and so there is an essential need of a perfect design
(Igwe, Nasiri and Hammad 2017). The engineers
associated with the project must be aware of the different
materials that are to be purchased and the dealers who
would be supplying be materials must be ISO certified.
Besides this the dealer’s should necessarily be associated
with providing the certification for the quality of each
and every material (Qazi et al. 2016). Besides this there
should also exist multiple dealers for the supply of
materials so as to make sure that if one of the supplier
fails then other could deliver the material that is required.
Design Risk There is always a need of having a perfect design so as to
avoid any kind of risks related to designing (Banihashemi
et al. 2017). There is also a need of spending more time
upon the designing process and survey reports along with
which the survey must be containing the GADs or the
general arrangements of sheets along with the hydrology
of every bridges along with the curves of the tracks.
Contractual risks and
exposure
This type of risks are having a huge impact upon the
projects the higher authority along with the railway
ministry should strictly be aware of any kind of breach in
the contract which would be initially responsible for
tendering the processes (Burtonshaw-Gunn 2017).

3PROJECT MANAGEMENT FUNDAMENTALS AND PRACTICES
Risk Mitigation
Financial risks This type of risk can be mitigated by taking a closer look
into the techniques utilized for the project cash flow
which would be acting as one of the major function of
the risk management process (Kerzner 2018).
Site Safety This is one of the major risk faced in the construction
sites and this can be mitigated simply by wearing safety
equipment such as the helmets, boots, hand glows and
many more (Sears et al. 2015). Besides this various acts
also needs to be followed for the welfare of the
employees.
Management risks This type of risks mainly arises when the site is not
receiving proper resources needed for proceeding with
the project and for that reason all the transportation
system needs to be managed properly and besides this the
resources which are stored in the sites should also be
protected from various things such as rains, winds and all
other unnecessary elements (Harrison and Lock 2017).
Human resource risks Proper assigning of employees for respective tasks in
which they specialized along with providing of proper
training to the new employees.
Construction related risks This type of risk is very much common in construction
project which generally occurs at the time of execution
and this can be mitigated by making sure that the site
engineer is associated with discussing the entire plan
with the senior engineer (Heagney 2016).
Besides all this the execution process should also be done
in a proper way by maintain proper guidelines and
modern equipment should also be used so as to have easy
and quality construction.
Legal risks This type of risks when the government agencies or the
civic bodies are getting affected due to the project puts
forward certain complaints. In order to mitigate this
problem it is essential to make sure that the project gets
approval from all this bodies so as to avoid any kind of
problem in the middle of the project.
6. Literature review:
According to Schwalbe (2015), life cycle is associated with the implication of two things
that is the process is perpetual along with the sequence of events which is obligatory or is uni-

4PROJECT MANAGEMENT FUNDAMENTALS AND PRACTICES
directional. For a project the life cycle generally does not refer to any kind of perpetual circle or
events nor is a sequence of events which are rigidly fixed and this is generally contracted to the
definition of the project which is associated with assuming a finite period. Generally the project
life cycle consists of different phases and this phases are sequential in nature which are having
punctuated ends. This endings are generally done either by the technical information transfer or
due to handing over of the technical components (Kerzner and Kerzner 2017). The phases of the
project generally vary in accordance to the project or the industry however some general phases
exists which includes the development, concept, implementation and the support. Some of the
general trends which are depicted by the project life cycle includes the required staffs and cost at
the starting of the project which is seen to be low and gradually increase in the middle phase
however this subsides as the project gradually comes to an end.
Fig 1: Project life Cycle: Cost and Staffing across the life cycle
Source: (Kerzner and Kerzner 2017)
Comparison between different project life cycles:
Waterfall model:
This model was introduced in the year of 1970 and is the model that has gone through
numerous changes as well as revisions throughout its entire lifespan. This model has received its
name from the analogy of the water falling downwards. The phases included in this model
generally varies in accordance to the project however there always exist a clear transition from
one phase to the other (Fleming and Koppelman 2016). Pure waterfall model is generally seen to
be well fitted for those projects where there exists a clear understanding of the requirements as
well as the technical tools, the infrastructure and the architectures that are needed. However the
weakness of this model is associated with making this model inadvisable whenever there is a
need of rapid development.

5PROJECT MANAGEMENT FUNDAMENTALS AND PRACTICES
Fig 2: Waterfall model
Source: (Heagney 2016)
Incremental life cycle:
The main concept which lies behind the incremental lifecycle is that it is having the aim
of producing products that are usable at the end of each stage. This model is generally associated
with the usage of the approach which is similar to the waterfall model mainly in the overlapping
sections (Walker 2015). However in reality the entire lifecycle is generally lead by a series of
objectives and the general objectives of the project are generally described at the beginning of
the project.

6PROJECT MANAGEMENT FUNDAMENTALS AND PRACTICES
Fig 3: Incremental life cycle
Source: (Kerzner and Kerzner 2017)
Spiral:
This is mainly the model which is oriented around reduction of the risks and is associated
with breaking down the projects into various mini-projects where each and every one is
associated with addressing one or more risks. The major aim behind the development of this
model is countering any kind of problem that are faced in the waterfall model. This is cyclic in
nature so the name spiral can be considered to be different from the liner waterfall model. There
exists mainly six phase which includes the planning, risk analysis, engineering or development
and evaluation. The projects following this method is passed repeatedly through these phases in
iterations. The baseline spiral which generally starts at the planning phase is considered to be the
place where the gathering of the requirements is doe and the risks are assessed (Schwalbe 2015).
The planning phase consists of gathering the resources whereas in the risk analysis phase the
processes is undertaken for the purpose of identifying the risks and solutions. The projects which
consists of highly risky elements can use this model as this helps in running a series of risk-
reduction iterations.

7PROJECT MANAGEMENT FUNDAMENTALS AND PRACTICES
Fig 4: Spiral Model
Source: (Sears et al. 2015)
Evolutionary or iterative process:
The evolutionary cycle is generally associated with the maintenance of the series of
phases which are seen to be having a distinct as well as a cascading nature. The phases of this
cycle is dependent upon the preceding phase similar to the other life cycles. This mode is similar
to the incremental model where at the time of designing phase development gets divided into
distinct increment or subset of requirements (Sears et al. 2015). But only a limited set of
requirements is constructed by for implementation. The processes is then repeated with the
requirements that are remaining which initially becomes the new requirements phase.
Fig 5: Evolutionary or iterative process

8PROJECT MANAGEMENT FUNDAMENTALS AND PRACTICES
Source: (Harrison and Lock 2017)
Agile or extreme:
This is just one of the emerging language that are potentially viable for any kind of
system development life cycle. Besides this the tenets which are basic and exist in this
philosophy are seen to be consistent with the other SDLC methodologies that are valid and the
basis of this process is generally found in the waterfall method (Kerzner 2018). But in this type
of methodology instead of focusing upon the documentation of the requirements the agile or the
extreme methodology is associated with seeking for compressing the time in the scope through
design phases by making use of the stories, scenarios and the use cases as the replacement of the
formal documentation, similarly the development and the tests generally takes place inside the
pre-defined “time-box” which would be acting as an additional mean of compression of time.
Fig 6: Agile or extreme methodology
Source: (Sears et al. 2015)
7. Work Breakdown Structure:
Light Rail Project
Initiation of Project
Feasibility Analysis
Technical Feasibility
Analysis
Analysis of Results
Environmental Feasibility
Analysis
Analysis of Results
Operational Feasibility
Analysis
Analysis of Results
Project Chartering
Charter Creation
Charter Submission
Milestone 1: Project
Charter Document
and Project
Management Plan
Project Planning
Analysis of Requirements
Finalization of
Project Scope
Budgeting and
Scheduling
Management of
Risks
Communication Plan
Allocation of Duties
Milestone 2:
Communication Plan
Design & Development
Procurement
Processes Designing of the Project
Creation of Design
Verification of
Design
Implementation of
Changes
Final Design of the
Project
Development of Project
Construction
Activities
Review of
Development Work
Integration Activities
Milestone 3:
Developed Rail
Project
Project Control
Project Activities
Review
Implementation of
Changes
Changes review
Measurement of
performance
Milestone 4: Change
Plan
Project Closure and
Maintenance
Documentation of
the project
Sign Offs
Closure report
Preparation
Closure report
Submission
Final release
Milestone 5: Closure
Report
Fig 7: Work Breakdown Structure
Source: Created by author

9PROJECT MANAGEMENT FUNDAMENTALS AND PRACTICES
Gantt chart:
WBS Task Name Duration Start Finish
0 Light Rail Project 783 days Fri
3/15/19 Tue 3/15/22
1 Initiation of Project 113 days Fri 3/15/19 Tue 8/20/19
1.1 Feasibility Analysis 70 days Fri 3/15/19 Thu 6/20/19
1.1.1 Technical Feasibility Analysis 25 days Fri 3/15/19 Thu 4/18/19
1.1.1.1 Analysis of Results 25 days Fri 3/15/19 Thu 4/18/19
1.1.2 Environmental Feasibility Analysis 30 days Fri 4/19/19 Thu 5/30/19
1.1.2.1 Analysis of Results 30 days Fri 4/19/19 Thu 5/30/19
1.1.3 Operational Feasibility Analysis 45 days Fri 4/19/19 Thu 6/20/19
1.1.3.1 Analysis of Results 45 days Fri 4/19/19 Thu 6/20/19
1.2 Project Chartering 43 days Fri 6/21/19 Tue 8/20/19
1.2.1 Charter Creation 23 days Fri 6/21/19 Tue 7/23/19
1.2.2 Charter Submission 20 days Wed
7/24/19 Tue 8/20/19
1.3 Milestone 1: Project Charter Document and
Project Management Plan 0 days Tue
8/20/19 Tue 8/20/19
2 Project Planning 89 days Wed
7/24/19 Mon 11/25/19
2.1 Analysis of Requirements 35 days Wed
7/24/19 Tue 9/10/19
2.1.1 Finalization of Project Scope 35 days Wed
7/24/19 Tue 9/10/19
2.2 Budgeting and Scheduling 24 days Wed
8/21/19 Mon 9/23/19
2.3 Management of Risks 45 days Wed
9/11/19 Tue 11/12/19
2.4 Communication Plan 35 days Wed
7/24/19 Tue 9/10/19
2.5 Allocation of Duties 45 days Tue
9/24/19 Mon 11/25/19
2.6 Milestone 2: Communication Plan 0 days Mon
11/25/19 Mon 11/25/19
3 Design & Development 417 days Wed
9/11/19 Thu 4/15/21
3.1 Procurement Processes 50 days Tue
11/26/19 Mon 2/3/20
3.2 Designing of the Project 261 days Wed
9/11/19 Wed 9/9/20
3.2.1 Creation of Design 261 days Wed
9/11/19 Wed 9/9/20

10PROJECT MANAGEMENT FUNDAMENTALS AND PRACTICES
3.2.1.1 Verification of Design 67 days Wed
9/11/19 Thu 12/12/19
3.2.1.2 Implementation of Changes 90 days Tue 2/4/20 Mon 6/8/20
3.2.1.3 Final Design of the Project 67 days Tue 6/9/20 Wed 9/9/20
3.3 Development of Project 156 days Thu
9/10/20 Thu 4/15/21
3.3.1 Construction Activities 89 days Thu
9/10/20 Tue 1/12/21
3.3.2 Review of Development Work 45 days Thu
9/10/20 Wed 11/11/20
3.3.3 Integration Activities 67 days Wed
1/13/21 Thu 4/15/21
3.4 Milestone 3: Developed Rail Project 0 days Wed
11/11/20 Wed 11/11/20
4 Project Control 337 days Thu
11/12/20 Fri 2/25/22
4.1 Project Activities Review 89 days Fri 4/16/21 Wed 8/18/21
4.2 Implementation of Changes 57 days Thu
8/19/21 Fri 11/5/21
4.3 Changes review 80 days Mon
11/8/21 Fri 2/25/22
4.4 Measurement of performance 45 days Thu
11/12/20 Wed 1/13/21
4.5 Milestone 4: Change Plan 0 days Fri 11/5/21 Fri 11/5/21
5 Project Closure and Maintenance 304 days Thu
1/14/21 Tue 3/15/22
5.1 Documentation of the project 20 days Mon
11/8/21 Fri 12/3/21
5.2 Sign Offs 12 days Mon
2/28/22 Tue 3/15/22
5.3 Closure report Preparation 23 days Thu
1/14/21 Mon 2/15/21
5.4 Closure report Submission 12 days Mon
12/6/21 Tue 12/21/21
5.5 Final release 10 days Wed
12/22/21 Tue 1/4/22
5.6 Milestone 5: Closure Report 0 days Tue 1/4/22 Tue 1/4/22
8. Network Diagram:

11PROJECT MANAGEMENT FUNDAMENTALS AND PRACTICES
Fig 7: Network Diagram
Source: Created by Author

12PROJECT MANAGEMENT FUNDAMENTALS AND PRACTICES
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13PROJECT MANAGEMENT FUNDAMENTALS AND PRACTICES
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