Program and Portfolio Information System Assignment - University Name

This document provides solutions to a Program and Portfolio Information System assignment, addressing key concepts such as system thinking, project management, systems engineering, Enterprise Project Portfolio Management (EPPM), and agile project management. The assignment includes responses to questions concerning the benefits of systems thinking for government ministers, explanations of project management and systems engineering roles, and the application of configuration management using agile methodologies. Additionally, the document defines EPPM and its advantages, and also provides explanations of project development plans. The assignment emphasizes the importance of integrating project management and systems engineering for successful project outcomes, and the role of configuration management in tracking project artifacts and changes. References are provided to support the answers.

Running head: PROGRAM & PORTFOLIO INFORMATION SYSTEM 1
Program and Portfolio Information System
Student’s Name
Institutional Affiliation

PROGRAM & PORTFOLIO INFORMATION SYSTEM 2
1. The Prime Minister of India knocks on your door and ask you to quickly explain to
him in no more than five sentences “Why should my ministers use systems thinking
in managing the government?” What do you tell him by incorporating the key
benefits of systems thinking that will be gained by those ministers and the country?
Answer to Question 6:
System thinking is a powerful tool that will help the government in reconfiguring
productivity as well as efficiency among different government departments. System thinking will
help the ministry to sustainably deliver services and products to the people without adversely
affecting the natural systems that sustains life on Earth. Applying system thinking will enable the
ministry to take full advantage of any elements within their system (Mittal & Martín, 2018).
Those working in the ministry will become problem lovers because system thinking aid people to
discover exciting opportunities which are provided by problems for creative and innovation
development. System thinking will provide the ministry with a dimensional perspective, this will
allow different departments in the ministry to move out of “siloed” departments and develop a
trans-disciplinary understanding of the micro and macro in a dynamic and interconnected manner
(Tian, Demirel, Hasan, & Pistikopoulos, 2018). Since the world is not flat by developing a
wholistic system view it will help the ministry to unlock its creativity power.
2. Please explain the following diagram?

PROGRAM & PORTFOLIO INFORMATION SYSTEM 3
Answer to Question 7:
Project manager is an individual tasked with the responsibility to lead a project from
inception to completion while a systems engineer is a person that plays a critical part towards the
success of a project by laying a basis for systems from project conception to attainment of
valuable operations. In this respect roles played by project manager and systems engineer are
almost similar hence they overlap (Tian, Demirel, Hasan, & Pistikopoulos, 2018).
Project management is a practice that entails, planning, initiating, closing ad controlling a
project team with the intent to attain particular goals to realize a specified success criteria over a
specified period. On the other hand, Systems engineering is an interdisciplinary means and
method that is used to enable the realization of successful systems by focusing on describing user
needs and the required functionality in the initial stages of the development cycle (Adcock,
2017). This is done through requirement documentation and moving into the design production
as well as system validation by considering the entire problem cost, performance, schedule,
support, operations, test and training. As a result, the success of complex and technical projects
depends on the integration of project management and systems engineering.
A systems engineer works on a project by planning, confronting risk, monitoring and
delivering technical features of a project on the other hand, a project manager has similar

PROGRAM & PORTFOLIO INFORMATION SYSTEM 4
concerns while working on a project but for the entire project (Bahill & Madni, 2017). Thus, due
to the shared concerns at some point there could arise tension between the roles played by a
system engineer and project manager in particular projects as shown in the above figure.
However, in certain projects there is no overlap of responsibility while on other projects their
responsibilities could be shared. A project manager can perform both systems engineer and
project manager’s roles particularly in small projects.
3. In the SEBoK it states that an effective systems engineering approach includes a
disciplined process for change control as part of the larger goal of configuration
management. The primary objective of configuration management is to track
changes to project artifacts that include software, hardware, plans, requirements,
designs, tests, and documentation. Please explain this approach by using an example
of a project that you have studied?
Answer to Question 8:
Agile project management. It is an incremental iterative method used to deliver requirements
throughout the life cycle of a project. Agile project entails five major project configuration
management: planning, identification, control, status accounting and audit. During planning a
configuration management plan outlines the manner in which the project manager will control,
track, audit and record configuration (Tian, Demirel, Hasan, & Pistikopoulos, 2018). During
identification step all configuration requirements regarding a project are identified and
documented. The requirements include design requirements, functionality requirements and
other specifications. Control ensure that as the project scope is altered all the configuration
impacts are analyzed, approved and recoded.

PROGRAM & PORTFOLIO INFORMATION SYSTEM 5
4. What is Enterprise Project Portfolio Management (EPPM) and what does Oracle
say are the advantages of EPPM?
Answer to Question 9:
Enterprise Project Portfolio Management (EPPM) is a top-down methodology used to
manage all project-intensive resources and works in the entire business. The advantages of
EPPM include:
It helps corporations to select investments, priorities, propose, manage, control and plan the most
complex portfolios and projects.
EPPM helps organizations to quickly identify redundant and underperforming programs, as well
as strategically align resources, budget and other investments through portfolio management
prioritization and rationalization,
Please explain the following diagram?

PROGRAM & PORTFOLIO INFORMATION SYSTEM 6
Answer to Question 10:
The above diagram is an illustration of a project development plan. The project plan starts with
identifying strategic objectives for the project. Once the project objectives have been identified
they are defined and the project is then formulated. The project is develop using a waterfall
methodology where one phase has to be completed to move to the next phase, which is shown by
the back arrow key.

PROGRAM & PORTFOLIO INFORMATION SYSTEM 7
References
Adcock, R. (2017). Guide to the Systems Engineering Body of Knowledge (SEBoK), Version
1.9.
Bahill, A. T., & Madni, A. M. (2017). Risk Analysis and Management. In Tradeoff Decisions in
System Design (pp. 597-672). Springer, Cham.
Mittal, S., & Martín, J. L. R. (2018). Netcentric system of systems engineering with DEVS
unified process. CRC Press.
Tian, Y., Demirel, S. E., Hasan, M. F., & Pistikopoulos, E. N. (2018). An overview of process
systems engineering approaches for process intensification: State of the art. Chemical
Engineering and Processing-Process Intensification, 133, 160-210.