10/1/2023

PM Simulation: An Overview
Hasmukh Gajjar

PM Simulation : Purpose
This simulation offers students
a hands-on opportunity to explore the complexities of managing
projects through a rapid, safe and inexpensive-experimentation as
compared to a real project experience.
To discover how the three main levers of PM(scope, resources, and
schedule) together with team dynamics and project organization
impacts project success or failure.

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Learnings!
1. How scope, resources, and schedule can be used to improve
project outcomes and how the levers interact with each other?
2. How project characteristics, including deadlines and team skill
levels, affect team morale and work quality?
3. How project managers’ decisions impacts on team morale and
work quality?
4. How prototyping and iterative project processes can help
moderate the effects of uncertainty?
5. What’s the impact of poor-quality work on project outcomes?

Your Role in Simulation

Your Role:
 Senior Project Manager at Delphi Printers & Peripherals, a small electronics
and computer peripheral manufacturer.
Your Task:
 You need to assemble and direct a product design team to develop a new
and innovative consumer printer. Delphi has intelligence suggesting that a
competitor is launching a printer with similar features and capabilities in 6
months, putting pressure on you and your team to develop a new printer
that can compete effectively against the competitor's offering.
Simulation Goals:
 Successfully complete the assigned project.
 Your project success will be rated on the following metrics:
1) scope
2) schedule
3) resources (cost)
4) team process (morale & stress)
Simulation Timeline:
 The simulation will continue until either you successfully complete the
project at hand or you decide to prematurely end your project.

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Scope

Resources
 Team Size
 Team Skill Level
 Outsourcing
Support tasks
Primary tasks
 Overtime

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Team Process

Prototyping

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What causes each effect?

Project Outcomes
• Tasks completed
• Cost incurred
• Project completion time
• Productivity
• New Problems discovered

Team attributes
• Moral
• Stress level
• Rates of mistakes

Scenario-A:

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Scenario A
Senior management expects you to release a new printer retaining rough parity
with the competitor's new printer.
The projected schedule allows you to ramp up manufacturing and marketing
quickly enough to match the competitor's new printer profile with your own printer.
The target budget supports a cost structure that will permit profit margins at a
level roughly equivalent to those of the current printer.
Market intelligence gathered on your competitor’s plans is considered reliable, so
the target specifications for your new printer, required to retain parity with their
new printer, are clearly defined, well understood, and expected to remain stable
throughout the project.
Management has indicated that scope, schedule and cost are of equal
importance in a successful launch, and they have committed to providing stable
access to resources during the project.

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Project Targets
Target Points for Points for
meeting the goal exceeding Goal

Scope (Level-2) 200 100

Schedule 18 200 100

Budget $42,500 200 100

Team Process 85-95% 100 N/A

Total Points 1000 700 300

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