Determine a project's management method referring to OPAs, is this an example of benchmarking?
Yan WuTrainer/Consultant| Changeway Management Consulting Co., Ltd.Beijing, China, Mainland
This topic comes from a discussion of the following question.
The key stakeholders of a short-term project want to avoid quality control. The project manager knows that a minimum level of quality must be provided. What tools or techniques does the project manager use?
A Benchmarking
B Sampling
C Design on Experiment
D Cost-benefit analysis
There's a discussion between A and D. People referring to A think that we can use benchmarking in determining management practise by tailoring and referring to history project experience.
Others insists that benchmarking is a heavy weight method and can only refer to those best practise led to best quality.
I'd suggest that D would be the better answer as it is quite likely the reluctance of the stakeholders relates to cost & effort and doing the analysis to show the costs and benefits of the proposed quality approach might sway them. Such analysis would involve comparing the cost of doing nothing (usually just Cost of Poor Quality) with the reduced COPQ resulting from such expenditures on Cost of Prevention and Cost of Inspection.
Benchmarking wouldn't necessarily address the concerns the stakeholders have - just saying "We should do X because other companies are doing X" is a pretty weak argument.
Kiron Saving Changes...
Sergio Luis ConteHelping to create solutions for everyone| Worldwide based OrganizationsBuenos Aires, Argentina
If the question is about to answer in the context of a certification exam then people has to answer what the PMI expect as an answer in the context of the PMBOK. With that said, here comes my comment based on what I face in my work life. There is nothing bad in try to avoid quality control. In fact, this is the key justification about to invest in quality. To avoid quality control organizations needs to put money in quality assurance. It does not mean that organization will eliminate quality control. It does mean that thanks to try to avoid it lot of money is getting in terms of benefits. But other thing has to be taken into account. Quality is an strategical decision where a balance between quality and grade has to be defined in advance. If the organization decide to create products with low quality and high grade then quality control is avoided. Examples there are a lot which includes the most important companies in the world for example in the software domain. Saving Changes...
Thomas WalentaGlobal Project Economy ExpertHackenheim, Germany
Wan,
I would agree with Kiron and go for D.
The PMBoK mentions cost of quality as the sum of conformance cost plus non-conformance cost to quality requirements. There are always quality requirements, a product has to be fit for use.
So if you avoid quality control, you lower your conformance cost but you raise your cost for non-conformance (failures, damage etc). A good and frequently tool used to justify conformance cost by estimating the dis-benefits of non-conformance is cost/benefit analysis.
The benchmarking option can easily be discarded by saying we are special.
There are 2 key parts to reading this question. The stakeholders want to avoid quality control (QC). The PM realizes some measure of quality is required. That would tell me that the intent of the question is related to providing some, but limited QC. The only answer directly applicable to that question is Sampling.
Benchmarking will provide information on quality processes used elsewhere. Cost benefit analysis could be a appropriate answer as it would provide data as to how much QC is justified via a business case. Both of those could be approaches to figuring out how much QC is required, but both are broadly applicable to many problems rather than related directly to QC.
Sampling however is a method to perform QC on a limited set of process outputs (statistical sample) instead of the entire process output. Analyzing it from a test taking perspective, I would say that Sampling directly addresses quality, rather than general approaches for finding solution compromises. Saving Changes...
I agree with Keith. Since the problem states that the stakeholders want to avoid Quality Control, but the Project Manager knows that a minimum level of quality must be provided, and that is just the results of a Statistical sampling, in which not all processes or products are tested, but determined ones are selected to perform a Quality test. The results allow to establish a certain Quality Criteria without testing all the entire statistical universe. Saving Changes...
Peter RapinSubject Matter Expect; Project Delivery| Independent ConsultantOntario, Canada
My issue with this question is that the stakeholder wants to avoid quality control yet all the offered responses are quality control tools.
I see quality control in two parts:
1) putting in place procedures to ensure the end product meets the requirements, and
2) sample the product to determine the frequency that the product meets the requirements.
If you want some degree of product compliance you need to perform 1). The only discussion is to what detail you go to. If the project involves building a 'gismo', a rudimentary requirement may be to check the design with the client before you build it - otherwise the finished product may turn out to be a 'whatsit'.
If you chose not to sample the end product all you are doing is transferring the risk of not meeting requirements to the consumer - I ordered a 'gismo', you delivered a 'whatsit'.
I guess what I'm saying is that quality control is not an option, only the extent of quality control is subject to discussion. The best tool to use in discussion with the stakeholder is risk analysis and management. Saving Changes...
