Deck 18: Project Management for New Products and Processes

Question 1

If specific technical,technological,and production skill information can be transfered by written documents to company vendors,then they qualify as instances of explicit knowledge.

Answer 1

True

Question 2

PERT and CPM differ regarding the notion of a critical path.

Answer 2

False

Question 3

For effective project design,more activities are better than few because that allows greater activity control.

Answer 3

True

Question 4

A Gantt project-planning chart is good for any project except those where visualizing the basic structure of the system is required.

Question 5

With really large and complex projects,the PERT calculations can be done by hand.

Question 6

One rule that applies to a company's new product selection is to choose products that have attributes that are familiar to management because of existing experiences.It is usually best to play to one's strengths (core competencies).

Question 7

Projects are time-based endeavors that bring together skills and technology to accomplish goals.

Question 8

PERT information systems show that team members are communicating with each other while monitoring progress.

Question 9

Knowledge management of complex systems is usually satisfied by explicit information alone.

Question 10

The Gantt project-planning chart for a manufacturing system starts with assembling,moves to planning,and ends with certification.

Question 11

When two or more arrows converge at a single node,choose the smallest value of EF among the converging arrows for the ES value of the next activity.

Question 12

PERT is the acronymic name for the shortest time-path from start to finish of the project.

Question 13

Gantt project-planning methods,based on graphical analysis,can lead to optimal resource utilization or provide sufficient project-tracking capability for the complex projects that now are undertaken by large organizations.

Question 14

Networks representations often consist of arrows and nodes.The arrows connect the nodes while providing a sense of direction by means of the arrow heads.

Question 15

Concurrent project management is characterized by production managers having the opportunity to work on marketing issues and then marketing has a lot of leeway to work on production problems.

Question 16

Change management projects are unique work configurations that demand specific capabilities including leadership and teamwork.

Question 17

In-person,classroom teaching remains one of the best ways to transfer tacit information.

Question 18

Engineering change orders often appear to be major alterations in the product design but turn out to be minor instead.

Question 19

Change management projects called (a) require planning,designing,building,testing,redesigning,and implementing the system.

Question 20

Slack (associated with an activity) describes the amount of time that can be treated as a safety buffer for slippage.

Question 21

To spend sensibly to decrease the length of the critical path,as a rule of thumb,select first those activities that provide the largest decrease in project time for the least amount of investment.

Question 22

Many projects move rapidly at the beginning while many ideas are being considered.

Question 23

The tactical aspect of resource leveling is that it can affect the entire system's timing without changing the budgets.

Question 24

Resource leveling is an excellent example of fancy bells and whistles which should only be used when the fundamentals of the project's design and analysis have been completed.

Question 25

Activity time estimation in the PERT system utilizes an optimistic estimate,a pessimistic estimate,and a most likely estimate of time required to complete each project activity.

Question 26

Crash time is associated with the minimum cost estimate and its time for accomplishment is based on "walk,don't run."

Question 27

Normal time is associated with the minimum necessary spending on project activities because there is no stress on completing the project as soon as possible.

Question 28

Resource leveling seeks to move people from understaffed activities to those that are overstaffed.

Question 29

Good resource allocation decisions are a P/OM project management responsibility.

Question 30

The fundamental idea of resource leveling is to switch extra resources from places where they are not essential to places where they could be used immediately.

Question 31

For managers responsible for multiple projects,the sharing of information in an efficient way is an opportunity for synergy and serendipity,through coordination of their efforts.

Question 32

Crashing is generally used to decrease the length of the critical path.

Question 33

Crash time is a minimum time estimate to accomplish an activity.Its cost is usually at or near the maximum expenditure level.

Question 34

Resource leveling provides the option to withdraw resources or to add new resources.

Question 35

Products have life cycle stages which means that the project environment is dynamic and challenging.

Question 36

Resource leveling cannot be used effectively to manage multiple projects.

Question 37

A challenge faced by managers of multiple projects is the need to be juggling ideas and schedules.

Question 38

The existence of slack is an important condition for resource leveling.

Question 39

When the variance of a noncritical project path is larger than the variance along the critical path,it is possible that the noncritical path will become critical.

Question 40

Normal time is associated with the minimum necessary spending on project activities because there is no great stress on completing the project as soon as possible.

Question 41

Companies that have the systems viewpoint lack the ability to achieve the level of cooperation necessary to win the race.

Question 42

Correct information gathering is the function of marketing intelligence.

Question 43

_____ is the interaction of elements that,when combined,produce a total effect that is greater than the sum of the individual elements.

A)Synthesis
B)Synergism
C)Sympathetic empathy
D)none of the above

Question 44

Projects that are tracked by good information systems require more management time to produce controlled innovative success stories.

Question 45

Management generally relies upon its ability to estimate before hard data are available.

Question 46

_____ is responsible for managing the inventory of knowledge that exists in the company.This includes the ability to find,select,and absorb new knowledge to add to the prior encyclopedic storehouse.

A)Explicit knowledge
B)Knowledge management
C)New product management
D)Core competency

Question 47

Which of the following stages is NOT part of designing new products?

A)concept selection,development and testing
B)estimation and business modeling
C)plant construction
D)process specification and pilot plant

Question 48

Explicit knowledge is the description of what must be done to make things work.

Question 49

Explicit information requires synchronous transmission meaning that the teacher and the student must be in direct communication.

Question 50

Projects can include some repetitive activities.

Question 51

Unlike explicit knowledge,tacit knowledge never requires synchronous transmission.

Question 52

Good project-management methods do which of the following?

A)Keep track of what has been done.
B)Point to activities critical for completion.
C)Expedite activities that are slipping.
D)all of the above

Question 53

Body language is often mentioned as a clue to purpose and intention.

Question 54

The ultimate test of explicit information is whether it can be studied successfully using distance learning methods.

Question 55

Which of the following are considered to be part of the five project life-cycle stages?

A)describing the goals
B)planning the project
C)carrying out the project
D)completing the project
E)all of the above

Question 56

New products accomplish which of the following?

A)help increase the cash flow that sustains a company
B)replace old products that are becoming unprofitable
C)provide opportunities to extend the life of successful product lines
D)support marketing efforts
E)all of the above and more

Question 57

The project manager views activities with small amounts of slack as the activities that demand constant attention because slippage (especially when there is zero slack) results in project delay.

Question 58

The kinds of problems encountered in projects are different from those encountered in the job shop and flow shop.

Question 59

Which of the following is a form of knowledge that describes basic transferable information that is required to operate processes?

A)core knowledge
B)explicit knowledge
C)tacit knowledge
D)none of the above

Question 60

Which factors are important aspects of project management?

A)There is insufficient ROI until project completion.
B)Rapid completion is essential.
C)Project managers must be guided by strategic planning.
D)all of the above

Question 61

The _____ path is the longest time-path from start to finish of the project and determines the completion date of the project.

A)forward
B)backward
C)critical
D)economic

Question 62

In _____,project activities are the connecting arrows.Each arrow starts with a numbered node and ends with a larger numbered node.The arrow can be identified by these numbers.

A)AOL
B)AON
C)AOA
D)EOA

Question 63

_____ is associated with the minimum necessary spending on project activities because there is no urgency to complete the project as soon as possible.

A)Crash time
B)Normal time
C)Normal program
D)Abnormal time

Question 64

Which choice is one of the three different methods for obtaining estimates?

A)a person's opinion derived from his or her experiences
B)the pooling of a number of individuals' opinions (derived from their experiences)
C)several parameters of estimation requested from participants and combined
D)all of the above

Question 65

What does the control management process entail?

A)protecting the system with security and safety measuress
B)running the system
C)shielding the system from external disturbances
D)controlling the inputs,transformations and outputs
E)all of the above

Question 66

There are two main types of P/OM activities.One is the domain of project managers.The other is the domain of process managers.To highlight this difference,a and b are used to designate each type.Which is the beta type?

A)domain of process managers
B)domain of project managers

Question 67

Which are characteristics of good project managers?

A)They are accustomed to risk and coping with uncertainties.
B)Their goals are strategic and vitally important to top management and the success of the company.
C)They inspire rapid systems wide cooperation to resolve their problems quickly.
D)all of the above

Question 68

Which is the most essential rule that applies to project management?

A)Accurate time and cost estimates for all project activities are essential.
B)Backup redundancy of activities should be increased.
C)Expertise is not required to outline project activities and to sequence them correctly.
D)Multiple project leaders are preferred.

Question 69

_____ enables the project managers to determine how long it will take to complete the project.

A)Forward pass rule
B)Backward pass rule
C)Slack
D)none of the above

Question 70

_____enables the critical path to be identified and permits the determination of slack.

A)Forward pass rule
B)Backward pass rule
C)Slack rule
D)none of the above

Question 71

Project redesign is often used to _____.

A)meet the budget
B)lengthening the critical path
C)lengthening completion time
D)all of the above

Question 72

In general,the most important dimension for evaluating project success is _____.

A)time for completion
B)total cost of the project
C)quality of the completed project
D)all of the above

Question 73

When using the equation Estimate - Actual result = Error to collect data,it is possible to evaluate estimators in terms of _____.

A)how close their total error is to zero
B)how dispersed are their errors
C)whether their errors tend to be biased
D)all of the above

Question 74

Every event node in the PERT network is identified with a four-part scorecard. Which of the following is the correct four-part scorecard?

A)EF ES LS LF
B)ES EF LS LF
C)ES EF LF LS
D)ES LF LS EF

Question 75

Which of the following selections is the set of activities that define the shortest time in which the project can be completed without slippage?

A)path of greatest slack
B)the critical path
C)path of max
D)path of min

Question 76

Which choice translates to allowable slippage in an activity's schedule along a slack path?

A)LS - ES > 0
B)LF - EF > 0
C)Slack > 0
D)all of the above

Question 77

_____ is when each activity will be done in the least possible or minimum time.

A)Normal
B)Peaking
C)Crashing
D)Least-time

Question 78

If you are going to crash one particular activity to get the most effect,which one should be chosen?

A)Choose the activity where Dc/Dt is smallest
B)Choose the activity where Dc/Dt is largest
C)Choose the activity where Dc/Dt = 1
D)Choose the activity where Dc/Dt = 0

Question 79

The largest value of EF and LF at the last node in the network is the

A)backward pass point of the project.
B)project completion time.
C)time-length of the critical path.
D)all of the above

Question 80

Which of the following is the first step required to utilize PERT-type network models?

A)Draw a precedence diagram.
B)Estimate the time to perform each activity.
C)Detail all of the activities.
D)Meet with suppliers.