Topics 1 & 2 (137 words each) 1 page w/topic identified.
This discussion topic further explores the project charter. Obviously, the content and degree of detail in the charter are dependent on the nature of the project, the practices and degree of project management maturity of the organization, etc. Suppose you are a newly-hired project manager in an organization that has few, if any, formal project management practices and no formal methodology/approach, and you have been assigned a new project which is just starting. The organization does not typically develop charters for their projects. Your sponsor would like you to make a presentation on the key very near-term next steps, and you believe that developing a charter is essential.
1. What would you cover in your presentation to convince your sponsor of the need for the charter-development effort?
2. What resistance might you anticipate and how would you plan on countering it?
TOPIC 2
Managing project knowledge is vital to developing a learning organization – an organization that learns from past mistakes, leverages past work, does not reinvent the wheel, gains insights from the past for future decision making, etc.
1. Discuss some of the challenges an organization may encounter in managing project knowledge. If possible, relate your response to experiences from projects you have managed or been involved with and attempt to provide a broad and wide-ranging perspective – for example, what role do technology, human factors and behaviors/agendas, incentives, management style, emotional intelligence, culture, politics, job security/insecurity, etc. play in ensuring that knowledge is effectively shared and managed.
2. As a project manager, how might you promote and facilitate effective management of project knowledge, and what skills do you believe would be important to do this?
You can respond to this topic even if you have no prior project experience by viewing and addressing it from the more general perspective of effectively capturing and sharing past and present work-related knowledge in any job (not necessarily project-related) in order to better perform future work and to better inform decision making.
