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Explain What Is Meant By The Term Project Scope

Paul Naybour Paul Naybour

Published: 18th January 2016

Explain what
is meant by the term Project Scope (10 Marks):-

Project
scope is all the products produced, and all of the work required to produce the
products, the outcomes, and the benefits derived from the use of the products.

With the aid
of suitably labelled diagrams where appropriate explain four aspects of
defining a Project’s scope (40 Marks):-

  1. Scope starts to be defined during the
    concept phase where the benefits are determined in the Business Case, and then the
    further defined during the Definitions stage and recorded in the PMP.   It is defined through requirements capture
    and analysis by liaising with the users and stakeholders. During this stage it
    should be ensured that the scope in the PMP is fully aligned with the Business
    Case.  Scope detailed can be further defined
    during the Development phase, until the Products that will be produced are
    formed.

  • The Product Breakdown is produced to
    provide a detailed hierarchical representation of all of the Products, and the hierarchical
    representation of the work required to produce the Products is produced as a
    Work Breakdown Structure. The Products within the Product Break down Structure
    are put under Configuration Control, and documented as part of the configuration
    items list.

  • Ensure there is a plan in place for design
    freezes at certain stages of the development to ensure stability of latest
    versions and therefore prevent too much uncertainty and costly re-work.  For example for an engineering project the architectural
    design will be frozen with no further changes authorised to that part of the
    design, which would be checked to ensure that he design is in line with the
    agreed Requirements and is therefore inside the scope of the project, before  proceeding to the next detailed design phase.

  • The Products are monitored and
    assessed as the project progresses utilising the implementation of a Change
    Control process to ensure that uncontrolled changes are not introduced, and to
    prevent scope creep. This will involve ensuring that Changes are formally
    requested, and analysed with any additional time, cost, and quality impact to
    the inter-related products understood. 
    Changes must then be agreed and this may be by members of a relevant Change
    Control Board for the project, and be authorised by the Sponsor before
    implementing the Change.