MODULE 2 CLOSURE
Spring 2010
Compiled by Greg Kinney
“MUDDIEST ITEMS”
MODULE 1 CLOSURE
Spring 2010
Compiled by Greg Kinney
“MUDDIEST ITEMS”
QUESTION:
For me, the ‘muddiest’ item in the module was the section on Constrained Weighted Factor Scoring Model. This model is a combination of the basic Weighted Factor Scoring Model and the addition of additional criteria that must be present or absent in order for a project to be acceptable. This didn’t quite make sense and the breakdown of the changed model equation was not particularly clear on the matter for my understanding either.
ANSWER:
The most familiar example of this approach is the model known as Kepner-Tregoe (named for its creators). If you have a set of identified alternatives for addressing a particular problem, you have a couple of steps to evaluate it. The first we’ll call the feasibility step. In that step, you identify criteria that are go or no-go, and you evaluate the alternatives against those criteria. That way, you eliminate alternatives that do not meet those constraints and you consider them no further. Those alternatives that survive go on to the next step, which we’ll call the optimization step. That’s where we come up with weighted scores based on desirability, which is the kind of thing you did on your homework.
QUESTION:
I know PPP is a very useful and efficient tool to help evaluate projects. My question is, if there is any numeric module or approach to interpret this method just like Weight Scoring Model?
ANSWER:
PPP is not really a tool; it is a process , typically performed by sizeable organizations that have to make decisions among worthy projects as to what is the most necessary and valuable.
QUESTION:
The ‘muddiest’ part of the module was the group section. I was not quite sure of what was expected and not sure what input I was supposed to come up with.
ANSWER:
You need to participate in the discussion, to include debating points if you don’t agree with a particular direction that the group is heading in, or with a point that a team member is making. If you are PM, you’re responsible for organizing and writing the final answer.
QUESTION:
When are un-weighted scoring models used? Can you give me a real-world example?
ANSWER:
This is a good question. If you are doing scoring models, some companies give criteria based on a point system. Rather than weighting the scores in the way that we do in homework, they do essentially the same thing by adjusting the point value of a particular criteria up front. I am very familiar with a company that used this approach for a number of years to do initial project scoring for the project review board. It was simpler to set up the software this way than to go through the weighted approach which – believe it or not – many managers think is complicated.
This may be a testimony to how numerically and logically illiterate some managers become as they climb the corporate ladder. As you’ve discovered, doing a weighted scoring scheme isn’t complicated at all, but often senior managers think it is. At that point, they refuse to deal with it.
QUESTION:
The author states: “An idealist is needed to strip away almost all the reality from a problem, leaving only the aspects of the real situation with which he or she wishes to deal.” Since each model adds another level of complexity/realism, I was surprised that the list was not in the opposite order. Is this because more effort is required to develop weights and constraints?
ANSWER:
I agree with you on the surprise. I think it is because of the extra effort and the fact that some managers feel that weighting models just makes things too complicated. We’ve seen that it really isn’t that complicated, but once that idea sets in for a manager, they are typically closed to any further consideration.
QUESTION:
One of the ‘muddiest’ things from this module is what the real world industry actually uses or if they just go with what is comfortable to them or what their boss said the company has always used.
ANSWER:
I know, it doesn’t seem right that managers in industry would not use good selection models. Some of them really do think that weighted models are too complicated, even though you’ve already found out they are not. Many managers really just rule based on gut feeling.