PRM701 Project Management Principles

Assessment and Submission Details

Marks: 30 % of the Total Assessment for the Course

Due Date Report: Week #11 (Thursday @ 5pm)

Assignments are to be submitted by SafeAssign.

DO NOT SUBMIT THE ASSIGNMENT TO THE

COURSE CO-ORDINATOR OR TUTOR.

The assignment will be marked out of a total of 100 marks. Once marked, ALL assignments will be checked for plagiarism and/or collusion between individuals. Please remember this assignment is an individual task and must be your own work.

Refer to your Course Outline or the Course Web Site for a copy of the “Student Misconduct, Plagiarism and Collusion” guidelines.

Note: Each student MUST be able to produce a copy of their assignment and this copy MUST be produced within 24 hours of it being requested by the Course Co-ordinator. Failure to produce the second copy of the assignment when requested may result in loss of marks or a fail grade for the assignment.

Requests for an extension to an assignment extension MUST be made prior to the date of submission and requests made on the day of submission or after the submission date will only be considered in exceptional circumstances. Please note because this assignment forms the basis of the next task extensions will not be given without documented medical evidence off inability to work.

Case Study: NBN CO Australia

Background:

NBN Co (National Broadband network Corporation) was established in 2009 to design, build and operate Australia’s wholesale broadband access network. Underpinned by a purpose to connect Australia and bridge the digital divide, NBN Co’s key objective is to ensure all Australians have access to fast broadband as soon as possible, at affordable prices, and at least cost.

To achieve this objective, NBN Co has been structured as a wholesale-only, open-access broadband network. NBN Co provides services on its local access network on equivalent terms to retail phone and internet providers, to provision for end-user needs. This is intended to level the playing field in Australian telecommunications, creating real and vibrant competition within the industry and providing choice for consumers.

Since establishment, the Government has presented NBN Co’s mandate through a Statement of Expectations (SoE) which is supplemented from time to time by policy directives and correspondence. NBN Co’s current objectives are set out in the 24 August 2016 SoE.

NBN Co is wholly owned by the Commonwealth of Australia as a Government Business Enterprise (GBE), incorporated under the Corporations Act 2001 and operated in accordance with the Public Governance, Performance and Accountability Act 2013 (PGPA Act).

The rollout of the NBN Co broadband access network remains one of the largest and most complex infrastructure initiatives undertaken in Australia. NBN Co is the company helping Australia transition to a digital future by building and operating this new high-speed, wholesale local access broadband network.

The Company’s purpose is to lift the digital capability of Australia, allowing Australians to have access to a fast, reliable broadband network, at least possible cost to the taxpayer.

There are more than 30,000 people working around the country on this important transition. And NBN Co is committed to for NBN Co to be a great place to work, underpinned by a customer-led culture. For example, NBN Co works in collaboration with Retail Service providers (RSPs), the industry, regulators and the government to better understand customers’ needs and their experience with their services.

As the network wholesaler, NBN Co provides wholesale broadband to Retail Service Providers (RSPs) on a non-discriminatory basis. This approach is intended to level the playing field in the Australian telecommunications industry, enhancing competition and providing greater choice for customers3 across the country.

The commitment is to deliver access to peak wholesale download data rates of at least 25 megabits per second (Mbps) to premises, and at least 50Mbps peak wholesale download data rates to 90 per cent of the fixed-line network.

There is also now real evidence that this network is having an impact on Australia. It has helped create jobs and new businesses, boosted the economy, supported more people to work from home and created more entrepreneurs.

As NBN Co look to the future and complete the network, the impact will be greater as more people are connected.

In your role as a Business Analyst team you have delivered a report that outlines proposed projects, your team prioritised them and delivered a charter for one.

You are to refer to your work in task one and work individually to do this work on potential projects for NBN Co. Choose one project that you identified during task one and develop a project plan for this project containing the sections listed below. Please note that this project need not be the one for which you developed a charter in Task 1. Make sure that your project plan is distinct, e.g. differentiate milestones, project requirements, limitations and exclusions, work/ process breakdown schedule, risk management, and project budget, and communication plan.

This report should address the following issues and you should include the following sections in the main body of the report. Please note standard report structure must be adhered to. There are standard templates available on blackboard for some sections.

As a guideline you may want to consider the following report sections:

1. Project Background which includes a summary of Task 1 and the following sub-sections
2. Project Background

You need to go beyond the given case study and include what is happening in the business environment that forms the background to the project.

1. Project goal
2. Project objective
3. Project deliverables
4. Strategic alignment of project.
5. Project Schedule which includes the following sub-sections

1. Milestones
2. Project requirements
3. Limits and exclusions
4. Work/ process breakdown schedule

3. Risk management
4. Project Budget
5. Communication management plan. You can find a sample communication strategy plan in your lecture materials. You need to complete a stakeholder analysis, list communication modes and justify the inclusion of each mode to both internal and external stakeholders.
6. Recommendations

Assignment Requirements and Deliverables

Your submission will be a Microsoft Word document.

Resubmission due to uploading an incorrect file will not be permitted.

Submission

The completed assignment is to be submitted by SafeAssign on or before the due date.

The assignment will be assessed according to the marking sheet (Appendix A). Late submission of the assignment will be penalised according to the USC policy.

Assignment Return and Release of Grades

Assignment grades will be available on the course web site on two weeks after week 5 at the latest. An electronic assignment marking sheet will be available.

Where an assignment is undergoing investigation for alleged plagiarism or collusion the grade for the assignment and the assignment will be withheld until the investigation has concluded.

Assignment Guidelines

This assignment will take a few weeks to complete and will require a good understanding of the Project Management material for successful completion. It is imperative that students take heed of the following points in relation to doing this assignment:

1. It would pay to start this assignment early.
2. Ensure that you clearly understand the requirements for the assignment – what has to be done and what are the deliverables.
3. If you do not understand any of the assignment requirements – ASK.
4. Each time you work on any aspect of the assignment reread the assignment requirements to ensure that what is required is clearly understood.