A Sample of my Multimedia Project Created A Year Ago

The following posting contains a variety of content that was created during a Walden University Multimedia course.  I am adding it here so I can link to it via my Pathbrite portfolio for my Capstone project.  I could not find a way to add audio to Pathbrite unless it is in a video that the site allows.

The following script was used for a podcast and it was supplied by the instructor.

A ‘blog’ is a website where entries are written in journal-format.  That is, entries are submitted and displayed in chronological order.  Essentially, a blog is an online diary.  It is used to record personal accounts, just as a written diary is used.  However, a blog can also be used for the reporting of news and fact-based stories, much like a journal. The term ‘blog’ is a combination of two words:  Web + Log = Weblog.  The term ‘Weblog’ was then condensed to the term ‘blog’, which is widely used today.  The term ‘blog’ can be used as a verb, meaning to maintain or add content to a blog, or as a noun, as in the website containing the written content itself.  Blogging has become more and more popular and more widely used, but is, however, just now seeing its potential.  Between news, media, personal logs, current events, popular culture, etc., blogging brings about openness and a new free forum for people to voice their opinions.

Can Scope Creep Ruin A Vacation?

Since I have not done much as a project manager or instructional designer in the past, I thought I would give the example of a camping trip to show how something that sounds like an easy and inexpensive vacation can also end up going over budget to keep everyone happy.

Scope creep is defined in our text as, “the natural tendency of a client, as well as project team members, to try to improve the project’s output as the project progresses” (Portny, Mantel, Meredith, Shafer, Sutton, & Kramer, p. 350, 2008).  Most of us have a desire when we plan events, even vacations, to add all we would like to do in a short amount of time.

The vacation plan can start out simple, as a camping trip in a State Park near the ocean.  You can decide on which beach you want to camp near, and then figure out how much park reservations will cost, and when you need to make them.  Planning early helps to ensure that your choices will be available.  

Food choices for a beach camping trips sounds simple enough.  Hot dogs, and all the things to go with it.  Breakfast will be items that can be cooked on a camp stove easily with minimal maintenance, and clean up.  You are at the beach so what do you really need, right?  The planning seems great since it is a casual type of vacation, and economical since hotels are being avoided.

Once you are on vacation is when the scope creep happens, and the PM (usually a parent, or if with friends, the leader of the group) wants to make sure that everyone has a good time.  You notice that nearby there are some other attractions that seem like fun, such as a boardwalk, and of course everyone wants to go there at night.  It is the third night and everyone is sick of hot dogs, so the decision is made to walk to the nearby town and boardwalk, and find a place to eat there.  Everyone wants pizza!  Of course none of this is planned for, but everyone has credit cards (or the PM does).

The resort prices for pizza are higher than where you live, and at the boardwalk everyone wants ice cream, and to play some of the carnival games.  Now the budget has creeped forward, but everyone is still having fun.

The next day is fine and everyone is happy to eat hot dogs again.  However all the junk food is gone to go with the hot dogs, so someone goes into town to replenish the chips, nachos, and other fun stuff, and brings back more due to the beach atmosphere and exercise increasing appetites.  Of course the prices are much higher than at the discount club grocery store.  However, everyone is happy.

As the weekend draws near the campground gets more crowded, and the weather gets colder as it tends to do on weekends.  That night hardly anyone sleeps because of all the parties going on, and the dogs barking.  So the next morning it is raining, and everyone is in a rotten mood, and decides to drive to a motel or hotel where they can get a nice hot shower, and watch television, and have something besides hot dogs and pizza, and a quiet night of sleep for the long drive home.  Another break in the budget, but everyone had fun!

For next years vacation the planning and saving will start sooner, and there will be extra in the budget for the unforeseen events.

Reference

Portny, S. E., Mantel, S. J., Meredith, J. R., Shafer, S. M., Sutton, M. M., & Kramer, B. E. (2008). Project management: Planning, scheduling, and controlling projects. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Images:

Camping: https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRcd2edD0vMGGcB0q9gKXbuRwaLaRLnly--guk9P6bAjqhS_k2O

Hot Dogs: https://encrypted-tbn3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTkQYyrksvH_10zQppp6u_54SXfVRWsvm9fNPZ4y8AG5nH29FPnaw

My Search for Estimating Costs & Allocations Resources

In my search to locate some resources for estimating costs and allocating resources so that I can get some help for my project at Walden University, I saw similar blogs from former Walden students.  That is where I found the image listed above, so it was interesting to view the resources that the blog listed, too.  The blog is titled, The Lightening Blog, and it is also a blogger blog authored by Julie M. Jones, a student at Walden in 2012.

She used a resource that I also have book marked from earlier classes, and I am sure that this website will also look familiar to my Walden classmates. It is Don Clark's site titled, Big Dog & Little Dog's Performance Juxtaposition.  When you read articles on Clark's site it helps you to gain confidence to get started trying new things, like creating a budget.  Jones found an excellent resource in Clark's site since there are also other links there for more study on creating time allotments for training programs.  Some of the links lead to free resources, and there are others that you have to pay for.

One of the links went to The Elearning Guild, which is a pdf file showing results from 103 individuals who participated in a survey on developing both asynchronous, and synchronous e-Learning projects.  The survey is a time ratio survey comparing the developmental time to create one minute of and e-Learning course, along with general questions about the organization.

Here are the links for my first 3 resources:

Clark, D.  (2010).  Big dog & little dog's performance juxtaposition. Estimating costs and time in instructional design. Retrieved on February 4, 2015 from http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/hrd/costs.html

THE ELEARNING GUILD. (2002). The e-Learning development time ratio survey.  Retrieved from http://www.elearningguild.com/pdf/1/time%20to%20develop%20Survey.pdf

Jones, J. (2012, July 25).  The Lightening Blog.  Estimating costs and allocating resources. Retrieved on February 4, 2015 from http://jmjidt.blogspot.com/ 

General Eisenhower and Lessons in Project Management of D-day

In our discussion posts at Walden University, one of the classmates is in the US Military and gave the following two quotes in his discussion post which led to my reply.

A German military strategist once said, “No battle plan survives contact with the enemy.”  Even General Eisenhower famously stated, “Plans are useless, but planning is indispensable.”  The point of these two great military minds really are the same, that planning is indispensable, but being prepared for what could go wrong is even more important. 

Your post reminded me of watching the Military Channel® with my father and I am always fascinated by the D-Day Normandy invasion.  That is why I have to comment on your post (even if it is the last day). The source I am using to write this is from www.history.com, and shows the importance that weather forecasting and communication with General Eisenhower played in executing the well planned mission (Klein, 2014). Only one meteorologist was allowed to have direct contact with Eisenhower, and his reports would play a vital role in WWII (Klein, 2014).

It is amazing to think of the technology used in 1944 to predict the weather and to also predict that if the invasion was postponed from June, 5, to the following day there would be a temporary break in the weather that would turn the high probability of a disastrous landing on Omaha beach to one with a higher probability of success (Klein, 2014).  The Allied forces had more advanced methods to forcast the weather than the Nazis, and it involved a chain of communication among several meteorologists (Klein, 2014).  The Nazis believed that there would be ongoing storms throughout June making and sea to land invasion impossible, so they reduced their forces guarding the beaches in their occupied countries (Klein, 2014).

General Eisenhower listened to his SME advisor about the weather, and made a decision that lead to the start of the turn of the Nazi's control over victory in WWII.  Taking a huge risk in his decision and having so many men sacrifice their lives to die for their country and the fight to eliminate the Nazi power's control of Europe proved to be the right move for Eisenhower (Klein, 2014).  If General Eisenhower postponed the invasion, it would not have been possible to be carried out for another year (Klein, 2014).  That would have meant another year of lives lost, and the horror of the Concentration Camps would have lasted longer. General Eisenhower was the PM in this project and he made wise use of those who advised him, trusted in their judgements and made the right decisions.

Reference

Klein, C.  2014.  The weather forecast that saved D-Day.  Retrieved from http://www.history.com/news/the-weather-forecast-that-saved-d-day

Photo Credit:  "Into the Jaws of Death 23-0455M edit" by Chief Photographer's Mate (CPHoM) Robert F. Sargent - This media is available in the holdings of the National Archives and Records Administration, cataloged under the ARC Identifier (National Archives Identifier) 195515.This tag does not indicate the copyright status of the attached work. A normal copyright tag is still required. See Commons:Licensing for more information.English | Español | Français | Italiano | Македонски | മലയാളം | Nederlands | Polski | Português | Русский | Slovenščina | Türkçe | Tiếng Việt | 中文（简体） | 中文（繁體） | +/−High resolution file from http://narademo.umiacs.umd.edu/cgi-bin/isadg/viewobject.pl?object=10623. Licensed under Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Into_the_Jaws_of_Death_23-0455M_edit.jpg#mediaviewer/File:Into_the_Jaws_of_Death_23-0455M_edit.jpg

Communicating Effectively

The following video shows what might happen to brave communicators, who really do not know how to get their message across the way they want it to be interpreted. Our blogging assignment for this week is to analyze the same message delivered three different ways, and to state how we responded to the message with each type of delivery. I do not believe any animals were really harmed in the making of this video, but proceed with caution because the animals are really cute.

Here is a screen shot of the message text that we saw in an email as shown, then heard in a voice mail message, and finally saw a video clip of a face to face delivery of the message.  

Image Taken From:  http://mym.cdn.laureate-media.com/2dett4d/Walden/EDUC/6145/03/mm/aoc/index.html

My first impression of the email message was that the writer, Jane, was facing an upcoming deadline and needed Mark to complete his task and get it to her so that she would meet meet her deadline. I sensed urgency in Jane’s email and that it might not have been the first contact that she had had with Mark requesting an ETA for his report, or more important some data so that she could work on her assignment.

My impression from the voice mail message was that Jane did not want an over the telephone confrontation with Mark, since she called knowing that he was in meetings all day.  Perhaps she knew if she talked to Mark, he would have come up with excuses, or maybe he talks a lot and she did not want to waste time, but wanted to get right to the point of what she needed him to do.

The face to face conversation seemed like the best way for Jane to let Mark know what she needed.  The fact that she was standing up looking over the cubicle wall led me to believe that he was sitting at his desk and available to listen or to respond.  Also Jane got right to the point, and she did not appear angry or upset, but seemed to be understanding Mark's work load when viewing her body language. She delivered the message to Mark in a calm manner.  She did not demand that he hand over the information right away, but gave him some breathing room by allowing him to send the data to her by email.

The factors that influenced how I perceived the messages include my own communication strategies.  Often times I will send an email because I can BBC copies to either myself, or someone with more authority who I want to document my communication with, or to another interested party.  I also use email when I do not want to be on the telephone for a long amount of time, or have the time to meet with the person face-to-face.  Often times in my emails I ask to set up a time when we can talk over the phone, or meet face to face (including the amount of time I need).

I do not like to waste time talking on the telephone at work, so I might do what Jane did, and leave a detailed message, so that I am not interrupted when there is something important that I can leave in a 1-2 minute message.  That way the listener can choose how he or she wants to respond, and we do not get side tracked.

When Jane met with Mark face to face it did not seem that she caught him off guard, and when I need to discuss something with a colleague face to face, I will stop by to see if they are in their office, or call first to see if it is okay to stop by before showing up.  I will not show up at a colleague’s desk and demand something from them at that moment. They usually know what I need prior to my visit.

Authors Portney, Mantel, Meredith, Shafer, Sutton, & Kramer write about formal and informal communication in Chapter 10 of their book (2008).  All of Jane’s messages were of an informal nature, but for documentation purposes the email would have been the better in my opinion.  I would have also kept a log of the voice mail message, and the face to face conversation.  By the nature of the content of the message I would hope that Mark was aware of his responsibilities as part of the project team, and that he was in the communication loop for updates to project deadlines (Portney et al, 2008).

These three forms of communication with the same message have shown the importance of all team members being aware of their role on the team and the sequencing of tasks along with due dates (Portney et al, 2008).  There should also be some line of leadership, so that individuals on the same team can avoid confrontations with each other and keep a working relationship in tact (Portney et al, 2008).

References

Laureate.  (n.d.) The art of effective communication. [Multimedia Program].  Retrieved from http://mym.cdn.laureate-media.com/2dett4d/Walden/EDUC/6145/03/mm/aoc/index.html

Portny, S. E., Mantel, S. J., Meredith, J. R., Shafer, S. M., Sutton, M. M., & Kramer, B. E. (2008). Project management: Planning, scheduling, and controlling projects. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Reputeagency.  (2010, October 5).  A guide to effective communication.  [Video file]  Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwjAAgGi-90

Post-Mortem Analysis of a Project Idea That Failed When Put Into Action

Approximately five years ago our administrators wanted the staff to come up with 5 success skills that both staff and students would focus on, and we would develop a one semester long course for our students to take, with each unit detailing one of the skills.  I was on the team that would roll out their skill first, and we did not have a lot of time to complete it, but there are a lot of over achievers where I work and we did meet the deadline.  The five skills are:  Initiative, Responsibility, Communication, Teamwork, and Commitment.  At the time we were working on this course, we were also having a new school constructed.  It was an exciting time, but very stressful since school was still in session.

All of the course creators wanted the course to count as elective credits, but the administrators did not think the course had enough rigor to be a stand alone elective.  The name of the course was Success Skills.  Each unit during the first semester of the following year we were going to require all students to take one of the 5 skills packets of work, and complete it, and meet with their facilitator to discuss it and review their work in it.  The rollout of the Success Skills was to be a part of the opening of the new school.

The staff's concerns were that it would be difficult to get the students to complete the work due to the main fact that our students are focused on credits.  They do not want to do extra work with no reward.  We used volunteers from our ASB Leadership (Associated Student Body) class to test the course and got feedback from them at meetings where new units for the course were presented and staff members were divided into groups to go through one activity in the packet and present their findings.  The students worked along with the staff members.

The students were honest in giving their feedback about the course and most liked it but said if it had no course credits assigned to it they would not want to do the work.  Administration made it mandatory for us to assign the course the following school year even though the staff who had to create the course believed what the ASB students said about the course.

It was a shame to see so much effort not make it past 2 or 3 units, and to reach the full potential that it could have reached.  Now that I know more about pre-planning a project and listening to your stakeholders, I can see the mistakes that were made by the project managers (higher level administrators) for this course.  It is difficult to believe that higher level administrators for schools can lose touch with how students think so fast.  Our ASB students volunteer countless hours of time on campus to plan and run lunch time events, fund raisers, and attend strategic planning sessions where we need to represent the student population.  They are mostly over achievers, and did take the Success Skills course as part of their ASB grade.  However, they said other students would not take it without some sort of reward; preferably course credits.

I had some success with students completing the work by counting it as extra credit in their English packet work.  As long as they were getting something for their efforts they were not as reluctant or did not completely refuse to do the work, at least for the first 2 units.

The chart below demonstrates some of the positive and negative outcomes. "Post Mortem” Review Questions found on pages 42–43 of The Project Management Minimalist. Just enough PM to Rock Your Projects! were used as a guide to format the chart.

Positive and Negative Outcomes to the Design of the Success Skills Course

Positive	Negative
Teamwork in designing each unit	Administration gave the assignment, and deadlines, but did not participate in creating the units.
A well balanced set of activities	Administration would not allow a full course to be created adding elective credits.
Approximately 12 hours of work to complete	Students did not complete all of the assignments.
One person in the Unit group was given the leadership duties.	Once the unit was tested by staff and students no changes were made.
All units were ready by the due dates.	Staff was expected to have all students complete all the packets despite objections.

Looking back at this experience with the knowledge I have about planning projects, it seems that this one was doomed from the early stages. There was not an established need for the course to begin with, especially since it was not being created as a required elective with credits for all students. On pages 30 and 31 of the book, Project Management: Planning, Scheduling, and Controlling Projects, the authors talk about defining projects, including what the need is for the project, and what the expected outcomes are. There must be a valid reason and that reason should be understood and agreed upon by the decision makers involved before the work on the project begins (Portny, Mantel, Meredith, Shafer, Sutton, & Kramer, 2008).  In the case of the Success Skills Course; once it was discovered that it was not really a valid course, but perceived as busy work by the students, there was no real need or reason for the facilitators to assign the extra work.

References

Greer, M. (2010). The project management minimalist: Just enough PM to rock your projects! (Laureate custom ed.). Baltimore: Laureate Education, Inc.

Portny, S. E., Mantel, S. J., Meredith, J. R., Shafer, S. M., Sutton, M. M., & Kramer, B. E. (2008). Project management: Planning, scheduling, and controlling projects. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Happy New Course and New Year-2015!

Welcome blog readers from EDUC-6145-3 Project Management in Ed & Training!

This is Gayle, and it is nice to be posting on my blog again.  Let me know if you have any difficulties following this blog.  I look forward to visiting your blogs, too, so be sure to give a link back to them. This is going to be a quick post, but I thought I would leave you with some Project Management cartoons I found around the internet.