Control Scope

With excerpts from my Project Management Novel, I will illustrate the many processes of the PMBOK.  Here is the twenty-sixth one: Control Scope. Use this map to see how this process fits into the scheme of processes.   

As the autumn moved into winter and the work on tower moved inside, Robert, the priest, was asking for changes on the interior design of the steeple. At first Gwilym agreed to his changes but soon it became clear that each change cost money and time. He addressed his concerns to Robert.

“Father, you’ve asked me to move that wall three times now. You realize that each time I do that, it costs me a day of two men’s time. Not only is that money out of my pocket, it takes a day away from us finishing on time. I have to keep in control of the project’s scope.”

“I understand, son,” replied the priest. “But it is much cheaper to make the changes now, rather than when the steeple is finished isn’t it?”

“It is certainly cheaper for you. You’re not paying me anything for these changes. But each one is costing me.”

Father Robert looked thoughtfully at Gwilym. “I dare say you’re right. Perhaps you should be charging me from now on.” They agreed to a daily rate for all changes and the priest’s requests dropped significantly.

Verify Scope

With excerpts from my Project Management Novel, I will illustrate the many processes of the PMBOK.  Here is the twenty-fifth one: Verify Scope. Use this map to see how this process fits into the scheme of processes. 

The sponsor for this project was a priest called Robert. He was dark and hairy of body except for his tonsured head. He wore a shy smile and had a self-deprecating manner that Gwilym found disarming. He was very interested in the progress of the project and constantly asked for updates. Gwilym would show him the progress at the end of each day and show him how they would check off deliverables in the project plan.

One day, when Gwilym had indicated that the first floor was complete and proudly checked off that deliverable on the project plan, Robert had stopped him. “Shouldn’t I be the one who does that?” he asked of Gwilym.

Gwilym cocked his head and asked the priest to explain.

“Well,” said Robert, raising his shoulders in an exaggerated shrug and grimace. “Since I’m the sponsor, shouldn’t I be the one who decides that the deliverable is complete?”

Gwilym showed the Quality Assurance measures that went with this deliverable: the length, width and height, the straightness, the smoothness of the walls. All the quality requirements had been met.

Robert looked up at Gwilym and shrugged again. “I know, I know, but I still think it should be me, not you, who decides if it is complete.”

Gwilym shrugged too, raised his hands as if accepting a load from the priest and asked him, “Do you accept this deliverable?”

Robert looked around again at the finished storey and asked to see the plan. Gwilym showed him the quality measures again, went over the measurements and showed him where on the tower each measurement was taken. The priest even took some of his own measurements to satisfy himself. Then he took the quill and ran a stroke through Gwilym’s check mark to turn it into an X.

“I verify that this deliverable is complete,” he said to Gwilym with a smile. “May I do so with all the past deliverables?”

Gwilym took him through each of the earlier ones and showed him, as best he could, how they had met the requirements. Some of the quality measures of the foundations were impossible to see not that they were covered up. Robert dutifully crossed through each of Gwilym’s check marks and grew happier each time.

When they had completed this activity Gwilym asked him, “Shall we have you verify scope each time before I sign them off in future?”

Robert breathed a huge sigh of relief and, shrugging again, said, “Well, that’s probably a good idea.”

Gwilym talked this over on Sunday with Fred. Fred liked the idea and Gwilym summed up the discussion: “There’s a difference between meeting all the quality requirements of the deliverable and getting acceptance by the customer. Even if he doesn’t want us to change anything, he wants to be the one to accept the deliverable, not have us tell him it has been accepted. It’s a good lesson.”

Fred agreed. “Let’s do this on all th’future projects.”

Define Activities

With excerpts from my Project Management Novel, I will illustrate the many processes of the PMBOK.  Here is the seventh one: Define Activities. Use this map to see how this process fits into the scheme of processes. 

That evening Fred was all smiles as he ate with Gwilym and his boys, going over the day’s events. “It’s as though we could see th’whole bridge and tower bein’ built right in front of us! And we could see where we’d be gettin’ in each other’s way and what had to happen before what else. And that Charlie, rememberin’ the road. We’d ha’ been sloggin’ through the mud before we’d a remembered it. I love this tool. I’m comin’ up wi’ a couple of verses for it in my Project Management Guide song.”

Gwilym smiled at his excited foreman. He too, was happy at how well it had worked but he was also a little troubled by this morning’s events. “I think I may have been premature when I said we knew HOW to build the tower. We know the structure of the project but we need more definition in these activities.”

“Wha’ do tha mean, Gwilym?”

Gwilym frowned. “Well, look at some of these activities. Wood for arch supports, for instance. That doesn’t tell how to get there. The men need to do a lot of things to get that wood. Like: Measure arch; measure depth of water, make a drawing of the supports; add up the measurements; add some extra for scrap; order the wood; deliver the wood. Now, the men are doing that, but who’s to say that some of these more defined activities won’t be repeated or skipped or unnecessary, just like activities in the Work Breakdown Structure. I think we need to define these activities better right now before we run into trouble.”

“Aye. I get what tha means, Gwilym. But do tha worry that th’men will think it stupid to have tha write down ever little step? Will they think tha are watchin’ over them like an owld mother hen?”

“Not if they are the ones giving me the steps. And not if I don’t go to ridiculous detail: ‘Walk to bridge, Look up, Take out measuring stick, Place one end at bottom of tower.’ I think they trust me now. I can go to the master of each activity and ask them to define their activities and then pull it all together myself for them to look at as a whole. And I can find the problems myself before I show it to the men so that they will see the value.”

“Sounds like a lot of work”

Gwilym moved around the team throughout the day, getting definition on all the activities and inscribing them all in his scrolls. He checked in on Fred after every level and praised his careful work. He noticed that as Fred painted, he repeated the name of the letter like a mantra, “G, G, G,” Gwilym smiled to himself and continued gathering information from his men.

While they ate dinner together, one of the older men pushed his way to sit across from Gwilym, stuck his chin out and glared at him. “’Ow long ’ave you been a mason, sonny?”

Gwilym cocked his head and admitted he’d never been one.

“Then why don’t you stop askin’ me stupid questions about me doin’ my job and just concentrate on yer own job?”

Gwilym sighed, held the man’s eye and explained. “My job is making sure everything goes smoothly. I’m getting detail on all of the activities we worked out yesterday so that I can make sure we’re not running into each other, or having to do anything twice. When I’m done, we’ll go over it all and look for the problems.”

Gwilym spent the day inscribing all the defined activities into his scroll and, after the boys were asleep, compared each set of activities to work out the problems. The next morning, when the men assembled, he brought them back into the tavern for an hour and went over each set with them. He read the activities out loud, showed where he had made the corrections, and got their input into the changes. The men were at first shocked when Gwilym crossed out and rewrote over the existing scroll. They were accustomed to scrolls being sacred texts, handled by priests. But they soon got used to it and felt respected for their opinions. By dinner they were all satisfied that the work was well defined so they ate and went off to do their jobs. A carpenter said to the disgruntled mason, “At last, you won’t be asking me to do my work again after I’ve finished.” They both laughed and went to their places.

Work Breakdown Structure

With excerpts from my Project Management Novel, I will illustrate the many processes of the PMBOK.  Here is the sixth one: Create Work Breakdown Structure Requirements. Use this map to see how this process fits into the scheme of processes. 

At dawn the next morning, Gwilym and Fred inspected the tower and surrounding land to make broad plans: what they needed to move first, where they would store the materials and where they would place the arch supports. Then they went to the tavern and paid the man in advance for the food and drink he would provide. The day was warm so they opened the door and window and extinguished the fire to keep the room’s air clean.  Fred set up some wood planks on the benches to make a broad table. Gwilym placed a bag full of smooth wood shingles, each about a hand’s breadth square, in the center of this table. Next to this, he placed a quill in a bottle of ink.

The men started drifting in and Gwilym invited them to break their fast. He asked that they drink more water than they do ale, because he wanted their minds sharp for this planning session. He asked each man to introduce himself and name his skill. Gwilym wrote this information on a scroll, checking off skills present with the skills he needed based on his previous estimates. When the team was all assembled he asked if there were any more sawyers. One carpenter said he could bring a friend the next day to add to the team.

“Gentlemen,” began Gwilym, eliciting a laugh from these rough working men. “Allow me to read to you the royal charter for this project, written by Sir Kay and signed by the High King himself: Arthur.” This quieted the men and brought some murmurs of approval from the men as he unrolled the impressive scroll. Gwilym read the charter out loud to the men repeating certain areas to emphasize points.

“So now that we know what we’re doing and where and why we will do it, we are going to determine how we are going to do it.”

Gwilym reached for the bag of small shingles, inked a rough sketch of a finished tower on the first and placed this in the middle of the top of the bench. “This is the goal of the project. A finished tower.” He looked at the men for evidence of their understanding and saw nodding heads in response.

“To get to a finished tower, we need to do six things. First we need to support the old bridge.” He drew a supported arch and placed this on the left of the table, below the level of the previous shingle. “Then we must remove the old tower.” He drew a bridge missing a tower and placed this about a foot to the right of the previous shingle. “Then we need to remove the bridge.” He drew an empty creek channel still containing arch supports and placed this shingle a foot to the right of the last one.

“Next we build a new supported arch, a completed tower and finally remove these supports.” He drew pictures on three more shingles and distributed these to the right of the previous three, revealing the structure shown below.

“So this is the structure of how we are going to rebuild this tower.” Some of the men surrounding Gwilym nodded in agreement and looked at each other with impressed looks on their faces. A few of the older men rolled their eyes.

“If we are in agreement with the basic structure, let’s go into more detail.” Gwilym started making quick drawings to lay out the steps below the drawing of the arch missing the tower.

“Some of us must clear out some space east of the tower. I will be numbering each of the stones on the existing tower so that we can put them back the way they were. Then we take the tower down in layers and place these layers next to each other in the order they came off, with the stones in the same position they held in the tower. We throw away any wood inside, it’s all rotten now.” He had laid out five shingles illustrating these actions below the second shingle. “This is called Decomposition,” he said to his team.

“Meanwhile, one of us can be buying wood for the arch supports,” he drew a pile of lumber and placed this under the first shingle. “They may as well be buying wood for the new arch at the same time.” He placed an identical shingle under the fourth shingle. The wisecracking veterans stopped clowning and paid attention.

“We’ll need to let the boat captains who use this stream know that they either need to find other docks or stay in the wharf all winter while we support the arch.” He placed a picture of a man approaching a boat under the first shingle. The men all laughed at this, picturing irate boat owners trying to reach the river. Gwilym looked around, saw the approving looks, and realized that he had the men now. He continued describing and laying out shingles in their appropriate places.

The table soon looked like this:

“Now, if I were a tyrant, I’d tell you to do exactly what this says and we’d get to work. But I’m no tyrant. I value your experience. What have I forgotten? What did I get wrong? What is done in the wrong order? What could be done better? I want all your input now so that we don’t have to redo our work later.”

The men were hesitant to begin with but, following the veterans, they all gave their input within their own specialties. The sawyer told Gwilym that they needed different wood for arch supports because they would be half submerged. The lead mason told Gwilym that they may be able to reuse the old foundations, saving lots of time. He could assess that as they were reaching the end of the demolition. Others questioned placing the original stones in layers as there was not enough room so they agreed to place three layers on top of each other.

In this fashion the men worked together, moving shingles, replacing them, adding others until they all seemed satisfied. Then Gwilym asked them a question. “See that tower on the top of this Work Breakdown Structure? If we do all the work below, will we end up with that tower, the way the charter wants it?”

The men thought for a while and one of the younger men said, “No. The…charter says we need roads leading to both sides of it. I don’t see any roads in this…structure.”

Gwilym clapped the man on the shoulder and shouted, “Good work, Charlie! Where should we place the road shingles in this structure?”

Charlie swelled up with pride, thought for a while and said, “We need to build the road foundations soon since we’ll need them to move the tower stones to the empty land. But they’ll get destroyed over the winter with all the moving around we’ll be doing. So we’ll need to add more rock as the winter progresses and we’ll have to finish it off last thing. He drew some crude road drawings on three shingles and placed them under the first, second and last shingle.

Once everyone seemed satisfied, Gwilym again looked at the men and asked the same question: “If we do all the work below, will we end up with that tower, the way the charter wants it?” The men thought for a while and then, one by one, looked at Gwilym and nodded.

“A round of ale, barkeep!” shouted Gwilym. “We have cause to celebrate. Now we know WHAT we’re doing, WHY and WHERE and HOW we will build this tower! We’ll eat our dinner and start work.”

After the men ate, Gwilym set them to work. “Carpenters figure out how much wood we need for the arch supports and the tower and go order it. Masons inspect the existing stone and order enough to replace the broken ones. You three clear some space for placing the old tower and the rest of you, start clearing a road.”

Gwilym and Fred transcribed the Work Breakdown Structure, using words and pictures, onto a scroll. Then they went out, Fred supervising the men while Gwilym painted numbers and letters on the existing tower stones in preparation for the orderly demolition.

Define Scope

With excerpts from my Project Management Novel, I will illustrate the many processes of the PMBOK.  Here is the fifth one: Define Scope. Use this map to see how this process fits into the scheme of processes. 

“Now let’s draw what this tower looks like.”

The men all gathered around the second parchment. The overall placement and dimensions of the tower set by Kay caused no dispute. The placement and dimensions of the silo were argued over. Half of the tower meant different things to the workers than to Gwilym. The workers expected that the interior dimensions of the silo should equal half the exterior dimensions of the tower and they couldn’t be made to understand that the walls took up space. Their bickering was giving Gwilym a headache.

Fred spoke up. “This drawin’ shows a cross-section of th’tower, right Gwilym?”

Gwilym agreed.

“Then how about if I draw th’wall separatin’ th’barracks from th’silo and tha pick which side tha want?”

The workers were suspicious and refused this trickery.

“All right then, tha draw the wall and Gwilym will pick which side goes to th’barracks.”

The workers, farmer and shipper squatted on the ground next to the table and scratched out various options in the dirt until they realized what Fred was proposing: the only fair way to divide the tower.

Athelstan spoke to Gwilym. “You are de best writer here. You draw de separating vall and ve vill pick our side.”

Gwilym drew a wall from corner to corner that divided the tower into barracks and silo. Athelstan picked one side and Gwilym drew the location of the stairs on the barracks side. Then he drew interior walls on the rest of the silo’s triangular section, indicating a smooth surface covering the wooden supports. There was still some grumbling as the men saw that their interior dimensions were smaller but Athelstan explained the fairness to them and they stopped arguing.

Gwilym and the farmer decided where the road should go and where they should place openings in the side to pour in the grain. Then he worked with the shipper on the placement of the openings leading to the channel. After computing in his head for a while, Gwilym wrote out a series of numbers, showing how much extra stone and clay they would need to line the silo and the channel to the water. “This you will need to supply,” he told Athelstan.

“Dis tower vill take all vinter to build,” replied Athelstan. “How do ve protect our grain until den?”

“Gather some building materials and build a temporary shelter here. Then, as we build the silo you can add grain as we go. You can use a temporary roof to protect it.”

When all had reached agreement on every detail of the tower, Gwilym signed the bottom of both parchments and asked all men present to do the same.

He titled the first: Requirements of the Airmyn Watchtower.

He titled the second: Scope of the Airmyn Watchtower.

Fred stared off into the distance, moving his lips. Gwilym realized that he was composing another verse or two of his Project Management Guide song. Bleddyn brought more ale and then everyone broke off for dinner.