week ’ sfirst chapter reading gives W r i t i n g

In 200 words, reply to this discussion post. Needed ASAP!

Planning for a project is the prime step while starting a project. Evaluate what activities

can be included, and the resources needed for it. The procurement management comes into play

at this stage where the work or the services that needs to be contracted are managed. This week’s

first chapter reading gives an overview of the process involved during procurement and how it is

managed. This management involves plan the things that need to be contracted and the process

of doing them, provide the requirements to contractors, bidding takes place, a contractor is

chosen and contract is signed, monitor the contract closely and once work is completed, contract

is closed out. In this week’s first chapter reading I found learning about the concepts on

procurement process and the types of contracts quite knowledgeable. The second chapter reading

for this week is about quality planning which explains the term quality and gives out information

regarding the quality planning tools and techniques. Quality is all about making sure that the

project is being built according to the terms, conditions and standards that were agreed upon

while doing it efficiently (Watt, 2019). It is same as meeting the budget or the schedule goals. I

found the information on various tools and techniques on planning and controlling the quality of

a project that the chapter provides interesting.

Procurement management plan is one of the management plans used in a project. It is all

about giving out work or receiving services in the form of contracts. There are different types of

contracts mentioned where the major kinds of contracts mentioned would be fixed-price contract

which means contracting on an agreed upon price and the cost-reimbursable contracts are used

where the activity budget is unknown and the cost is reimbursed by the client after completing

the work. The process provided in the chapter clearly explains the steps in the cycle reflecting

the activities involved from opening to closing the contracts. The first step is to develop a plan

that foresees the entire activities that will help the contract to complete successfully which

includes selection of the contract approaches, preparing the contract quotes, evaluating the

contracts, signing the contract, monitoring the quality, managing any changes and closing the

project and each of these steps take time depending on the complexity of the project. The

contract approach is selected in the next step where the technical team, project management

team, and the procurement team are involved in determining the approach to be used. After the

RFQ or the RFP is prepared, checking is done for potential bidders and then the bids are

evaluated in response to the RFQs where the lowest total price for the work being contracted will

win the contract. The contract is awarded after verification of all the conditions of the bud and

the contract with the potential contractor. Later while the work is in progress the client company

tracks the performance and its quality. I have found this information useful and will help me in

my future projects.

Quality planning is also a crucial component in the lifecycle of a project as others.

Conformance to requirements is the core for the satisfaction and is used as a measure to check if

the project gives out what it is intended to do so (Watt, 2019). For doing so planning is necessary

and is done so during the preparation of the scope of the project. There are various techniques

and tools to determine and control the quality and the extent to which one or more are used

depends on the complexity of the project. Some of the quality tools are cost-benefit analysis tool

where the costs are evaluated against the benefits or gains form the project, benchmarking tool

where the results from the previous projects is applied to the current one, control charts tool

which is used to determine the acceptable limits, design of experiments tool, cost quality, cause-

and –effect diagram tool, etc. Once the quality plan is in place, the guidelines are known for

managing the quality of the project including the strategies to monitor the quality (Watt, 2019).

Reference

Watt, A. (2019). Project Management. 2nd Edition, BCcampus, Open Education.