Department of Technology Management and Innovation

MG 8203: Project Management

Summer 2019
Dr. Mihir Parikh
Mihir@NYU.edu

Version: 23-April-2019 (This version supersedes all previous versions)

This case represents a fictitious situation for learning purposes. Any resemblance to a real
situation, company or person is only by coincidence.

With the exponential upsurge of transactional and marketing data in recent years, companies are
unable to keep up with their internal server-based data centers. They are looking a solution in which a
reliable partner who can provide hassle-free, low-cost storage of data, while they rather focus on
their own businesses. That is where KloudMe comes in. Founded in 2015, KloudMe, Inc. has grown
rapidly over the years to become a leading provider of cloud-based data storage services.

When hired, KloudMe helps its clients transition their internal data services to an external cloud-
based platform. Each transition is a unique project requiring proper planning and execution of the
plan. A failure or delays in a transition can significantly affect the operations of the client and, hence,
incur severe penalties for KloudMe.

SpicySoya, a fast-growing restaurant chain, caters to vegans and vegetarians with delicious plant-
based food alternatives. With its unique focus on the food habits of individual customer, SpicySoya
continuously collects data about its customers. Although initially its internal data center supported
the company well, it is now finding it hard to keep up with the rapidly growing data needs.

Few months back, Ms. Jackie Schmidt, Chief Information Officer of SpicySoya contacted Mr. Torrey
Jackson, Vice President of KloudMe, regarding moving data services to cloud and hiring KloudMe for
the project. Working together, they came up with a plan for the transition.

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The transition will start with an introductory meeting of IT staff of SpicySoya and consultants from
KloudMe. After the meeting, security consultants of KloudMe will determine and prepare an initial
report on the security considerations in cloud-based data services. The report preparation will take
place over six days. In parallel, dataflow consultants of KloudMe will analyze the dataflow among
different applications and servers of SpicySoya. This analysis will take four days. Then, using the
security considerations and dataflow, security consultants will spend five days to determine the
security gaps and procedures to close those gaps. Meanwhile, after analyzing the dataflow and using
the security considerations, dataflow consultants will determine new dataflow parameters in the
following six days. Then, both security and dataflow consultants will get together to completely
redefine the system parameters based on the procedures to close the security gaps and new dataflow
parameters. This will take five days. Meanwhile, using the new dataflow parameters, the network
consultants will spend four days to develop network rerouting procedures. Then, security and
dataflow consultants will integrate redefined systems parameters in the network rerouting
procedures to prepare an overall cloud-based dataflow plan. This will take six days. In parallel, using
the network rerouting procedures, the network consultants will install new network routers in four
days. Then, in this important step in the transition, all three types of consultants—security, dataflow
and network—will come together to implement the cloud-based dataflow plan using the newly
installed network routers. This will take four days. After the implementation, security consultants will
create new user accounts in the following three days. After the implementation, dataflow and
network consultants together will test the dataflow and monitor network performance for five days.

Short Case Report Requirements:

Your Short Case Report should address the followings:

• Prepare a work breakdown structure for this project with – Activity ID, Activity Name,
Duration, Predecessor, and Involved People.
• The AON network of this project
• Which activities are critical?
• How long the project will take to finish?
• Gantt charts of the project – 1) with the earliest start times and, 2) with the latest start times
• What are the slacks—Total Slack and Free Slack—for each activity?

Report Format:

• The report must contain a title (Short Case 1) and your full name on the first page.
• It can be handwritten, but legible. If the report is not legible to the instructor, the student
would run the risk of reduced points due to misunderstanding or non-readability.
• If typed up, it should be in Ariel (or Helvetica or equivalent font), 10 point size, Single
spaced, 1” margin on all sides.
• There is no limit on the length of the report.

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Report Submission:

• Submit your Short Case Report as one file in the .PDF format, regardless of whatever
software you use—Microsoft Word, Microsoft, Excel, Microsoft PPT, Google Docs,
Scanned hand-written notes (should be readable), Microsoft Visio, etc..
o If you don’t have Adobe Acrobat, use free PDF maker software available on
the web such as - PDF Split and Merge, PDFedit, PDF ReDirect 2.2.5; PDF995
Printer Driver 8.4; CutePDF Writer 2.7; PdfEdit995 8.0.
o If you are submitting a handwritten report, please scan all your papers into
one PDF file.
• Name of the PDF file should be as, 8203Sum19_Case
1_YourLastName_YourFirstName.PDF (e.g. 8203Sum19_Case 1_Peterson_Jane.PDF). This
will help me great deal in managing your report file.
• Please submit you Short Case Report only one time. Your first submission will only be
considered. No revised submissions will be allowed. So, please double check your report
before you submit.
• Submit your file via email before the deadline. Late submissions will incur stiff penalties.