3.

Scope Management

Software
Project Management

Lesson 3
Alton Chua

3. Project Scope Management

Project Scope Management

• What is project scope management
• Scope planning
• Scope definition
• Work breakdown structure
• Scope verification
• Scope Control

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 3. Scope Management

Project Scope Management

• Scope refers to all the work involved in creating the

products of the project and the processes used to create
them.

• A deliverable is a product produced as part of a project,

such as hardware or software, planning documents, or
meeting minutes.

• Project scope management includes the processes

involved in defining and controlling what is included in a
project

3. Project Scope Management

Five Processes
• Scope planning
– Deciding how the scope will be defined, verified, and controlled

• Scope definition
– Reviewing the project charter and preliminary scope statement and adding
more information as requirements are developed and change requests are
approved

• Creating the WBS

– Subdividing the major project deliverables into smaller, more manageable
components

• Scope verification
– Formalising acceptance of the project scope

• Scope control
– Controlling changes to project scope
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Scope Planning

• Planning effort varies

– According to project size, complexity, importance and other
factors

• Main input: project charter, preliminary scope

statement and project management plan
– Bases for making scope management decisions

• Main output: a scope management plan

– The scope management plan includes descriptions of how
the team will prepare the project scope statement, create the
WBS, verify completion of the project deliverables, and
control requests for changes to the project scope

3. Project Scope Management

Scope Definition

• Tools and techniques

– Analysing products, identifying alternative approaches,
understanding stakeholders’ needs, and using expert
judgment

• Main output: project scope statement

– improve the accuracy of time, cost and resource estimation;
it provides a baseline for performance measurement and
project control; and it adds to communicating clear work
responsibilities

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Project Scope Statement

• Essential components
– Overall objectives and justification.
– Detailed descriptions of all project deliverables.
– Characteristics and requirements project products.

• Additional components
– Project success criteria,
– Project boundaries,
– Project acceptance criteria,
– Constraints and assumptions,
– Project organisation,
– Risks,
– Milestones,
– Cost estimate (order of magnitude),
– Configuration management requirements,
– Approval requirements,
– References to other documents: product specification, corporate
policies, and other technical design documents.
3. Project Scope Management

Work Breakdown Structure

• A deliverable-oriented grouping of the work involved in a project

that defines the total scope of the project.

• A foundation document that provides the basis for planning and

managing project schedules, costs, resources, and changes.

• Key inputs:
– Project scope statement and project management plan

• Main technique: decomposition

– Subdividing project deliverables into smaller pieces, based on how the
work will be performed.

• Main outputs:
– The WBS, WBS dictionary, a scope baseline, and updated documents
(input docs)

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 3. Scope Management

Sample WBS (by products)

3. Project Scope Management

Sample WBS (by phase)

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 3. Scope Management

Sample WBS (In Gantt Chart)

3. Project Scope Management

Approaches to developing WBS

• Analogy approach:
– Review WBSs of similar projects and tailor to your project.

• Top-down approach:
– Start with the largest items of the project and break them down.

• Bottom-up approach:
– Start with the specific tasks and roll them up.

• Mind-mapping approach:
– Write tasks in a non-linear, branching format and then create the
WBS structure.

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Approaches to developing WBS

3. Project Scope Management

WBS Dictionary and Scope Baseline

• Many WBS tasks are vague and must be explained in more

detail so people know what to do and can estimate how
long the work will take and what it will cost.

• A WBS dictionary is a document that describes detailed

information about each WBS item.

• The approved project scope statement and its WBS and

WBS dictionary form the scope baseline, which is used to
measure performance in meeting project scope goals.

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Group Discussion

• List three characteristics of a good WBS

3. Project Scope Management

Scope Verification
• Many IT projects suffer from scope creep and poor scope
verification

• Thus, scope verification is essential: Formal acceptance of

the completed project scope by the stakeholders.

• Inputs: scope statement, WBS, scope management plan,

and deliverables.

• Outputs: accepted deliverables, requested changes ad

recommended corrective actions.

• Main techniques: inspection (by customers, sponsors,

users).

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Scope Control

• Scope control involves controlling changes to the

project scope.

• Goals of scope control are to:

– Influence the factors that cause scope changes.
– Ensure changes are processed according to procedures
developed as part of integrated change control.
– Manage changes when they occur.

• Variance is the difference between planned and actual

performance.

3. Project Scope Management

Case Study
1. What was the intended objectives of Taurus?

2. What happened to Taurus?

3. What lessons could be learned from Taurus?

4. What implications does the Taurus hold for

software project managers?

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Bibliography
Textbook: Chapter 5

Drummond, H. (1998). Riding a tiger: some lessons of Taurus.

Management Decision, 36(3), 141-146

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