Analyzing Scope Creep

Years ago I moved to Washington State form North Carolina. In the process of the move I decided to leave my vehicle, with hopes of finding a way to get it there later. It took me about a month to get settled in, and eventually I got tired of taking public transportation to get around. I thought it would be more feasible if I got my vehicle shipped rather than flying home and driving cross country. I had to take into account that the cost would simply be too high with having to pay for a ticket for me and my daughter to fly, pay for gas on a long road trip, lodging in order to get rest in between states, and plus the amount of time it would take to get my car their. With all that to be considered, I decided to get my vehicle shipped by a professional auto transport company.

I did research and found a reputable company, paid the non-refundable deposit and set the date for pick up. Everything was on track until……. you’ve got it “Scope Creep”. Let’s just say the car ended up residing in North Carolina for the next four years, due to unexpected circumstances. Scope creep is the change or growth of project scope and my car not being in Washington State with me, turned out to be that change.

Scope changes can make a project larger or smaller, and affect the timeline and the cost of the project (Gurlen, 2003). I lost money, my patients, and most importantly what I was working so hard to get, my car. Even though it was hard for me to handle at the time, I had to adjust to the fact that I would have to depend on public transportation for just a little while longer. After about another couple of months, I saved up some money and bought a used car. That car turned out to be a lemon, but I luckily got my money back and purchased a more reliable vehicle.

What I thought was an easy task or project, turned out to be a little bit of a headache, kind of like scope creep. I made the best out of the situation and found my self becoming more independent and capable of making important decisions. I was young, but learned very important life lessons from this little situation which grew to be a bigger, but workable problem.

References:

Gurlen, S. (2003). Scope Creep. Retrieved February 9, 2011 from, Web site:
http://www.umsl.edu/~sauterv/analysis/6840_f03_papers/gurlen/

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.

Communicating Effectively With Stakeholders

How did your interpretation of the message change from one modality to the next?

• Email- The email message was clear, concise, convenient and polite in its tone. For a busy person on the run, this email message can also be checked virtually anywhere, from cell phones to laptops.
• Voicemail- The message must not be of that much importance if a voicemail is left on the phone. It may not be checked immediately if the person is out of the office for an extended amount if time or just too busy to check their phone messages that particular day.
• Face-to-Face- While email can be a convenient form of communication, especially in the business sector, certain discussions need to be handled in person. If a situation is too in-depth to discuss any other way, I wouldn’t send an email or leave a voicemail, I would arrange for a face to face meeting.

What factors influenced how you perceived the message?

The most important factors that I perceived from the message were that the intended message was short with a clear point, and the tone of voice, tone of the written message, and the body language was positive.

Which form of communication best conveyed the true meaning and intent of the message?

I communicate 99% of the time via email at work, so I would reply to this form of communication more than the two other modalities. As stated before, this particular email message was clear, concise, and polite in its tone. All of the information that was needed for Mark to accomplish the task, that was asked of by Jane, was right there in the email massage.

What are the implications of what you learned from this exercise for communicating effectively with members of a project team?

There are several forms of communication and all forms can be used effectively to get a message delivered. You need choose the correct form of communication at the right time and with a recipient who responds positively to the one you use. In other words if you choose email to send an intended message, the tone could be misunderstood by the recipient and a breakdown in communication occurs. Some individuals communicate better face to face, so sending an email can be ineffective.

Through communication people exchange and share information with one another, and influence one another's attidudes, behaviors, and understandings (Portny, 2008).


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.

Blog Assignment: Learning from a Project “Post-mortem”

I really had to sit down and brainstorm in order to come up with a project that I wanted to elaborate more on. I thought of using on the job examples, but I had none. After juggling around ideas I thought of a perfect example that Dr. Stolovitch discussed in the video program, “Defining the Scope of an ID Project”. When he creating a work breakdown structure chart which simply focused on planning a party, I thought that my last party planning project would be a perfect example for this blog assignment.

This project was my sons second birthday. I began the planning process in mid October, because his actual birthday was in mid December. I had two months to plan a party for about eight, very active 2 year old toddlers. My team consisted of my 14 year old daughter, mainly because she love parties and she was the only one interested in helping her mom. We sat down one day and wrote down a list of things to do. When I saw Dr. Stolovitch’s chart, it reminded me a lot of my list. We had to establish a date and time that was conducive for the parents and kids, a theme that would make my son happy, a place to have it, the kids that would be invited, the supplies needed to make everything happen, and the budget that we were working with.

This list primarily came about, because of the poor planning for my son’s 1st birthday party. Many of my guests didn’t show because of the time and place I selected. First of all, the time of the day was too late for the little ones and it was in the cold of the winter. Of all places, I chose Chuck E Cheese’s as the venue. It was too crowded and busy for anyone to truly enjoy themselves. I guess the ultimate problem was that I’d been planning parties for an older child for so long; I really didn’t remember how to plan correctly for a baby.

This year I got it right after learning from my mistakes. I basically found the list to be very helpful, and the end results of this party proved that everything worked out perfectly, even the cleaning up process. I selected an early time in the day, invited most of the kids from my son’s daycare, and I used the basement in my house for the festivities. My daughter and I then cleaned out the basement and baby/kid proofed it weeks before the party, and shopped for the supplies with in budget at that time as well. I did not want to do anything last minute; especially if I couldn’t find the things I needed for his “Cars” theme. I did want to run around town looking all over what I really wanted, pay more for it somewhere else, or have to just settle for anything. That does sound a lot like “Scope Creep”, which means for any variety of reasons the project may become larger than initially planned. Overall, the party was an overall success, with the help from my team “daughter”, my organizational list, and my past experiences.


Stolovitch, H. (2011). Video Program: “Defining the Scope of an ID Project”. Retrieved January 11, 2011 from Walden University, Web site: http://sylvan.live.ecollege.com/ec/crs/default.learn?CourseID=4744643&Survey=1&47=6446129&ClientNodeID=984650&coursenav=1&bhcp=1