Course syllabus
7,5 Credits
Grading: TH - Five, Four, Three, Fail
Major subject: Mechanical Engineering
Department: 40 - INDUSTRIAL AND MATERIALS SCIENCE
Eligibility:
In order to be eligible for a first cycle course the applicant needs to fulfil the general and specific entry requirements of the programme(s) that has the course included in the study programme.
Course specific prerequisites
None in particular
Aim
Improve the ability of students to lead and work in projects. (Both industrial and academic projects such as a bachelor thesis project).
Learning outcomes (after completion of the course the student should be able to)
Describe state-of-the-art and important trends in project management, project management frameworks and project organizations in relation to industrial projects
- Explain the driving forces and challenges for project management and project managers.
- Explain how decisions about projects and products will affect a company's business.
- Identify and account for current future trends.
- Describe and apply different forms of project management frameworks, including Water-Fall, Stage-gate, Vee, Lean and Agile project forms.
Describe the function for different project tools and some IT tools for project management and planning.
- Describe basic project management concepts and tools.
- Design a WBS according to accepted principles for industrial projects.
- Adapt a project life cycle model according to principles for graphical planning methiods and be able to follow-up and adapt it to the product life cycle.
- Write a project plan adapted to a specific project.
- Design and describe project goals.
- Categorize different project challenges based on its complexity, e.g. using the NTCP framework.
Describe how projects can be used to control development work in complex organizations.
- Explain and analyse management problems in project environments with the support of appropriate literature.
- Evaluate organizational learning and lessons learned through projects.
- Compare and adapt different frameworks for project-controlled organizations.
- Describe different roles in a project, types of leadership and ways to create motivation in project work.
- Use literature to critically evaluate project management models.
Lectures & Course modules
The course is divided into 7 modules with associated lectures. (See figure below).
The course is organised in traditional lectures, that are also available digitally (pre recorded), with follow up activities such as exercises, discussions and quizzes.
Each module will have a different theme and will require active participation.
Content and Schedule
The course is organised around a series of lectures, exercises and a project work. The modules are presented in the schdule and the course overview.
Literature
A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK® GUIDE ), Available as download, PDF through the Library.
Steven R. Hirshorn, NASA SYSTEMS ENGINEERING HANDBOOK rev 2 (available online and as PDF), 2017
+ a project management book of choice, (You need to justify why this book is relevant, but if you are new to PM pick an easy beginners book, if there is something complex aspect of PM that is of particular interest to you, pick that book). The two above books may not be chosen as your "book of choice".
Examination including compulsory elements
For completion of the course the students must have at least a "passed" grade on a home exam, on the project work and attended the compulsory lectures and exercises. The final grade depends on the results from both the digital exam and from the project work.
The digital exam and the project work is weighted equally towards the final individual grade.
Both the project work and the digital exam will give maximum 22 points. 10 points are required to pass. 10-13 points equal the grade 3, 14-17 points equal the grade 4, 18-22 points gives the grade 5.
Project 3,0c Grading: TH (U-5) 3,0c
Laboratory 1,5c Grading: UG 1,5c
Examination 3,0c Grading: TH (U-5) 3,0c
Examiner: Dag Bergsjö (dagb@chalmers.se)