Scope Creep

In my course this week, I was asked to describe a project that I have done that I experienced issues related to scope creep.  Scope creep refers to “the natural tendency of the client, as well as the project team members, to try to improve the projects output as the project progresses.” (Portney, 2008)  This means that more work was added to the project as time went by.

I was once part of a team that was creating a “show” for parents to watch.  The children were going to perform by dressing up as a famous historical figure and their parents were to guess which character they were.  The project started off with high hopes and intentions.  As the project was moving forward, some of the team members decided that we should also have the students sing a few songs together on stage.  We found appropriate songs and began to practice.  The date of the “show” was coming quickly.  Another team member decided that we should also have a food and drink for the students and parents.  All of these little details added up and now we only had a week to ensure that the students knew there “parts”, were able to sing the songs, and we also had to prepare food, drinks and have a place to gather.  Long story short, it worked out, but I felt it was very disorganized.  The parents were very nice and appreciated what we had done.  To better manage this in the future, I feel that sticking to a plan of action and making sure to have all of the details in the beginning of the project would have made the entire project work more efficiently.

References:

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.

Resources for Estimating ID Costs

My assignment this week was to find two resources on estimating costs for ID projects and review each.  Here they are!

http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/hrd/costs.html

Big Dog and Little Dogs Performance Juxtaposition

This article gives information on budgeting.  It states that most ID projects are now working with a budget and although you may not get it right the first time, it is a good goal to work toward.

It also has helpful figures on some of the costs associated with an ID project.  For example, it has Produce a professional video - $1,000 - $3,000 per-finished minutes.  The variation in the costs associated with this are due to concept, location, talent, special effects, etc.

The article also has estimated development hours.  It estimates that the development time to create one-hour of simple asynchronous eLearning is 117 hours.

http://theelearningcoach.com/elearning_design/isd/time-to-develop-online-learning/

The eLearning Coach For designing smarter learning experiences With Connie Malamed

This blog gives a plethora of resources.  Connie has links to several articles that would be useful in an ID project or environment.  One is a link to an article from ASTD by authors Karl Kapp and Robyn Defelice where they discuss several of the factors that will affect you time estimate.  Another is an article by Donald Clark that provides budgets and cost guidelines and time estimates.

Resources

Big Dog and Little Dogs Performance Juxtaposition, retrieved on October 1, 2014 from http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/hrd/costs.html

Malamed, Connie. The eLearning Coach For Designing Smarter Learning Experiences, retrieved on October 1, 2014 from http://theelearningcoach.com/elearning_design/isd/time-to-develop-online-learning/