Describe a project, either personal or professional, that experienced issues related to scope creep. What specific scope creep issues occurred? How did you or other stakeholders deal with those issues at the time? Looking back on the experience now, had you been in the position of managing the project, what could you have done to better manage these issues and control the scope of the project?

In 1990, I worked as a graphic arts instructor at a local vocational school. Twenty-one years ago I realized that the school lacked current technology resources. I had to develop a plan to meet the social change within our business community in order to have my students employed within the district. I was instructed by my supervisor to develop a five year plan to incorporate current technology into my program.

That year, I presented a plan to the board of education for incorporating computers into my department for a graphic design lab. I had to unfreeze the administration's attitude about the use of technology in meeting local corporations request for computer savvy students. The moving process entailed data and statistics collected from community leaders and then presented to the board of education. Regrettably, I did not have verbal or formal suggestions from community leaders signed in a summary report. I lacked the evidence from the community required to support my five year plan.

Unfortunately, since I did not have prior experience as a project manager, I had underestimated the resources and cost required to meet the board of education's projected one year plan. The first year plan embedded a purchase of three computers which followed one additional computer purchase each year after the first initial phase. The cost did not exceed over $9,000 dollars total for three Macintosh computers and one small black and white printer. Nevertheless, I had fifty students enroll into my program and I taught multimedia skills with three small Macintosh computers. Sadly, the technology lacked in the ability to perform the required skilled need to employee students in the community. I had no control over the purchase of the equipment. My principal ordered the computers without my knowledge prior to school starting in September of 1991. Obviously, there was a miscommunication on the purchase of the type of computers that was required for my program. I made accommodations that year and I survived working with three small computers and one black and white printer. Again, I reassessed the project and realized that I had to adjust to the project plan and deal with the modifications from my initial summary report presented to the board of education.

The following year I revised the documentation of each scope change that applied to my needs in order to purchase additional computer and larger monitors, tablets, and a color printer. I updated a new project scope statement and a new project five year plan. The plan included conditions for the needed equipment, a project five year time frame, and the community leaders who recommended and approved my five year plan. The community leaders also purposed a project report with a rationale statement and a written confirmation for the changes and the corresponding revised plan needed to sustain an emerging technology program.

Finally, the closing stage enabled changed behaviors among the students who were motivated to learn new technological strategies and became employed before graduation. Overall, fifty percent of the students became employed as a result of the five year phase of change brought into the revised program at the vocational school. Initially, the multimedia program was a stepping stone to implementing a phase of technology resources exposed throughout the entire school. Today it remains as one of the most popular courses to enroll in at the vocational school.

As an inexperienced instructor dealing with project planning, I realized that I needed to analyze the situation and prepare a summary and progress report for my new computer lab each year for the board of education and my community leaders. According to Portny (2008) "A progress report is a convenient way to keep key audiences involved in a project and informed of anything they have to do to support the project's ongoing performance (p.361).

References:

Portny, S.E., Mantel, S.J. Meredith, J.R., Shafer, S.M., & Sutton, M.M. (2008). Project management: Planning,
scheduling, and controlling projects. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.