Analysis of Project Costs and Software Availability

1) What is the total cost of the project? How much of the total cost are labor costs?

Labor cost = $ 844,980 (this amount was taken from the Microsoft project document)

It is projected that A&D would need twelve Windows 2000 workstations (at $3,000 each) and five Windows 2000 servers (at $12,500 each).

Software costs = 12*$3,000 + 5*$12,500 = $98,500

Overall Project Cost = Labor cost + Software cost = $ 844,980 + $98,500 = $943,480

Labor cost represents 89.5% of the total cost.

2) What is the projected availability date of the software system? In other words, when is the earliest you can put it to use in the company?

According to the Microsoft project document, it is estimated that the software will be ready to be used in the company on 18 November 2003. This date might change if there is

6) Recommendations

• A&D should apply a risk management plan during the whole project life cycle. In this case, they should incorporate preventive actions and contingency plans in case there is a delay or problem in any of the critical activities. They can do this effectively by including another person whose main responsibility will be monitoring trigger metrics and informing the project manager directly in case they need to conduct a contingency plan.

• Another action A&D could perform is taking the option of buying the commercial application instead of creating a custom-developed program from the scratch. Doing so it will be able to have the online store ready before the due date; the only problem with this is that the software would not have all the specifications or requirements that A&D wants, but, they can still put custom modifications to make it more similar to the desired software and still they would finish