Background
The WBFK Transport Company operates throughout mainland Australia. The company specialize in fast delivery of pallet-loads of goods from one WBFK depot to another WBFK depot. It does not do pickups at a customers premises nor does it deliver door to door. It deals exclusively in Pallet size loads and is not involved in small parcel transport unless a customer with a small parcel is prepared to pay a full pallet price.
The business is thiving and has grown 60% in the last two years with 40% growth expected this financial year.
Currently there are depots in each State and Territory Capitals and additional depots as follows :
Three depots in Queensland located in Townsville, Mt Isa and the Gold Coast
Four depots in NSW located at Grafton, Dubbo, Newcastle and Woolongong
Four depots in Victoria at Geelong, Albury-Wodonga, Bendigo and Mildura
One depot in South Australia at Port Augusta
Two depots in WA at Freemantle and Broome
One depot at Alice Spring.
The business was originally started to carry freight between Melbourne and Sydney and has grown in answer to demand, rather than in a planned way. No attention has been paid to the efficiency of the business nor to analyzing costs. All freight from any depot outside a capital city is sent to that capital city then forwarded to the capital city in the state where it is addressed. Currently there is no direct transport from Queensland to any other State except through Sydney and all Ex-Sydney freight to States other than Queensland goes via Melbourne. Similarly, all Northern Territory freight is shipped via South Australia.
Your Project
You have been engaged as a project manager to scope a project which will analyze the freight currently handled by WPFK Transport.
The broad project brief is to find what volume of freight (number of pallets) goes between each depot.
It has been decided to survey each depot for two (2) two-monthly periods over the next eight months, once in November/December(very busy period) and again in March/April (quiet period).
The Company suspect they could make considerable savings and reduce delivery dates by initiating new routes. For example from Brisbane directly to Adelaide, via Dubbo and Mildura with drop-offs and pickups from interim depots along the way.
Your Project will define the Scope, construct the Work Breakdown Structure, define all of the activities and sequence these, schedule the project and then resource and budget the project using Microsoft Office Project.
NOTE:
• You are NOT asked to design the survey document, nor produce a Business Report analysing the data collected during the two-monthly periods. Your project is to plan for and implement the project to collect the data.
• All assumptions you make must be explained in detail and be realistic. For example, you may employ a consultant to prepare and/or process the survey document.
Rationale
This assessment has been designed to allow you to show your ability to:
• be able to demonstrate how a practicing project manager actually applies project management skills, methods, techniques and tools;
• be able to use an industry standard project management software tool (Microsoft Project);
• apply project management skills, methods, techniques and tools to a real world problem typical of a project manager;
• be able to describe what exactly a quality system is and how it is achieved in project development;
• be able to identify how the disciplined application of quality assurance can lead to significant productivity gains; and
• be able to demonstrate how to expedite project tasks during project delivery.