IWU Management Facing Challenges in Making up Rigid Ideas Discussion

Introduction to Project Management

Getting Started

Which projects do we choose to work on? Information Technology (IT) departments are notoriously understaffed and with limited resources comes the need for prioritization on what to work. If you have 200 projects to choose from and resources to do only 20 of them, how do you choose?

One method is to compare impact on the business and effort level of the project. If effort is low and impact (positive) is high, that choice is a no-brainer and such projects are called low-hanging fruit. If effort is high and impact is high, then those are the difficult projects, but sometimes legal or regulatory demands raise them to the top of the list. The same goes for low impact/high effort—you only do those projects (sometimes called losers) when you must legally or in response to some other mandate. Low-impact and low-effort projects are used as filler projects that you get to when you can or when they are the only projects you can do with limited resources.

Resources

Website: Bible Gateway

Background Information

Making choices on what projects to take on is hard, since politics and loud voices sometimes enter the environment. Choices are also involved inside projects, when decisions on how to proceed are made. Hopefully good judgment prevails, and ethical decisions are driven by a moral compass given to us by God and prayer. Can you name an ethical company in which you trust? How easy is that compared to naming a company that is or has been unethical?

It is simple to know that human beings can be sinful and make bad choices. When we look at John 6:70, Jesus even says one of His chosen twelve is a devil. Why do our decisions matter? Look at Romans 14:12 and you see that you will have to give an account of yourself to God.

Jesus answered them, ‘Did I not choose you, the Twelve? And yet one of you is a devil.’

John 6:70

So then each of us will give an account of himself to God.

Romans 14:12

Instructions

Review the rubric to make sure you understand the criteria for earning your grade.

Read the Introduction and Alignment and the Background Information sections.

Navigate to the discussion thread and respond to the following prompts:

What do you do when you face really tough decisions?

What is your process to make a tough decision? Would prayer help?

Do you involve others in your decision making and if so, what role(s) do they play?