The necessity to effectively manage the development of new products and services is seen as an organisations life-blood. This module concentrates on the process, techniques and tools that are used by managers during this conceptual period to enable crisp and appropriate decision making.

The module firstly identifies typical models of projects, their organisational structure and the role of stakeholders. Progressing to a project brief, and how the project is defined in terms of key resources, and their subsequent control systems that will finally lead to the projects termination and successful handover. Wherever possible, computer based systems will form part of the toolkit used for the various stages of project analysis.

A written report (based either on their own organisational situation or on information provided in an issued case study/scenario) examining project management practices and leadership and management issues relating to a work based project (2000 words) (100 %)
(Learning Outcomes 1 - 3 )

Field, M., Keller, L., (2006) Project Management. The Open University, Thomson Learning
Mantel, S., Meredith, J.R., Shafer, S.M. and Sutton, M.M., (2011) Project Management in Practice (Fourth Edition), John Wiley and Sons
Maylor, H. (2011) Project Management (Fourth Edition), Pearson Education

Staffordshire University electronic resources and off-campus library facilities
Module website

1. DEMONSTRATE KNOWLEDGE AND UNDERSTANDING OF PROJECT MANAGEMENT PRINCIPLES INCLUDING HOW TO DEFINE THE PROJECT
Knowledge and Understanding

2. EVALUATE THE STRATEGIES, AND UNDERSTAND THE CONSTRAINTS NECESSARY WHEN DESIGNING THE PROJECT PROCESS.
Analysis

3. APPLY BASIC PROBLEM SOLVING TECHNIQUES TO DELIVER A PROJECT WITHIN THE PRE-DEFINED RESOURCE BASE.
Application
Problem Solving

The learning strategy for this module is based around students committing a total of 150 hours of activities towards achieving the learning outcomes. These will be split between 39 hours of direct contact with a tutor and 111 hours of directed, guided and self-study, together with preparation for and completion of the assessment tasks. Learning support material will be provided for the module.
The module will draw upon a mixture of activities including lectures, web-based activities, case study analysis, relevant videos and in-class discussions, individual and group problem solving and self-directed learning.