Project Management Case Study free essay sample

After spending a small fortune on a new gaming system and video games for her son, she believes that parents usually pay for video games and want to be even more informed and involved in knowing what their children are playing. She also knows that many adults spend more and more of their free time using video games, and children also pay for games and other products themselves, especially via online orders. This Video Game Market Research Project would involve several marketing and information technology professionals. The main goals of the project would be to research the current and projected market, develop and administer online surveys to collect data, hold focus groups to help understand the potential market and target markets, analyze the data, determine whether or not your company should enter this market and how, and develop a plan for moving forward, if applicable. Tasks 1. To become more familiar with the video game market, do some preliminary research to find out how big this market is, who the main companies are in the market, what the best-selling products are, who buys video games (adults vs. We will write a custom essay sample on Project Management Case Study or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page hildren), how the games are distributed, etc. Write a two to four-page paper (double-spaced) with your findings, citing at least two references. You can include a paragraph or two with your personal experience in this area, if applicable. 2. An important part of market analysis is preparing financial projections. Prepare a spreadsheet that can be used to determine the profit potential of getting into the video game market. Include inputs for the initial investment cost, number of customers in the first month, customer growth rate/month, monthly rental fee/customer, and fixed and variable monthly operating costs. The VP of marketing is not sure who should manage this Video Game Market Research Project. Lori has several strong people in her department, but many of them are unfamiliar with this market and the potential of doing almost all of the marketing for a product over the Internet. Write a one-page job description that would help decide who would be a good candidate for managing this project. 4. Create a weighted scoring model (see the template in Appendix D) that Lori could use to help evaluate candidates for the project manager position. Make up at least five criteria for evaluating the project managers, four potential candidates, and scores for the candidates. Print out the spreadsheet including the chart on one page. 5. Prepare a project charter for the Video Game Market Research Project. Assume the project will take six months to complete and cost about $200,000. Use the project charter template provided in Appendix D. Part 2: Planning Scenario The VP of marketing, Lori, selected Elliot Wood as the project manager for the Video Game Market Research Project. Elliot had previous project management and market research experience within the company, and he also was an avid video game enthusiast. He still had the Atari system he used to play in high school, and he enjoyed playing newer games with his two children. Elliot, however, was wary of doing business on the Internet and refused to make any of his own purchases online. He also did not let his grade school children use the Internet unless they were supervised, and he screened the video games they played, as well. Elliot was starting to put the project team together. Team members so far included you, a programmer/analyst and aspiring project manager (who also loved playing many video games geared for adult males), Eric, a young market analyst (another video game enthusiast), Katie, an experienced business analyst (who had never played video games and thought they were a waste of time), and Krishna, a young Web guru (who also enjoyed video games). Elliot also asked Adam, an experienced lawyer and ethics specialist for the company, to assist the team on the project.