QUESTION: 377 Exam Topic: 2, Volume B

Which of the following statements best describes the influence of stakeholders and the cost of changes as project time advances?

The influence of the stakeholders increases, the cost of changes increases.
The influence of the stakeholders decreases, the cost of changes increases.
The influence of the stakeholders increases, the cost of changes decreases.
The influence of the stakeholders decreases, the cost of changes decreases.

Answer(s): B

Explanation:

Stakeholders and changes versus time in the Project Life Cycle
There are lots of common features regarding project life cycles:
· Most stages of the project follow one after the other and in many cases could be described in technical way.
· Expenditures and personnel engaged in the task are quite cheap at the beginning of the project, rise in the middle phase and fall significantly in the final stage. The Picture below shows exactly the described model.

· At the beginning of the project - in initial stage the risk of failure and not to meet your goals is very high.
When this crucial period is over the project comes into an intermediate phase where the situation is more stable and predictable. · Stakeholders have a big influence for the project's product in many technical aspects, costs etc. at the beginning of its life cycle. However their impact become lower within duration of the project and cost of changes and other corrections - which are low in initial phase rise considerably as the project continues. The Picture below demonstrates clearly this situation.

In our opinion lots of project life cycles have many similar characteristics but few of them are the same. For example some projects can consist of five stages, others with ten or more? Depend on complexity and duration of the project. One institution's hardware testing can have one individual testing stage whereas another organization can have more phases for this task like: general and detailed testing, error correction, compatibility with different computers etc. Separate life cycles can also cover these subprojects for instance: one team of engineers can analysis and look for any defects of the product and the other team can simultaneously check compatibility with other devices.
In conclusion we recommend you to deal with every project separately and especially at big and complex enterprises treat every phase as subproject with an individual life cycle.