Project

Develop an automated and instant all-in-one support software that is compatible with multiple Microsoft Components

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Abstract

The report aims to provide a comprehensive overview of ‘Support Software’ being developed to facilitate user support services for the regular users of Microsoft components. The ‘Support Software’ will be an integrated, all-in-one support solution that will be capable of providing instant, customized and rapid troubleshooting for various Microsoft Components including Microsoft Access, Microsoft Publisher, Microsoft Project, and Microsoft Vision. It will be aimed to enhance customer support service for regular users of Microsoft. The report provides a detailed financial analysis, feasibility and contingency analysis, methodology, targeted deliverables and goals of the project.

Project Overview

Project Scope

Our project “All-In-One Support Software For Microsoft Components” aims to provide an integrated and instant support for revolutionary user experience. For this purpose, it is requested to our honorable sponsor Adam Schulz, Head Finance Department, Microsoft to review our project scope and limitations for better facilitation of successful development of our project.

The project is completed four Phases – Planning, Design, Trial Implementation, and Feedback/Assessment. Once successfully accomplished, the project membership is granted to interested users – individual and company-based. The Phase 1 focused on Planning the trial implementation of software during its assessment period and planning to generate feasible feedback. Phase 2 involved designing the assessment and feedback methodology. Phase 3 focused on successful deployment of the software at the targeted location for trial and assessment purposes. While Phase 4 ensured that the users of the software will be assessed for their experiences and recommendations once the trial period is over.

Each of this phase is specifically focused and completed by modularly focusing on sub-components. The modularization of the project helped in focusing on the specific problems that were identified in Problem Statement, and addressing them in most optimized manner. Furthermore, modularization also helped in enhancing the performance efficiency of our team.

When planning and scheduling the project, we ensured its completion on time. However, the unscheduled Audit of the project delayed the completion by one week. However, it must be understood that this Audit is inevitable and beneficial for the project in long term. It helped us in reassessing our performance and resource utilization efficiency. The Audit is conducted right after we finished the Phase 3. Therefore, our Phase 4 had to be rescheduled. But we used our team’s rapid decision making skills to re-plan and re-schedule Phase 4 tasks while Phase 3 is being conducted. This helped us stay focused and determined to successfully completing our project.

Tentative Results

Our project “All-In-One Support Software For Microsoft Components” aims to provide an integrated and instant support for revolutionary user experience. The project is scheduled to be completed in 2020.

The goal of the project is to develop an automated and instant all-in-one support software that is compatible with multiple Microsoft Components such as Microsoft Access, Microsoft Publisher, Microsoft Project, and Microsoft Vision. It is aimed to enhance customer support service for regular users of Microsoft. The project is successfully completely as shown by the Phase 4 i.e. Assessment/Feedback phase. Over 85% of the participants and users showed their satisfaction and provided positive feedback for the developed application.

The developed application will be successful to address the user support issues being faced by the users. Now the users are able to get rapid, customized and integrated support without any hassle. The Microsoft Inc. will also be demonstrated for the successful implementation of the project. And We got very encouraging support from the viewers and stakeholders.

The application is expected to manage to generate significant revenue by membership within the first month of its formal release. The stakeholders have assessed the ROI and current income generation rate. And they are very hopeful for its future success and tendencies. According to our future market assessments, the Application is promising. And with continuous upgradations and improvements, we can generate some major annual revenue on constant basis.

Overall, it is a very successful development lifecycle for the innovative project. The support of sponsors and stakeholders kept us determined and focused on our goals.

Restraints, Limitations and Assumptions

Phase 3 of our project focuses on Implementation of the Project within the test environment for further assessment, feedback and improvements. It is expected that the implementation of the project would be completed successfully and we can swiftly move on to the next phase. However, there is an unforeseen, but important event that delayed the start-up for Phase 4 of the project.

Right in the middle of this phase an unscheduled audit took place as per the demands of our company. This audit for the project delayed the project by one week. While this is an unscheduled audit, it is necessary to ensure quality and success of the project. Therefore, it is inevitable. The audit is conducted in order to assess modular efficiency, accuracy of financial investments, performance criteria, etc. The entire process took 4 working days to complete while the audit report is released 2 days later.

In order to overcome this delay, we have rescheduled and re-planned our Phase 4 activities, tasks and goals in such a way that it must not be delayed any further even in case of any emergencies or unforeseen events. For this purpose, we have conducted a quick risk analysis and feasibility analysis for Phase 4 that could help us plan an alternative in case of any incidents. As part of the plan, our Review and Testing team will continue to work on their regular designated tasks regardless of any incident. While the managerial and support team will look into the incidental matter. This will help us utilize our time and human resources in an optimized manner.

While this process delayed the project completion by one week, I am glad to report that the audit report confirmed high level efficiency and quality of the on-going project. For the commencement of this Audit, we spent $25K to ensure reliable audit report and overcome the loss of time as much as possible.

While Phase 3 is completed on time, the Week 4 had a delayed start. We started one week later from our designated schedule. Our stakeholders and developers were notified of the delay and upcoming challenges to ensure completion of the project without any further delays. The vigilance of team helped us remain efficient. They immediately rescheduled the tasks and re-designed the goals. The team is immediately put to work so that no further delays are caused. We are very much hopeful that no further delays will occur and the completion of project with high level of quality will be ensured.

Final Recommendations

The project will successfully accomplish the specified goal that is to develop an automated and instant all-in-one support software that is compatible with multiple Microsoft Components such as Microsoft Access, Microsoft Publisher, Microsoft Project, and Microsoft Vision. Once the project is successfully implemented, it will be high time that we must consider moving forward and planning to enhance the quality, performance, scope and efficiency of our current project. One of my immediate recommendations is to broaden the scope of the project. This will involve integrating more support facilities that are compatible with more Microsoft Domains including Microsoft Visio, MS Word, etc. The broadening of the scope will ensure that we are targeting more of the consumer base that can generate more revenues and profits. Furthermore, in order to improve the efficiency and reliability of the service, we can integrate Artificial Intelligence within the Application that is capable to developing customized solutions and guides according to the level, demand and previous trends of support taken up by the user. Another module that can be added within the Support Software is the facility to have face-to-face or voice over chat with the customer service representative in a hassle free manner. This will further enhance the services being offered by our application. The application will have a global scope as well.

Term Definitions

Support System: a network of people who provide an individual with practical or emotional support.

Troubleshooting: analyse and solve serious problems for a company or other organization.

Artificial Intelligence: is an area of computer science that emphasizes the creation of intelligent machines that work and react like humans.

Scheduling Tasks: Scheduling is the process of arranging, controlling and optimizing work and workloads in a production process.

Decision-Making: the action or process of making important decisions.

Section II

In order to accomplish this research, following are our milestones. All of these steps will be conducted in detail. However, brief modifications can be done in order to accommodate any required changes or enhancements. Following Gantt chart previews the tentative plan of accomplishment of this research work.

The above mentioned Gantt Chart shows that there are 8 major milestones that have to be achieved throughout the process of project accomplishment. However, these are the major milestones only. Each of these milestones consist of several sub-units as well that need to be completed and achieved with great vigilance and dedication.

References

Kerzner, H., & Kerzner, H. R. (2017). Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and controlling. John Wiley & Sons.

Larson, E. W., & Gray, C. F. (2017). Project management: The managerial process. McGraw-Hill Education.

Schwalbe, K. (2015). Information technology project management. Cengage Learning.

Fleming, Q. W., & Koppelman, J. M. (2016, December). Earned value project management. Project Management Institute.

Heagney, J. (2016). Fundamentals of project management. Amacom.