SEB324 T2 2015 Summative Assignment 4 (S4)

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Summative Assignment 4: Major Complex Contemporary Project
– East West Link Project

Objective:
To relate the project management theory we have studied this trimester to a recent major complex project in Australia.

What You Need to Do:

The scope of this assignment focuses on the Victorian East West Link Project. This public private partnership (PPP) project promised to deliver an 18 km tollroad across the Northern suburbs and urban areas of Melbourne linking the Eastern Freeway with the Western Ring Road.

The project was to be undertaken in two stages. Stage 1 was to consist of approximately 6km of tollroad construction between the existing Eastern Freeway at Clifton Hill and the existing CityLink tollroad at Parkville and was to include twin 4.4km three-lane tunnels.

The project had its substantive origins in 2006 when the Victorian State Government commissioned Sir Rod Eddington to investigate the feasibility of a new major roadway across Melbourne to link the city’s Eastern and Western suburbs.

Originally having bipartisan support from Labor and the Liberal/National Coalition in Victoria, the project received a significant boost in May 2013 when the Coalition Government announced its commitment to Stage 1 of the project with an estimated budget of between $6 billion and $8 billion.
During 2014 the political environment surrounding this project altered significantly. In the months leading up to the state election in late November, the Opposition Leader, Daniel Andrews, pledged in early September that if elected into government that Labor would “dump” the project and cancel it. In late September the Coalition State Government, bolstered by a promise of $1.5 billion in funding support for the project from the Coalition Federal Government, signed contracts with the private consortium East West Connect for Stage 1 of the project thus enabling site works to commence. The project was a central issue in the state election soon after with significant factions of supporters and opponents of it.

On 29 November 2014 the Coalition Government was defeated at the state election. The incoming Labor Government almost immediately halted all work on the project. Earlier this year the Labor Government announced it had successfully negotiated a financial settlement with East West Connect and it continues its efforts to close the project entirely by resolving all and any outstanding matters.

Since being elected to government last year, the Labor Government has publicly released a significant amount (but not all) of the project’s documentation including contract documents and the business case for the project which had been kept confidential by the Coalition Government.

As of September 2015 this project stands as a case study in risk and stakeholder influence in major complex projects.

And a complex mix of factors and forces that led to an accelerated advancement of the project’s planning and procurement in 2014 to be followed by rapid action to halt and close down the project in late 2014 and 2015 to date.

And what happens now? Will this project be completely closed as intended by the current Labor Government, never to be resurrected? Will all the project documentation be publicly released for scrutiny? Was this project “too complex” to succeed?

SEB324 T2 2015 Summative Assignment 4 (S4)
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Requirements for this Assignment

 This assignment is to be undertaken individually by all students. Make sure that any analysis you present is your own – not simply a summary of what is presented in source or reference materials. Don’t cheat or plagiarise.

 Prepare a well-structured and well-researched report that critically analyses this project from 2006 to date in the context of best practices project management that we have studied this trimester. Your report should include, but is not limited to, the following knowledge areas (not provided in any particular order):

 Procurement Management
 Scope Management
 Cost Management
 Risk Management
 Stakeholder Management
 Your report should also consider the relevant process groups (initiating, planning, executing, monitoring and controlling, and closing process groups) as defined by the PMBOK Guide that interact in a phase or project and that map to the knowledge areas. You need to keep in mind what actually was accomplished, or not, on this project and what the significant constraints, forces, factors, and influences were.

 A simple text-based format is all that is needed with the report layout consisting of a few sections of text (with section headings). Use photos or diagrams sparingly and only if necessary and/or relevant to include in your report. Just use a basic and common text font such as Arial or Times New Roman with at least 10 point font size for body text. Single-spaced paragraphs are acceptable. (This document uses Arial 10 single-spaced in the body text.)

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 Your submitted report will be marked according to the marking rubric attached to this document. The rubric also indicates what Unit Learning Outcomes (ULOs) and Graduate Learning Outcomes (GLOs) are considered in the marking scheme for this assignment.

 This assignment is worth 30 marks (30%) of the total assessment for this unit this trimester.
 The word limit is 2000 words minimum to 4000 words maximum (3000 words +/- 1000 words) – not including the References Section.

o The word count includes the first word of the first section’s heading to the last word of the last section’s
heading but it does not include the References section. Any included figures, diagrams, charts or graphs (and their associated labels) are not included in the word count.

 There must be a References Section in your submission. We expect at least six relevant, independent, and credible citations. Use a suitable referencing style such as the Harvard Style.

Submission Deadline

 Your report must be submitted on CloudDeakin in the Summative Assignment 4 dropbox by Monday 12 October by 11:59pm (Geelong Time). Submit your report document as a Microsoft Word (.doc or .docx) file

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