Project Development Planning

AY2017/2018 Semester 2

This course is aimed at the third year student who will soon face the need to define and execute his or her Final Year Project. The practical work is to develop a project plan (the FYP plan) and to understand critical project phases. Emphasis is placed on the understanding of time and resource constraints. Planning methodologies covered are the Roadmap and Gantt chart. Advanced techniques like PERT are mentioned on the side. A project checklist is developed and used as guide to develop each student's project plan. Different types of plans are introduced: planning a FYP, planning an exhibition, planning in a commercial environment and finally the key elements of a business plan for a startup. The course has two parallel threads. The first one follows critical project phases like idea generation, proof of concept, prototype, development, publicity and exploitation. In this thread, concepts are taught and the student develops his or her project plan The second thread picks selected case studies and brings in guest speakers from outside highlighting their respective planning needs and methodologies. Case studies include Christo and Jeanne-Claude, wrapped Reichstag and James Turell, Roden Crater. Speakers are from the movie, animation and game industries, from innovation development and from Museum management. A survey of funding opportunities in Singapore is given.