NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF SINGAPORE

PM5106 DESIGN MANAGEMENT

Semester 1, AY2015/2016

Time Allowed: 2 Hours

INSTRUCTIONS TO CANDIDATES

1. Candidates must attempt ALL questions.

2. Candidates should illustrate their answers with sketches on answer book, where
appropriate.

3. Candidates may choose from any industry a hypothetical capital project (e.g. hotel,
road, water-plant, etc., when answering, provided that these assumptions are not
inconsistent with the information given in the questions.

INFORMATION TO CANDIDATES

1. This examination paper contains FOUR questions and comprises THREE printed
pages.

2. This is an OPEN BOOK examination

3. The total mark for this paper is 60

4. All questions carry equal marks

5. The examiner for this module is Mr Leonard Yeo

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Question 1: Design as a critical activity in project life-cycle

Assume that you are the project manager Mr. A of a capital project, in a development
cum investment company. Your companys interest is to lead the project from
development to financial closure (full capitalisation of the single-purpose vehicle
(SPV), a subsidiary company dedicated to the project), including construction. The
companys exit plan is to sell the capital project AFTER construction completion and
one year of successful operations.

To justify a significant design budget prepare a 2-page (excluding diagrams, charts, and
sketches if needed) executive summary to the SPVs Board of Directors Finance
Committee, explaining the importance of design activity as a critical success factor to
support the development, financing and construction phases. Your summary should be
high level and at least cover the following:

a) project title, project brief or requirements,

b) design terms of reference and required critical deliverables at each phase, and

c) critical impacts on each phase of the projects success.

(15 marks)

Question 2: Design Process

Assume that you are the deputy project manager Mr. D of the capital project as
described in Question 1, responsible for outsourcing the design activities. The
company has no prior experience in projects development, where designs are NOT
already provided for. To prequalify potential design consultancies to support the project,
prepare a 2-page (excluding diagrams, charts, sketches, if needed) executive summary
to the project manager, Mr. A, recommending:

a) all the relevant criteria & percentage weightage for pre-qualification;

b) reasons for the weightage in a); and

c) the information or materials that the design companies must submit in the pre-
qualification submissions, to be used in the pre-qualification evaluation.

(15 marks)

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Question 3: Design Deliverables, Dynamics of Design versus Building & Operation

Assume that you as Mr. D have prequalified the potential design consultancies as
described in Question 2, for the capital project in Question 1.

Prepare a 2-page (excluding diagrams, charts, and sketches if needed) executive

summary to the project manager, Mr. A, recommending the information items that
should be included in the RFP (Request for Proposal) submission from the prequalified
design consultancies, under following paragraph headings:

a) the design brief or requirements;

b) the deliverables that the design consultant must submit at each critical project
milestone relating to development, construction and operation phases; and

c) the consultant execution plan.

(15 marks)

Question 4: Managing Design, Risks and Returns on projects Life-Cycle Costing

Unrelated to questions 1-3. Assume that the poor economic outlook requires project
design budget in the development & financing phases to be significantly reduced until a
financial closure is more certain or secured.

The life-cycle of the capital project begins with a development stage through financial
closure, followed by a period of minimum 2-year construction plus over 10 years
operation. As the Design project manager in a Design Consultancy, prepare for the
client a short 2-page (excluding sketches if needed) executive summary:

a) to describe and illustrate the good principles of Design Management at four

different stages of the project life cycle;

b) to advise the challenges faced by Design Consultancies with clients having tight pre-
financial closure budget; and

c) to provide two examples of the risks that both clients and designers face in case b)
above and possible risk mitigations, without compromising the project Key
Performance Indicators (KPIs) at each stage.

(15 marks)

END OF PAPER