This course introduces students to a range of technically-orientated issues in business, engineering and software management. Students are provided with concrete strategies for addressing important issues within practical, relevant and contemporary contexts.

The course comprises slections from one or more of the following topic areas:

• Project Management. This is a major topic for the course. Tools and techniques appropriate to management of both generic and software-specific projects are introduced.
• Business Environments - a systems-thinking approach to understanding the internal and external environments for an organisation will be used to set the stage for work in business planning and management.
• Business Planning - students will gain practical experience of new venture planning
• Ethics and Corporate Responsibility - individual ethics and ethical culture - structured approach to arrive a a normative conclusion
• Planning and Strategic management - management decision-making; risk management
• Organisational Design - alignment with corporate goals; staffing and people management
• Leadership - motivating, influencing, communicating, managing groups and teams
• Control in Organisations and change management
• Quality - definition, value and scope. Quality management techniques
• Understanding Variation - the truth behind the management report, statistical process control (SPC) for managers
• Software specific issues - Choosing or tailoring a software development life cycle. Constructing a software development plan. Applying techniques and tools for determining size, effort and cost of a software development. Constructing a schedule and determining resource requirements and allocations. Identifying, assessing and managing risks (including technical, schedule and resource risks). Choosing and using metrics for different purposes such as monitoring progress, controlling resources and estimating rework.

Individual Project Plan (25%); Group Business Plan (25% weighted as 15 % for the document; 10% for a concept presentation & minutes of the first meeting); Final Exam (50%)

Thirty one-hour lectures and five two-hour laboratory sessions.

12 units of 3000-series IT