OPMT2171 Pacific Northwest Bank

The most critical success factor for any project is its planning documentation. A project could have perfect execution, but could completely miss what the client actually wanted. For example, an engineering consulting firm was not paid by the City of West Vancouver after presenting its final report even though the City's management commended the quality of the report. Why? The end report did satisfy the City's requirements as agreed to on the Terms of Reference.

The purpose for this assignment was to construct a Terms of Reference (TOR) for the initial phase of Pacific Northwest Bank's plans to implement an e-procurement system. The goal of this system is to allow its supply management department to provide more value-added tasks necessary to become a strategic unit within the corporation.

The TOR is composed of the following sections:

• Problem/Opportunity Statement
• Goal Statement
• Project Scope (Also includes what is NOT in scope->very important)
• Project Objectives (Deliverables, Milestones, Methodology)
• Constraints
• Success Criteria
• Resource Requirements
• Risks (Response through mitigation).

Click here to view the full TOR.

Completing this TOR really helped in developing the TOR for my team's Directed Studies project for Central 1 Credit Union. Directed Studies is a capstone course for my program where we take on an industry project for a local company. My team will be starting work on the project after spring break over a duration of 9 weeks.

OPMT2171 Jose's Mexican Restaurante

The course name for OPMT2171 is Applied Management Engineering, however the core focus is Project Management. This course has taught me all of the essential skills of managing a project from planning to closing.

In addition to acquiring skills in project management, I also applied learned theory on process improvement in the case study: Jose's Mexican Restaurante. The main problem the restaurant faced was that customers were not being served in a reasonable time. In order to develop a feasible solution to this problem, several of Six Sigma's quality tools were used including Pareto diagrams and flowchart as exhibiting below:

Through the analysis, it was clear that the waiters were spending a significant portion of their time helping the chef in the kitchen instead of waiting on tables. Thus, the recommended solution was to hire a full-time assistant cook which would definitely increase table turnover, customer satisfaction, and decrease wait times during peak periods.

To view the whole report, please click here:

BSYS3100 Quails' Gate Estate Winery Database

This is the 2nd project I've done based on Quails' Gate Estate Winery. For those of you who haven't yet tried their wine, I highly recommend doing so!

BSYS3100, Database Applications, taught me how both the theory and hands-on skills required to build simple databases using Microsoft Access 2007. There are many aspects to a database including Tables, Queries, Forms, & Reports. Tables are the foundation of a database and ensuring the relationships between tables are properly configured is crucial.

Before touching Access, written plans had to be completed. This included the Business Requirements document which outlined specifically what the client wanted out of the database. From this document, the fields for each table were identified.

The next step was the technical design in Access. There were many steps to building this database, but I would like to highlight one form we created as shown below:

This simple Order Entry form allows a CSR to enter an order, as well as check on the status of existing orders. Other forms included Products and Customers. To make the database easy-to-use, we designed a switchboard menu that utilized macros to open windows. This makes it unnecessary for a user to know how to use access.

BLAW3100 Employment Law Case Presentation

For BLAW3100, Canadian Business Law, I was to analyze several cases found on CanLII and make a presentation to my class that incorporated debate and discussion from the audience.

The focus for the two cases selected for this presentation was Employment Law, specifically human rights & harassment.

Before presenting the details of the case, relevant law concepts are explained to ensure the audience is given a proper background.

The first case was Roy v. Maksteel Inc. The plaintiff sued his employer claiming wrongful dismissal and discrimination because of his incarceration. The court decided in favour of the plaintiff and awarded loss wages and moral damages totalling $50,000. However, this decision was appealed and the Court of Appeal reversed this decision in the favour of the employer citing the termination was valid as being incarcerated is not an excuse for not showing up to work.

The second case was Mottu v. MacLeod. The plaintiff sued her employer for discrimination based on sex, sexual harrassment, and forced resignation. Mottu was a bartender at a New Westminster nightclub and the case centres around a BCIT student party that had a hawaiian theme. The employer made it mandatory for all female staff to wear a bikini top and skirt, where the male staff could wear shirt and shorts. The case went to the BC Human Rights Tribunal which awarded Mottu $3000 in damages.

To view the full powerpoint, click here.

BUSA3800 Hidden Adventures Travel Ltd.

As a major component of BUSA3800, Entrepreneurship & E-business, we were to apply the course concepts by developing a full business plan for a small business.

In brainstorming business ideas, we were advised to try to take something we enjoy doing, such as a hobby. As mentioned in some of my previous posts, I am an avid traveler with six countries under my traveling belt. Based on this, I decided on creating a plan for an adventure travel tour company and chose to name it Hidden Adventures Travel. The name stems from my mission to provide customers with 'hidden gems' of each destination, not just the typical tourist destinations.

Before writing the full business plan, I completed a feasibility study to ensure that my business idea was indeed worth pursuing. In doing this, I utilized the following analysis models: SWOT, Buskirk's, and Porter's. This study is also considered to be a marketing plan for a business as a full market research is required.

The full business plan essentially builds upon the feasibility study, with more detail, especially in regard to financial pro-forma statements.

In completing this project, I enjoyed learning about how to start up my own company and maximize the chances of success and selling my business idea to an investor.

To view a copy of my business plan, please click here.

By the way, if you are curious about what animal is shown above, it is the Tarsier monkey, the world's smallest monkey. I got the chance to hold a live Tarsier when I was in Bohol, Philippines.