1.3.2 Instructions for Rock'n Bands game
1.3.3 Student debriefing and solution
1.3.4 Instructor ideas for debriefing
Let’s begin.
Overview
This learning module (Lesson 3 of Unit 1) is part of a course called Project Management Fundamentals and may either be completed individually as a stand-alone topic, or part of a trio of introductory learning modules, or as part of the course.
This learning module consists of an experiential exercise called the Rock'n Bands game by Klassen & Willoughby (2003) where students engage in a simulated project management exercise.
Learning outcomes.
"Rock'n Bands: A Project Management Decision-Making Game" (c)
by Ken Klassen and Keith Willoughby (2003) is a classic experiential exercise where students learn about project dynamics and the critical path.
The authors give us permission to use it through an educational use agreement that pre-dates Creative Commons licensing, but would amount to the following: CC-BY-NC-SA. Authors must receive credit. It may only be used for educational purposes, but may not be sold. It may be used as-is or remixed.
The game takes between 45 minutes and 1 hour to play. It also requires a short 10-15 minute debrief either immediately following or later, or perhaps as a reflection assignment.
The game works equally-well live in-person or synchronously in a virtual environment.
I find that the game is a perfect beginning of the semester or topic activity for students to engage in "cold" (i.e., without prior knowledge) as it surprises and delights them (and occassionally frustrates and discourages them) and serves strong touch-point throughout the course (especially during the Time Management lessons) and beyond.
To prepare, you should thoroughly read the teaching note (provided as a link here rather than PDF in the learner section).
Also, you will need the Excel spreadsheet (which has many cells locked so that you cannot alter the dynamic nature of the model).
Upon successful completion of this module, you'll be able to:
- Understand the truly dynamic nature of projects (even fictious ones).
- Appreciate how it is better to plan ahead rather than "wait and see."
- Know that there is a crticial path within a project that must be actively monitored and managed.
Preparing for the Rock'n Bands game (by Klassen & Willoughby).
- Students should read the attached handout thorughly.
- Make sure you remember the rules of the game:
- Target: Complete project in 10 weeks or less.
- Goal: Minimize costs (i.e., labor) associated with project.
- You may assign up to five (5) workers per week.
- The first four workers cost $200 per week and the fifth worker costs $300 per week.
- You may assign no more than two (2) workers to any one activity each week.
- You may not start any task until its predecessor has been finished (the week before).
- Penalty: You will pay a penalty of $2,000 if you do not complete the project by the required target.
- In teams of 3-5 students, using page 4 of the handout, complete your strategy for assigning workers for the duration of the project - how many to each task each week.
Playing the Rock'n Bands game (by Klassen & Willoughby).
As the instructor, you will need to coordinate the "game play" per the teaching note for guidance. Additionally, I would suggest you conduct a dry run of this game yourself as both a student team (supplying worker assignments) and as instructor (recording worker assignments and announcing any changes).
Your instructor will coordinate the game and ask each team to relay their worker assignments each week.
Occassionally, there may be some announcements that will impact the project.
Debriefing the Rock'n Bands game (by Klassen & Willoughby).
Here you will need to decide if you want to have a live debrief or have students do a reflective assignment or something else altogether. Whichever method you choose, you should refer to the Teaching Note for suggested topics to investigate. In my experience, in addition to the rich cognitive learning, this game also provides an opportunity for affective learning. You may like to examine the attached article on "Blind Spots" for ideas on how to frame your debrief (see appendix).
Your instructor will lead either a debrief discussion or...
Alternatively, you may wish to reflect upon your experience playing the game and consider the following questions:
- What do the following terms mean in project management?
- Task time
- Precedence relationship
- Network diagram
- Resource allocation
- Critical path
- Crashing (expediting)
- Why was this game challenging?
- How did you feel as you were engaged in the game?
- How might you have competed better in the game (i.e., met the target timeline with minimal cost)?
Once you've thoroughly debriefed the experintial exercise (i.e., the Rock'n Bands game), check out the CPM analysis of how the critical path could have been found for the initial project conditions (see attached).