PM 585 Week 2 Work Breakdown Structure Example

Two Thousand Four Hundred Yards, One Structure: Building the Work Breakdown Structure for a Lead Service Line Replacement Project

[Student Name]

University of Phoenix

PM/585: Project Scheduling and Value Management

Week 2 Assignment

[Instructor Name]

[Date]

Every name, code and figure here, the water authority included, is a composite written for a model paper.

The composite western Pennsylvania utility in this course, Allegheny Ridge Water Authority, set the boundaries of its first replacement project in Week 1: roughly 2,400 lines across two building seasons, with access agreements, notification, filters, pavement restoration, records and compliance reporting, and with clear exclusions. This paper breaks that scope into a work breakdown structure (WBS) that the schedule, cost estimates and progress reports will all use.

What a WBS Is For

In the current standard, the WBS breaks everything the team must deliver into layers, each smaller than the one above, until the pieces can be planned and managed (Project Management Institute [PMI], 2021). The practice standard emphasizes that the WBS should be deliverable-oriented and follow the 100 percent rule: every level must contain all the work of the level above, and nothing outside scope (PMI, 2019). Globerson (1994) showed that different ways of structuring a WBS lead people to conceptualize a project differently, affecting which interfaces and responsibilities they notice, which means the organizing choice is not merely cosmetic.

Three Ways to Organize It

By phase: design, procurement, construction, closeout. This mirrors how engineers think, but construction would hold almost all the work in one branch, hiding the difference between replacing lines, restoring streets and reporting.

By geography: neighborhood by neighborhood. This mirrors how crews work, but cross-cutting deliverables such as the access agreement process, filter distribution and compliance reporting would be scattered across every neighborhood.

By deliverable: replacements, restoration, community engagement, records and compliance, management. This keeps each kind of result in one place for estimating and acceptance, but on its own it would make a single work package of 2,400 replacements, too large to control.

The authority chose a hybrid: deliverables at level two and geography, as construction blocks of about 40 addresses, at level three for replacements and restoration.

The Top Three Levels

1 Lead Service Line Replacement Project, Phase 1

1.1 Project management: 1.1.1 planning and scheduling; 1.1.2 cost control and loan draw requests; 1.1.3 risk and change management; 1.1.4 closeout.

1.2 Design and permits: 1.2.1 block designs and site plans; 1.2.2 street opening permits; 1.2.3 traffic control plans.

1.3 Procurement: 1.3.1 construction contract; 1.3.2 materials, including pipe, fittings and curb boxes; 1.3.3 filters.

1.4 Community engagement and access: 1.4.1 access agreements; 1.4.2 notices and multilingual materials; 1.4.3 resident hotline; 1.4.4 filter distribution and flushing guidance.

1.5 Service line replacements: 1.5.1 to 1.5.60, one element for each construction block of about 40 addresses.

1.6 Restoration: 1.6.1 to 1.6.60, matching the blocks, covering pavement, sidewalks, curbs and lawns.

1.7 Records and compliance: 1.7.1 material verification records; 1.7.2 asset system updates; 1.7.3 state compliance reports; 1.7.4 funding authority reports.

Every item in the Week 1 scope maps to one element. Indoor plumbing and main replacement, which are excluded, appear nowhere.

If something in the scope statement cannot be found in the WBS, nobody has planned to do it.

A Dictionary Entry

Element 1.5.07, replacements for Block 7, Northside, Elm to Linden Streets.

Scope: replace 38 identified lead or galvanized-requiring-replacement lines from the main to the building entry, including excavation, tapping, pipe installation, connection inside the foundation, disconnection of the old line and temporary surface patching.

Acceptance: all 38 lines meet the replacement criteria set in Week 1, with photographs and material records stored; residents have received filters and flushing instructions.

Owner: contractor crew 2, with the authority inspector for Northside.

Estimates: 38 crew-days of work, about $342,000 in direct cost at a planning average of $9,000 per line.

Dependencies: access agreements for at least 34 of 38 addresses (1.4.1), street opening permit (1.2.2), materials delivered (1.3.2); followed by restoration for Block 7 (1.6.07).

Milestones: start by May 12; complete by June 20.

Testing the Structure Against the Scope

Before adopting the WBS, the project manager walked through the Week 1 scope statement line by line with the engineering director and the community outreach lead, finding each item in the structure. Two gaps appeared. Lawn restoration on private property, promised in the customer requirements, had been left out of the restoration branch, which covered only streets and sidewalks; it was added to each block's restoration package. Filter replacement cartridges for the six months after each replacement, required by the regulatory group, had been folded into the one-time filter distribution; they became a separate element so that their cost and logistics would not be overlooked. The walk-through also confirmed that excluded items, such as indoor plumbing, did not appear anywhere.

Who Owns Each Branch

Ownership follows the structure. The authority's project manager owns project management and records; the engineering supervisor owns design and permits; the purchasing manager owns procurement; the community outreach lead owns engagement and access; and the two field inspectors own replacements and restoration in their neighborhoods, with contractor crew leads responsible for individual block packages. Naming an owner for every element at level two means that when a block falls behind, it is clear who must explain why and who must act.

Level of Detail

Each block element is a work package: it can be estimated from the per-line averages and site surveys, assigned to one crew, scheduled within five to six weeks and accepted by one inspector. Breaking it further into individual addresses would add 2,400 elements without improving control; address-level tracking happens in the asset system, not in the WBS. Project management, design and engagement elements are decomposed only to the level at which one person can own and estimate them.

Rolling Wave Planning for the Second Season

The 60 blocks are not equally well known. The 30 blocks for the first season have completed site surveys and access agreements in progress, so they are fully decomposed. The 30 for the second season are held as six planning packages, one per neighborhood, with rough estimates. They will be decomposed into blocks during the first winter, once lessons from the first season are known and the list of unknown-material lines has been narrowed by testing.

Control Accounts

Control accounts sit at level two for most deliverables and at the neighborhood level within replacements and restoration, giving the authority eight control accounts in all. Each has a control account manager, a budget and a schedule. Earned value will be measured at the work package level, with each block earning value as lines pass inspection.

Connecting to the Schedule

The WBS elements become the source of the schedule's activities. Each block package will expand into activities such as notification, excavation and installation, inspection and patching, with dependencies on permits and materials. Because blocks repeat, the schedule can use a standard set of activities for each, which simplifies both scheduling and progress measurement.

Conclusion

Allegheny Ridge's WBS organizes 2,400 replacements into a hybrid structure: deliverables at the second level and construction blocks below them for the repetitive field work. It satisfies the 100 percent rule, includes a dictionary for each work package, uses rolling wave planning for the less-known second season and ties into control accounts and the schedule. It gives the estimates and schedules of the coming weeks a single, complete framework.

References

Globerson, S. (1994). Impact of various work-breakdown structures on project conceptualization. International Journal of Project Management, 12(3), 165-171. https://doi.org/10.1016/0263-7863(94)90032-9

Project Management Institute. (2019). Practice standard for work breakdown structures (3rd ed.). Project Management Institute.

Project Management Institute. (2021). A guide to the project management body of knowledge (PMBOK guide) (7th ed.). Project Management Institute.