Post Grad Mba/ MSC Detail Project Proposal Document

Coventry University Faculty of Engineering and Computing
Post grad MBA/ MSc Detail project proposal document

Explanatory Notes You should read these before filling in your proposal (Please do not hand these notes in with your form ) The project summary is an indication of your intent to carry out a project in a certain field of discipline for a Masters level module. The project must be mindful of and demonstrate EACH of the following learning outcomes 1. Apply intellectual rigor to a topic area or subject that is of interest to the student and relevant to the programme of study undertaken at a Masters level. 2. Conceptualise and articulate a particular area of research or industry requirement in the body of a coherent, comprehensive and logically argued professional report. 3. Utilise and justify a range of research methods to identify, select and review a wide range of fully cited information sources to support the subject matter, both historical and current. 4. Identify and apply appropriate approaches, methodologies, tools and techniques that will support the progression of the subject matter and theme of a project. 5. Develop well structured solutions to an identifiable industry requirement or support a hypothesis / intellectual argument regarding an area of research. 6. Critically evaluate options and make justifiable recommendations for the subject matter. 7. Critically evaluate the approach and conduct of the project. 8. Demonstrate and conduct a project to good project management characteristics and Quality Assurance techniques. 9. Apply appropriate measures to address any legal and ethical issues relating to the project work. The project must fall in the scope of YOUR programme of study i.e. if you are an engineering student then your subject matter must be related to the world of Engineering although comparisons can be made to other disciplines, similarly for KM students then subject matter must be related to the world of ICT in support to the discipline of choice. This document can form the basis of allocation of staff to your project. This summary document will then be further worked for detail through a Project Proposal document, which will be similar to the document prepared in the study skills module.
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Notes on the document fields General Subject Area (with Keywords) A broad topic area that defines the area of project and keywords that could be used in a search facility Topic areas for Engineering it could be : Contract management, Engineering management, Engineering strategy, Entrepreneur and innovation , Finance / Decision making and risk, HRM, ICT, Lean management or operations, Manufacturing (/ simulation), Marketing, Production management, Project Management, Quality management, Supply Chain Management, Telecoms/ ICT, Vehicle Engineering design, material technology, environmentally sustainable, innovation, automation, Technology etc Topic areas for KM could be : Strategy, Logistics, Management, Business Intelligence, project management, Ecommerce, Mcommerce, Quality, Networks, Software development, Health and IT etc. Keywords could be any list of words that could be used in locating your project in a library database search facility. Proposed Subject Title A proposed title of the project, succinct and clear as to the project undertaken Eg Feasibility of , How Lean principles in Large scale companies can be applied to , A case study of the barriers and triggers for Ghana to adopt WAP, etc Brief Project scope and abstract
The background about the project, topic, company, situation and overall summary as to the nature of problem and what is required. This would explain the aim of the project and put it into context /setting the scene. If you have a client then this is mentioned with their relevance to the project. This is really a mini-executive summary of the whole project, with considerations to the scope/ boundaries. Project Objectives
List overall objectives of the project listing approx 7-10. These should be measurable and will be used in part assessment in determining the level of achievement of the project. These can be a breakdown of what you are trying to achieve and can be representative of activities/ phases that are to be conducted in arriving at the project deliverables. Words such as acquire, identify,
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evaluate, conduct , develop, demonstrate, analyse etc could be used. These should reflect the Learning outcomes of the Module for example : 1. Research the principles / background / impact of chosen subject matter in terms of either engineering or ICT, regionally, nationally and or globally. 2. Conduct GAP/ PESTLE/ SWOT analysis and define some strategic positioning to provide context to the subject matter. 3. Identify appropriate case studies to analyse in respect of primary and secondary research for comparison and contrast; these can be regional, national and/or global case studies. 4. Evaluate triggers and barriers of subject matter in the context of the problem domain and given scenario. 5. Analyse and build a requirement specification / feasibility study or design using an appropriate and justified business, IT or Engineering lifecycle. 6. Instantiate the relevant business, IT or Engineering lifecycle within the context of the project 7. Determine and discuss possible options, scenarios and solutions 8. Draw conclusions and clear recommendations for the progress and approach for the future realisation of the solution with provision of a timeline 9. Make critical evaluation of the project and approach. The objectives should be relevant and specific to your project, reflect the aims and the learning outcomes. They should be realistic, though sufficiently challenging and measurable.
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FEC MBA/ MSc Detail Project Proposal Form
Please type and fill in the following form and all fields. Once completed and reviewed by supervisors then submit an electronic copy to Coventry University (see details at the end of this form). Thankyou.
Details
Uni Start Date Surname (Family Name ) Student ID no. Contact E-Mail
January 2012 Okon 3890307 Course okonr@coventry.ac.uk, mailplenty@yahoo.co.uk Mobile/Contac t No. Forename(s) (Given Name) Rowland Akerentui ECT 074 MSc. Information Technology 07507223606 , 07438273235
First Supervisor 2nd Assessor
Phil Lovett Vernnon Sassman
Project Details General Subject Area Keywords /Topic areas listed (A broad topic area that defines the area of project and keywords that could be used in a search facility) IT Procurement, IT Service Management, IT Service Level Agreements, Service Level Management
Project Title : A proposed title of the project, succinct and clear as to the project undertaken. Evaluating the readiness of the Broadcast Industry in Nigeria to manage service level agreements for Cloud Services (A case study of the Nigerian Television Authority) Abstract/ Summary : Please provide some background about the project, topic, company, situation and overall summary as to the nature of problem and what is required (approx 500 words)
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The United States National Institutes of Standards and technology defines cloud computing as A Model for Delivering ubiquitous , convenient , on demand network access to a shared pool of computing resources that can be rapidly provisioned and released with minimal management effort or service provider interactions (Mell et al 2011:3). Cloud Computing offers dynamically scalable and virtualized resources as services over the internet (Chakraborty et al 2010: 29). These services are collectively called Cloud Services. Cloud services are services that take advantage of cloud computing and virtualization to enable companies sell or provide value added services to users (Dikaiakos et al : 2009) The broadcast and media industry rely on cloud services to deliver products such as: On Demand Video services, Video Content Archiving and Retrieval services, and Media Production and Collaboration services. In Nigeria the growth of digital terrestrial broadcast platforms, such as the NTA-Startimes network (Thisdaylive.com 2011) has meant that the major terrestrial broadcast companies can now compete in new designated market areas. Broadcast companies are now able to reach new audiences across by taking advantage of these digital terrestrial broadcast platforms. The outcome of this is stronger competition, now that their audiences are empowered with a greater variety of choices. In response to these changes in the market scenario, Nigerian broadcast companies are looking to cloud services for solutions and products that will differentiate their services and improve the experience of their audience: with respect to the convenience in which the access media content and the perceived quality of such contents. The general strategy of these broadcast companies is to distribute their contents digitally across various web-based video platforms. To succeed with this strategy, broadcast companies in Nigeria are at various levels of procuring various Cloud based solutions, to enable them deliver video on demand and video live streaming services. Unlike traditional Information Technology managed systems, there is more responsibility on companies to manage cloud based service (Armbust et al 2010). This Client Responsibility approach model requires these companies have defined Service Level Management process for cloud services. Service level Agreements (SLAs) management: is a key stage of Service Level management. A Service Level Agreement is a contract signed between a customer (in this case the Broadcast Company) and the cloud service provider. These agreements defines the terms of service including non-functional requirements of the service specified as quality of service (QoS), obligations , service pricing and penalties in the case of service violations (Emeakaroha et al 2010:48). Since the cloud service providers and their services are transparent to the audiences, it is important that Nigerian broadcast companies are able to effectively manage Service Level Agreements.
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The Issues to be studied are:
1. What are the service element metrics to be prioritized by Nigerian

Broadcast Companies when considering service level agreements?
2. How will these metrics be collated and reported to satisfy other service
level management requirements (In terms of organisational structure and tools e.g. reporting software.)?
3. How do the service level management techniques used compare to ITIL

(Information Technology Infrastructure Library) standards?
4. Can the current service level management process of Nigerian Broadcast

Companies, be adapted for Cloud services
5.
In a multi cloud service environment, should the broadcast companies in Nigeria outsource service level agreement management?
This research will study the service level agreement management methods of Nigerian Television Authority, the largest Terrestrial broadcast company in Nigeria.
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Objectives List overall objectives of the project. These should be measurable and will be used in part assessment in determining the level of achievement of the project. These should reflect the Learning outcomes of the Module. (Can be a breakdown of what you are trying to achieve and can be representative of activities/ phases that are to be conducted in arriving at the project deliverables) Identify Cloud Services and operators used by the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA). Identify the quality of service metrics and factors, which influence Service level Agreement management decisions, in the NTA. Analyse the service level management practice in the NTA (With Respect To Service Level Management).
Critically Evaluate Service Level Management process of the NTA, using the ITIL (Information Technology Infrastructure Library) Standards. Highlight the possible challenges the NTA may encounter with managing service level agreements.
Suggest solutions and recommendations, which should improve service level agreement management in the NTA.
Project Outcomes : Provide a list of key outcomes of the conducted project (can be deliverables/outputs for each of the above objectives/ stages and these can be studies, reports, requirements, plans, recommendations etc ) 1. Ethics Approval 2. Literature Review Report 3. Industry Review Report 4. Case Study Report (on Service Management process in the NTA) 5. Developed Metric List/Table (For Non-Functional requirements of selected cloud services) 6. Designed Questionnaire 7. Designed Interview with questions 8. Begin Administration of questionnaires and conduct interviews 9. Documented Interview Response 10.Collated Questionnaire Response 11.Data Analysis report (based on Interview and Questionnaire response) 12. Produced Critical Evaluation Report of NTA service management process 13.Begin Compiling the dissertation report 14. Proof read and Correct dissertation report 15.Complete dissertation report 16.Hand in dissertation report.
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Why are you interested in the project ? Provide a reason for your interest, what greater general interest it serves (In Industry or as part of Research) and who it could benefit (the target audience(s) that this project would be beneficial to) In the past Nigerian Companies have had little or no structure or model to manage service level agreements for Information Technology, this has resulted in financial loss for these companies and abandoned Information Technology Projects in various departments an example is being the Nigerian Television Authoritys WonderCUBE project (SUNDAY TRUST 2012) As a result I feel it is important to carry out research that could help Nigerian Companies develop a Framework for Service Management (with emphasis on service level agreements) for cloud services. The broadcast industry is a good place to start such research efforts because of the diversity in the type cloud services these companies use already
What are the key questions the project attempts to answer? These should be testable in some way. These should be the key focal points that the project is trying to determine. (Challenging views, practises, models, behaviour, adoption etc on areas such as: the nature of .., impact of , the practicality of.., a hypothesis of , inferences questioned, assumptions deliberated and tested, questions of comparisons and contrasts .,etc-)
1. How effective are Traditional Information Technology Models are, in

managing Service Level Agreements for cloud services?
2. Do Broadcast Companies in Nigeria need to adopt new organisational

service management agreements? strategies, to manage service level
3. Should Nigerian broadcast companies invest more in their service management processes (with respect to, Managing Service Level Agreement)
What research methods do you intend to use? (Discuss the nature of investigation considering the multitude of academic and Industry methods, with thoughts on qualitative and quantitative methods, and primary and secondary methods)
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This research is a primary research. A primary research is a research where you (the Researcher/author) collect the data from the (primary) source: a primary source is an original document containing first-hand information about a topic (skinner 2004:p3) data that will be used in the research will be collected via Information technology (IT) Production Data, interviews and questionnaires administered to Managers and Chief technology officers of the five terrestrial broadcast companies. The research will use the quantitative method, metrics tables and best practice models will be pre -designed for the evaluation of the data collected from the five terrestrial broadcast companies specified in the case study. quantitative research is defined as social research that employs empirical methods and empirical statements, an empirical statement is defined as a descriptive statement about what is the case in the real world rather than what ought to be the case (Cohen 1980 cited in Sukalmoson 2007:p1)
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What primary and/or secondary data sources do you intend to use? (for each of the above identified methods discuss the pool of sources of authentic and credible information giving examples, e.g. consider target audiences such as profiles of general public, company representatives, people with specialist knowledge and in specific positions, type and title of books, journals etc) PRIMARY Data Sources 1. NTA Information Technology operations quarterly reports (From September 2010- September 2011) 2. NTA Information Technology Procurement quarterly Reports (From September 2010- September 2011) 3. Sample of Service Level Agreements for the NTA/Wondercube Archiving and Multi-channel project 4. Questionnaires response: of Information technology Managers and Users of Cloud services, at the NTA. 5. Structured Interview response: from the Chief Technology Officers of the NTA.
SECONDARY Data Sources 1. Journals and Articles IEEE Xplore Digital Library: IEEE Xplore is an online delivery system providing full access to the highest quality technical literature in Computing, Information Technology and related Subjects
Academic Search Complete: Academic Search Complete is a multidisciplinary full text database with over 5,300 full text periodicals which includes 4,400 peer-reviewed journals. ACM Digital Library: Association of Computing Machinery (ACM) Digital includes the full text of every article published by the ACM ETHOS : British Standard Online: Provides Access to a full-text set of current British Standards and documents.
2. Books ITIL Life Cycle Suit (2011): A Set of Five Books Published by the Information Technology Information Library (ITIL), Which Describes best practice models, for the different aspects of IT Service
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Management.
Service Level Agreement Management Handbook Volume (Enterprise Edition) 2004, Published by The Open Group (Online)
Managing Information (Core Management) by Diana Bedward and John Stredwick (2004) Published by ELSEVIER Butterworth Heinemann. MANAGEMENT by Richard L. Daft, Martyn Kendrick, Natalia Vershinina (2010) Published by Cengage Learning EMEA.
Please provide draft chapter headings for your report 1 INTRODUCTION Overview of the Nigerian Broadcast Industry Introduction to the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA) Cloud Computing and Cloud Services Overview of Service Level Agreement for Cloud Services
2 LITERATURE REVIEW Academic Review Service Level Management and Service Level Agreements Cloud Computing and Cloud Services Service Level Agreement Models for Cloud Services. Industry Review Cloud Services and the Nigerian Broadcast Industry Service Management and Service Level Agreements: For Cloud Based Media Services. 3 RESEARCH INVESTIGATION Research Problem Research Aim and Objectives Research Process Description Research Theory Research Assumptions RESEARCH DESIGN Data Collection Techniques Research Limitations Summary of Research Design Methodology RESEARCH ANALYSIS
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6 RESEARCH FINDINGS The Cloud Service Environment in the Nigerian Television Authority. Service Management and Service Level Agreements, Process and Practice in the Nigerian Television Authority. Challenges of Managing Cloud Services SLAs in the Nigerian Television Authority . CONCLUSION RECOMENDATIONS FUTURE REASEARCH
7 8 9
10 References, Bibliography, Appendices, Glossary.
Gantt chart Attach or outline a project schedule (Gantt chart) which incorporates the phases of your project and activities to undertake, duration, start and end dates, any milestones/ deliverables and major dependencies. This should preferably be in MS project (by exception: .xls, .doc, PowerPoint etc)
Date :
12-06-2011
Return of form to Coventry University
Thank you for completing the form please ensure your supervisor has a copy and submit an electronic copy by CUonline by the relevant module web (M99EKM or equivalent).
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You also need to complete the online ethics form through the following link:-
http://ethics.coventry.ac.uk This form will then be reviewed by the universities ethic committee.
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The following is for Office use only Date received : Comments by checker :
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