Question
You are managing a telecom project. You have two teams reporting to you. One team is responsible for equipment installation and the other team is responsible for commissioning and testing the equipment. Both teams are working in parallel so that as soon as the installation team finishes equipment installation at one site, they move on to another site for installation. This allows the commissioning and testing team to start their activities on the newly installed site. The reporting structure is such that each of the teams has five engineers and a separate team lead. Each team member interacts with each other but only the team leads interact with you. Both team leads also interact with each other to synchronize their operations. How many communication channels do you have on your project?
A.) 33
B.) 23
C.) 42
D.) 78
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Answer & Explanation
Correct Answer: A)
This was a difficult question wasn’t it? Let’s analyze the scenario to calculate the answer.
> We have two independent teams. Each team has six members (five engineers and one team lead). Each team member is interacting with each other so communication channels for each team are (6)*(6-1)/2=15. And because we have two teams like this, the total is 2*15=30.
> Both team leads are communicating with you so there are two communication channels for this interaction.
> In addition, because both team leads are interacting with each other, there is one additional communication channel.
Therefore, the total communication channels on your project is 30+2+1=33.
Reference: PMBOK Guide 5th Edition, page 292
