Effective Project Management

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Effective Project Management

• Barbara Stone
• September 27, 2007

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Agenda

• Elevator Speeches
• Prioritization
• Evaluation of alternatives
• Approach to project
• WBS
• Define
• Sequence
• Duration
• Schedule

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Elevator speeches

• You are Standing
• Informal
• Informative
• Brief
• Include Business issue you are tackling
• How company benefits
• Why you are excited to take part
• What the listener can do
• if you need something

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Elevator speech

• http//www.creativekeys.net/PowerfulPresentations/
  article1024.html
• Prepared presentation
• Articulates in 3-4 minutes
• Who are you helping
• With what problem
• How company benefits
• Practicing is a good idea

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Scope planninghigh-levelskills analysis
Charterbusiness casefeasibility studyproduct
description
Scope statement
Scope definitionassumptionsscope
in/outalternatives
WBS
Risk Mgmtplanning
ActivityDefinition
Costbudgeting
Resourceplanning
Costestimating
Cost baselineTime-phased budget
Risk Mgmtplan
Resourcerequests
Activitydurationestimating
Activitysequencing
CommunicationPlan
Schedule development
Networkdiagram
Project schedule
Project Plandevelopment
Project plan
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Prioritization

• Waterfall
• Timing determines likelihood
• Developers instead of customer
• Agile
• Value determines likelihood
• Reassessed throughout project

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Kano
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Kano conclusions
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Alternatives review decision

• There may be multiple ways to fulfill the
  Requirements
• Eliminate alternatives that dont meet external
  constraints
• Evaluate remaining alternatives against selected
  criteria
• time/budget requirements
• Team skillset and interest
• Other criteria as team requires

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Traditional, agile, extreme?
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Cone of uncertainty
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Project sizing
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PMBOK process to create project schedule
These processes can be combined, and iterative,
if need be
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• The what

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Work Breakdown Structure

• A hierarchical description of the work that must
  be done to complete the project as defined in the
  Project Overview Statement.
• Inputs
• POS
• Requirements Document
• Terms
• Activity Chunk of work
• Tasks Smaller chunk of work. Activities are
  made up of tasks
• Work Package Complete description of how the
  tasks that make up the activity will actually be
  done

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Uses for the WBS

• Thought Process Tool
• Architectural Design Tool
• Planning Tool
• Project Status Reporting Tool

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Activity Definition

• Decomposing the task areas / sub-projects
• tasks in appropriate level of detail what
  does this mean for your project? Think about
• experience of your team
• possibly duration of task
• of people performing the task if hand-off,
  new task
• Only needs single person to oversee work
• Team creating the WBS should have appropriate
  level of expertise to assign approximate duration
  to each task(because they will, later).

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Brainstorming

• Recorder writes all ideas where visible to team
• Allows people to build on others ideas
• Participant knows his/her contribution is
  valuable heard

• Facilitator
• All ideas accorded consideration no editing
• keeps discussion focused
• Sets time limits

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Affinity diagram (Ishikawa)
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Mind-mapping user story nodes
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Adding task details
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Tips

• Person who has experience in doing something
  similar better at defining sub-tasks and
  duration. No team member with experience? Adds
  to risk needs safety Try to get someone with
  experience to help with planning if you cannot
  have them on the team for execution
• May not know all detail as work through the
  plan and the project, scope will shift
  hopefully only slightly

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Activity Sequencing

• Process of determining both order and possible
  overlap of tasks - start with task constraints
• Examples
• Task A needs to be complete before task B may
  start
• Tasks C, D, E may be done in parallel, but all
  must be complete before task F may begin
• Task X may not begin until milestone Y has
  occurred
• Task Q must start at the same time as task R

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PERT activity on arc
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PERT activity on node
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Activity duration estimating

• An art, with a little bit of science
• Best estimators are those who have done similar
  work
• Beware of confusing duration and effort
• The duration of most activities will be
  significantly influenced by the resources
  assigned to them

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PMBOK Activity Duration Estimating
Inputs
Tools/Techniques
Outputs

1. Activity List
2. Constraints
3. Assumptions
4. Resource Requirements
5. Resource capabilities
6. Historical information
7. Identified risks

• Expert judgment
• Analogous estimating
• Quantitatively based
• durations
• Reserve time
• (contingency safety)

• Activity duration
• estimates
• Basis of estimates
• Activity list update

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Pert (one network diagram technique)

• Task Duration
• O most optimistic estimate
• M most likely estimate
• P most pessimistic estimate

• Formula

O4MP6
Sample Optimistic Most Likely Pessimistic Risk
adjusted 1 week 3 weeks 6 weeks 3 weeks 16
weeks 17 weeks 30 weeks 19 weeks
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Sizing
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Story points
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How much, how fast
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Planning poker

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• Youve been infected with spy wear and suspect
  its a root kit have to do a clean install

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Six Criteria to Test for WBS Completeness

• Status/Completion is measurable
• The activity is bounded
• The activity has a deliverable
• Time and cost are easily estimated
• Activity duration is within acceptable limits
• Work assignments are independent
• Seventh Criteria Project managers judgment
  that the WBS is not complete

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Exceptions to the Completion Criteria Rule

• Stopping Before Completion Criteria Are Met
• Decomposing Beyond Completion of the Criteria

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Factoring in constraints

• Factor if multiple working on task together?
  discuss XP example.
• Also factor if do not have resource 100 of time.
  Why this is a bad idea.
• Adding Project Management factor
• Do Jodie and Barbara do this?

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Putting it all together

• Tasks
• Duration
• Sequencing
• Start date
• Project Schedule
• Does it meet Deadline / Scope / constraints?

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Gantt chart

• Does not show task interdependencies or resources
  assigned
• Do not help organize project as effectively as
  WBS network diagrams
• Completed after WBS
• Effectively show progress time

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Agile
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Common scheduling pitfalls

• Planned downtime calendar events, team needs
• External interfaces contractors, external teams
• Constraints duration, access, etc.
• Time to come up to speed
• 100 optimization
• Just plain missed it