PROJECT MANAGEMENT PROJECT MANAGEMENT TECHNIQUESTECHNIQUES
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Agenda
• Definition/Importance of Project Management
• Staffing the Project
• Organizational Ownership
• Creating a Practical Budget
• Communications
• Risk Management
• Project Management Tools
• Managing Multi-Agency Projects
• Warning Signs/Symptoms of Failure
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Project - Definition
• Sequence of tasks with a beginning and an end that are bounded by time, resources, and desired results
• Specific desired outcome
• Deadline or target date for completion
• Budget that limits project resources (people, supplies, money)
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Why is Project Management Important?
30% of all projects are canceled before completion
30% experience schedule delays
50% exceed original cost estimates
12% completed on time and on budget
1995 - $81 billion spent on canceled technology projects
The Standish Group, 1995Cats-Baril & Thompson, 1995
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A large western state invested $260 million in a system to track “dead-beat” parents... As a result of ongoing setbacks, the legislature scrapped the project and started over.
In 1994, a southern state hired a well known firm to develop a child-support tracking system. After four years and spending more than $20 million, the system was unfinished and the contractor had stopped working.
Kavanaugh, 1997
Examples
Rock Hill Herald, 1997
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Staffing:
Finding the RightPeople
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Project Manager
• Critical for success
• Must coordinate and facilitate all aspects of the project
• Takes full responsibility and accountability
• Manages project tasks, schedule, people, and budget
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Traits of a Good Project Manager
Enthusiasm for the Project
Ability to Manage Change Effectively
Tolerant Attitude Toward Ambiguity
Team Building and Negotiating Skills
Customer First Orientation
Adherence to Priorities of the BusinessBaker, 1998
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Motivating Team Members
Demonstrate Leadership
Exhibit a Positive Attitude
Provide Challenging Opportunities
Define Performance Expectations
Praise Team Efforts
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• Team members are critical to success of project
• Identify skill sets required for the project
• Evaluate in-house resources, availability
• Contract required skill sets
• Utilize surgical suite concept
Staffing the Project Team
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• Seek members with high-level skills; strong people will overcome difficulties throughout the project; the weak will not, without assistance
•Create small team - drastically reduces communication overhead and conflicts
• Avoid relying exclusively on a single team member (cross-train)
•Consider member personalities as well as skills; will the team work well together, what are the potential points of friction
High Performing Team
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•Create incentives - technically challenge each person on the project
•Select members interested in the project
•Provide training to increase skills, confidence and performance
•Assign areas of responsibility, rather than tasks
•Expect and anticipate turnover (be prepared)
•Insist on participative team approach
High Performing Team
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Outsourcing / Contracting
• Contract for required or specialized skills not otherwise available
• Include opportunity for knowledge transfer
• Develop internal capacities
• Beware of excessive outsourcing; loses its effectiveness beyond 30%
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Do not believe in miracles.
Rely on them.
COMPUTER THEOREM
COMPUTER THEOREM
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Organizational Ownership
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Organizational Ownership
• The reason for any IT project is to add value to the organization
• Organizational value comes from supporting the most critical business goals and helping the organization deliver on its business strategies
• Select projects to achieve the greatest net benefits for the organization
• Justify the project in light of the organizational goals
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· Strategic planning, IT planning, and selection of projects are closely linked
· Insist on an executive sponsor (chief); up to 83% don’t, contributes to failure
· Identify and involve all stakeholders
· Involve steering members in key decisions and problem solving activities
· Demonstrate a favorable cost/benefit analysis
Organizational Ownership
If you build it ... they will come!
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Creating a Practical Budget
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Break down each activity into individual tasks
Cost out each task as accurately as possible
Include project management costs (consultants, software, documentation)
Consult the individuals who actually perform the tasks; experts can provide more accurate estimates of actual costs
Consider other factors that might impact budget (contractors, scope changes)
Creating a Budget
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Add 10-15% contingency for unanticipated expenses
Estimate 4-6 hours per day work time (factor in “down” time, e.g. administrative work, sick time, vacation, meetings)
Consider work space expenses, computers, additional phone lines, LAN connections, printing, travel
Use a budget worksheet
Creating a Budget
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Project Manager
as a Communicator
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Communication• Common ground of understanding
• Process by which information is exchanged between individuals through symbols, signs, or behavior
• Means of transferring information, emotions, or thoughts
• Includes verbal, written, and nonverbal means between two or more people
• Communication is only successful when message is correctly understood by intended message receiver
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Communication Methods:
Meetings
Reports/Memos
Presentations
Visits/Walk-Throughs
Phone, Email, Fax, Vmail, Web
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Risk Management
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Risk Management
• All team members should be responsible for identifying potential risks
• Most problems can be anticipated and avoided
• Solutions can be prepared in advance
• A problem resolved in advance is far simpler to resolve than one that occurs unexpectedly
• Reduces stress to team members
The formal process by which risk factors are systematically and continuously identified, assessed, managed, and
mitigated
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Risk Magnitude
Risk Magnitude =
(Severity of Impact) X (Probability of Occurrence)
1 5 10 1 5 10 minimal catastrophic not highly
likely probable
Example: Late delivery of server
Severity = 9 (high)
Probability = 8 (high) Risk Magnitude = 9 x 8 = 72
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• Maintain a running list of problems in a contingency table
• Sort by risk magnitude with most severe on top
• Focus on those with highest risk magnitude
• Review and update the list frequently (continuously)
Risk - Contingency Table
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• Using the worksheet in your notebook, develop a contingency table for a project you are currently involved with or are familiar with
• Identify five risks to the project description of the risk who is responsible for resolving potential severity of impact probability of occurrence calculate risk magnitude contingency plan date contingency must be in place
Risk Management - Activity
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Project disasters can be avoided by an explicit early
concern with identifying and resolving high-risk
elements. . .if you are not managing risk,
you are managing the
wrong thing !!!
Avoid Disasters
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Project Management
Tools
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Purpose of Project Management Tools
Maintain project control
Allow for quick overview of the project
View project details in different perspectives
Present relationships and order of project tasks
Display and communicate schedule in various ways
Identify and manage the sequential flow of critical activities in a project
Helpful for identifying and managing risks
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Project Management Tools
• Quality Assurance
• Documentation
• Schedule
• Gantt Charts
• PERT Charts
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Quality Assurance•Publicly declare a departmental
commitment to quality
• Implement training
•Set-up a measurement program
• Identify problem areas, look for solutions that will prevent recurrence
•Build quality into each interim deliverable
•The earlier project defects are identified, the less they cost to fix.
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Documentation• Specifications and Requirements - essential if
the project is to meet the organization’s goals
• Organizational Structure - project team
• Roles and Responsibilities - minimize misunderstandings and conflict
• Contingency Table (updated weekly) & Risk Forms
• Change Requests
• Regular Project Updates (weekly)
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• Essential for keeping the project on track
• Microsoft Project 98 - automated tool
• Schedule activities, milestones, critical path, resources, tasks
• Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)
• Break each phase into individual tasks, with assigned responsibility and time
• Assists in identifying potential problems early
Project Schedule
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MS Project 98 - ScheduleID Task Name Duration
1 PHASE 1 - Define Phase 63 days
2 Develop Project Plan 28 days
3 Define & Train Project Team 5 days
4 Review Statement of Work 5 days
5 Define hardware, software, services & supplies 3 days
6 Develop needs analysis plan 5 days
7 Prepare training plan 5 days
8 Prepare acceptance plan 5 days
9 Identify and Justify software devleopment approach 3 days
10 Prepare configuration management plan 7 days
11 Prepare quality assurance plan 3 days
12 Develop risk management plan 4 days
13 Refine cost estimate 3 days
14 Review Plan and Sign off by customer 3 days
15
16 Conduct needs analysis 35 days
17 Prepare user questionnaire 2 days
18 Meet with users to define requirements 10 days
5/30 6/6 6/13 6/20 6/27 7/4 7/11June July
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Planned schedule
Actual schedule
Gantt Chart
1
2
3
4
5
Time
Tasks
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PERT/CPM Chart
PERT - Program and Evaluation Review Technique
CPM - Critical Path Method
• Useful for large projects
• Identifies minimum project time based on dependent consecutive tasks
• Identifies concurrent tasks
• If a task on the critical path takes longer than expected, the entire project is delayed
1
3
25
47
6
98
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• A clearly identifiable point in a project
• Summarizes the completion of an important set of tasks
• Commonly used to summarize the important events in a project
• Stakeholders don’t want or need the details in a project plan
Milestone - Definition
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Project Management Activities
Monitor the status of the project
Adjust budget, schedule, work plan
Coordinate all project-related activities
Document project status, project plan revisions
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ManagingMulti-AgencyProjects
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Multi-Agency Projects
• Support of CEO from all agencies
• Project goals are understood and shared
• Importance of mutual cooperation for project to be successful
• When conflicts threaten to impact the project, meet with the parties to find reasonable solution
• Make sure all agencies expect to benefit
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Warning Signs
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Symptoms of a Failing Project
Time, money, and resources have not been allocated to researching the problem; the problem remains poorly defined
Objectives of the implementation project are vague and ambiguous; benefits are difficult to measure
Little or no time is spent in preliminary planning
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Symptoms of a Failing Project
No standards to use in estimating preliminary costs or the duration of the project
Project team is not properly staffed --personnel are assigned on an as available basis and cannot dedicate themselves to the project.
User groups to be served are not represented on the project team
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Personnel Shortfalls
Unrealistic Schedules and Budget
Developing the Wrong Functions and Properties
Developing the Wrong User Interface
Gold Plating
Continuing Stream of Requirements Changes
Shortfalls in Externally Furnished Products
Shortfalls in Externally Performed Tasks
Real-time Performance Shortfalls
Straining Computer-science Capabilities
Ten Reasons for Failed Projects
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In summary, I fully realize that I have not
succeeded in answering all of your questions. . .
Indeed, I feel I have not answered any of them
completely. The answers, I have found, only serve
to raise a whole new set of questions, which only
lead to more problems, some of which we weren’t
even aware were problems. To sum it all up. . . in
some ways I feel we are as confused as ever, but I
believe we are confused on a higher level and about
more important things.
Summary
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PROJECT PROJECT MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT TECHNIQUESTECHNIQUES