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Risk Management
Anne Banks PidduckAdapted from John Musser
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Risk Management
• Problems that haven’t happened yet• Why is it hard?• Some are wary of bearing bad news
– No one wants to be the messenger– Or seen as “a worrier”
• Define a strategy early in your project
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Risk Management
• Identification, Analysis, Control• Goal: avoid a crisis• Thayer: Risk Mgmt versus Project Mgmt
– For a specific project versus all projects– Proactive versus reactive
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Project Risk
• Characterized by:– Uncertainty (0 < probability < 1)– An associated loss (money, life, reputation, etc)– Manageable – some action can control it
• Risk Exposure– Product of probability and potential loss
• Problem– A risk that has materialized
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Types of Risks
• Schedule Risks• Schedule compression (customer, marketing, etc.)
• Cost Risks• Unreasonable budgets
• Requirements Risks• Incorrect• Incomplete• Unclear or inconsistent• Volatile
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Types of Risks
• Quality Risks• Operational Risks• Most of the “Classic Mistakes”
– Classic mistakes are made more often
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Risk Management Process
Risk Management
Risk Assesment
Risk Control
Risk Identification
Risk Analysis
Risk Prioritization
Risk Management Planning
Risk Resolution
Risk Monitoring
“Software Risk Management”, Boehm, 1989
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Risk Identification
• Get your team involved in this process– Don’t go it alone
• Produces a list of risks with potential to disrupt your project’s schedule
• Use a checklist or similar source to brainstorm possible risks
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Risk Analysis
• Determine impact of each risk• Risk Exposure (RE) or Impact
– RE = Probability of loss * size of loss– Example: Risk is “Facilities not ready on time”
• Probability is 25%, size is 4 weeks, RE is 1 week
– Ex: Risk is “Inadequate design. Redesign required.”• Probability is 15%, size is 10 weeks, RE is 1.5 weeks
– Statistically are “expected values”– Sum all RE’s to get total expected overrun
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Risk Analysis ..2
• Estimating size of loss– Loss is easier to see than probability
• You can break this down into “chunks” (like WBS)
• Estimating probability of loss– Use team member estimates and a risk-estimate review– Use Delphi or group-consensus techniques– Use gambling analogy “How much would you bet?”– Use “adjective calibration”: highly likely, probably,
improbable, unlikely, highly unlikely
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Risk Prioritization
• Remember the 80-20 rule• Often want larger-loss risks higher
– Or higher probability items• Possibly group ‘related risks’• Helps identify which risks to ignore
– Those at the bottom
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Types of Unknowns
• Known Unknowns– Information you know someone else has
• Unknown Unknowns– Information that does not yet exist
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Risk Control
• Risk Management Plan– Can be one paragraph per risk– McConnell’s example
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Risk Resolution
• Risk Avoidance– Don’t do it– Scrub from system– Off-load to another party
• Risk Assumption– Don’t do anything about it– Accept that it might occur– But still watch for it
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Risk Resolution
• Problem control– Develop contingency plans– Allocate extra test resources
• Risk Transfer– To another part of the project (or team)– Move off the critical path at least
• Knowledge Acquisition– Investigate, maybe with a prototype– Buy information or expertise about it– Do research
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Risk Monitoring
• Top 10 Risk List • Rank• Previous Rank• Weeks on List• Risk Name• Risk Resolution Status
• A low-overhead best practice• Interim project post-mortems
– After various major milestones
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Risk Communication
• Don’t be afraid to convey the risks• Use your judgment to balance
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Miniature Milestones
• A risk-reduction technique• Use of small goals within project schedule
– One of McConnell’s Best Practices (Ch. 27)• Fine-grained approach to plan & track• Reduces risk of undetected project slippage• Pros
– Enhances status visibility– Good for project recovery
• Cons– Increases project tracking effort
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Miniature Milestones ..2
• Can be used throughout the development cycle• Works well with hard-to-manage project activities
or methods such as with evolutionary prototyping• Reduces unpleasant surprises• Success factors
– Overcoming resistance from those managed– Staying true to ‘miniature’ nature
• Can improve motivation through achievements
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Miniature Milestones ..3
• Requires a detailed schedule • Have early milestones
– 1 to 2 days to 1 to 2 weeks• Encourages iterative development• Use binary milestones
– Done or not done (100%)
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Feature-Set Control
• Class mistake avoidance• Early Stages
– 1. Minimal Specification– 2. Requirements Scrubbing– 3. Versioned Development
• Mid-Project– Effective change control
• Late-Project– Feature cuts
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Traditional Specifications
• Drive for “traditional” specifications– Necessity– Downstream cost avoidance– Full control over all aspects
• As McConnell notes: • “But the goal is not to build exactly what you said
you would at the beginning. It is to build the best possible software within the available time.”
• Idealistic but worth remembering
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Minimal Specification
• This is not XP (extreme programming)• Traditional specification issues
– Wasted effort because too much detail– Obsolescence– Details do not guarantee success– Overly constrained design– User assumption that costs are equal
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Minimal Specification ..2
Costs and Risks– Omission of key requirements– Unclear or impossible goals– Gold plating– Used for the wrong reasons
• Lazy substitute for doing good requirements
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Minimal Specification ..3
Benefits– Improved morale and motivation– Opportunistic efficiency– Shorter requirements phase
Success Factors– Used only when requirements are flexible– Capture most important items– Involve key users
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Requirements Scrubbing
• Removing a feature from the product– Eliminates all effort: specification, design,
development, test, documentation– The earlier the better– Typically done during or right after
Requirements
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Requirements Scrubbing ..2
• Less risky than minimal specification• Aims
– Eliminate all but absolutely necessary requirements
– Simplify all complicated requirements– Substitute cheaper items
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Versioned Development
• Eliminate work from the current version• “Let’s put it in release 1.1”
– You’re still saying “Yes”, not “No”• By next revision, the list has changed
anyway
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Mid-Project Feature-Creep
• Average project has 25% change in requirements during development
• Sources of change– Marketing: want to meet customer’s check-list– Developers: want to perfect deficiencies– Users: want more functionality or now ‘know’
what they want• They will all try to insert these mid-project
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Mid-Project Feature-Creep ..2
• The devil is in the details• Trivial feature can have weeks of
impact• Developers can insert things when
you’re not looking• No specification can cover all details;
you must.
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Change Control Board (CCB)
• Representatives from each stakeholder party– Development, QA, Marketing, Management,
Customer Support• Perform “change analysis”
– Importance, priority, cost, benefit• Triage
– Allocating scare resources– Some will not receive treatment– Life-critical to the project
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Change Control
ChangeControlSystem
CMSystem
CM Tool
“Quality Software Project Management”, Futrell, Shafer, Shafer
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Configuration Control
• A management support function• Includes
– Program code changes– Requirements and design changes– Version release changes
• Essential for developed items– Code, documentation, and so on
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Configuration Control Terminology
• Software Configuration Control Item (SCCI)– a.k.a. Source Item (SI)– Anything suitable for configuration control– Source code, documents, diagrams, and so on
• Change Control: process of controlling changes– Proposal, evaluation, approval, scheduling,
implementation, tracking
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Configuration Control Terminology ..2
• Version Control– Controlling software version releases– Recording and saving releases– Documenting release differences
• Configuration Control– Process of evaluating, approving and disapproving, and
managing changes to SCCIs.
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SCM
• Software Configuration Management• Formal engineering discipline• Methods and tools to identify and manage
software throughout its use
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Configuration Control Needs
• Establish clearly defined management authority• Setup control standards, procedures and guidelines
– All team members must be aware of these
• Requires appropriate tools and infrastructure• Configuration Management Plan must be
produced during planning phase– Often part of Software Development Plan