The business success comes from a team of motivated, hard/smart working employees – in any small and medium size company. In a seminar, I attended few years ago – I noted few valuable points about this topic, and I would like to share them here.
Creating a Positive Environment – Every employee should feel worthwhile and important. Such office environment gives a positive energy to employees, and it makes a productive office. The manager’s office door should be always open for staffs – their questions and concerns.
Career oriented growth – The manager should help the employees to reach to the next level professionally by providing on-site coaching – through their day to day works. There is professional one-to-one counseling available, which can help people learn how to overcome personal and professional obstacles on their career path.
Acknowledge every contributions – A manager can make a very big difference in employee morale simply by taking the time to recognize the contributions and accomplishments of every members in team.
Incentives – Offering incentives to members for best performance is a good practice. It can be something small like a gift certificate, or something more such as performance based bonus. “Employee of the Month”, “Star Performer” kind of treats will help a lot in motivating employees.
In my experiences, I crossed many success stories in my team – of course by implementing the above mentioned ideas.
Showing posts with label project. Show all posts
Showing posts with label project. Show all posts
Sunday, April 3, 2011
Thursday, December 16, 2010
Project Management and Trends
Changing or additional requirements are the leading cause of project delays, according to the results of a recent Survey Says online poll by ProjectsAtWork. Project management practitioners also cite lack of stakeholder involvement and poor communication as common reasons that projects fall behind schedule.
The September 2010 poll found that 41 percent of respondents said that “additional or changing requirements” were the No. 1 reason for project delays, followed by “lack of stakeholder involvement or knowledge” (30 percent) and “poor communication” (24 percent). Only 5 percent said “new or unfamiliar processes or technologies” were a cause for project delays.
Asked to choose the No. 2 reason for project delays, 35 percent of respondents chose changing requirements, followed by poor communication (29 percent), lack of stakeholder involvement (21 percent) and unfamiliar processes (14 percent).
The September 2010 poll found that 41 percent of respondents said that “additional or changing requirements” were the No. 1 reason for project delays, followed by “lack of stakeholder involvement or knowledge” (30 percent) and “poor communication” (24 percent). Only 5 percent said “new or unfamiliar processes or technologies” were a cause for project delays.
Asked to choose the No. 2 reason for project delays, 35 percent of respondents chose changing requirements, followed by poor communication (29 percent), lack of stakeholder involvement (21 percent) and unfamiliar processes (14 percent).
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Executive EPMO Dashboards
Executive Dashboards are key IT requirements now days in many EPMO Groups. It is a tool that provides you with a graphical view of the progress of your project, so that you can see at a glance whether you're on track. It's basically a set of Charts that gives you the current status of the project at any time. You can create the Charts manually in Excel, or use smart software that does it for you.
Recently I delivered design specification for a client, for their Executive EPMO dashboard application. Let me share some observations regarding constructing a dashboard, so that it can be helpful for those, who are into same kind of processes.
Define the success criteria of Project: list the things that determine the success of your project – for example schedule, quality, resource loading, budget tracking, key milestones etc.
Collect required data from real time: The project data needed to measure the success criteria we have already defined. The data can come from project plans, quality reports, issue spreadsheets, budget reports, Timesheets, Change/Issue/Risk Logs etc.
Model Graphical Views: Filter your data, sort them into groups and file it all in one place – mostly a database. Use Reporting engines to generate appropriate graphical views. There are many available for .NET and Java based platforms. I see many for PHP / Open source too.
Let’s see some most wanted Charts required in Executive EPMO Dashboard.
Time Charts: Required for schedule tracking. Planned versus actual completion status for key milestones can be showed. Critical Paths and their status can be added here. Summarized view of this data will help to find out whether the project is ahead of behind schedule. A detailed Task level progress chart can be a presented in drill-down manner. Group them in “Not Started”, “Not Completed”, “In-Progress” and “Complete” - and show dependencies always.
Budget / Cost Chart: Required for Budget Management. I suggest calculating the total cost of resources, materials, equipments and any expense forms completed by staff and present them single view. Earned value, Cost comparison charts can also be added.
Resource Usage: This report can be generated from Project plans. The resource graphs from project plans gives us clear view about over-loaded or underutilized resourced.
Risk Reports: Give a graphical view of Risks, Issues and changes that will have impact on delivery timelines. Show dependencies wherever required. This report can be generated from Log Files. The data in graphical view should be grouped as low, medium and high impact.
There are many Executive Dashboards available in online for reference – I suggest projectmanager.com – just give a try.
Let us discuss more about defining best practices in working with Dashboard development in near future.
Recently I delivered design specification for a client, for their Executive EPMO dashboard application. Let me share some observations regarding constructing a dashboard, so that it can be helpful for those, who are into same kind of processes.
Define the success criteria of Project: list the things that determine the success of your project – for example schedule, quality, resource loading, budget tracking, key milestones etc.
Collect required data from real time: The project data needed to measure the success criteria we have already defined. The data can come from project plans, quality reports, issue spreadsheets, budget reports, Timesheets, Change/Issue/Risk Logs etc.
Model Graphical Views: Filter your data, sort them into groups and file it all in one place – mostly a database. Use Reporting engines to generate appropriate graphical views. There are many available for .NET and Java based platforms. I see many for PHP / Open source too.
Let’s see some most wanted Charts required in Executive EPMO Dashboard.
Time Charts: Required for schedule tracking. Planned versus actual completion status for key milestones can be showed. Critical Paths and their status can be added here. Summarized view of this data will help to find out whether the project is ahead of behind schedule. A detailed Task level progress chart can be a presented in drill-down manner. Group them in “Not Started”, “Not Completed”, “In-Progress” and “Complete” - and show dependencies always.
Budget / Cost Chart: Required for Budget Management. I suggest calculating the total cost of resources, materials, equipments and any expense forms completed by staff and present them single view. Earned value, Cost comparison charts can also be added.
Resource Usage: This report can be generated from Project plans. The resource graphs from project plans gives us clear view about over-loaded or underutilized resourced.
Risk Reports: Give a graphical view of Risks, Issues and changes that will have impact on delivery timelines. Show dependencies wherever required. This report can be generated from Log Files. The data in graphical view should be grouped as low, medium and high impact.
There are many Executive Dashboards available in online for reference – I suggest projectmanager.com – just give a try.
Let us discuss more about defining best practices in working with Dashboard development in near future.
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Success in Fixed Bid Projects
Improving the success rate of fixed bid Projects is a challenge for any project manager in IT services. Most of the service projects come with tight deadline and requirements unfreeze. In my experience, in most of the small and medium size organizations, the pre-sales and sales team decides the timeline based on their rough estimations. The project comes to project manager as a semi-finished document, with fixed final delivery date. The success rate improves with quality management, scope management, communications management, and of course Issue management. Let us discuss few important points, which can help the project managers to achieve success rate in their fixed bid projects. This can be applied to T&M, and Retainer projects too, based on few or no modifications.
1. In the project Initiation meeting, make sure that your customer defines their requirements in detail – at the maximum level. You need to know exactly what it is that must be delivered, to whom and when. Try to make it specific, write it up formally and get them sign it off. This document will become the basis upon which to measure your success.
2. Try to involve your customer throughout the entire project lifecycle – including analysis and planning as well as executions. Inform about every status, including the risks. This helps us to manage their expectations. Make sure the communication is happening with right information at right time. Weekly status reports, regular weekly calls and use defined templates as much as possible.
3. Plan your delivery timelines short and more realistic. I suggest never agree to lengthy timelines. If possible, split your project into “mini-phases” – and keep them short – less than 4 weeks. This keeps everyone motivated and focused on targets. Let every “mini-phase” include a milestone and add delivery deadlines to your milestones. Try to deliver the commitment on every deadline, no matter what. If you can’t deliver, inform your customer about it as early as possible and give them realistic re-scheduled plan.
4. Organize a small change control board which includes your sales team, account manager and customer. Only authorize changes to your project scope if there is no impact on immediate and final timelines. Get approval from Change control board and then get their buy-in to extend the delivery dates if you need to.
5. Let the Quality be the most important achievement anytime. Keep it high with your deliverables as much as possible. Constantly review quality and never let it slip. Implement “peer-reviews”, external reviews, and web-Ex demos with customer to improve the solution, and to meet your customer’s needs.
6. For every phase – including the mini-phases, with their integrated phases – hand it formally over to customers and get them to sign an acceptance form to say that it meets their expectations. It makes your deliverable 100% complete.
7. Issues Management is an important phase – in support level. Plan about handling your issues and risks as soon as they are identified. Prioritize and resolve them before any impact in project. If required, prepare a separate issue management plan and publish regular burn-down chart.
Share with me, your experiences and techniques in improving success rate of fixed bid projects. It can help us to discuss more.
1. In the project Initiation meeting, make sure that your customer defines their requirements in detail – at the maximum level. You need to know exactly what it is that must be delivered, to whom and when. Try to make it specific, write it up formally and get them sign it off. This document will become the basis upon which to measure your success.
2. Try to involve your customer throughout the entire project lifecycle – including analysis and planning as well as executions. Inform about every status, including the risks. This helps us to manage their expectations. Make sure the communication is happening with right information at right time. Weekly status reports, regular weekly calls and use defined templates as much as possible.
3. Plan your delivery timelines short and more realistic. I suggest never agree to lengthy timelines. If possible, split your project into “mini-phases” – and keep them short – less than 4 weeks. This keeps everyone motivated and focused on targets. Let every “mini-phase” include a milestone and add delivery deadlines to your milestones. Try to deliver the commitment on every deadline, no matter what. If you can’t deliver, inform your customer about it as early as possible and give them realistic re-scheduled plan.
4. Organize a small change control board which includes your sales team, account manager and customer. Only authorize changes to your project scope if there is no impact on immediate and final timelines. Get approval from Change control board and then get their buy-in to extend the delivery dates if you need to.
5. Let the Quality be the most important achievement anytime. Keep it high with your deliverables as much as possible. Constantly review quality and never let it slip. Implement “peer-reviews”, external reviews, and web-Ex demos with customer to improve the solution, and to meet your customer’s needs.
6. For every phase – including the mini-phases, with their integrated phases – hand it formally over to customers and get them to sign an acceptance form to say that it meets their expectations. It makes your deliverable 100% complete.
7. Issues Management is an important phase – in support level. Plan about handling your issues and risks as soon as they are identified. Prioritize and resolve them before any impact in project. If required, prepare a separate issue management plan and publish regular burn-down chart.
Share with me, your experiences and techniques in improving success rate of fixed bid projects. It can help us to discuss more.
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
PMO for Medium Size Organizations
PMO – Project Management Office is becoming an interesting keyword now days in many medium size organizations too. When a project manager hears that PMP is going to be established, the first thought would be “MORE ADMIN WORKS”. Actually … NO it is NOT.
Let’s see the Top 7 advantages of PMO in medium size organizations
1. Improve project portfolio management. A PMO can help you select the mix of projects that will most effectively meet strategic objectives. IT leaders need to make sure that their IT projects are not in a silo, but connected to the company's larger objectives.
2. Provide project support. A PMO can be a conduit for project management guidance to project managers in other business units. Think about the pockets of project management excellence that you have and how powerful it would be to spread the expertise around.
3. Create a project management process and methodology. A PMO can develop and implement a consistent, standardized process so that you aren't constantly reinventing the wheel.
4. Conduct training. A PMO can build training programs and develop a staff of program managers who can manage multiple projects across the enterprise. This is especially important for IT leaders in a world where technology is a critical part of an organization's efficiency.
5. Establish a home base for project managers. A PMO can create a centralized office from which project managers operate as a cohesive team that works across the organization.
6. Become internal consultants and mentors. A PMO becomes valuable when it can share best practices and help to educate managers throughout a company.
7. Assess project management software tools. Part of a PMO's job is to select and maintain project management software that will be useful for the capabilities of the staff.
PMO creates work with a value – in fact a meaningful work. It needs to be a living breathing system within any organization. The overall control and accountability are important outcomes.
Let’s see the Top 7 advantages of PMO in medium size organizations
1. Improve project portfolio management. A PMO can help you select the mix of projects that will most effectively meet strategic objectives. IT leaders need to make sure that their IT projects are not in a silo, but connected to the company's larger objectives.
2. Provide project support. A PMO can be a conduit for project management guidance to project managers in other business units. Think about the pockets of project management excellence that you have and how powerful it would be to spread the expertise around.
3. Create a project management process and methodology. A PMO can develop and implement a consistent, standardized process so that you aren't constantly reinventing the wheel.
4. Conduct training. A PMO can build training programs and develop a staff of program managers who can manage multiple projects across the enterprise. This is especially important for IT leaders in a world where technology is a critical part of an organization's efficiency.
5. Establish a home base for project managers. A PMO can create a centralized office from which project managers operate as a cohesive team that works across the organization.
6. Become internal consultants and mentors. A PMO becomes valuable when it can share best practices and help to educate managers throughout a company.
7. Assess project management software tools. Part of a PMO's job is to select and maintain project management software that will be useful for the capabilities of the staff.
PMO creates work with a value – in fact a meaningful work. It needs to be a living breathing system within any organization. The overall control and accountability are important outcomes.
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Enterprise Program Management Office
In recent days, whenever I introduce myself to anyone as EPMO project planning manager, they ask - “What is EPMO?” - :-). Enterprise Program Management Office is really new to many of the small and medium size organizations, because of less experience in such big projects. Let me take this opportunity to discuss few major points about EPMO and its operations here.
What is EPMO, and its responsibilities?
As a quick view Enterprise Program Management Office helps to speed up project implementations within existing company guidelines and improves efficiency in the realizations of the business delivery.
The main responsibilities of an EPMO regarding the different programs are basically
1. Strategic Resource Planning
2. Inter-project co-ordination
3. Overall project oversight
4. Cost estimations
5. Contingency planning
6. Quality Assurance
7. Resource Management
8. Professional Development
9. Coaching & Guidance of Management
10. Process and Change Management
11. Tool Support and Training
In our future articles, let’s discuss more about every single functional sections of EPMO…
What is EPMO, and its responsibilities?
As a quick view Enterprise Program Management Office helps to speed up project implementations within existing company guidelines and improves efficiency in the realizations of the business delivery.
The main responsibilities of an EPMO regarding the different programs are basically
1. Strategic Resource Planning
2. Inter-project co-ordination
3. Overall project oversight
4. Cost estimations
5. Contingency planning
6. Quality Assurance
7. Resource Management
8. Professional Development
9. Coaching & Guidance of Management
10. Process and Change Management
11. Tool Support and Training
In our future articles, let’s discuss more about every single functional sections of EPMO…
Thursday, April 8, 2010
6 Microsoft Office Live Workspace Services for Better Project Management
Every project - regardless of its complexity and budget, requires lots of planning, organization, co-ordination and communication between members. In early days we used MS-Excel for scheduling and tracking tasks and member activities, after few years - it moved to MS-Project standalone and MS-project server editions. Now days, there are many small and medium size organizations, working into Web 2.0 and Mobile Development projects and their investment is less – practically the implementation of project management server is becoming a costly thing. But they have requirements to plan, organize and share contents with stakeholders. Microsoft Office Live workspace helps here with lots of useful services – all for FREE.
1. Visit here [http://workspace.officelive.com/en-GB/ ] and use your Office Live ID or MSN ID to log-in. Don’t have an ID – No problem. Create a new ID for FREE.
2. Free Web Space to Store and Share Documents – It is good to store and share your SRS Documents, Bug Reports, Log Files, Specification documents in one place. Microsoft Office Live Workspace helps you with 5 GB space. You can Store your documents, Sheets, scripts and Presentations and share them with access limitations – if required. You can also use this space to deploy your content to clients – Just like an FTP.
3. There are many free Pre-built template Web-spaces available for quick start. You can choose from one of them and start working on documents. For every new project I suggest to have separate Workspaces.
4. You can create Small Notes, Lists, Tasks Lists, Contact Lists, Event Lists
a. Small Notes – helps you for quick information storage – I suggest this for instructions management – for example: Release notes, Updates in current build etc.
b. Lists – General list – it can be books list for reference, web links, or sample data for testing etc.
c. Tasks List – Create a simple Work Breakdown Structure of Tasks and set priority with due dates. You can share this with your tea m and stakeholders. It helps to give better visibility of planned works to everyone.
d. Contact List – Store Phone numbers, Email IDs and share them for quick reference.
e. Event List – Schedules of your releases, builds, holidays, milestones etc.
5. You can also store, edit and share familiar MS word, MS Excel and MS Power-point files.
6. For Quick communications – use comments pane. Add comments and it is visible to everyone. Use this for instructions, quick requests etc.
7. You can use “Add Documents” for uploading files from your Desktop. It can be shared via a centralized workspace.
I hope this will help many project leaders to handle their projects and deliver things efficiently.
1. Visit here [http://workspace.officelive.com/en-GB/ ] and use your Office Live ID or MSN ID to log-in. Don’t have an ID – No problem. Create a new ID for FREE.
2. Free Web Space to Store and Share Documents – It is good to store and share your SRS Documents, Bug Reports, Log Files, Specification documents in one place. Microsoft Office Live Workspace helps you with 5 GB space. You can Store your documents, Sheets, scripts and Presentations and share them with access limitations – if required. You can also use this space to deploy your content to clients – Just like an FTP.
3. There are many free Pre-built template Web-spaces available for quick start. You can choose from one of them and start working on documents. For every new project I suggest to have separate Workspaces.
4. You can create Small Notes, Lists, Tasks Lists, Contact Lists, Event Lists
a. Small Notes – helps you for quick information storage – I suggest this for instructions management – for example: Release notes, Updates in current build etc.
b. Lists – General list – it can be books list for reference, web links, or sample data for testing etc.
c. Tasks List – Create a simple Work Breakdown Structure of Tasks and set priority with due dates. You can share this with your tea m and stakeholders. It helps to give better visibility of planned works to everyone.
d. Contact List – Store Phone numbers, Email IDs and share them for quick reference.
e. Event List – Schedules of your releases, builds, holidays, milestones etc.
5. You can also store, edit and share familiar MS word, MS Excel and MS Power-point files.
6. For Quick communications – use comments pane. Add comments and it is visible to everyone. Use this for instructions, quick requests etc.
7. You can use “Add Documents” for uploading files from your Desktop. It can be shared via a centralized workspace.
I hope this will help many project leaders to handle their projects and deliver things efficiently.
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
Managing Risk in Project Management
Risk Management is one of the essential subdivisions in Project management – particularly for fixed budget projects. A project manager is expected to do Risk management as a Key activity in every organization. I remember my initial days, we used a simple excel sheet to list down some common risk items and have a management plan for each of them. Most of them are scope and resource based. Recently I met few managers; they concentrate only on Risk Management in large scale projects – as primary activity. Let’s discuss few suggestions from these managers to manage risks efficiently in small and medium size business.
1. Scope your deliverables
Many projects get started without a clear definition of the required deliverables. A project Charter – can be a simple WBS excel file – helps here a lot. This document should define the project vision, objectives, scope and deliverables.
2. Identify Risks at early stages
A simple discussion session with team – or a workshop – can help to identify risks at early stages. A Risk is an unforeseen event that might impact negatively on the delivery of project in the future. The third party delays, resource unavailability can be examples here. The best suggestion is to document every risk and determine its likelihood and severity of impact on the project.
3. The Team should take the accountability
As a project manager, the best way is, passing few of the responsibilities to each member of team. Suggest the team, which elements of the project charter they are responsible for delivering and makes them accountable by holding review meetings each week to measure progress.
4. Plan and Monitor Risks
The Risk plan should be created at early stage. This document helps to identify actions that the team can take to reduce the likelihood of the risks occurring. As the project progresses, the Risk monitoring meetings are required to review the risks we already identified. Ask questions, and measure review responses and action items.
Communication helps to reduce the stress in risk management. The suggestion is communicate the project risks openly with boss / project sponsor, so everyone is aware of them. Share regular report lists of the risk and plans / actions for resolving them. It will give them confidence in your ability to control the project and it will help gain their support when you need it.
1. Scope your deliverables
Many projects get started without a clear definition of the required deliverables. A project Charter – can be a simple WBS excel file – helps here a lot. This document should define the project vision, objectives, scope and deliverables.
2. Identify Risks at early stages
A simple discussion session with team – or a workshop – can help to identify risks at early stages. A Risk is an unforeseen event that might impact negatively on the delivery of project in the future. The third party delays, resource unavailability can be examples here. The best suggestion is to document every risk and determine its likelihood and severity of impact on the project.
3. The Team should take the accountability
As a project manager, the best way is, passing few of the responsibilities to each member of team. Suggest the team, which elements of the project charter they are responsible for delivering and makes them accountable by holding review meetings each week to measure progress.
4. Plan and Monitor Risks
The Risk plan should be created at early stage. This document helps to identify actions that the team can take to reduce the likelihood of the risks occurring. As the project progresses, the Risk monitoring meetings are required to review the risks we already identified. Ask questions, and measure review responses and action items.
Communication helps to reduce the stress in risk management. The suggestion is communicate the project risks openly with boss / project sponsor, so everyone is aware of them. Share regular report lists of the risk and plans / actions for resolving them. It will give them confidence in your ability to control the project and it will help gain their support when you need it.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
5 SCRUM Project Management Keywords
Couple of weeks before, one of my friend called for a quick discussion. He is a Tech. Lead in IT, and the recent appraisal gave him an opportunity to play the role of project leader for a new software project. We discussed general project management “TO-DO” practices, and I shared some checklists for his benefits. While discussing, I found that he is already doing some set of project management activities without knowing the right ‘technical’ titles of them. So I suggested him to also ‘know’ the keywords. I am sure many Technical Leaders, and Project Leaders and in same scenario. As knowledge sharing, let me share some keywords and meanings for SCRUM project management model today.
Daily SCRUM Meeting: Basically a 15 minutes daily meeting to discuss about 3 essential questions. Question one is “What have I done since the last Scrum meeting?”, Question two is “What will I do before the next Scrum meeting?”, Question three “What prevents me from performing my work as efficiently as possible?”
Product Backlog: The Scope / Requirements for a System, expressed as a priority list of Product Backlog Items. The requirements will be both functional (ex: a menu) and non-functional (ex: performance) customer requirements, as well as technical team generated requirements (ex: Tools). Product owner is responsible for the prioritization of the Product Backlog.
Product Burn-down Chat: The Progress of a Project. It shows how much work was left to do at the beginning of each sprint. The scope of this chart spans releases. A release burn down chart can be made for release specific.
Sprint: An Iteration of work during which an increment of product functionality is implemented. The duration will be maximum 4 weeks. Every Sprint starts with a sprint planning meeting. At the end of the Sprint, the Sprint review meeting and retrospective meeting follows. During the Sprint, the team must not be interrupted with additional requests. It guarantees the commitment.
Sprint Backlog: Defines the work for a sprint, represented by the set of tasks that must be completed to realize the sprint's goals, and selected set of product backlog items.
Velocity: Typically, “how much product backlog effort a team can handle in one sprint?” This can be estimated by viewing previous sprints, assuming the team composition and sprint duration are kept constant. It can also be established on a sprint-by-sprint basis, using commitment-based planning.
Once established, velocity can be used to plan projects and forecast release and product completion dates.
Daily SCRUM Meeting: Basically a 15 minutes daily meeting to discuss about 3 essential questions. Question one is “What have I done since the last Scrum meeting?”, Question two is “What will I do before the next Scrum meeting?”, Question three “What prevents me from performing my work as efficiently as possible?”
Product Backlog: The Scope / Requirements for a System, expressed as a priority list of Product Backlog Items. The requirements will be both functional (ex: a menu) and non-functional (ex: performance) customer requirements, as well as technical team generated requirements (ex: Tools). Product owner is responsible for the prioritization of the Product Backlog.
Product Burn-down Chat: The Progress of a Project. It shows how much work was left to do at the beginning of each sprint. The scope of this chart spans releases. A release burn down chart can be made for release specific.
Sprint: An Iteration of work during which an increment of product functionality is implemented. The duration will be maximum 4 weeks. Every Sprint starts with a sprint planning meeting. At the end of the Sprint, the Sprint review meeting and retrospective meeting follows. During the Sprint, the team must not be interrupted with additional requests. It guarantees the commitment.
Sprint Backlog: Defines the work for a sprint, represented by the set of tasks that must be completed to realize the sprint's goals, and selected set of product backlog items.
Velocity: Typically, “how much product backlog effort a team can handle in one sprint?” This can be estimated by viewing previous sprints, assuming the team composition and sprint duration are kept constant. It can also be established on a sprint-by-sprint basis, using commitment-based planning.
Once established, velocity can be used to plan projects and forecast release and product completion dates.
Friday, March 19, 2010
Project Management: Fixed Price – Mobile application development projects
Mobile application development is becoming a next generation business for most of the Indian software development organizations – particularly for small and medium size companies. In my unofficial reviews of these projects, through my known contacts, I find some ways to improve the work – here I would like to suggest them.
1. Mobile application development is not like PC software development. The major criteria here are device compatibility. I suggest get confirmations for required mobile models. Clients usually suggest “every single mobile in this world” – this is practically not possible. There are many compatibility limitations in available mobile devices – So plan for target devices and list them for new build releases – this saves time. Always release a list of mobile devices compatible with your application.
2. Change Management – I would suggest having a confirmation for prototype before get into real application development. This prototype can be a graphic model but with detail screens for every function and data flow. But getting new changes are unavoidable – yes, but you can update your client with impact analysis report – if you are in the middle of the development and you feel the given change will take some time to implement. Give detail reasons, talk to client clearly. Everyone is new to this industry – so it’s better to share details. This avoids unnecessary frustrations
3. Publish your project plan – it should show the milestones clearly. Give the visibility of your work to your stakeholders. This also enables you to get clarified with list of tasks you have to manage for the quality and best results.
4. Model a framework for UI and common Interface architecture. This reduces time in development, and helps to build and application logic with definite data flow. Build a content library for icons, images, color palates and templates. Saving time saves budget and resource usage.
5. Apply EVM (Earned Value management) techniques to track the progress of the project against the baseline plan.
6. The important point here is communication. Create a communication plan – and it should have not just conference call schedules, but also status reports, weekly project plan updates, daily improvements, new ideas, impact analysis – basically construct a friendly relationship with client. He/she should have complete understanding about what you are doing and what you are going to deliver and what all its limitations.
1. Mobile application development is not like PC software development. The major criteria here are device compatibility. I suggest get confirmations for required mobile models. Clients usually suggest “every single mobile in this world” – this is practically not possible. There are many compatibility limitations in available mobile devices – So plan for target devices and list them for new build releases – this saves time. Always release a list of mobile devices compatible with your application.
2. Change Management – I would suggest having a confirmation for prototype before get into real application development. This prototype can be a graphic model but with detail screens for every function and data flow. But getting new changes are unavoidable – yes, but you can update your client with impact analysis report – if you are in the middle of the development and you feel the given change will take some time to implement. Give detail reasons, talk to client clearly. Everyone is new to this industry – so it’s better to share details. This avoids unnecessary frustrations
3. Publish your project plan – it should show the milestones clearly. Give the visibility of your work to your stakeholders. This also enables you to get clarified with list of tasks you have to manage for the quality and best results.
4. Model a framework for UI and common Interface architecture. This reduces time in development, and helps to build and application logic with definite data flow. Build a content library for icons, images, color palates and templates. Saving time saves budget and resource usage.
5. Apply EVM (Earned Value management) techniques to track the progress of the project against the baseline plan.
6. The important point here is communication. Create a communication plan – and it should have not just conference call schedules, but also status reports, weekly project plan updates, daily improvements, new ideas, impact analysis – basically construct a friendly relationship with client. He/she should have complete understanding about what you are doing and what you are going to deliver and what all its limitations.
Monday, March 8, 2010
Essential responsibilities for project manager
Whenever I discuss in a professional management group, I get this question – “what is the exact set of responsibilities for project management profile..?” This question is really valuable, because, many small and medium size corporate organizations are using their project managers as just project coordinators – there are many reasons and politics behind this.
To answer the question – I always list these essential responsibilities for project manager.
• Determine lifecycles, templates and checklists appropriate for various projects
• Assess priorities in order to optimize project success
• Evaluate the importance and best method of project authorization
• Define the project boundaries to minimize changes and focus resources
• Produce estimates for the creation of an accurate budget and schedule
• Develop project plans for communication, risk and change control
• Develop a system for resolving issues and reporting progress during the project
• Identify ways to increase or decrease management efforts depending on a project's scale
There are a lot to discuss in detail regarding each one of the above mentioned items. Let’s do it in near future.
To answer the question – I always list these essential responsibilities for project manager.
• Determine lifecycles, templates and checklists appropriate for various projects
• Assess priorities in order to optimize project success
• Evaluate the importance and best method of project authorization
• Define the project boundaries to minimize changes and focus resources
• Produce estimates for the creation of an accurate budget and schedule
• Develop project plans for communication, risk and change control
• Develop a system for resolving issues and reporting progress during the project
• Identify ways to increase or decrease management efforts depending on a project's scale
There are a lot to discuss in detail regarding each one of the above mentioned items. Let’s do it in near future.
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Six Essential Reports
Project management is the discipline of planning, organizing, and managing resources to bring about the successful completion of specific project goals and objectives. The Reports are important in every stage of project management. Reports provide essential inputs to team, top-management and stakeholders.
Reports can be for Status Information or for Metrics – they get information from Project plans and Log registers. Let’s discuss about few essential reports and their data sources.
Time based Reports:
Schedule based reports, includes achieved activities, in-progress activities, not started, not finished, estimated schedule, slippages, actual schedule etc. The data source is Project plan.
Cost based Reports:
Budget based reports, includes Estimated budget, actual cost for completed activities, pending activities to be completed, revised estimation for pending tasks, revenue reports etc. The data sources are Project plan and Account Revenue Status Sheet.
Resource Reports:
Resource reports are reports all about Team size, resource utilization week or month wise, resource availability, skill matrix etc. The data source is Project plan.
Scope Reports:
Scope Changes and Impact analysis, revised estimations, revised resource requirements, revised budget can be presented in Scope Reports. The Change Request Log, Project plan, Estimation Documents are data sources for these Reports.
Quality Reports:
Quality reports are about Issues Recorded, Open & Closed, expected delivery schedules, testing estimations & actual, Bug Report Status, Quality Metrics etc. The data sources are Issue Log, Bug repository etc.
Action Reports:
Action Reports are mostly about Action Items based on Status calls, Stake-holder communications, Opportunities, challenges, Risks and Issues etc. The data source will be minutes of meeting, Change request Logs and Project plans.
These reports can be in document format or spreadsheet, but I suggest using presentation tools – it gives detail view and helps you to add more graphs and models. There are many templates available – you can also develop and share your own models.
Reports can be for Status Information or for Metrics – they get information from Project plans and Log registers. Let’s discuss about few essential reports and their data sources.
Time based Reports:
Schedule based reports, includes achieved activities, in-progress activities, not started, not finished, estimated schedule, slippages, actual schedule etc. The data source is Project plan.
Cost based Reports:
Budget based reports, includes Estimated budget, actual cost for completed activities, pending activities to be completed, revised estimation for pending tasks, revenue reports etc. The data sources are Project plan and Account Revenue Status Sheet.
Resource Reports:
Resource reports are reports all about Team size, resource utilization week or month wise, resource availability, skill matrix etc. The data source is Project plan.
Scope Reports:
Scope Changes and Impact analysis, revised estimations, revised resource requirements, revised budget can be presented in Scope Reports. The Change Request Log, Project plan, Estimation Documents are data sources for these Reports.
Quality Reports:
Quality reports are about Issues Recorded, Open & Closed, expected delivery schedules, testing estimations & actual, Bug Report Status, Quality Metrics etc. The data sources are Issue Log, Bug repository etc.
Action Reports:
Action Reports are mostly about Action Items based on Status calls, Stake-holder communications, Opportunities, challenges, Risks and Issues etc. The data source will be minutes of meeting, Change request Logs and Project plans.
These reports can be in document format or spreadsheet, but I suggest using presentation tools – it gives detail view and helps you to add more graphs and models. There are many templates available – you can also develop and share your own models.
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
5 Key Elements of Project Planning
Planning is the compulsory activity for projects of any size – it can be for few weeks, or for years. Project planning gives a complete visibility about tasks to be completed, schedules / milestones to be followed, and resources / skill sets required to complete the project in successful way. It helps a lot in committing deliverables with clients. Basically it improves the accountability, quality of deliverables and trust on overall management.
Let’s discuss about 5 Key elements required for any project planning – it can be a software project, or a social activity, construction or even any engineering work.
Work Breakdown: Basically a detail list of tasks to be completed. Start from the day one work and try to break big tasks into details as much as possible. Let the duration of activity be minimum 1 day – (8 Hours) - the maximum 5 days (40 Hours). If many activities are going to be completed in one day – group them and assign 0.5 / 0.25 type of durations. This helps you to understand what all we have to do in given time.
Resources: It can be people who for the project, or even the equipments required completing the job. For every task in your Work Breakdown List – assign a resource, and make sure the resource is not overloaded anywhere – you can do this by seeing, how many hours the resource is loaded with tasks per day. Add resource cost to see the cost of overall execution. You can even group resources to identify group level resource usages in future.
Connect Tasks: Predecessors help to connect each task with its pre-requisite task. For example – Task 1 should be completed before we start Task 2. In this case, the Task 1 is the predecessor for Task 2. Task 2 becomes successor for Task 1. You can have multiple predecessors, if a single task requires more than one task to be completed before its starting date. There are different type of predecessors – Finish to Start, Start to Start, Start to Finish and Finish to Finish – lets discuss about this more in future articles.
Calendar: Update your calendar in Plans with holidays and resource available status information. This will have an impact with schedules. Using a calendar with expected holidays, and leave status, resource availability statuses is always a good practice in project management.
Baseline: This is an important process with project plans – Baseline you plan for any future tracking and status updates. Baseline helps you to generate management reports with tasks, schedules and resources. If your scope is increased after few weeks of project start date – update the new activities, assign resources and re-baseline the project plan – but remember to re-baseline only new and updated tasks.
The Project plan should be tracked for status updates every day. Add milestone tasks under each important deliverables and flag them once it is completed. You can generate all management level reports with project management tools – there are many tools available in online & offline.
Let’s discuss about 5 Key elements required for any project planning – it can be a software project, or a social activity, construction or even any engineering work.
Work Breakdown: Basically a detail list of tasks to be completed. Start from the day one work and try to break big tasks into details as much as possible. Let the duration of activity be minimum 1 day – (8 Hours) - the maximum 5 days (40 Hours). If many activities are going to be completed in one day – group them and assign 0.5 / 0.25 type of durations. This helps you to understand what all we have to do in given time.
Resources: It can be people who for the project, or even the equipments required completing the job. For every task in your Work Breakdown List – assign a resource, and make sure the resource is not overloaded anywhere – you can do this by seeing, how many hours the resource is loaded with tasks per day. Add resource cost to see the cost of overall execution. You can even group resources to identify group level resource usages in future.
Connect Tasks: Predecessors help to connect each task with its pre-requisite task. For example – Task 1 should be completed before we start Task 2. In this case, the Task 1 is the predecessor for Task 2. Task 2 becomes successor for Task 1. You can have multiple predecessors, if a single task requires more than one task to be completed before its starting date. There are different type of predecessors – Finish to Start, Start to Start, Start to Finish and Finish to Finish – lets discuss about this more in future articles.
Calendar: Update your calendar in Plans with holidays and resource available status information. This will have an impact with schedules. Using a calendar with expected holidays, and leave status, resource availability statuses is always a good practice in project management.
Baseline: This is an important process with project plans – Baseline you plan for any future tracking and status updates. Baseline helps you to generate management reports with tasks, schedules and resources. If your scope is increased after few weeks of project start date – update the new activities, assign resources and re-baseline the project plan – but remember to re-baseline only new and updated tasks.
The Project plan should be tracked for status updates every day. Add milestone tasks under each important deliverables and flag them once it is completed. You can generate all management level reports with project management tools – there are many tools available in online & offline.
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
5 Communication guidelines for Support Projects
Communication management is a central part of Project management. It connects all other management activities and drives the project for success. I would like to share few processes here for managing communications for T&M type accounts, and support projects.
Build and Share your communication plans: your communication plan should have support availability times – in your Offshore and Onsite. Clearly state whom to communicate for what type of requirements. Give emails, and mobile numbers of important support contacts. Define an escalation matrix. Share your plan with all your stakeholders.
Respond to Emails: This should happen as early as possible. If you have a blackberry – and you can access it in all your “available times” – use it. Send a response for appreciations, Issues, Suggestions, change requests – everything. If you access your office works, only from office PC – Let this work be the first thing in the morning. Clients always expect a response for his Issues – mainly in T&M accounts. At least respond them with a message “we understood – we are working on it” – or “need clarification” if you are not sure about what they are asking for.
Issue Log and Reports: Maintain an Issue Log document (A simple excel sheet will be fine) – and record all the issues and status updates. Update them into your project plan daily/weekly basis. Add Issue Log status information in your weekly status reports – this helps the clients to understand the progress and avoids unnecessary escalations.
Clarifications – Set call: Whenever you need a clarification for the issues or change requests, set a “request for conf call” or direct meeting as early as possible. Emails are fine for asking clarifications, but talking will provide more inputs and sometimes, the clients Issue/Change request will become simple than what you expected. Circulate the minutes of meeting after each discussion, to avoid misunderstandings. Action items should be mentioned in your minutes of meeting document and the status of them should be updated in weekly status reports.
Expert teams: Build an expert team, not only for technical support but also for domain related queries and to provide suggestions for improving the requirement. A detail functional flow model will be helpful to understand change requests or Issues raised by the clients. Introduce your expert team members to clients – this helps the client to get a confident about your background and quality of delivery.
T&M (Time and Material) is the business model for mostly support projects and maintenance projects. A good communication management will improve the quality of service with less escalation.
Build and Share your communication plans: your communication plan should have support availability times – in your Offshore and Onsite. Clearly state whom to communicate for what type of requirements. Give emails, and mobile numbers of important support contacts. Define an escalation matrix. Share your plan with all your stakeholders.
Respond to Emails: This should happen as early as possible. If you have a blackberry – and you can access it in all your “available times” – use it. Send a response for appreciations, Issues, Suggestions, change requests – everything. If you access your office works, only from office PC – Let this work be the first thing in the morning. Clients always expect a response for his Issues – mainly in T&M accounts. At least respond them with a message “we understood – we are working on it” – or “need clarification” if you are not sure about what they are asking for.
Issue Log and Reports: Maintain an Issue Log document (A simple excel sheet will be fine) – and record all the issues and status updates. Update them into your project plan daily/weekly basis. Add Issue Log status information in your weekly status reports – this helps the clients to understand the progress and avoids unnecessary escalations.
Clarifications – Set call: Whenever you need a clarification for the issues or change requests, set a “request for conf call” or direct meeting as early as possible. Emails are fine for asking clarifications, but talking will provide more inputs and sometimes, the clients Issue/Change request will become simple than what you expected. Circulate the minutes of meeting after each discussion, to avoid misunderstandings. Action items should be mentioned in your minutes of meeting document and the status of them should be updated in weekly status reports.
Expert teams: Build an expert team, not only for technical support but also for domain related queries and to provide suggestions for improving the requirement. A detail functional flow model will be helpful to understand change requests or Issues raised by the clients. Introduce your expert team members to clients – this helps the client to get a confident about your background and quality of delivery.
T&M (Time and Material) is the business model for mostly support projects and maintenance projects. A good communication management will improve the quality of service with less escalation.
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