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Chapter 5

Project management

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Project management : Is Organizing, planning and scheduling software projects

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Topics coveredManagement activitiesProject planningProject schedulingRisk management

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Concerned with activities involved in ensuring that software is delivered on time and on schedule and in accordance with the requirements of the organizations developing and procuring the software

Project management is needed because software development is always subject to budget and schedule constraints that are set by the organization developing the software.

Software project management

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The product is intangible (can’t be seen or touched), the managers can’t see the progress of product.

The software development process is not standardized as building engineering, the process varies from organization to another

Many software projects are 'one-off‘: each project is different from previous others, even

the manager who have a long experience may find it difficult to solve the problem in new software project, Because of rapid technological change in computer .

Lessons learned or experienced may not be transfer to new project.

Software engineering distinctions (differences) (which can make the software management difficult)

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Most managers have these responsibilities: Proposal writing, objectives of project and how it will be carried

out. It include cost and schedule estimates.

Project planning and scheduling, identifying activities, milestone and deliverable produced by project.

Project costing, cost estimation for resources needed to a accomplish the project plan .

Project monitoring and reviews, it is a continuing activities which can predict potential problems, and track the progress of the project. Such as daily discussion with project staff.

Personnel selection and evaluation, select a skilled personal .

Report writing and presentations, write a report with critical information to client and contractor , present this report during progress review.

5.1 Management activities

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Project staffingMay not be possible to appoint يوظف the ideal

people to work on a project because of:

Project budget may not allow for the use of highly-paid staff

Staff with the appropriate experience may not be available

An organization may wish to develop employee skills on a software project

Managers have to work within these constraints.

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5.2 Project planningProbably the most time-consuming project management

activity

It is the tasks required to define resources, timelines.

The project plan sets out, the resources available to the project, the work breakdown تجزئة, and schedule for the work

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Continuous activity (planning is iterative process) from initial concept through the system delivery. Plans must be regularly changed as new information becomes available, it evolves as the better information becomes available.

. Various types of plans may be developed to support the main software project plan that is concerned with: schedule plan budget planquality planvalidation planconfiguration planmaintenance planstaff plan

5.2 Project planning, cont…

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Types of project planPlan Description

Quality plan Describes the quality procedures and standards that will beused in a project. See Chapter 27.

Validation plan Describes the approach, resources and schedule used forsystem validation. See Chapter 22.

Configurationmanagement plan

Describes the configuration management procedures andstructures to be used. See Chapter 29.

Maintenance plan Predicts the maintenance requirements of the system,maintenance costs and effort required. See Chapter 21.

Staff developmentplan.

Describes how the skills and experience of the project teammembers will be developed. See Chapter 25.

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5.2.1 Project plan structureMost plans should include the following sections: Introduction, describe objectives and set constraints (budget,

time).

Project organization, the way the development team is organized.

Risk analysis, describe possible risks, and the risk reduction strategies.

Hardware and software resource requirements, describe the hardware and the support software required to carry out the development, estimate of the price.

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Project plan structure, cont..Work breakdown, describe the breakdown of the project

into activities and identifies the milestones and deliverables associated with each activity.

Project schedule, describe the dependencies between activities, estimate time required to reach each milestone and allocation of people to activities.

Monitoring and reporting mechanisms, describe the management reports which should be produced.

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5.2.2 Activity organization (milestones and deliverables)

Milestones are the end-point of a process activity, the software process must be broken down into basic activities.

At the end of each milestone there should be a formal output such as a report.

Deliverables are project results delivered to customers

deliverables are milestones but milestones need not be deliverables.

Milestones are an internal project result used by manager to check project progress that are not delivered to customer

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Milestones in the RE(Req. Eng.) process or activties

Evaluationreport

Prototypedevelopment

Requirementsdefinition

Requirementsanalysis

Feasibilityreport

Feasibilitystudy

Architecturaldesign

Designstudy

Requirementsspecification

Requirementsspecification

ACTIVITIES

MILESTONES

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5.3 Project schedulingSplit project into tasks and estimate time and resources

required to complete each task

Organize tasks concurrently (simultaneously or side by side) to make optimal use of workforce.

Minimize task dependencies to avoid delays caused by one task waiting for another to complete

Dependent on project managers intuition and experience

schedules must be continually updated as better progress info becomes available.

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The project scheduling process

Estimate resourcesfor activities

Identify activitydependencies

Identifyactivities

Allocate peopleto activities

Create projectcharts

Softwarerequirements

Activity chartsand bar charts

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Scheduling

The maximum a mount of time of any activity is from 8-10 weeks.

The minimum at least 1 week

If it is larger than this , it must be divided.

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5.3.1 Bar charts and activity networks

Graphical notations used to illustrate the project schedule

Show project breakdown into tasks. Tasks should not be too small. They should take about a week or two

Network Activity show task dependencies and the the critical path

Bar charts show schedule against calendar time

The minimum time required to finish the project is called the critical path, which it is the longest path in the activity graph.

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Task duration and dependenciesExample: T3 start after T1 finish.

Task Duration (days) Dependencies T1 8 T2 15 T3 15 T1 (M1) T4 10 T5 10 T2, T4 (M2) T6 5 T1, T2 (M3) T7 20 T1 (M1) T8 25 T4 (M5) T9 15 T3, T6 (M4)

T10 15 T5, T7 (M7) T11 7 T9 (M6) T12 10 T11 (M8)

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Activity networkfor example, if T8 is delayed 2 weeks, it will not affect the completion date because it does not lie on critical path.The critical path is: T1 T3 T9 T11T12The minimum days required to complete project is : 8+ 15+ 15+7+10 =55 day

Activity network

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start

T2

M3T6

Finish

T10

M7T5

T7

M2T4

M5

T8

4/7/99

8 days

14/7/99 15 days

4/8/99

15 days

25/8/99

7 days

5/9/99

10 days

19/9/99

15 days

11/8/99

25 days

10 days

20 days

5 days25/7/99

15 days

25/7/99

18/7/99

10 days

T1

M1 T3T9

M6

T11

M8

T12

M4

Activity network

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Activity timeline4/7 11/7 18/7 25/7 1/8 8/8 15/8 22/8 29/8 5/9 12/9 19/9

T4

T1T2

M1

T7T3

M5T8

M3

M2T6

T5M4

T9

M7T10

M6

T11M8

T12

Start

Finish

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Staff allocation4/7 11/7 18/7 25/ 1/8 8/8 15/8 22/8 29/8 5/9 12/9 19/9

T4

T8 T11

T12

T1

T3

T9

T2

T6 T10

T7

T5

Fred

Jane

Anne

Mary

Jim

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5.4 Risk management

Risk management is concerned with identifying risks and drawing up plans to minimize their effect on a project.

What are the top ten risks for this project? For each of the risk, what is the chance that risk will become a problem and what is the impact if it does?

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Risk management continues..

A risk is a probability that some adverse (unfavorable) circumstance will occur, such categories are:

Project risks affect schedule or resources. e.g. Loss of an experienced designer

Product risks affect the quality or performance of the software being developed.

e.g. the failure of a purchased component.

Business risks affect the organization developing a software

e.g. a competitor introducing a new product

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Risk management continues..

All risk types are overlap : if an experienced programmer leave the project (project risk) replacement with new one with less experience will result in programming errors (product risk)

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Possible Software risks

Risk Affects Description

Staff turnover Project Experienced staff will leave the project before it is finished.

Management change Project There will be a change of organisational management with different priorities.

Hardware unavailability Project Hardware that is essential for the project will not be delivered on schedule.

Requirements change Project and product

There will be a larger number of changes to the requirements than anticipated.

Specification delays Project and product

Specifications of essential interfaces are not available on schedule

Size underestimate Project and product

The size of the system has been underestimated.

CASE tool under-performance

Product CASE tools which support the project do not perform as anticipated

Technology change Business The underlying technology on which the system is built is superseded by new technology.

Product competition Business A competitive product is marketed before the system is completed.

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The risk management process (iterative process)

Risk identificationIdentify project, product and business risks

Risk analysisAssess the likelihood and consequences of these

risksRisk planning

Draw up plans to avoid or minimize the effects of the risk

Risk monitoringMonitor the risks throughout the project

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The risk management process

Risk avoidanceand contingency

plans

Risk planning

Prioritised risklist

Risk analysis

List of potentialrisks

Riskidentification

Riskassessment

Riskmonitoring

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5.4.1 Risk identification

Six types of risks that can be found:

Technology risks: Risks derived from Hw + SWPeople risksTool risks : Risks derived from CASE toolOrganizational risks : from Organization

environment Requirements risks: from Req. ChangeEstimation risks: from estimate the resources

used to build the system

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Risks and risk typesRisk type Possible risks

Technology The database used in the system cannot process as many transactions per second as expected. Software components that should be reused contain defects that limit their functionality.

People It is impossible to recruit staff with the skills required. Key staff are ill and unavailable at critical times. Required training for staff is not available.

Organisational The organisation is restructured so that different management are responsible for the project. Organisational financial problems force reductions in the project budget.

Tools The code generated by CASE tools is inefficient. CASE tools cannot be integrated.

Requirements Changes to requirements that require major design rework are proposed. Customers fail to understand the impact of requirements changes.

Estimation The time required to develop the software is underestimated. The rate of defect repair is underestimated. The size of the software is underestimated.

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5.4.2 Risk analysisAssess probability and affects of each risk

Probability may be very low, low, moderate, high or very high

Risk effects might be catastrophic, serious, tolerable or insignificant

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Risk analysis

Risk Probability Effects

Organisational financial problems force reductions inthe project budget.

Low Catastrophic

It is impossible to recruit staff with the skills requiredfor the project.

High Catastrophic

Key staff are ill at critical times in the project. Moderate Serious

Software components that should be reused containdefects which limit their functionality.

Moderate Serious

Changes to requirements that require major designrework are proposed.

Moderate Serious

The organisation is restructured so that differentmanagement are responsible for the project.

High Serious

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5.4.3 Risk planning

Consider each risk and develop a strategy to manage that risk, these strategies fall into three categories:

Avoidance strategiesThe probability that the risk will arise is reducedE.g. deal with defective component by bought a component.

Minimization strategiesThe impact of the risk on the project or product will be

reduced. E.g. staff illness [ overlap work]Contingency plans

If the risk arises, contingency plans are plans to deal with that risk, if the worse happens, you are prepared for it.

E.g financial problem

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Risk management strategies

Risk Strategy

Organisationalfinancial problems

Prepare a briefing document for senior managementshowing how the project is making a very importantcontribution to the goals of the business.

Recruitmentproblems

Alert customer of potential difficulties and thepossibility of delays, investigate buying-incomponents.

Staff illness Reorganise team so that there is more overlap of workand people therefore understand each other’s jobs.

Defectivecomponents

Replace potentially defective components with bought-in components of known reliability.

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5.4.4 Risk monitoring

Assess each identified risks regularly to decide whether or not it is becoming less or more probable

Also assess whether the effects of the risk have changed

Each key risk should be discussed at management progress meetings

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Key pointsGood project management is essential for project

successThe intangible nature of software causes problems

for managementManagers have diverse roles but their most

significant activities are planning, estimating and scheduling

Planning and estimating are iterative processes which continue throughout the course of a project

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A project milestone is a predictable state where some formal report of progress is presented to management.

Risks may be project risks, product risks or business risks

Risk management is concerned with identifying risks which may affect the project and planning to ensure that these risks do not develop into major threats

Key points