IT Project Management

PRESENTED BY:

SRAVAN KUMAR BANKA

Chapter 11IT PROJECT

MANAGEMENT

Objectives of Project Management

The important goal is to deliver a quality product that meets the business needs on time, every time with an affordable budget.

There are 3 basic constraints that needs to managed to achieve this. They are :

TimeScopeCost

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SOME DEFINITIONS

ProjectA project is a temporary endeavor undertaken to

create a unique product or service. It typically is a one time initiative that can be divided into related activities that require coordination and control, with a definite beginning and ending.

Project ManagementThe application of knowledge, skills, tools, and

techniques to a broad range of activities in order to meet the requirements of a particular project.

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SOME DEFINITIONS

ProgramA group of projects managed in a coordinated way

to obtain benefits not available from managing them individually.

Program Management OfficeAn organizational unit with full-time personnel to

provide full range of standard approaches to project management support and services that are utilized across projects; lessons learned from each project are collected from post-project reviews and shared across project managers.

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IT PORTFOLIO MANAGEMENT

Its typically the responsibility of a committee of senior business managers and IT leaders of an organization to prioritize, manage and maintain the approved IT projects.

Decision making about any important aspects in the project are made here.

It is the responsibility of the organization to maintain a trusted relation with the business, and also monitor the progress of the approved projects.

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PROJECT PRIORITIZATION

The idea of prioritization on different projects is based on organizational standards and vision of implementation.

Most organizations prioritize their projects based on the investment, financial returns and obviously the strength in personnel, and the technologies that can actually handle the project.

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PROJECT PRIORITIZATION

According to Denis et al(2004) prioritization is of four types:

Absolute Must A mandate due to security, legal, regulatory, or end-of-life-cycle IT issues.

Highly Desired/Business-Critical Includes short term projects with good financial returns and portions of very large projects already in progress.

Wanted Valuable, but with longer time periods for returns on investment.

Nice to have Projects with good returns but with lower potential business value.

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PROJECT MANAGEMENT

New projects requests are typically submitted using an organizational template.

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PROJECT MANAGEMENT ROLES

Usually every project in an IT organization may contain 3 roles in common.

Project Manager

Project Sponsor

Project champion

However the role of project manager is more critical in every project management.

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PROJECT MANAGER

Any systems project is typically led by an IT project manager demonstrated with both technical and managerial skills.

He is responsible for managing relationships with the project sponsors and other stake holders, as well as initiating, planning, executing, controlling and closing a project.

He is the one who is responsible to identify, and manage risks during any phase of project execution.

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PROJECT MANAGER

Project manager is the one who should maintain the metrics and monitor the progress of project.

He is the one who should make sure all the deliverables are delivered to the business as per the schedule.

He also maintains the project budget and work towards improving financial returns on the project.

He takes care of scheduling, and staffing the resources.

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PROJECT MANAGER

Effective project manager should not only have technical expertise, but also should possess some non technical skills.

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PROJECT SPONSOR

Project Sponsor is a high level fiscal owner of the project.

He is typically a business manager who financially “owns” the project (i.e., the person who “writes the check” for the project).

For systems projects that will be implemented in multiple business functions or business units, the sponsor is likely to be the officer of the company(e.g., a CFO or COO) or designated owner of major business process (e.g., a supply chain manager).

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PROJECT CHAMPION

The project champion is a business manager with high credibility among the business users who will be impacted by the new system.

Project champions are usually business analysts who have a very good knowledge on the domain and the workflow of the customers.

For some projects project sponsors may also play a role of project champion.

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THE PROJECT LIFE CYCLE

There are four different phases in which any project life cycle is categorized into. They are:

Project Initiation

Project Planning

Project Execution and Control

Project Closing

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PROJECT INITIATION

This is the first phase in which the project is formally authorized and a determination is made as to whether the project should actually proceed or not.

The important deliverable in this phase is a Project Charter.

Project Charter is a document that describes a project’s objectives, scope, assumptions, and estimated benefits.

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PROJECT INITIATION

Project feasibility is assessed in various dimensions here. Like :

Economic – Positive Financial Return?Operation – Impact on Organizational operation?Technical – Technology and required expertise?Schedule – Time constraints and impact?Legal or Contractual – Legal conflicts?Political – positive support from all stake holders?

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PROJECT PLANNING

The objective of project planning process is to ensure that the project goals are achieved in the most appropriate way.

The 3 major components of project planning are:

Scheduling

Budgeting

Staffing

These components are obviously interrelated, and poor planning for one component can severely effect the another.

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SCHEDULING

Project Scheduling usually starts with work breakdown analysis.

Work breakdown is a basic management technique that systematically subdivides blocks of work down to level of detail at which the project can be controlled.

Once the work is broken down, estimates are given for each and every task based on the past experience.

A master schedule is defined with Project milestone dates and deliverables.

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BUDGETING

It documents the anticipated cost for the whole project.

There are two traditional approaches to estimating project costs:

Bottom-up approach – costs estimated based on the tasks in project plan and are then integrated.(Most preferred)

Top down approach – used when not much information is known in the project or not very clear about the tasks.

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BUDGETING

According to Frame(1994), inexperienced estimators typically fall into 3 estimation traps:

Too optimistic about what is needed to do the job.

Tend to leave components out of estimates.

Do not use a consistent methodology for estimations.

Good training in how to estimate project estimates should be mandatory for all the PMs involved in estimations.

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BUDGETING

Sometimes project estimates are done inaccurate purposefully and can have adverse effect on the project.

They are :

Highballing(budget padding) – Overestimating project costs on purpose.

-- Projects may not be approved sometimes because of this.Lowballing– Underestimating project costs on purpose.-- Sometimes helps in gaining project approval, but can result in failed projects due to over budget.

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STAFFING

Project team must have a mix of IT skilled resources to be a successful one.

PM should be capable enough to estimate the skill type, proficiency level, quantity and time required for a resource to complete a particular task.

Appropriate “knowledge transfers” are done for a specific project.

Established COE to achieve skilled resources for future projects.

Provide incentives to retain high skilled resources.Ensure proper knowledge on business is delivered to

resources from SMEs.

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STAFFING

Staffing must include exercises which help in “team building” to inculcate motivation and team spirit among all team members.

Some resources must be assigned full time for the project, and some can be hired on contract based on the skillset required for the project.

However having employees on contract is not always advisable because of the risks and standards of the organization from which they are hired.

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PLANNING DOCUMENTS

Two primary deliverables from the Planning phase

Statement of Work(SOW) – A high level document for the customer that describes what the project will deliver and when.

Project Plan – A formal document that includes the project schedule, budget, and assigned resources that is used by the project manager to guide the execution and control of project.

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PLANNING DOCUMENTS

Other common planning documents are : (1) PERT or CPM charts (2) Gantt chart.

PERT(Program Evaluation or Review Technique) or CPM(Critical Path Method) graphically models the sequence of project tasks and interrelationships using a flow chart.

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PLANNING DOCUMENTS

A Gantt chart graphically depicts the estimated times (and later, the actual times)

Overlapping tasks can be easily seen.

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PROJECT EXECUTION AND CONTROL

The objective of the execution process is to effectively coordinate all the resources as the project plan is carried out.

Most projects exhibit the following characteristics:Risk and uncertainty are highest at the start of the

projectThe ability of the project stakeholders to influence the

outcome is highest at the start of the projectCost and staffing levels are lower at the start of the

project and higher toward at the end

The deliverable for this phase is the completed project.

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PROJECT EXECUTION AND CONTROL

Good communication among the team members are also critical for task coordination and integration

Communications with other stake holders should be simple and accurate

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PROJECT EXECUTION AND CONTROL

Request for change (RFCs) are something which effects the project flow.

All the changes are to be documented with the RFCs so that we will have a record of the cost,and schedule being effected.

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PROJECT EXECUTION AND CONTROL

Be considerate about people-related and process-related “early warning signs”.

People related “Early warning signs”Required business stakeholder may be unavailable

sometimes

Process related “Early warning signs”Lack of documentation

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MANAGING PROJECT RISKS

Reduce the risk of failing to achieve the project’s objectives

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MANAGING BUSINESS CHANGE

Change Management is the ability to successfully introduce change to individuals and organizational units.

According to Lewin/Schein most of business changes have their roots in 3 stages.

Unfreezing Stage – Should be in “safe to change” environment.

Moving Stage – Requires KTs for necessary information

Refreezing stage – Changing the original setup.

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MANAGING BUSINESS CHANGE

Kotter change management model:

Establish a sense of urgencyForm a powerful guiding coalitionCreate a visionCommunicate the visionEmpower others to act on the visionPlan for and create short term winsConsolidate improvements and produce still more

change Institutionalize new approaches

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PROJECT CLOSING

Project closure includes a post-project review session.

Discussions during post project review:

What went good?

What went bad and how can be overcome that in future?

What are the lessons learned through this project?

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MANAGING COMPLEX IT PROJECTS

Most of the times experienced IT PMs in an organization are asked to handle complex IT projects.

Three high level factors that are critical for a complex IT projects are:

The business vision was integral part of project

A testing strategy was used at the program level

The projects used a phase release approach.

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MANAGING VIRTUAL TEAMS

Outsourcing IT applications

Virtual teamwork can also introduce new IT project risks due to 3 related factors:

Difference in communication normsUnfamiliarity with different culturesLack of trusting relationships across team members.

However this strategy is encouraging because of cost effectiveness.

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LESSONS LEARNED

Most IT projects are successful when they actually follow all the standards that are defined for the project.

Be pro active in every phase of project until closure.PMs are important and should be hired with

appropriate knowledge.Document everything as it would be used for other

teams following the same standards.Managing different teams would be a risk but can be

handled if dealt properly.Risks should always be kept in mind in every phase.

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QUESTIONS