Managing in the yellow zone philadelphia spin

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild1

Managing in the Yellow Zone

Getting the troubled project under control

(and keeping it there)

Philadelphia Software Process Improvement Network November 20, 2003

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild2

Topics

What is a Yellow Zone project? What’s in a color Preventing the Yellowing of the Green When it goes Yellow anyway A Yellow Zone rescue infrastructure The Orange Zone: unsalvageable Yellow Zone

projects Questions

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild3

What is a Yellow Zone project?

Green, Red, or Yellow?– Green Zone – Projects that are on schedule and on budget,

with no significant risk factors– Red Zone – Projects that are in serious trouble, with a high

likelihood they will fail– Yellow Zone – Projects at risk, but potentially salvageable

The line from Green to Red usually passes through Yellow

Up to 70% of all active projects are in the Yellow Zone

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild4

What’s in a color?

The Business Case is the reference point– Green Zone Project will probably achieve the goals and

objectives of the business case– A Yellow Zone Project may fail to achieve at least one goal

or objective in the business case– A Red Zone Project will probably fail to achieve the goals

and objectives in the business case

Green Zone projects can turn Yellow, and Yellow can turn Red or back to Green

Red is likely to stay Red until Dead

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild5

What defines a Green Zone project?

All business requirements are traceable to the business case, and the entire business case is covered in the requirements

All IT requirements are traceable to the business requirements and all business requirements are covered by the IT requirements

Requirements baselined and under change control Clear lines of communication understood and followed Ownership is being accepted Milestones are being managed successfully Minimal impact from rework time and costs

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild6

top causes of yellowing…

Bad idea in the first place– Overambitious– Ambiguous– Dubious measurability– Aim at the wrong business drivers

Inadequate verification and validation of “upstream” deliverables, e.g., business cases, requirements, and specifications, can defeat even a GOOD idea

Poor communication between users and developers Scope creep

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild7

Preventing the Yellowing of the Green

Establish a sponsor-IT partnership at the beginning Focus on business user-IT communication from the

beginning Revalidate upstream deliverables against their

predecessors whenever there is a change Control scope creep relentlessly

– If it is not required by the business case, leave it out– If no longer required by the business case, TAKE IT OUT

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild8

The kiss of death

No audit trail showing that clear lines of communication are understood and ownership is being accepted– Clear lines of communication enable information to flow

efficiently and effectively– Ownership prevents confusion or denial over authority and

responsibility– Both are essential to correcting problems in anything else

If these are lacking, everything else will eventually spin out of control

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild9

When it goes Yellow anyway

Happens when prevention is applied too late Most frequent causes

– Inadequate requirements management– Poor communications between business and development

If caught early enough, may be correctable or reversible

BE PREPARED FOR MERCY KILLING

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild10

Early signs of Yellowing

More and more meetings accomplish little Critical path action items start to remain open Unanticipated pressures on cost and schedule

drivers– Degrading relationship between developers and users– Churn among key team members– Difficulty in decisions about core requirements– Significant changes in probability and/or potential impact of

exposure factors– Changes in “drivers of complexity”

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild11

why kill a Yellow Zone project?

It all comes back to the business case– How deep in the Yellow Zone?– Is acceptable payback still possible?– Is acceptable ROI still possible?– Does the original business case still make sense?

If the answers don’t make a good case to continue, logic says to kill the project

Still….

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild12

Doomed projects are hard to kill

Every project develops its own interest groups– Sponsors with a political stake– Developers whose jobs may depend on the project

continuing– Vendors with a sale to protect– Champions with an emotional stake

Cancelled projects can create organization problems– Cancelled projects may have already burned a lot of money– Cancelled projects may result in cancelled jobs

Few projects have an Exit Champion

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild13

The importance of an Exit Champion

The “Devil’s Advocate” for technology decisions– Resists the political and emotional arguments to continue a

doomed project– Provides Management with the information that enables

Decision-by-Fact

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild14

The Kill or Cure-and-Continue decision

Start with high-level project review– Evaluate project viability against known exposure factors– Revalidate the business case against the current project state– Give as much credence to the Exit Champion as to the Continue

Champions– Decide whether to Kill or Cure-and-Continue

If the decision is to Cure and Continue– Reassign personnel wherever necessary– Appoint a Team Catalyst– Create the infrastructure to permanently correct the exposure

factors– Add a recurring revalidation process to ensure continuing

alignment with the business case

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild15

The importance of a Team Catalyst

“The problems of software are not so much technological as sociological”– Tim Lister and Tom DeMarco, “Peopleware”, 1979

A Team Catalyst can help restore cooperative working relationships and help ensure that they stay cooperative

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild16

Initial anti-Yellowing actions

Ensure effective meeting management Acknowledge and resolve relationship issues Take control of team churn Enforce timely resolution of critical path action items Resolve requirements issues through facilitation Strengthen contingency/continuity management

components of risk management process Establish a “rapid response” process to manage

impact of changes in “drivers of complexity” Use all of the above to create a Yellow Zone rescue

infrastructure

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild17

The Yellow Zone Management infrastructure

Processes People Tools

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild18

Processes

Business case revalidation Requirements triage Retrospective Verification and Validation of

deliverables Risk-Driven testing

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild19

Business case revalidation

May prevent exercises in futility May find legitimate, previously unrecognized

justifications to continue– Additional or extended financial benefits– “Intangible” operational benefits

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild20

“intangible” benefits

Often higher value than hard dollar benefits Can strengthen a marginal business case Can often be translated into tangible benefits Examples:

– Improved customer satisfaction– Improved employee morale– Increased user self-sufficiency

Recommended reading:– “Making Technology Investments Profitable: ROI Roadmap

to Better Business Cases ” by Jack M. Keen and Bonnie Digrius (Wiley, 2003)

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild21

Typical Activities

Identification of Business Requirements Risk Assessment for Project and Product Risk-Driven Testing

– Decomposition of Critical-risk Requirements into testable parts

– Creation of Test Scenarios– Execution of Test Scenarios– Defect Reporting and Tracking– Status Reporting

Intra-phase reviews and quality gates

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild22

Requirements Triage

Re-evaluate every requirement that has not been completed for– Criticality to the first release– “Implementability”– Impact on other requirements– Impact on cost and schedule

Eliminate or defer any requirement that is not critical to the business case in the first release

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild23

Retrospective Verification and Validation

Business Case

Business

Requirem

ents

IT

Requirements

Specificati

ons Code

Forward expectations and boundaries

Retrospective validation

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild24

Risk-driven Testing

Includes– Decomposition of Critical Requirements into testable parts– Creation/Execution of Test Scenarios– Defect Reporting, Tracking and Status Reporting

Traces back to prioritized business requirements Seeks to limit business exposure Seeks “Big Bugs” first Focuses on impact to the business case more than

probability of occurrence Requires a high-efficiency method, e.g. table driven

scripts

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild25

Intra-phase reviews and quality gates

Re-assess business drivers and adjust business case Re-prioritize business requirements Re-prioritize IT requirements Update test strategy to reflect reprioritized IT

requirements

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild26

Summing up

Prevention pays Communication and partnership are essential Every project creates an interest group biased toward

continuing the project Revalidate the business case before adding to the

investment Recover only what is worth recovering It takes courage to kill a doomed project

Senior

Partners

Guild

©2003, Senior Partners Guild27

More information?

Robert Benjamin, Partner

609 448-1963 (P)

609 977-6214 (M)

609 371-1322 (F)

[email protected]

www.SeniorPartnersGuild.com