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e-Learning:
Project Management 16 Critical Software Practices for Performance-Based Management The “16 Critical Software Practices for Performance-based Management” and Templates contain the 16 practices (9 best and 7 sustaining) that are the key to avoiding significant problems for software development projects. These practices have been gathered from the crucible of real-world, large-scale, software development and maintenance projects. Together they constitute a set of high-leverage disciplines that are focused on improving a project’s bottom line. This document is intended to define the essential ingredients of each best and sustaining practice. These practices are the starting point for structuring and deploying an effective process for managing large-scale software development and maintenance. They may be tailored to the particular culture, environment, and program phases of a program. Of course, these practices cannot help “death march” programs that are expected to deliver under impossible schedule deadlines with inadequate funding and without the required staffing with essential skills. Achieving Project Success through Best Practices Many terms are used to describe today's business environment; dynamic, decentralized and global, among others. This is because today's businesses do not rely on one strategic project, but several parallel initiatives that must combine to meet business objectives. With decentralized and global work forces, projects must coordinate the efforts of multiple cross-functional teams operating in different environments and geographic locations. And more often than not, project information needs to be shared and presented to an increasing number of stakeholders, including senior management, clients, suppliers, partners and controlling bodies whose impact can threaten or strengthen the outcome at any moment. In this dynamic environment, traditional business models stagger, and project-based organizations thrive. With faster response to market demand, better utilization of resources, and improved project control and performance, project-based organizations have the flexibility to maximize their investments in core business projects and leverage evolving technology. E-Project Management for the New e-Reality In their article (published in PMI’s PM Network) Peter Kulik and Robert Samuelsen highlight differences between e-projects and traditional projects. It suggests a process and framework for e-project management that adapts proven project management rigor for use in the fast paced, time crazed new economy. IT: A Brave New World IT must transition from being a cost center to a value center to remain viable within an enterprise. Managing Multiple IT Projects: Process Re-engineering Tad Haas, Vice President of Account Management at Artemis explains the importance of multi-project control systems on the Software Engineering Institutes (SEI) Software Maturity Model. Project Management as a discipline, focuses on tasks, jobs, people and structures, but not on the actual process for managing multiple projects. Most organizations have some understanding of how to manage individual projects, but many fail to implement a process for managing multiple projects. This has led to a number of well publicized IT project disasters and is reflected in the fact that, based on surveys undertaken in Europe and North America, between 85% to 98% (dependent on the country) of software development organizations are classified on the lowest level 1 (ad-hoc) on the Software Engineering Institute's (SEI) Capability Maturity Model. According to the model, organizations do not begin to mature to level 2 until they have developed a process for managing multiple projects. Measuring Change Requests to Support Effective Project Management Practices Some of the major reasons for software project failures relay in the area of the management of project objectives and requirements. In the actual “ever changing world”, software requirements are subjected to continuous changes that might claim revisions of the allocated resources. Estimating effort, duration and costs from stable requirements is a difficult task, but estimating from “moving” requirements could simply be overwhelming. In a contractual market relationship between customer and supplier, the capability to measure Change Requests, for technical and managerial reasons, is critical and influences directly the Customer Satisfaction level as well as the profitability of the business for the Supplier. The standard IFPUG Function Point Analysis technique provides a mean to measure software from the external user point of view and is particularly effective in supporting contractual aspects. Unfortunately the original method is not satisfactory if applied to the Change Request measurement problem. This paper is focused on an operational approach to the functional measurement of Change Requests and on the related expected impact on the amount of additional effort and duration needed to implement them. Systems Approach for Software Management The goals of traditional software project management have been to make sure that a project is “on time and on budget.” The life cycle classically follows a sequential move from requirements gathering, to design, to code, to testing with ad-hoc documentation that attempts to capture intermediate representations at every stage. After coding and unit testing individual components, the components are compiled and linked together (integrated) into a complete system. Analytical or traditional software management asks managers to use analysis, which takes a system apart, but when we do so we lose all its essential properties. The usual practice is to buffer the integration and testing activity time to compensate for the loss of ”essential properties” from the project plan. What should occur is the realization by managers that software management is a process of managing transformation, rather than development. The Project Matrix: a Model for Software Engineering Project Management This paper reports on a simple model for technical project management, the Project Matrix. The authors have found this model to be effective in coordinating the work of many people, managing the operation of a software development project, reducing the complexity of the development process and producing high quality software. Further, this approach requires no special resources other than those normally assigned to a software development project, and can therefore be operated on a single-project scale, needing no particular institutional structure (such as a Technical Writing or Quality Assurance Department). The model is easy to explain and simple to grasp—it has intuitive appeal for people of a technical orientation. Where Does Team Building Fit As A Component of Mature Software Development Processes? Software development is large-scale, integrated, intellectual work. The skill of developing software is the skill of managing intellectual complexity. Performance ranges among professional software engineers routinely exceed twenty to one. Software engineers differ markedly in the level of complexity they can handle. The folklore of software engineering is replete with remarkable feats by heroes, wizards, and gurus. Although the presence of an extraordinary individual on a project can have dramatic impact, there are not enough of these individuals to staff more than a handful of the projects in most organizations. Software organizations can lament these circumstances, or they can take actions to improve them. |
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