cs3100 s/w project managementweek 2: project breakdown 1 cs3100 software project management prof...

CS3100 S/w Project Management Week 2: Project breakdown1

CS3100Software Project Management

Prof Terry Young

Week 2: Project breakdown

Jane CorderJane CorderSubject Liaison LibrarianSubject Liaison Librarian

2

Tracking down informationTracking down information


www.brunel.ac.uk/library

Summon. Good for quick searches and checking availability of resources

Links to other search tools and subject specific

resources

If you still can’t track something down or

require further advice, contact Jane


Accessing specific e-journals/e-journal articles

To track the article down…• Search on Summon (Articles sub-search) by article

title, or• Search on Summon (Journals sub-search) by journal

title, or • Search Google by article title, or• Search Library catalogue by journal title, or• Contact the Library

www.brunel.ac.uk/library

E.g.

Young, T. (2005) ‘An Agenda for Healthcare and Information Simulation’, Health Care Management Science 8 (3), pp. 189-196

Contact me

Jane Corder Jane Corder SISCM Subject Liaison Librarian

LibraryLibrary Brunel University, Uxbridge

Middlesex, UB8 3PH, UKTel +44(0)1895 266160

E-mail [email protected] www.brunel.ac.uk/library

@siscmlibrarian

Consult the Library web pages for further information

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Contact me directly: [email protected]


The questions

Name three ways of representing a project as a diagram.

What four advantages do Cadle & Yeates offer in favour of planning tools?

What drawbacks do they cover? What paperwork is associated with the

development stage?


Learning outcomes

To be able to discuss a project from concept to completion in terms of basic phases

To have a broad concept of the tasks and outputs associated with various phases

To be able to break a whole project down in an iterative manner until one has an appropriate collection of tasks.


Let’s start at the beginning…Customer’s world

Supplier’s world

bid

Provides:•1st shared view of the project (customer & supplier)•A basis for planning…•… and negotiation•The foundation for future commitment

How do we get to the bid phase?

negotiation

On

Week 6: BiddingFiona Pearson

(also some interviews on Blackboard)

Proposal from the supplier to the customer to do a piece of work within a set time for a specific amount of money


Two basic routes into a project:Customer’s world

Supplier’s world

bid

customerplanning

request forquotation

supplierbid cycle

Customer’s world

Supplier’s world

bid

suppliersales gp.

preliminarydiscussions

customerplanning


Customer’s world

Supplier’s world

Start-up

Phases of a project

bidnegotiation& contract

customerpre-bid

supplierpre-bid

Customer’s management processes

develop-ment

com-pletion

Kick-off

oper-ational

As a SoftwareProject Manager,

this will generally be your interest

But sometimes you will find yourself on the other side of the fence, monitoring anexternal project


Customer’s world

Supplier’s world

Start-up

We will focus on a 4-phase model from the supplier’s side


customerpre-bid

supplierpre-bid

Customer’s internal processes

develop-ment

com-pletion

Kick-off

oper-ational


Customer’s world

Supplier’s world

Start-up

Our simple 4-phase model


customerpre-bid

supplierpre-bid

Customer’s internal processes

develop-ment

com-pletion

Kick-off

oper-ational

start-upphase

developmentphase

completionphase

operationalphase


A 4-phase modelstart-upphase

developmentphase

completionphase

operationalphase

SupportDebuggingAnalysisEvaluation (FYP)Selling!

Site visitsPatchesNew releasesInternal reports

More Proposals

typ

ica

l pro

cess

es

typ

ica

l ou

tpu

ts

High-level plansQuality plansRisk analysisTeam & resourcePoliciesTest schedules

Overall planningQuality planningAnalysing riskTest planningSetting policies

Req. documentsSpecificationsDesignsCodeTest results

Working systemCustomer accept-

anceManualsTest certificates

DeliveryFinish manualsCommissioningCustomer take-

over

Doing the workRequirmnt cap.SpecificationDesignCodingTesting

See Cadle & Yeates, section7.4-7.8


Back to our modelstart-upphase

developmentphase

completionphase

operationalphase

typ

ica

l pro

cess

es

typ

ica

l ou

tpu

ts

Given your requirementspecification,

you can either…

Decompose the project by processesDecompose the project by processes(Work Breakdown Structure – WBS)(Work Breakdown Structure – WBS)

Decompose the project by outputsDecompose the project by outputs(Product Breakdown Structure – PBS)(Product Breakdown Structure – PBS)


Breaking down using WBS

traditional (applied in different industries as well)

means-based divisions be able to breakdown into estimable atomic

tasks time (a day or two) + people (one person)


WBS – an exampledo project

Detailedplanning

design devel/imp testing roll-out

Top level breakdownTop level breakdown

Requirementsdecomposition

Resourceplanning

... ... ... ...second level breakdown

Coarse systempartitioning

Milestoneplanning

… … third level breakdown … …

develop sub-project plan

produce risk plan

atomic tasks (~1 day’s duration) typically with a single output

bottom level breakdown

I, personally, am worried about going to this level – you can spend almost as much time planning the task as

doing it!


Breaking down using PBS

emerging (getting popular in SW projects) ends-based division “what” rather than “how” be able to breakdown into atomic products easier to breakdown than WBS problems

• difficult to know “what” you want• difficult to estimate Underpins PRINCE approach (PRojects IN Controlled

Environments)


Example of PBS in action

final product

requirementsA product

designcode

Testresults

delivery

Top level breakdownTop level breakdown

second level breakdown

third level breakdown

proj. plan risk plan

atomic products

bottom level breakdown

Quick break:What things have you triedusing WBS or PBS?


Let’s try to think this through

You have to gather information from doctors, nurses and

administrative personnel. You are aiming to define the

requirements of a replacement information system which

reflects the different perspectives of the groups identified

above, and so are seeking to consult the different

stakeholders to draw up the system’s requirements.

Provide simple, separate work-breakdown and product-

breakdown structures for the requirements definition

phase only of the software project.


conduct interviews to frame issues

conduct individual interviews

gatherrequirements

conduct individual interviews

write questionnaire

administer questionnaire

analysedata

Apply WBS

get requirements from doctors

get requirements

from admin staff

get requirementsfrom nurses


requirementsdocuments

individual interviews scripts

questionnairequestionnaire

dataanalysed

data

Apply PBS

general issuesindividual interviews

scripts

Statement of doctors’

requirements

Statement of admin staff

requirements

Statement of nurses’

requirements


Let’s recap

PBS• Focuses on tangible

elements of project• Offers insight readily

– good for newer managers

• Emphasis on products may make estimating times harder

WBS• Focuses on process

elements of project• Ultimately, probably

offers the deeper insights

• Traditional approach – widely understood


What do they have in common?

They present different perspectives on the same basic entity – the project

Both involve products and processes Both take an hierarchical approach to

understanding how projects work Once you understand one, it is possible

to switch to the other


In summary…Projects are not a

piece ofmagic

They come about because people need the jobs done and others are

willing to do them

We can break them down into manageable chunks

Next week

We’ll look at some of the tools to use

NB – It’s not all about hammers!

There are more subtle

tools, too


Next week: PERT

Cadle, J. and Yeates, D. (2008). Project Management for Information Systems (5th edition) London, UK: Pearson Education Ltd, Chapter 10

Questions?


Questions

What is the critical path? What numbers can you put in an

activity-on-node diagram What do you understand by

dependencies in a network diagram?

cs3100 s/w project managementweek 2: project breakdown 1 cs3100 software project management prof...

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