Project Management Workshop

Project Management Workshop

Nick Cook Citigroup Corporate and Investment Bank

European Technology Business Office Manager

Edinburgh University April 2002

Introduction

Who am I? What are we here to do?

Goals of the workshop

understand the nature of projects have a feel for the key activities involved in project

management understand how effective management can help

provide an effective solution to the final year project NOT TO TURN YOU ALL INTO EXPERT PROJECT

MANAGERS

Agenda

Overview Project lifecycle SLDC and project lifecycle Project roles Project planning Project tracking and control Reporting progress Project risk

Overview

What is a project? How do we manage projects and why is project

management important? Why is project management important? Much of project management is common sense - but

procedures and tools can help

Project Lifecycle

start up

• establishes the need for the project and agrees the main tasks

plan

• agrees what is to be produced sets up the plans and schedules that will be used to track project activities and

execute

• main activities of the project against plans to make sure the project meets its goals

close down

• bring project to a close in a orderly fashion

IT Development SDLC

SDLC = Software Development Life Cycle This cycle is different from the project lifecycle - most

of the SDLC activities will be completed during the Project Execute phase

What are the typical IT development SLDC phases?

SDLC Phases

initiation definition technical design construction validation implementation review

Project Roles

Projects typically involve the interaction of a number of people in different roles - eg project sponsor, project manager, team leader,

team member

Concentrating on the project manager - what are the key responsibilities?

Project Manager - Responsibilities

manage the production of the required goods plan and monitor direct and motivate the team manage project risk initiate corrective action where needed provide progress reports agree and ensure quality is achieved on occasion - terminate the project when necessary

Project planning

How do you plan the project determine and agree the project goals - what are you going to

produce

Break the project down and identify the main project tasks - and estimate the time it will take to perform each task

Record the tasks in a logical order

Develop target start and end dates/times for each task

Use a GANNT chart to show how the tasks will run in logical sequences

Identify project risks and build additional time into task duration to take account of these

Project planning (2)

Task breakdown - example

W o rk B rea kdo w n S truc tu re fo r D e ve lo pm e nt o f a n A e ro p la ne

M a na ge m e nt

F u e l T a n ks A irb re a ks

R ig h t W ing L e ft W ing

W in gs F u se la ge F lig h t S ys tem

F u e l P ip es

F u e l P ressu re G a u ge

F u e l T a nk

F u e l S ys tem T u rb in es

E n g in es

W h o le a irc ra ft

Project planning (3)

Scheduling Gantt chart examples using MS Project

Project planning (4)

Resource planning who will be doing what and when

consider the skills you have available in the project team - don’t ask the plumber to do the plastering!!!

Pay particular attention to scarce resource - can only 1 person in the project team complete a particular task?

Project planning (4)

Risk management - planning projects without considering risk is a common mistake

generic risk eg resource risk - right people not available at the right

time. Use you project plan to find alternative solutions

project-specific risk these will be peculiar to your project and you need to

identify them and have ideas/solutions in case the problems occur

Project control

Murphy’s law - “if everything seems to be going well, you obviously don’t know what’s going on …..”

Project tracking and controls

What should you monitor time

• you Gantt chart should have milestones - are you meeting these?

cost

• are you spending more than you planned - is each task taking more effort then you estimated

quality

• harder to measure, but is the quality of the product you are developing in line with the original goals

Project monitoring - corrective action

if the project starts to go off track against the plan - what can you do? Assess the situation

analyse the problems

implement solutions and monitor

refine the project schedule in the light of changes

Project monitoring - corrective action (2)

5 choices of action brainstorm an alternative approach - eg code something

in a different way put in place contingency plans or change the key project parameters - cost, time, quality

apply more resource - but will cost more

move the end date - but will deliver late

provide less functionality than planned - but will dilute quality

Reporting progress

communication during the project is vital consider the following types of communication

activities: project meetings

project status reports

informal reviews and discussions

Project risk

planning risk mitigation is key - see above consider the following

scale of the risk

probability of the risk

significance of the risk

try brainstorming to identify risks and solutions

Summary

Key aspects Planning

‘those who fail to plan, plan to fail’

Monitoring and control ‘you can’t control what you can’t measure’