Project Planning / Project Management CIS 103

Objectives  Learn about Project Planning (40 min)  Try it! – Prep for your own Project Plan (40 min)  Present to class (40 min)

Questions  What is a project?  What is project management?  How does project management relate to other disciplines?  What is the career outlook for project managers in information technology?

Career Outlook  “In fact, there is a growing shortage of project talent as organizations have begun to recognize that project managers can improve business performance in any industry. According to a study published in October 2008 by the Anderson Economic Group, an average of 1.2 million project management positions will need to be filled each year through “ (Project Management Institute: Development/Career-Employment-Outlook.aspx)

5 Why do we learn project management?  Applies all the knowledge you have learned in IT, such as  programming  data management  system analysis  Networking  But more – management  Consider you get a programming job. In the first week in the company you are asked:  To join a project group for internal software resource sharing project but you don’t know who are your colleagues before a meeting; or  To look into the latest WiMAX (IEEE e) technology to see the potential application to your company’s business.  To investigate the search engine market and write a proposal – it is a task for a programmer?  What should you do?

6 What Is a Project?  A project is “a temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product, service, or result.”*  A project ends when its objectives have been reached, or the project has been terminated.  Projects can be large or small and take a short or long time to complete.

What is project management ?  The management of projects (Well, Duh!)  A more academic, if not more useful, definition:  The application of knowledge, tools, skill, and techniques to project activities in order to meet project requirements

8 Status of IT Projects  31% IT projects were cancelled before completion  53% were completed, but were over-budget, over- schedule, and did not meet the original requirements.  The average cost overrun of medium-sized projects was 202%

What Went Wrong?  Philip A. Pell, PMP, commented on how the U.S. IRS needed to improve its project management process. “Pure and simple, good, methodology-centric, predictable, and repeatable project management is the SINGLE greatest factor in the success (or in this case failure) of any project…  In 2006, the IRS lost over $320 million due to a botched fraud-detection system project  More examples: Management/Projects-Gone-Wrong / 9 *Comments posted on CIO Magazine Web site on article “For the IRS, There’s No EZ Fix,” (April 1, 2004).

10 What the Winners Do*  Recent research findings show that companies that excel in project delivery capability:  Use an integrated project management toolbox that includes standard and advanced tools and lots of templates.  Grow project leaders, emphasizing business and soft skills. *Milosevic, Dragan and And Ozbay, “Delivering Projects: What the Winners Do,” Proceedings of the Project Management Institute Annual Seminars & Symposium (November 2001).

11 Top Information Technology Skills Cosgrove, Lorraine, “January 2004 IT Staffing Update,” CIO Research Reports (February 3, 2004). Information Technology (IT) Skill Percentage of Respondents

Top IT Skills  More: skills-wanted-for-2012/ skills-wanted-for-2012/3503

13 Large Project: Online medical services appointment system  Making the appointment with a PCP or specialist doctor is normally via phone call. Even though e-commerce and many other online services are prevailing, such a service in medical area is not common. Such a system, this system would allow patients to check the availability of a doctor or any other medical services from the Internet, making and changing the appointment. This is a promising system in several ways:  It will greatly make the appointment convenient  It can be connected to other networked medical information services, such as medical insurance.  It will also benefit the medical service providers much in saving costs and improving service quality.  There are several issues :  Who will initialize the project?  Who should be involved ?  Who is to be a target buyer of the system?  How this system can be co-operated with other medical information systems?  Is this system really beneficial?

14 Other Examples of IT Projects  A help desk or technical worker replaces laptops for a small department.  A small software development team adds a new feature to an internal software application.  A college campus upgrades its technology infrastructure to provide wireless Internet access.  A department moves its classrooms and labs to a different location.

15 Examples of IT Projects  A cross-functional task force in a company decides what software to purchase and how it will be implemented.  A television network develops a system to allow viewers to vote for contestants and provide other feedback on programs.  A government group develops a system to track child immunizations.

16 Factors For Successful Projects  Clear statement of requirements  Proper planning  Realistic expectations  Smaller project milestones  Clear vision & objectives  Hard-working, focused team  What else do you suggest?

17 The Triple Constraint  Every project is constrained in different ways by its:  Scope goals: What work will be done?  Time goals: How long should it take to complete?  Cost goals: What should it cost?  It is the project manager’s duty to balance these three often-competing goals.

18 The Triple Constraint of Project Management

19 Risks & Assumptions  Internal risk  From the estimation process or from the fact that a key member of the project team could leave in the middle of the project  External risk  Arises from the dependencies on other contractors or vendors  Assumptions  What we used to estimate scope, schedule, and budget and to assess the risk of the project

20 Examples of “Risk”

21 Project Stakeholders  Stakeholders are the people involved in or affected by project activities.  Stakeholders include:  Project sponsor  Project manager  Project team  Support staff  Customers  Users  Suppliers  Opponents to the project

22 Phases/Stages of Project Planning  Define project goal  Plan project  Answer questions (What, why, how, who, et al)  Baseline plan  Execute and Monitor project plan  Adjust the plan –  ALWAYS  Close project  Evaluate project

Communication is KEY  What are methods used to communicate?  Advantages?  Disadvantages  Newly added team members?  Knowledge “capture”  Perfect documentation is not a goal - "perfect" communication is a goal 23

Building a Gantt Chart Dependencies: Show dependencies between activities with arrows –E.g., activity 2 cannot start until activity 1 is complete Activity 1 Activity 2 Milestone Time Frame: day 1 day 2 day3… day 23 Dependencies

25 Sample Gantt Chart The Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) is on the left Each task’s start and finish date are shown on the right using a calendar timescale.

26 Sample Network Diagram Each box is a project task from the WBS. Arrows show dependencies between tasks. The bolded tasks are on the critical path. If any tasks on the critical path take longer than planned, the whole project will slip unless something is done. Network diagrams were first used in 1958 on the Navy Polaris project, before project management software was available.

27 What is PMBOK ?  The Project management body of Knowledge (PMBOK)  A document providing a basis for identifying and describing the generally accepted principles and practices of project management  Originally published in 1987  Available from Project Management Institute (PMI)

Developing Your Project Plan  Scope Management Plan 1. define and set main objectives for the project  Staffing Management Plan 1. define and assign roles for all persons or groups involved in the project  Schedule Management Plan 1. create a task list 2. determine the approximate duration of each task 3. assign a person or group to the task (this is you for summer internship)

Developing Your Project Plan (cont)  Communication Management Plan 1. create a contact list of team members and other people with a stake in your project 2. determine the best method of communication  Quality Management Plan 1. set up meeting times to discuss challenges, difficulties, suggestions, and progress of the project  Risk Management Plan 1. discuss potential risks in the project 2. discuss response methods to address problems when they occur

Etc…  Use Project Planning for Capstone and Course projects (requirement?)  Your efforts are PM "in the small“  Always work towards documentation and communication

Questions?

Your turn!  We will divide into groups (you have the option to work individually)  We will assign each group a project  You: Plan project, well as possible, apply the Project Management Guide to your project (see assignment in Blackboard)  Make assumptions as necessary  Discuss…keep moving through the plan  Identify critical concerns for your project  Identify risk  Upload your plan to Blackboard  Present your plan to the class

Team Assignments TeamProject 1A help desk or technical worker replaces laptops for a small department. 2A college campus upgrades its technology infrastructure to provide wireless Internet access. 3A cross-functional task force in a company decides what software to purchase and how it will be implemented. 4A government group develops a system to track child immunizations. Alternative ProjectA computer information systems/computer science department needs to move its classrooms and lab to a different building.