Multimedia Project Management (Planning)

1. Multimedia Project Management (Planning)

2. Topics • Introduction to Project Management • Project Scheduling • Risk Analysis 2

3. Project • Dictionary Definition • A task or scheme that requires a large amount of time, effort, and planning to complete • A planned undertaking • A specific plan or design • Focus on Activity, Plan, and Objective 3

4. Management Tasks • Planning – deciding what is to be done; • Organizing – making arrangements; • Staffing – selecting the right people for the job, etc.; • Directing – giving instructions; • Monitoring – checking on progress; • Controlling – taking action to remedy hold-ups; • Innovating – coming up with new solutions; • Representing – liaising with users, etc. 4

5. Management Problems • Poor estimates and plans; • Lack of quality standards and measures; • Lack of guidance about making organizational decisions; • Lack of techniques to make progress visible; • Poor role definition – who does what? • Incorrect success criteria. 5

6. Planning • Effectively schedule, allocate, use, and replace resources to achieve goals • Master schedule is the basic tool and main output of planning • Project control is based on comparing the progress with schedule • Planning and scheduling are dynamic 6

7. Reluctance to Planning • Takes too much time and cost • Preventive action • Long-term payoff is greater than short-term cost • Too tedious (mental activity) • “Thinker” and “doer” • Ego (shoot from the hip) • Not realistic 7

8. Effective Schedule • Understandable • Sufficiently detailed • Highlighting critical tasks • Flexible • Based on reliable estimates • Conform to available resources • Compatible with other related projects 8

9. Developing the Schedule • Defining objectives • Attainable, definitive, quantifiable, with specific duration • Breaking down the work • Sequencing the activities • Estimating costs and durations • Reconciling with time constraints • Reconciling with resource constraints • Reviewing 9

10. Work Breakdown Structure • WBS is a hierarchical representation of a process or product or both (hybrid). • WBS can be shown in a tree graph or as an indented list • A decimal numbering to label the elements • e.g. 4.1.2 is the 2nd element of the 1st element of the 4th 4th 1st 2nd 10

11. Tree Graph WBS for ATC Air Traffic Control System Project Management SW Eng. Operations Product Assur. Req. Eng. Design Coding Test V&V QA Preliminary Detailed 11

12. Indented List WBS for ATC • 0.0 Air Traffic Control (ATC) System • 1.0 Project Management • 2.0 Software Engineering • 2.1 Requirement Engineering • 2.2 Design • 2.3 Coding • 2.4 Test • 3.0 Operations • 4.0 Product Assurance • 4.1 Quality Assurance • 4.2 Verification and Validation 12

13. Notes on WBS • “Rolling wave” approach • First top levels • Gradual completion • Keep partitioning into 72 elements • Make sure about numbering scheme • Top-level zero or one, … • Work package specification for lowest level entries (info, completion, …) 13

14. Sequencing Scheduled Activities • Interrelationship among activities • Milestones and Gantt charts are most common • Gantt chart also shows the relationship between work load and time • Full-wall method gives a global view • Precedence networks are used for larger projects • Critical Path Method (CPM) • Program Evaluation and Review Technique 14

15. Milestone Chart • Deliverable + scheduled time • Simplest scheduling method • Small projects or summary of larger ones • Ease and minimal cost • No interrelationships exhibited • Only completion dates • Not enough feedback 15

16. Gantt Chart • Gantt or Bar chart used more frequently • Suitable for less than 25 activities • Graphical display of start/end times • Shows overlapping activities easily • CPM or PERT may translate to Gantt • Estimation of resource and budget vs. time 16

17. Gantt Example - 1 17

18. Gantt Example - 2 18

19. Project Plan - 1 • Title page with • Signature box • Change history • Table of contents • List of figures • List of tables 19

20. Project Plan - 2 • Description (general idea) • Objectives (artistic and technical) • Deliverables (documents and non-docs) • Resources and team structure • Scheduling info (tasks, WBS, milestones, etc) • Risk analysis • Change control policy • Quality control policy 20

21. Effective Project Control • Detailed planning • Deliverables and measurable milestones • Communication • Tracking (money, time, resources, tasks) • Reviews • Signing-on • Reasons for poor control? 21

22. Milestone Analysis • Actual vs. estimated effort and schedule • Re-schedule • Scheduling training • Review tasks • Quality monitoring • Review test procedure • More tests • Risk-related monitoring 22

23. Risks • “Anything worth doing has risks. The challenge is not to avoid them but to manage them.” • Risk Management: an attempt to minimize the chances of failure caused by unplanned events. • Risks are events or conditions that may occur, and whose occurrence, if it does take place, has a harmful or negative effect. • Defects are not risk. They are almost certain. • Risks are probabilistic events. 23

24. Example • Computer show • Power failure • UPS • Generator • Power company guaranty • Risk management entails additional cost. • If risky event does not happen, the cost is not wasted ! • People tend to ignore risks. 24

25. Basic Concepts • Risk exposure (impact/factor) • RE = P(UO)  L(UO) • Risk Exposure = P(unsatisfactory outcome) x Loss(unsatisfactory outcome) • RE:risk exposure • UO: unsatisfactory outcome • P(UO): probability of UO • L(UO): loss due to UO • UO varies for customers, users, developers, and managers. 25

26. RE-based Decision Tree • Consider different possibilities and calculate RE for each. • Example: software critical error (CE) • P(UO) = 0.4 • L(UO) = $20 M • Two options: • Hire an independent verification and validation (IV&V ) team ($500K) • Use development team • For each: • Find CE (probability: 0.36 and 0.3) • Do not find CE (probability: 0.04 and 0.1) • No CE (probability: 0.6) 26

27. Risk Management • Risk Assessment • Identification • Analysis • Prioritization • Risk Control • Planning • Resolution • Monitoring • Correction (usually considered part of monitoring) 27

28. Risk Identification • Use checklists, comparison, decomposition, … • Top software risk items • Personnel shortfalls • Unrealistic schedules and budgets • Developing the wrong functions and properties • Developing the wrong user interface • Continuing stream of requirements changes • Shortfalls in externally furnished components • Shortfalls in externally performed tasks • Real-time performance shortfalls 28

29. Risk-Management Techniques • Personnel shortfalls • Top talents, job matching, team building, training • Unrealistic schedule and budget • Detailed estimation, incremental dev., reuse • Developing wrong functionality • Prototyping, analysis, user participation • Requirements changes • High change threshold, information hiding, incremental development • External jobs • Benchmarking, inspection, compatibility analysis 29

30. Risk Mitigation • A risk becomes a problem when “risk factors” cross a threshold, as defined in plan. Two types of planning! • Action planning • Prevention, Immediate response • e.g. training • Contingency planning • Correction, When needed • e.g. use of extra resources 30