Chapter 4

Project Management

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 1

Project management


Organising, planning and scheduling
software projects

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 2

Objectives

To introduce software project management and
to describe its distinctive characteristics

To discuss project planning and the planning
process

To show how graphical schedule representations
are used by project management

To discuss the notion of risks and the risk
management process

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 3

Topics covered

Management activities

Project planning

Project scheduling

Risk management

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 4

Software project management

Concerned with activities involved in ensuring
that software is delivered on time and on
schedule and in accordance with the
requirements of the organisations developing
and procuring the software

Project management is needed because
software development is always subject to
budget and schedule constraints that are set by
the organisation developing the software

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 5

Software management distinctions

The product is intangible

The product is uniquely flexible

Software engineering is not recognized as an
engineering discipline with the sane status as
mechanical, electrical engineering, etc.

The software development process is not
standardised

Many software projects are 'one-off' projects

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 6

Management activities

Proposal writing

Project planning and scheduling

Project costing

Project monitoring and reviews

Personnel selection and evaluation

Report writing and presentations

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 7

Management commonalities

These activities are not peculiar to software
management

Many techniques of engineering project
management are equally applicable to software
project management

Technically complex engineering systems tend
to suffer from the same problems as software
systems

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 8

Project staffing

May not be possible to appoint the ideal people
to work on a project
• Project budget may not allow for the use of highly-paid staff
• Staff with the appropriate experience may not be available
• An organisation may wish to develop employee skills on a
software project

Managers have to work within these constraints
especially when (as is currently the case) there
is an international shortage of skilled IT staff

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 9

Project planning

Probably the most time-consuming project
management activity

Continuous activity from initial concept through
to system delivery. Plans must be regularly
revised as new information becomes available

Various different types of plan may be developed
to support the main software project plan that is
concerned with schedule and budget

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 10

Types of project plan
Plan Description
Quality plan Describes the quality procedures and
standards that will be used in a project.
Validation plan Describes the approach, resources and
schedule used for system validation.
Configuration Describes the configuration management
management plan procedures and structures to be used.
Maintenance plan Predicts the maintenance requirements of
the system, maintenance costs and effort
required.
Staff development plan. Describes how the skills and experience of
the project team members will be
developed.

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 11

Project planning process
Establish the project constraints
Make initial assessments of the project parameters
Define project milestones and deliverables
while project has not been completed or cancelled loop
Draw up project schedule
Initiate activities according to schedule
Wait ( for a while )
Review project progress
Revise estimates of project parameters
Update the project schedule
Re-negotiate project constraints and deliverables
if ( problems arise )then
Initiate technical review and possible revision
end if
end loop

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 12

Project plan structure

Introduction

Project organisation

Risk analysis

Hardware and software resource requirements

Work breakdown

Project schedule

Monitoring and reporting mechanisms

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 13

Activity organization

Activities in a project should be organised to
produce tangible outputs for management to
judge progress

Milestones are the end-point of a process activity

Deliverables are project results delivered to
customers

The waterfall process allows for the
straightforward definition of progress milestones

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 14

Milestones in the RE process

ACT IVITIES

Feasibility Requir ements Prototype Design Requir ements

study analysis development study specification

Feasibility Requir ements Evaluation Architectural Requir ements

report definition report design specification

MILESTONES

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 15

Project scheduling

Split project into tasks and estimate time and
resources required to complete each task

Organize tasks concurrently to make optimal
use of workforce

Minimize task dependencies to avoid delays
caused by one task waiting for another to
complete

Dependent on project managers intuition and
experience

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 16

The project scheduling
process

Identify Identify activity Estimate resources Allocate people Create project

activities dependencies for activities to activities charts

Software Activity charts

requirements and bar charts

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 17

Scheduling problems

Estimating the difficulty of problems and hence
the cost of developing a solution is hard

Productivity is not proportional to the number of
people working on a task

Adding people to a late project makes it later
because of communication overheads

The unexpected always happens. Always allow
contingency in planning

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 18

Bar charts and activity
networks

Graphical notations used to illustrate the project
schedule

Show project breakdown into tasks. Tasks
should not be too small. They should take about
a week or two

Activity charts show task dependencies and the
the critical path

Bar charts show schedule against calendar time

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 19

Task durations and
dependencies
Task Duration (days) Dependencies
T1 8
T2 15
T3 15 T1 (M1)
T4 10
T5 10 T2, T4 (M2)
T6 5 T1, T2 (M3)
T7 20 T1 (M1)
T8 25 T4 (M5)
T9 15 T3, T6 (M4)
T10 15 T5, T7 (M7)
T11 7 T9 (M6)
T12 10 T11 (M8)
©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 20
Activity network
14/7/99 15 days
15 days
M1 T3
8 days T9
T1 5 days 4/8/99 25/8/99
25/7/99
T6 M4 M6
4/7/99 M3
start 20 days 7 days
15 days
T7 T11
T2

25/7/99 10 days 11/8/99 5/9/99

10 days
M2 M7 M8
T4 T5 15 days
T10 10 days
18/7/99
T12
M5
25 days
T8 Finish
19/9/99

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 21

Activity timeline
4/7 11/7 18/7 25/7 1/8 8/8 15/8 22/8 29/8 5/9 12/9 19/9
Start
T4
T1
T2
M1
T7
T3
M5
T8
M3
M2
T6
T5
M4
T9
M7
T10
M6
T11
M8
T12
Finish

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 22

Staff allocation
4/7 11/7 18/7 25/ 1/8 8/8 15/8 22/8 29/8 5/9 12/9 19/9

Fred T4
T8 T11
T12
Jane T1
T3
T9
Anne T2
T6 T10

Jim T7

Mary T5

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 23

Risk management

Risk management is concerned with identifying
risks and drawing up plans to minimise their
effect on a project.

A risk is a probability that some adverse
circumstance will occur.
• Project risks affect schedule or resources
• Product risks affect the quality or performance of the software
being developed
• Business risks affect the organisation developing or procuring
the software

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 24

Software risks
Risk Risk type Description
Staff turnover Project Experienced staff will leave the
project before it is finished.
Management change Project There will be a change of
organisational management with
different priorities.
Hardware unavailability Project Hardware which is essential for the
project will not be delivered on
schedule.
Requirements change Project and There will be a larger number of
product changes to the requirements than
anticipated.
Specification delays Project and Specifications of essential interfaces
product are not available on schedule
Size underestimate Project and The size of the system has been
product underestimated.
CASE tool under- Product CASE tools which support the
performance project do not perform as anticipated
Tec hnology change Business The underlying technology on which
the system is built is superseded by
new technology.
Product competition Business A competitive product is marketed
before the system is completed.
©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 25
The risk management process

Risk identification
• Identify project, product and business risks

Risk analysis
• Assess the likelihood and consequences of these risks

Risk planning
• Draw up plans to avoid or minimise the effects of the risk

Risk monitoring
• Monitor the risks throughout the project

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 26

The risk management process

Risk Risk analysis Risk planning Risk

identification monitoring

List of potential Risk avoidance Risk

Prioritised risk and contingency
risks list assessment
plans

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 27

Risk identification

Technology risks

People risks

Organisational risks

Requirements risks

Estimation risks

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 28

Risks and risk types
Risk type Possible risks
Technology The database used in the system cannot process as
many transactions per second as expected.
Software components which should be reused contain
defects which limit their functionality.
People It is impossible to recruit staff with the skills required.
Key staff are ill and unavailable at critical times.
Required training for staff is not available.
Organisational The organisation is restructured so that different
management are responsible for the project.
Organisational financial problems force reductions in the
project budget.
Tools The code generated by CASE tools is inefficient.
CASE tools cannot be integrated.
Requirements Changes to requirements which require major design
rework are proposed.
Customers fail to understand the impact of requirements
changes.
Estimation The time required to develop the software is
underestimated.
The rate of defect repair is underestimated.
The size of the software is underestimated.

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 29

Risk analysis

Assess probability and seriousness of each risk

Probability may be very low, low, moderate, high
or very high

Risk effects might be catastrophic, serious,
tolerable or insignificant

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 30

Risk analysis
Risk Probability Effects
Organisational financial problems force Low Catastrophic
reductions in the project budget.
It is impossible to recruit staff with the skills High Catastrophic
required for the project.
Key staff are ill at critical times in the project. Moderate Serious
Software components which should be reused Moderate Serious
contain defects which limit their functionality.
Changes to requirements which require major Moderate Serious
design rework are proposed.
The organisation is restructured so that different High Serious
management are responsible for the project.
The database used in the system cannot process Moderate Serious
as many transactions per second as expected.
The time required to develop the software is High Serious
underestimated.
CASE tools cannot be integrated. High Tolerable
Customers fail to understand the impact of Moderate Tolerable
requirements changes.
Required training for staff is not available. Moderate Tolerable
The rate of defect repair is underestimated. Moderate Tolerable
The size of the software is underestimated. High Tolerable
The code generated by CASE tools is inefficient. Moderate Insignificant

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 31

Risk planning

Consider each risk and develop a strategy to
manage that risk

Avoidance strategies
• The probability that the risk will arise is reduced

Minimisation strategies
• The impact of the risk on the project or product will be reduced

Contingency plans
• If the risk arises, contingency plans are plans to deal with that
risk

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 32

Risk management strategies
Risk Strategy
Organisational Prepare a briefing document for senior management showing how the project is
financial problems making a very important contribution to the goals of the business.
Recruitment Alert customer of potential difficulties and the possibility of delays, investigate
problems buying-in components.
Staff illness Reorganise team so that there is more overlap of work and people therefore
understand each other’s jobs.
Defective Replace potentially defective components with bought-in components of known
components reliability.
Requirements Derive traceability information to assess requirements change impact, maximise
changes information hiding in the design.
Organisational Prepare a briefing document for senior management showing how the project is
restructuring making a very important contribution to the goals of the business.
Database Investigate the possibility of buying a higher-performance database.
performance
Underestimated Investigate buying in components, investigate use of a program generator.
development time

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 33

Risk monitoring

Assess each identified risks regularly to decide
whether or not it is becoming less or more
probable

Also assess whether the effects of the risk have
changed

Each key risk should be discussed at
management progress meetings

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 34

Risk factors

Risk type Potential indicators

Technology Late delivery of hardware or support software, many reported
technology problems
People Poor staff morale, poor relationships amongst team member,
job availability
Organisational organisational gossip, lack of action by senior management
Tools reluctance by team members to use tools, complaints about
CASE tools, demands for higher-powered workstations
Requirements many requirements change requests, customer complaints
Estimation failure to meet agreed schedule, failure to clear reported
defects

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 35

Key points

Good project management is essential for project
success

The intangible nature of software causes problems for
management

Managers have diverse roles but their most significant
activities are planning, estimating and scheduling

Planning and estimating are iterative processes
which continue throughout the course of a
project

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 36

Key points

A project milestone is a predictable state where
some formal report of progress is presented to
management.

Risks may be project risks, product risks or
business risks

Risk management is concerned with identifying
risks which may affect the project and planning
to ensure that these risks do not develop into
major threats

©Ian Sommerville 2000 Software Engineering, 6th edition. Chapter 4 Slide 37