software management fundamentals 1

7/27/2019 Software Management Fundamentals 1

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Taming the Software

Dragon

Software Project ManagementFundamentals I


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Your name

Your current role What you would like to learn from

this class


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Goal

100% project success!!!

Knowledge + Practice

=

X


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Goal

Knowledge

Why projects succeed or fail

What to do to increase success

How are IT/software projects different


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Standard software EULA applies

Interactive - The question markbackground means please answerthe question

Please provide feedback cant leavewithout them ;)

End User License Agreement

Accept Decline


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It is a set of activities undertaken inorder to achieve a goal

A simplified view of a project:

Task 1 Task 2 Task 3 Task N GOAL

What is a project?


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Identify the goal

Identify the set of tasks, e.g.planning

Execute each task successfully

Task 1 Task 2 Task 3 Task N GOAL

How to ensure a projectssuccess?


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Studies show over half of IT projects fail in one fashion or another


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Lets consider some other non-ITprojects to see if we can draw someparallels

Why do projects fail?


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Anyone wants to climbMount Everest?


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Mount Everest

Total attempt: 11,000

3,000 success, i.e., reachedsummit

Success rate = 29%

207 climbers died on MountEverest

Fatality = 2.05%

54 summiteers died

Summit to fatality rate =1.82%


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Mont Blanc Much easier compared to

Everest or K2 20,000+ successful climb

each year Over 2,000 have died

climbing - considered mostin the world

Why does Mont Blanc havemore deaths when it iseasier??


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What can we learn fromMountaineers?

we need skills to overcome thetechnical difficulty of the mountain

We also need to put in 120% ofeffort to apply our skills, and nottake things lightly

We need to plan for externalfactors that are outside of ourcontrol


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What can we learn fromMountaineers?

Potential for success is a ratio betweenthe skills and the difficulty

Effort amplifies skills (and the lack of

effort de-amplifies skills) External factors amplify the difficulty

With enough skills and efforts to overcome

the difficulty and external factors, we havesuccess! Otherwise we have failure.


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P (Success): Skills / Difficulty

Success: Skills * Effort>Difficulty * External Factor

Failure: Skills * Effort


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Individual: technical, managerial,communication, domain knowledge, etc

Team: planning, collaboration,coordination, moving without the ball,prior delivery, etc

Organization: goal setting, governance,sponsorship, etc

What are some examples ofskills?


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Motivation

Focus/concentration

Persistence Continuous learning/training

Efforts amplify skills!

What are some examples ofeffort?


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Technical complexity howchallenging/complex the tasks are

Project complexity howchallenging/complex the projectmanagement becomes

Inherent complexity there are a certain

amount of complexity are inherent andcannot be reduced, while other complexityare accidental and can be reduced

What are some examples ofdifficulty?


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Unforeseen situations (people get sick,etc)

Politics Interruptions Change of priority/goals Lack of time Lack of resources

External Factors amplifydifficulty/complexity

What are some examples ofexternal factor?


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How to increase projectsuccess

Skills Effort

Difficulty External Factors

Individual

Team

Organization

Focus

Persistence

Learning

Technical Complexity

Project Complexity

Unforeseen situations

Politics

Project Constraints


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Why or why not?

Homework: think about how tomeasure success potential on yourproject, and what issues you have toovercome to do so

Does your project measuresuccess potential?


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Intermission


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Book keeping

http://dragonmaestro.com

Services

Surveys
http://dragonmaestro.com/http://dragonmaestro.com/


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Goal

Knowledge

Why projects succeed or fail

What to do to increase success

How are IT/software projects different


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Adding people to a late projectmakes it later

Why?

Because software projects are notfully partitionable

What is the Brooks Law?


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Fully-partitionable task

Time

People


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Non-partitionable task

Time

People


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Partitionable but complexinterrelated task

Time

People


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Communication Channels


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Number of possiblecommunicationchannels = N * (N 1) / 2

If unmanaged, thecommunicationoverhead soonoverwhelms workinghours (OT inevitable)

The larger the project,the less productivethe individuals tend tobe

# ofpeople

Hour /channel

Hour /person

7 0.5 3

7 1 6

10 0.5 4.5

10 1 9

20 0.5 9.5

20 1 19


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Key to software projectmanagement

Maximize the information flow whileminimizing the communicationoverhead information flow is thelifeblood of software projects!

Add people very carefully; each additionalperson increase project overhead

Impact: project complexity, projectconstraints


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Why is information flow the lifebloodof software projects?

Because of the complexity of theproblem domains, multiple parties,incompatible languages, and changes

Question


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Impacts toProject Management Triangle

resource

Resource, Scope, Time Pick Any two

Increase scope => increase resource needs

Increase resource => increase overhead => increase time

Fixed scope & time together is hard


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Fixed Resource and Time

People

Time

Stops when time runs out

Fixed cost but variable outcome


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Fixed Resource and Scope

People

Time

Stop when all scopes are addressed

Variable cost but fixed outcome

* Extended version of fixed resource and time


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Identify ways to partitioncommunication channels on a projectand identify the pros and cons of the

approach

Exercise


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Waterfall Method

Biz

BA

FA

DEV

QA

OPS

Seems ideal on paper, but does not work well in practice

Downstream almost always need to talk to upstream

Information flows are restricted artificially


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Under what situation will waterfall methodwork as advertised?

When the upstream has the skills to makeintelligent and correct decisions fordownstream

If not possible you will see a tendencyfor downstream to try to move upstream

Question


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Agile Methods

Biz

FA

DevQA

Ops

Designed to open up the communication channels

upstream never disengages, which is how it works in reality

Very similar to how it would work naturally


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It might seem like agile methods are better thanwaterfall, but what is the catch?

Agile methods by nature do not scale well due to

the large communication channels it employs

This arguably is an asset rather than a liability,but waterfall method also works for small

projects too

Project size matters more than methodologychoice for project success

Question


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Communication and Difficulty

The simplest way toincrease odds of successis to reduce the difficulty

A smaller project isautomatically easier

A project half as big isfour times as easy

Climb Mont Blanc dontclimb K2 if you arelooking for success

Difficulty

Technical Complexity

Project Complexity

H h dl bi j


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Instead of running one big monolithicproject, run multiple smaller projects!

What are the challenges with thisapproach?

This method will reduce some complexitybut not all running multiple projects isstill harder than running one project

How can we handle big projectthen?

Wh t i th il


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Agile enables learning more rapidlythan waterfall, by taking advantageof the nature of software

What is another reason agileworks better than waterfall?

S ft It ti F il


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Software, Iteration, Failure,and Learning

Unlike physical goods, software can be iterated Iteration allows for rapid learning as we see the

results earlier, and we can improve upon theprevious results faster (even if the previousresult is a failure)

Failure is an opportunity for learning The key to failure is to manage it so it does not

destroy your ability to learn from it so you canbecome successful

Fail small and frequently, and learn from them toinduce success

Succeed frequently (each task) and you willaccomplish your goal!


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In Closing


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History of Aviation


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Stand on the shoulders of giants

Sir George Cayley

Aerodyanmics

Daniel Bernoulli

Fluid Dyamics

Sir Isaac Newton

Laws of Motion

Otto Lilienthal

Gliding pioneer


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Insight and sound strategy

Learn to pilot first by gliding

The Flying Problem how to control the aircraft

Turning like birds wing warping


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Iterate quickly and cheaply

Use of wind tunnels to test out wing configurations

Hundreds of configurations

Models and experimentations are keys to learning!


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Relentless persistence

With every crash, they get back up stronger and better


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Questions?

software management fundamentals 1

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