COURSE 4500 | 2-DAY SESSION
Managing Real World Projects and Processes with Metrics

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Course Outline

I. MEASUREMENT ESSENTIALS
A. Measures vs. metrics in decision-making

      Exercise: What you need to know

B. Goal-question-metric

      Exercise: What you need to measure

C. Balancing what's easy with what's needed
D. Fear of punitive misuse of measurements
E. Why most measurement programs fail
F. Measuring individuals, pro and con
G Strategic, tactical, and operational uses
H. Different types and purposes of measures
I. Four core measures, cautions
J. Fundamental statistical calculations
K. Cause-effect vs. correlation vs. coincidence
L. Reliability, validity, and relevance
M. Distributions and variance
N. Key measurement principles, the range trap
O. Avoiding the Hawthorne Effect
P. Effort/cost vs. productivity vs. value
Q. Workable way to establish baselines

      Exercise: Refining your measures

 

II. MEASUREMENT AND PROCESSES
A. Project measures form process measures
B. Measuring line function processes

      Exercise: Define your process

C. Relation between process and measurement
D. Processes provide predictability
E. Distinguishing "REAL" from "presumed"
F. Defined and documented processes
G. Silos, stovepipes, and smokestacks
H. Measuring a process to its full end result
I. Process mapping and measurement points

      Exercise: Define your REAL process

J. Process capability and control charts
K. Common and special causes of variation
L. Effect of variation on improvement efforts
M. Error sources by phase, quality economics
N. Effect of (lacking) full process measures
O. Indirect measures of your process
P. Expert assessments
Q. Capability maturity model-fitting

      Exercise: Directly measuring your process

 

III. BUDGET/SCHEDULE DECISIONS

      Exercise: Meeting an ambitious schedule

A. Common pitfalls that reduce credibility
B. Lack of awareness or lack of credibility
C. Critical non-measurement success factor
D. Why bosses impose unrealistic constraints

      Exercise: Measures to provide credibility

E. Value-modeling sets decision foundation
F. Identify benefits first to give context
G. Business vs. system/product requirements
H. Anticipating business trends and changes
I. Problem Pyramid™ tool to get it right
J. Measures identify the REAL requirements
K. Defining scope that doesn't creep
L. High-level conceptual design
M. Requirements negotiation strategy
N. Four steps to reliable estimates
O. What's same/different for line functions

 

IV. CORE MEASURES OF WORK
A. Major causes of estimation failures
B. Bell curve normal distribution and success
C. PERT, weighted averages to reduce risk
D. Theory of Constraints local safety, buffers
E. Project manager's triangle
F. Core measure: size
G. Common external size measures, issues
H. Engineering types of internal size measures
I. Accounting for complexity and criticality

      Exercise: Defining relevant size measures

J. Core measure: cost/effort
K. Intrinsic vs. extrinsic durations
L. Top-down vs. bottom-up estimating
M. Work Breakdown Structure
N. Role of historical measures
O. Agile/lean vs. heavyweight approaches
P. Long- and short-term views, uncertainty

      Exercise: Define tasks/resources/effort

Q. Identifying, prioritizing, mitigating risk

 

V. FINANCIAL MEASURES/ROI
A. Expense vs. investment, justification
B. Financial benefits, revenues and expenses
C. Business value focus
D. Payback period, return and investment
E. Return on investment calculations
F. Discounted cash flow scenarios
G. Accounting for intangibles, risk, flexibility

      Exercise: Manager's use of ROI

 

VI. CORE MEASURE: TIME
A. Productive time per day
B. Non-productive time periods
C. Effects of multi-tasking on productivity
D. Extrinsic factors affecting duration
E. Dependency networks, Critical Path/Chain
F. Quantifying resource constraints

      Exercise: Shortening project duration

G. Brooks' Law, amended
H. Why measures are essential to negotiation

 

VII. CORE MEASURE: QUALITY
A. Categorizing and counting defects
B. Reporting defects so they get right attention
C. "Built as designed" or a defect
D. Cost to find, cost to fix, cost to not fix
E. Static and dynamic testing, levels and types
F. Pre- and post-implementation measures
G. Reliability and durability
H. Profile characteristics for trend analysis
I. Graphically projecting delivery date
J. Statistically estimating remaining defects
K. Quality confidence percentages, pitfalls
L. Test coverage, status, effectiveness metrics

      Exercise: Defect detection percentage

 

VIII. MEASURING COMPLETION
A. Enhanced planned vs. actual Gantt feedback
B. Earned value percent complete
C. Charting rates of delivery
D. Monitoring the critical path/chain
E. Detecting and adjusting for estimate errors

      Exercise: Managing with buffers

 

IX. BUSINESS MANAGEMENT METRICS
A. Customer satisfaction and loyalty
B. Production/operations performance, support
C. Assessing results vs. identifying corrections
D. Poor delivery vs. poor estimation process
E. Assessing strategies such as outsourcing
F. Evaluating management effectiveness
G. Cost of gathering metrics vs. benefits
H. Full process financial view
I. Key to advancement with metrics

      Exercise: Refining your metrics