Anticlue

The following are Deming's 7 deadly diseases:

1. Lack of constancy of purpose in planning product and service that will have a market, keep the company in business, and provide jobs.
2. Emphasis on short-term profits: short-term thinking (just the opposite of constancy of purpose to stay in business), fed by fear of unfriendly takeover and by push from bankers and owners for dividends.
3. Evaluation of performance, merit rating, or annual review.
4. Mobility of Management: job hopping
5. Management by use only of visible figures, with little or not consideration of figures that are unknown or unknowable.
6. Excessive Medical Costs
7. Excessive cost of liability, swelled by lawyers who work on contingency

When one begins to contemplate how important communication is to project success, it is also interesting how common barriers to communication become. Communication barriers often present an obstacle to delivering a successful project. Project Managers should be considerate of the frequently occurring barriers in order to assure there are no developing issues.
The most common barriers to good communications are:

• Misunderstanding other stakeholders' information needs - Misunderstanding commonly occurs when the project team doesn't understand the informational needs of other stakeholders. In this situation, information can be distributed inappropriately and inconsistently.
• Using media improperly - The media selected to communicate must be able to be used by all stakeholders and project team members. It does no good to send the Microsoft project version of the work break down structure when the team doesn't understand how to read the project plan.
• Isolating decision makers - The silo-ed decision maker can impede a successful project. Decision makers who isolate themselves or don't respond to requests for information are a common communication barrier.
• Misapplying policies and procedures - Team mates and stakeholders who don't follow the prescribed communication policies and procedures create confusion. These communications are commonly incomplete containing inaccurate information and are directed to the incorrect audience.
• Underestimating the importance of teamwork - Insensitivity to teamwork results in isolationists not distributing the information in a timely accurate way. A key signal that this problem exists is when team members don't participate in team-building activities.

Good communications create constructive attitudes and knowledge and take time to establish.

Further Reading:

• Ways to Improve Communication


• Information Distribution according to PMI

Information Distribution is about assuring the right information is available to the right people at the right time. Information Distribution executes the communication plan and responds to the unexpected requests for information.
The distribution mechanism can affect the information’s usefulness because if it is not timely or comprehended, then it shouldn’t have been communicated.

The only input to information distribution is:

• The Communications Management Plan – The Communications Management plan describes the methods for obtaining and distributing project information. The communication management plan provides:
  1. Stakeholder communication requirements
  2. Information to be communicated, including format, content, and level of detail
  3. Individual accountable for communications
  4. Recipients of the information
  5. Communication Methodology or Technology
  6. Frequency of Communication
  7. Escalation process with associated time frames
  8. Change control process for the communication plan
  9. Dictionary of related jargon

After reviewing the communications management plan, there are certain tools and techniques which can be employed to distribute information. The four tools and techniques are:

1. Communications skills – Communication Skills enable a project manager to take advantage of the dimensions of communication.
2. Information Gathering and Retrieval Systems – Information Gathering and Retrieval systems are all of the various ways to collect and share project documentation. Possible mechanisms are a manual filing system, electronic databases, collaboration software, and a project management information system.
3. Information Distribution Methods – Information distribution is the timely collection, sharing and distribution of information to the project team. Methods can be portals, collaborative work management tools, web conferencing, web publishing, and when all technology is not available, manual filing systems and hard copy distribution.
4. Lessons Learned Process – Lessons learned identify project success and failures from which knowledge can be gathered to make recommendations to improve future performance on projects. Some specific results from lessons learned include:
   • Update of the lessons learned knowledge base
   • Input to knowledge management systems
   • Updated corporate policies, procedures, and processes
   • Improved business skills
   • Overall product and service improvements
   • Updates to the risk management plan

The purpose of communicating is to exchange information it is best to assure all intended receivers can use the distribution methodology. The outputs from Information Distribution are:

1. Updates to the organizational process assets - Organizational process assets (updates) are used to update the project knowledge base. Updates to the organizational process assets include the following:
   • Lessons learned – Documentation includes the root cause of issues, strategies for preventing this from ever occurring again. Project management processes that can be improved, as well as recommendations on any enhancements or modifications.
   • Project Records – Project records include all correspondence and documents describing the project. This would be also in the form of a project notebook.
   • Project Reports – Formal and information project reports catch the project status, issues, and progress reports.
   • Project presentations – Project presentations are the information presented to the project stakeholders. This information is the foundation of the stakeholders view of the project.
   • Feedback from stakeholders – Feedback received from stakeholders should be used to modify or improve future project performance
   • Stakeholder Notifications – Information provided to stakeholders about resolved issues, approved changes, and general project status
2. Requested changes – Requested changes to the project management plan should be handled through the integrated change control process.

As a part of communicating, the sender is accountable for assuring the information is clear, complete, and comprehendible to the intended recipient. The recipient is responsible for understanding the information and making sure it was received in its entirety. Due to this structure, communication has many dimensions.

• Written and oral, which includes listening and speaking - Written communications include such activities as writing reports and executive summaries, and writing e-mails. Oral communications include giving oral presentations, communicating within a group context, and communicating one-to-one. Listening and speaking skills also are important in ensuring that project information has been distributed properly.
• Internal and external - Internal communications are information exchanges that take place within the organization itself. External communications involve stakeholders and customers who are not officers or employees of the organization – vendors, customers and the media are a typical example.
• Formal and informal - Formal communication involves formal deliverables, such as briefings and status reports describing any key accomplishments and concerns. Informal communications may include phone conversations, e-mail, and adhoc conversations.
• Vertical and horizontal - Vertical communications are directed at persons who are at different levels within the corporate hierarchy. Horizontal communications take place with persons who have similar levels of responsibility and authority your peers.

Project Managers are always involved in communications, and a key to success is understanding the various ways to interact with peers, team mates, stakeholders, and others within and outside of an organization.

Communications Planning determines which stakeholders need what information, when they will need it, how the information will be communicated, and who is responsible for communicating the information. One of the key task is to assure a reliable way to meet the informational needs of the stakeholders which is linked to the enterprise environmental factors and organizational influences.

The inputs to communication planning are:

1. Enterprise environmental factors - External and internal environmental factors influence the project's success. Examples: organizational culture and structure, infrastructure, existing resources, and communications technology.
2. Organizational process assets – Organizational process assets represent the knowledge learned and documented from previous organizational endeavors. Some organizational process assets are formal and informal plans, policies, procedures, and guidelines.
3. Project Scope Statement – The project scope statement describes the project scope including major deliverables, scope objectives, scope assumptions, scope constraints, and a statement of work.
4. Project Management Plan – The project management plan is the bought into, agreed to, realistic, and formal document detailing how the project will be executed, monitored and controlled. Assumptions and constraints may affect communications and should be considered.

When you use the proper inputs for Communications Planning, you will feel confident that you have a solid foundation for your Communications Management Plan. As project manager, you will want to use the proper tools and techniques to develop a communications plan from the inputs you have gathered. The two tools and techniques for communications planning are:

1. Communications requirements analysis – Communications requirements analysis determines the information needs of the stakeholders. By combining the type and format of information needed considering the information’s value to the audience. The goal is to walk the balance between overwhelming with too much granular information to too little high level reviews.
   In order to ascertain the project communications requirements, the project manager reviews:
   • Organization Charts
   • Project organization and stakeholder responsibility relationships
   • Disciplines, departments, and specialties engaged in the project.
   • Logistics of how many individuals are involved with the project at which locations.
   • Internal information needs
   • External information needs
   • Stakeholder information
2. Communications technology – The communication technology describes the methodology utilized to communicate with the stakeholders. This can include sharepoint, video cam meeting or minutes.
   When considering which communications technology to use, please consider the following:
   • The urgency of the information
   • The availability of the technology
   • The expected project staffing
   • The length of the project
   • The project environment

When determining which communication tool and technique to use, it is a good idea to keep in mind the channels of communication. The total number of communication channels is n(n-1)/2, where n is the number of stakeholders. The number of potential communication channels is an indicator of project’s communications complexity.

The output of communications planning is the Communications Management Plan. The communication management plan is comprised of the following information:

• Stakeholder communication requirements
• The format utilized
• The individual responsible for assuring communications
• The information recipients
• The form of communication (email, conference calls)
• The frequency of the communications
• Escalation time frames and management change for escalation
• The change control process for updating the communications plan
• A glossary of terminology and jargon

A Communications Plan clarifies the project's communications requirements and establishes communication strategies.

Project Communications Management Knowledge area provides a critical link between people, ideas, and information at all stages in the project life cycle. Project Managers should be spending about 90% of their time communicating. Formal processes aid in decision making and help to achieve a successful project.
The Project Communications Management processes are:

• Communications Planning – Communications planning is the process of ascertaining the information and communication needs of project stakeholder. This process normally occurs as a part of the Planning Process Group.
• Information Distribution – Information Distribution is the process of assuring the project stakeholders have the needed information available in a timely manner. This process occurs throughout the Executing Process Group.
• Performance Reporting – Performance reporting is the process of gathering and distributing project performance information including status reporting, progress measurement, and forecasting. This process occurs within the Monitoring and Controlling Process Group.
• Manage Stakeholders – Managing Stakeholders occurs within the Monitoring and Controlling Process Group. Managing stakeholders is concerned with satisfying the requirement for the project stakeholders and resolving any issues raised by the project stakeholders.

It is a good idea to remember that activities and responsibilities under the above process will depend upon the project on hand. A smaller project obviously will not have the same communication standard as a larger project.

The important point is that all communication should be effective, accurate, and considerate of project requirements.
The project communication processes provide a methodology for successfully implementing your project communications strategy. In addition to assuring stakeholders are informed and involved in the project.

Harold Kerzner identifies five levels for achieving excellence in
project management (PM).

Level 1: Common Language is the basic knowledge of PM and the
terminology used.

Level 2: Common Processes defined and developed are applicable and
repeatable.

Level 3: Singular Methodology is the synergistic effect of combining
all corporate methodologies.

Level 4: Benchmarking process improvement is required to maintain a
competitive advantage.

Level 5: Continuous Improvement evaluates the enhancement to PM from
each improvement.

Which level is your organization currently enjoying? How will your group rise to the next level?

Managing a project team involves tracking individual’s performance, providing feedback, resolving issues, and coordinating changes to enhance overall project performance. In a functional organization it is much like managing a department team with the nuance of enhancing the project’s performance instead of meeting the operational goals of the department.

The inputs to managing a project team yield an overview of project team performance and assignments so the project manager can determine what the next steps are. The inputs are:

• Organizational Process Assets – Organizational process assets are the organization’s policies, procedures, and systems which can be used to reward the team during the course of a project.
• Project Staff Assignments – Project Staff Assignments are the list of project duties for team members. Staff Assignments are often used during the monitoring and controlling process group to evaluate individual team members.
• Roles and Responsibilities – The roles and responsibilities document is used to determine what each team member should be focusing upon and completing.
• Project Organization Charts – Project Charts represent the reporting relationships among the project team.
• Staffing Management Plan – The Staffing Management Plan details when team members are needed and list training plans, certification requirements, and compliance issues.
• Team Performance Assessment - Team Performance Assessments are the documented formal or informal assessment of the project team’s performance. Common indications are staff turnover rates, team dynamics, and skill levels. After analyzing the information, project managers can identify and resolve problems, reduce conflicts, and improve overall team work.
• Work Performance Information – Work Performance information is gathered by observing team members performance while participating in meetings, follow-up on action items, and communicating to others.
• Performance Reports – Performance reports depict project performance information when compared to the project plan. This provides a basis for determining if corrective actions or preventative actions are need to assure a successful project delivery.

Managing a team involves making justifiable decisions about how to address the issues and problems that arise as part of project work. There are some tools and techniques you can use to manage the project team. Those tools and techniques are:

• Observation and Conversation - Observation and conversation involves project managers using indicators such as progress toward project goals, interpersonal relationships, and pride in accomplishments and work of project team members.
• Project Performance Appraisals - Project performance appraisals is a vehicle which enables team members to receive feedback from supervisors. Performance Appraisals can be used them to clarify team member responsibilities and to develop training plans and future goals.
• Conflict Management - Conflict management involves the reduction of destructive disagreements within the project team. The project manager can allow the problem to resolve itself or use informal and formal interventions before the conflict damages the project.
• Issue Log - An issue log is a list of action items and the names of the team members responsible for carrying them out. Issue logs provide project managers with a way to monitor outstanding items.

Often in the course of a project, it is necessary to make changes to the way the project is executed. The outputs of the Managing a Project team process are:

• Requested Changes – Requested Changes are staffing changes either planned or unplanned which can impact the project plan. When staffing changes which have the possibility of disrupting the project plan, the change needs to be processed through integrated change control.
• Recommended Corrective Actions - Recommended corrective actions are to overcoming the addition or removable of a teammate, outsourcing some work, additional training, or actions relating to disciplinary processes.
• Recommended Preventive Actions - Recommended preventive actions are taken to reduce the impact of anticipated problems. Such actions might include cross training a replacement before a team member leaves the project or clarifying roles to ensure that all project tasks are carried out or added personal time in anticipation of extra work which may be needed to meet project deadlines.
• Organizational Process Asset Updates – Organizational process asset updates are either inputs to team members performance appraisals or lessons learned documentation.
• Staffing Management Plan Updates – Staffing Management plan is a subsidiary plan of the project management plan. The staffing management plan is updated to reflect staffing related approved change requests.

Developing a project team improves the overall competencies and collaborations among team mates. This improvement will eventually result in enhanced project performance. The goals of developing a project team is to increase the team’s skill sets and increase trust among teammates.

The inputs to developing a project team are:

• Project Staff Assignments – Project Staff Assignments is a detailed list of the people who are on the team.
• Staffing management Plan – The staffing management plan identifies the way to develop the team, guidelines documenting staff acquisition and release, the timetable, training needs, recognition, compliance, and safety.
• Resource Availability – Resource availability information lists when team members are available to partake in team development activities.

Developing a synergistic project team means knowing who your team members are, helping them build upon their strengths and overcoming their weaknesses while promoting productive working relationships within the team. There are common tools and techniques to develop a project team. They are:

• General Management Skills – The soft skills or interpersonal skills help motivate a team’s performance and collaboration through empathy, influence, communication, creativity, and facilitation.
• Training – Training encompasses improving the skills and knowledge of team members. Possible training methods are classroom training, online learning, on-the-job training, mentoring or coaching
• Team-Building Activities – Team-building activities encourage communication, trust, and collaboration among teammates.
• Ground Rules – Ground rules establish clear expectations regarding acceptable behavior by project team members. The overall teams commitment to ground rules decreases misunderstanding and increases productivity.
• Co-Location – Co-location is the placement of all or most of the active team members in the same physical location to increase team-building opportunities.
• Recognition and Rewards – Recognition and rewards improve project work by achieving recognition and rewarding desired behaviors.
• Establish Empathy – Being empathic is the listening and understanding how the individual team member is feeling. There is a simple process that can be used to establish empathy: encourage openness, restate concerns, reflect, and summarize.

Developing a project team is an ongoing process that needs to be assessed on an ongoing basis. When tools and techniques have been used to develop the project team, the project manager or project management team needs to assess whether the team's effectiveness has improved. The single output from developing a project team is team performance assessment.

• Team Performance Assessment – As the team’s performance improves some indicators to measure the team’s effectiveness are:
  • Improvements in skills which allow an individual to perform assigned activities with increased effectiveness.
  • Improvements in competencies and sentiments which will help the team perform better as a group
  • Reduced staff turnover rate.

Team performance assessment allows project managers to recognize improvements, but it also highlights any difficulties so they can be addressed. If improvements are not noted or problems arise, you may need to revisit some of the tools and techniques you used to develop your project team and start again.

Developing an accurate perspective on an organization's culture can be accomplished by asking the right questions at the right time. The following is a list that can help to align the people with their culture:

• What is the organization's overriding strategic intent?
• How is the organization structured?
• What are the organizations values?
• How is work organized
• How are decisions made?
• How are resources allocated?
• Which behaviors are encouraged?
• Which are prohibited?
• What kind of people work for the organization? What are their values? How do they think?
• How do they act?
• How much power do they have?
• How much risk are they allowed, and how much do they want to take?
• How are they selected and developed?
• How are they rewarded?
• How is pay viewed is it seen as an investment or merely the cost of doing business?

Approach	Description	When to use
Problem - Solving	The problem-solving approach involves supporting the individuals involved in the conflict to help them consider all the options and find the best solution. Sometimes refered to as the Confrontation approach.	This approach should be employed in situations where there is not a clear concise agreed to solution, and there is time to allow the parties to collaborate and innovate. For this approach to work, it is also important that the conflicting parties both bring ideas and creativity to the problem.
Comprise	Comprise involves working out a middle ground that satisfies all parties to some degree. The compromising approach requires each of the conflicting members to accede in order to achieve a resolution.	This approach should be employed in situations when both parties have a valid but different approach to resolve the problem or complete the task hand, or when there is not a best practice to be followed. By assuring everyone's perspective is considered and represented, this approach will allow a win-win situation to occur.
Smoothing	Smoothing de-emphasizes the differences between points of view and focuses on commonalities. The smoothing approach involves minimizing the importance of the problem at the heart of the conflict in an effort to make the conflict seem pointless.	This approach is particularly useful for minor or unimportant issues, or issues that are not critical to project success.
Forcing	The forcing approach requires others to yield to the point of view of one side or another. It is also called the win-lose approach and can increase conflict. The forcing approach involves you, as project manager, using your influence and power within the project team to simply resolve the issue yourself, making a decision about the way to move forward.	This approach should be used when time is a critical factor. It is imperative that the project manager provides the desired resolution to the conflict. This approach doesn't solve the conflict, but it does ensure that things get done.
Withdrawal	Withdrawal involves avoiding or retreating from the conflict or potential conflict and allowing the involved parties to work out the conflict on their own. The withdrawing approach involves giving in to the conflict by simply refusing to acknowledge that there is a problem and declining to discuss it.	Because this approach involves avoiding the problem, it should not be used very often. It can be a temporary solution to deal with heated and emotional conflicts, or it can be used if the issue isn't relevant to the work of the project team.

Acquiring a project team is the process of obtaining the people needed to accomplish the project. Sometimes the project management team has control over the selection process. When selecting teammates, there are several base considerations which need to be evaluated. The inputs to acquiring a project team are:

1. Enterprise Environmental Factors – Teammates are available from internal and external sources. When selecting team members it is important to evaluated:
   • Availability – Who is available and when are they available?
   • Ability – What competencies do people possess?
   • Experience – Have the people done similar or related work? Has the work been of high quality?
   • Interests – Are the individuals interested in working on this project?
   • Costs – How much will each team member be paid? Especially if they are contracted from another organization.
2. Organizational Process Assets – Reviewing the documented policies, procedures, and guidelines governing staff assignments are encompassed in considering the organizational process assets.
3. Roles and Responsibilities – The roles and responsibilities document should be reviewed to ascertain team member’s roles, responsibilities, skills, levels of authority, and competencies.
4. Project Organization Charts – A project organization chart is reviewed to provide an overview of how many individuals are needed for the project.
5. Staffing Management Plan – The Staffing Management Plan, along with the project schedule, should be reviewed to ascertain when team members will be need and to gain understanding of the processed to acquire and release staff.

In order to complete a project, it is helpful to gather the best team available. With the right team, one will have a good foundation to overcome all opportunities presented. The common tools and techniques utilized to help assure the acquisition of a good project team are:

• Pre-assignment – Pre-assignment is commonly done when the project team positions are known in advance. This is commonly when the project is dependent on the expertise of an individual or if staff assignments are defined as a part of the charter.
• Negotiation – Negotiation is used when the pm needs to assure that the project receives competent staff within the required time frame, and that the project team members have the bandwidth to work on their assignments through to completion. Another situation which call for negotiations is when specialized or scare resources are needed to complete the project plan.
• Acquisition – When performing organizations do not have the in-house staff needed to complete the project, the staff acquisitions may be net new resources, consultants, or subcontractors.
• Virtual Teams – Virtual teams are utilized in the following situations:
  1. Teams comprise individuals who are not co-located in the same region
  2. Teams comprise employees who work from home.
  3. Teams consist of individuals from different shifts.
  4. Teams consist of individuals with mobile handicaps
  5. Projects which have no travel budget to co-locate.
  In a virtual team, communications are very important. Also while planning, consider the time added due to increased communications for setting expectations, how to resolve conflicts, and how to include the right individuals in decision making processes.

The results from acquiring the right project team are the same as those desired in any game of strategy. You want to have the right players in the right roles. When you have considered which people you need to complete your project and you have negotiated and secured their services, you have acquired your project team. The outputs resulting from the Acquire Project Team process are:

1. Project Staff Assignments - Project staff assignments illustrate who has been assigned to the project. These assignments should be documented in a team directory, in notifications to team members, in project organization charts, and in schedules.
2. Resource Availability - Resource availability details the time periods when each project team member is or is not available to work on the project.
3. Staffing Management Plan Updates – Changes in the Staffing Management plan may be needed in order to rebase the planned with the real team.

A project manager success starts with creating the best team possible and having the right people in the right roles.

Human Resource Planning defines project roles, responsibilities, and reporting relationships. One key result of Human Resource Planning is the Staffing management plan which depicts how and when team members are added to the team, and how the team members are released from the project, the training needs of the team, and several other key components.

The inputs to Human Resource Planning are:

1. Enterprise Environmental Factors – The Enterprise Environmental Factors that comprise of individuals of an organization interact and relate with one another are an input into Human Resource Planning. Items to considers about enterprise environmental factors involving organizational culture and structure are:
   • Organizational – Which organizations or departments are going to be engaged in the project? Are there existing working arrangements between them? What are the formal and informal relationships between the departments?
   • Technical – What are the areas of expertise needed to successfully complete this project? Do these skills need to be transitioned to the supporting organization?
   • Interpersonal – What types of formal and informal reporting relationships exist among the team members? What are team members current job descriptions? What are their supervisor-subordinate relationships? What levels of trust and respect currently exist?
   • Logistical – Are people in different locations or time zones? What are other type of distances between team members?
   • Political – What are the individual goals and agendas of the stakeholders? Where is the informal power base and how can that influence the project? What informal alliances exist?
   
   In addition to these factors, there are also constraints. Examples of inflexibility in Human Resource Planning are:
   • Organizational Structure – An organization with a weak matrix structure is commonly a constraint.
   • Collective Bargaining Agreements – Contractual agreements with service organizations can require interesting nuances to certain roles and reporting arrangements.
   • Economic Conditions – Hiring freezes, little to no training funds, and a lack of traveling budget can place restrictions of staffing options.
2. Organizational Process Assets - As an organization's project management methods evolve, experience gained from past projects are available as organizational process assets. Templates and checklists reduce the planning time required and the likelihood of overlooking key responsibilities.
3. Project Management Plan - The Project Management Plan contains activity resource requirements and project management activity descriptions which assist in identifying the types and quantities of resources required for each schedule activity in a work package.

With the proper inputs, the results are going to have a good foundation. Project teams use different tools and techniques to guide the Human Resource Planning process. These three tools and techniques are:

• Organization Charts and Position Descriptions - Organization charts and position descriptions are used to communicate and clarify team member roles and responsibilities and to ensure that each work package is assigned. Organization charts can have three formats: Hierarchical-type Organization chart, Matrix-Based Responsibility Chart, and the Text-oriented format.
• Networking – Informal interactions among co-workers in the organization is a constructive way to comprehend the political and interpersonal factors which will affect organizational relations.
• Organizational Theory – Organizational theory portrays how people, teams, and organizational units behave.

The three outputs from Human Resource Planning are found below:

• Roles and Responsibilities - Clarification of roles and responsibilities gives project team members an understanding of their own rles and the roles of others in the project. Clarity is always a key component of project success.
• Project Organization Charts - A project organization chart is a diagram of the reporting relationships of project team members. Project organization charts should be tailored for their audience, they can give a generalize overview or highly granular.
• Staffing Management Plan - The Staffing Management Plan is an important output of the Human Resource Planning process which establishes the timing and methods for meeting project human resource requirements. The components of the staffing management plan are:
  1. Staff Acquisition – Staff Acquisition details how the project will be staffed, where the team will work, and the level of expertise needed with the staff.
  2. Timetable – The timetable illustrates the necessary time frames for project team to be available. One tool commonly used is a resource histogram.
  3. Release Criteria – Release criteria lists the method and timing of releasing team member.
  4. Training Needs – Training needs is a plan on how to train the project resources.
  5. Recognition and rewards – Recognition and rewards are the criteria for rewarding and promoting desired team behaviors
  6. Compliance – Compliance details the strategies for complying with regulations, contracts, and other established human resource policies.
  7. Safety – Safety procedures are listed to protect the team members.

Just another point that should be committed to every managers memory.

Deming's 14 points for management:

1. Create constancy of purpose toward improvement of a product and/or a service with plans to become competitive, stay in business, and provide jobs.
2. Adopt the new philosophy. We are in a new economic age. We can no longer live with commonly accepted levels of delays, mistakes, defective materials, and defective workmanship.
3. Cease dependence on mass inspection. Require, instead, statistical evidence that quality is built in to eliminate the need for inspection on a mass basis.
4. End the practice of awarding the business on the basis of price tag. Instead, depend on meaningful measures of quality, along with price. Move towards a single supplier for any one item, based on the long-term relationship of loyalty and trust.
5. Improve constantly and forever the system of production and service, to improve quality and productivity, and thus constantly decrease costs.
6. Institute modern methods of training.
7. Institute modern methods of supervision.
8. Drive out fear, so that everyone may work effectively for the company.
9. Break down organizational barriers - everyone must work as a team to foresee and solve problems
10. Eliminate arbitrary numerical goals, posters, and slogans for the workforce which seek new levels of productivity without providing methods
11. Eliminate work standards and numerical quotas.
12. Remove barriers that rob employees of their pride of workmanship
13. Institute a vigorous program of education and training
14. Create a structure that will push the preceding 13 points every day.

Pareto Charts are commonly used to identify the source of chronic problems / common causes in a process. The Pareto principal commonly states that 80 % of the trouble comes from 20 % of the problems. A Pareto chart is a graphical technique which quantifies problems in order to position efforts to be expended in fixing the "vital few" causes versus to the trivial many.

The process to create a Pareto Chart or Diagram is as follows:

1. Define the problem and process characteristics to be illustrated in the diagram.
2. Define the period of time analyzed within the diagram. For example, was a month worth of errors analyzed or week's worth.
3. Count the number of times each cause of error occurred.
4. List the causes of error in descending order. Remember the extremely trivial errors are commonly categorized as other, and listed in a legend of the diagram.
5. Find the sum of all errors by adding together the counts of the causes of errors.
6. Calculate the individual percentage for each cause of error.
7. The next step in creating a Pareto chart is to calculate cumulative percentages.
8. Begin drawing a histogram with a numeric scale on the left. Add a bar to the diagram for each category. The height of each bar on the histogram indicates the frequency of errors in each category. Label each bar with the name of the category it represents.
9. Plot a line that shows the cumulative frequency of errors. Draw a scale on the right side of the Pareto diagram to measure cumulative percent. The scale should always range from 0 to 100 percent.
10. The last step, identifying the vital few causes of error, involves completing the histogram by using the cumulative percentages calculated in step 2, and plotting data points to represent the cumulative percentage of each category. Align the data points with the right edge of the corresponding bars. Connect the data points with a line. This completes the Pareto diagram.

The causes of errors that comprise 80% of the errors are vital errors.

Project Human Resource Management includes the processes necessary for organizing and managing the project team. Project Human Resource Management processes are sequential. The outputs of one process are the inputs to the next process. The Project Human Resource Management processes are:

1. Human Resource Planning – Human Resource Planning identifies and declares project team roles, responsibilities, and reporting relationship. Within this process, the project manager will create a Staffing Management Plan. This process occurs within the Planning Process Group.
2. Acquire Project Team - Acquire Project Team is the process of obtaining the project team and orienting them to the project. This process either within the executing process group.
3. Develop Project Team – Developing the project team improves the individuals and groups skill set to enhance project performance. The purpose of this process is not only to develop skills but to also build the team. This process occurs within the Executing Process Group
4. Manage Project Team – Managing the project team is where the appraisals of the team occur along with resolving conflicts, and providing feedback on performance. This process is completed within the Monitoring and Controlling Process Groups

The Quality Control Process engages in monitoring project results to ascertain whether the results conform to the relevant quality standards, and reveals ways to eliminate causes of unacceptable performance. Obviously performing quality control is continuously throughout the project lifecycle.

In order to properly perform quality control, it is good provide the project team with an understanding of the quality control process described in the quality management plan.

The inputs to performing quality control are:

• Quality Management Plan – The quality management plan details how the project team will implement the quality policy.
• Quality Metrics – Quality Metrics are the measurements used to assure the product or service is within the prescribed quality standard.
• Quality Checklists – Quality Checklists are utilized to verify that the required steps have been performed.
• Organizational Process Assets – Organization process assets are the organizations policies, procedures, templates, and standards.
• Work Performance Information – Work performance information is the status on project deliverables, performance measures, and the process on implementing necessary corrective actions.
• Approved Change Request – Approved Change Requests are requested changes which have been approved through the integrated change control process.
• Deliverables – Deliverables are the unique verifiable products or services that are produced and provided by the project.

The tools and techniques for performing quality control can be grouped into three categories: process analysis, data collection, and data analysis. The tools and techniques are:

• Cause and Effect Diagrams - Cause and Effect diagrams graphically illustrate how various factors have the possibility of affecting the outcome.
• Flowcharting – Flowcharting is a graphical presentation of a process. My favorite method is the swim lane diagram.
• Control Charts – Control Charts are a graphical display of the resulting data from a process examined over time against established control limits.
• Histogram – A histogram is a bar chart illustrating the distribution of variables. The height of each column represents the frequency of occurrence.
• Pareto Chart – A Pareto Chart is used to illustrate how many defects are created by categorization. Pareto Diagrams are outcomes of Pareto’s Law where 80 percent of the problems are due to 20 percent of the causes. A key point to remember is that the Pareto Chart has risk inherently built into the chart.
• Run Chart – A Run chart depicts the history and pattern of variation over time. Typically used as a part of trend analysis to monitor either technical performance or cost and schedule performance.
• Scatter Diagram – A scatter diagram portrays the patter of a relationship between two variables. Independent variables are compared to dependent variables. If the points are close to the diagonal line, there is an increased likelihood the variables have a correlation.
• Statistical Sampling – Statistical Sampling selects a part of the population of interest for inspection.
• Inspection – An inspection is the examination of the deliverable product to ascertain whether it conforms to standards. For example code reviews are a form of inspection.
• Defect Repair Review – Defect Repair review is the validation that the defect has been corrected and now the result conforms to quality standards.

The outputs from the Perform Quality Control process document the outcomes of quality control activities and provide a basis for improvements. The outputs are:

• Quality Control Measurements – Quality control measurements are the results which are submitted to quality assurance to reassess and evaluated the organization quality standards.
• Validated Defect Repair – Validated Defect Repair are the accepted or repaired defects.
• Quality Baseline Updates – Quality Baseline updates document the current quality objectives of the project.
• Recommended Corrective Actions – Recommended Corrective Actions are actions needed to bring the project back inline with the plan.
• Recommended Preventative Actions – Recommended Preventative Actions are actions needed to mitigate a possible risk to the project.
• Requested Changes – Requested changes are change requests which need to go through integrated changed control.
• Recommended Defect Repair – A defect which does not meet the quality requirements is submitted for repair.
• Organizational Process Assets – The organizational processes are updated with the completed checklists and lessons learned documentation.
• Validated Deliverables – Validated deliverables are the verified deliverables which have been through the quality control process.
• Project Management Plan Updates – Project Management plan updates are typically any approved change to the quality management plan from performing the quality control process.

We collect data for several different reasons. Data collection is performed to analyze a problem and its impact, to discover the causes of variations, to monitor an existing process, or to uncover how the current process works and if there are opportunities to increase effectiveness.

With Six Sigma, the three standard techniques to collect data are:

1. Tap into existing data sources – Tapping into existing data sources makes use of already existing data. The advantages of using previously existing data are that the unbiased information is quickly available at a minimal cost. However, if it is already existing there are chances that the data may not be exactly what is desired, its accuracy may be comprised since it was gathered with the purpose of the existing project.
2. Solicit the help of process participants and SME – Getting help from process participantas and Subject Matter Experts (SME) utilizes those already involved with the process. The benefits of this method are that feed back is solicited from those involve with the process and the solution is inexpensive and easily executed. The disadvantages are that the data maybe biased, the time to collect that data is limited by the participants availability, and therefore the data may take some time to collect.
3. Develop a new collection strategy – A new collection strategy is customized to the needs of the project so that one can obtain exactly what is need. However, the measurement system is going to take some time to develop and will have an expense associated with it.

Just keep in mind that although each technique has its purpose, teams often use several techniques in gathering the data needed for analysis.

As you go about transforming data into information one begins to realize the importance of how the data was measured. The Six Sigma measurement technique refers to the type of data chosen to be measured within a process.

The data that you measure for a Six Sigma project is especially important because it can indicate the size and seriousness of the problem in the process you are investigating, which will help you improve that process. Different measurements are taken to gather different data. The length of time for a process to execute, the count of defects produced in a day, or the dimension on a product part are all different types of measures. When one decides to measure, understanding the type of data to be measured is important for assuring accuracy of the measurement. The two categories of data are:

• Continuous data - Continuous data is data that can assume a range of numerical responses on a continuous scale. Continuous data is also known as variables data. Since continuous data can measure a wide range of values, the slightest defect can be measured and detected.

  The two types of continuous data are:

  1. Physical property data - Physical property data depicts the tangible aspects of a process. Examples of physical property data are weight, width, length, height, and temperature. All of these examples can be divided into smaller measures. A meter can be divided into centimeters.
  2. Resource data - Resource data details the assets related to a process, such as time and money. Both Time and money can also be sub-divided into ever-smaller segments.
  
  Physical property data and resource data are types of continuous data because they can be measured on an infinitely divisible scale. This ability can be used to illustrate the smallest levels of deviation.

  As with everything, continuous data has its pros and cons. On the positive side, continuous data may inform one the degree to which the product has missed the mark, and the small sample sizes may be adequate for evaluating the impact of a change in a key process input variables. Hover on the negative side, continuous data is complex and requires a measuring instrument which adds to the cost of gathering the data.

• Discrete data - Discrete data is the presence or absence of some characteristic in each device under test. Discrete data is also know as attribute data and it has an either/or quality.

  The three types of discrete data are:

  1. Characteristic data - Characteristic data details the attributes of a process. An example of characteristic data is measuring how many networking break/fixes rather than desktop break/fixes are being resolved each day.
  2. Count data - Count Data depicts the number or frequency of an observable event that occurs in a process. Commonly used to measure defects.
  3. Intangible data - Intangible data illustrates a piece of the process that is intangible. For example, a person's feeling might be measured on a scale of good to bad, or high to low. Intangible data is being measured in determining, on a scale of 1 to 5, business customers' satisfaction with their IT department. The artificial measurement of 1 to 5 is necessary because there is no other way to measure this intangible trait.
  
  Discrete data also has its positive and negative points. For the advantages, discrete data is quick and easy to collect due to its either/or characteristic. Discrete data is easily understandable. Everyone gets a customer satisfaction rating when they are given the scale. However, discrete data may require a large sample size to identify changes in process input variables, and the nuances of the data tend to get lost in the size.

Both categories of data, continuous and discrete, have advantages and disadvantages. For Six Sigma continuous data is normally preferred. Determining what data is needed is depended on the process being audited.

Further Readings:

• Six Sigma - Defects per Unit / Defects per Opportunity
• Six Sigma - What to measure?
• Six Sima - How to assure a valid measurement
• Six Sigma - The Data Stratification Model

As with all things, once you have implemented Capacity Management there is a need to assure that the system is working and operating within quality standards. First one has to set the stage with assuring someone is accountable for the process. The accountable individual is normally the role of the capacity manger. The capacity manager monitors and controls the process, develops and maintains the capacity plan, and updates and reviews the capacity database.

The capacity manager works closely with the system, network, and application managers. The system, network, and application managers are accountable for assuring service level agreements are met, optimizing the current configuration and forecasting future needs.

There are a couple of common tools and techniques employed to monitor and control the Capacity Management processes. They are:

• Thresholds – Thresholds are monitored in order to predict business demand and expectations. If thresholds are breached, it is time to acquire additional capacity.
• Planned changes - Planned changes are reviewed and analyzed to anticipate increases or decreases of capacity utilization for both the short term and the long term.

As with most ITIL processes, capacity management is closely tied to the service support and service delivery processes. Capacity Management is closely intertwined with the following service support processes:

• Incident management - Incident management makes CM aware of incidents which were related to capacity problems. Capacity Management can provide checklist scripts for incident management to diagnose or solve capacity problems.
• Problem management – Problem management is supported by Capacity Management for its reactive and proactive roles. Capacity management supports root cause analysis through the use of Capacity Manager’s expertise.
• Change management – Change Management can provide information about the need for capacity and the impact of a change on the provision of a service. Information regarding changes may also be included in the capacity plan. Capacity Managemetn can submit requests for changes during the development of the plan.
• Release management – Release Management is support by Capacity Management through the distribution planning when the network is used for automatic or manual distribution.
• Configuration management – Configuration Management is closely tied to Capacity management through the data links between the Capacity Database (CDB) and the configuration management database (CMDB).

Capacity Management is closely related to business requirements. Assuring capacity is an important part of the planning process. Capacity Managements relationships with the service delivery processes are as follows:

• Service level management – Capacity Management advises service level management about the feasibility of service levels. It measures and monitors performance levels and provides information regarding possible changes to the agreed-upon service levels.
• Financial management - Capacity management planning supports business case planning for budgeting and investments, cost-benefit analysis, and other financial investment decisions. Capacity Management also provides essential information for charging for capacity-related services, such as the allocation of the network capacity.
• IT service continuity management - Capacity Management specifies the minimum capacity needed to continue a service in the event of a disaster. The capacity needs of IT service continuity management should be constantly reviewed to ensure they reflect day-to-day changes to the operating environment.
• Availability management - Performance and capacity problems can cause unavailability because poor performance is typically viewed as unavailability. CM and availability management have similar goals and use some of the same methods, such as component failure impact analysis and fault tree analysis.

Quality assurance is the execution of planned, systematic quality activities to assure the project will take advantage of all processes necessary so the product, application or service meets customer requirements. An aspect of quality assurance is continuous process improvement which entails using an iterative process for improving the quality of all processes. The goal of continuous process improvement is to reduce waste and non-value added activities allowing processes to operate at an increased level of efficiency and effectiveness.
The inputs to performing quality assurance incorporate information from project plans, project performance, and project changes. This information provides a basis for performing the quality-related activities that lead to continuous improvement. The inputs are:

• Quality Management Plan - The Quality Management Plan describes how the team will implement the performing organization's quality policy. The Quality Management Plan is the plan on validating previous design decisions. For example the database schema will be reviewed by colleagues from the DBA department and development to assure it of third normal form. This is a peer review.
• Process Improvement Plan - The Process Improvement Plan lists the steps for analyzing processes that expedite the identification of ineffective wasteful process or non-value added activities.
• Quality Metrics - Quality metrics describe the specific attributes of the project work that will be measured to determine whether the work meets quality standards. Quality metrics are used to provide information on cost, rework, and cycle time to improve the quality of the project deliverables and work processes
• Work Performance Information – Work performance information are the technical performance measures (CPI, SPI), project deliverables status, required corrective actions, and performance reports.
• Approved Change Requests – Approved change requests are modifications to scope, cost, time or quality which have been approved through the integrated change control process.
• Quality Control Measurements – Quality Control Measurements are the outputs of Quality control that may be used to evaluate and analyze the current quality standards.
• Implemented Change Requests – Implemented Change requested are approved change requests which have been executed and implemented.
• Implemented Corrective Actions – Implemented Corrective Actions are approved corrective actions to bring project performance back in line with anticipated performance which have been implemented as a part of project execution.
• Implemented Defect Repair – Implemented Defect Repairs are approved defected repairs to the product, application or service back in line with expect quality standards.
• Implemented Preventative Actions – Implemented Preventative Actions are approved preventative actions to mitigate risk to a project’s performance.

The tools and techniques for the Perform Quality Assurance process give performing organizations the tools they need to achieve quality results while reducing costs. The tools and techniques for the Quality Assurance Process are:

• Quality Planning Tools and Techniques - there are some common tools and techniques which project managers employ during the process. For example:
  1. Cost-benefit analysis - A cost-benefit analysis evaluates the cost-benefit tradeoffs for making a potential change.
  2. Design of experiments (DOE) – Design of experiments is a statistical method which identifies influencing factors of the product or process being created. This technique provides a way to change all of the influencing factors at once instead of on a factor by factor basis.
  3. Benchmarking – Benchmarking engages in comparing projects as a basis to measure performance.
  4. Costs of Quality (COQ) – Costs of Quality are the total costs incurred by investing in preventing nonconformance to requirements, appraising the conformance to requirements, and failing to meet the requirements.
  5. Affinity diagramming – The affinity diagram helps to categorize brainstorming ideas.
  6. Force field analysis – Force field analysis examines and evaluates all the forces for and against a decision. Project managers use this method to weigh the pros and cons of a decision.
  7. Nominal group techniques – Nominal group techniques are structured procedures that identify and rank major problems or key issues that need to be addressed. Project managers may use this method to obtain multiple ideas from team members on a particular problem or issue.
  8. Matrix diagrams – Matrix diagrams are used to compare the efficiency and effectiveness of alternatives based on the relationship between two criteria. A project manager can use a matrix diagram to analyze the relationship between project cost and project performance.
  9. Flowcharts - Flowcharts are graphical representations of a process. A flowchart allows a project team to create a diagram of the events in a process. By examining flowcharts carefully, the project team can often identify gaps in workflow that could cause problems and errors.
• Quality Audits – A quality audit is a structured, independent review which ascertains if the project is complying with prescribed policies, processes, and procedures. The purpose of a quality audit is to identify inefficient and ineffective policies, processes, and procedures in use on the project.
• Process Analysis – Process analysis examines problems and constraints experienced and non-value added activities identified within a process. After performing a root cause analysis, the improvements are implemented and a control monitor is placed to assure the process has been improved.
• Quality Control Tools and Techniques – The Quality Control Tools and Techniques are the Seven Basic Tools of Quality.

Remember Quality Assurance is repeated throughout project execution. The outputs from the Perform Quality Assurance process provide a way to turn the findings of quality assurance activities into actions that improve the organization's ability to meet quality requirements. After performing quality assurance, one will have the resulting outputs:

• Requested Changes - Requested changes are proposed alterations to the performing organization's policies, processes, or procedures.
• Recommended Corrective Actions - Recommended corrective actions correct the results of work activities that weren't performed according to required procedures, and they bring performance into compliance with planned quality standards. These are reactive actions taken to address the findings of quality audits or process analysis.
• Organizational Process Asset Updates – Organizational Process Asset Updates update the set of quality standards the organization applies to standard processes.
• Project Management Plan Updates - As an organization executes a Quality Management Plan, it sometimes discovers that the plan needs to be modified. Since the Quality Management Plan is a subsidiary plan of the Project Management Plan, updates to the Quality Management Plan are updates to the Project Management Plan

Quality planning is the process which identifies which quality standards are important to the project and determines a way to satisfy the relevant standards. Project managers normally develop the quality requirement as a part of the Planning Process Group.

The inputs to the quality planning process are:

• Enterprise environmental factors - Enterprise environmental factors are any or all external environmental and internal organizational influences on a projects success. The purpose of inputting enterprise environmental factors into the quality planning process is to assure your plan is cognizant of the bigger picture.
• Organizational process assets - Organizational process assets are any process-related assets which can influence the projects outcome. Assets commonly include informal or formal quality policies, guidelines, and procedures, as well as historical databases related to quality.
• Project Scope Statement - The Project Scope Statement describes the major deliverables, acceptance criteria for the deliverables, objectives, assumptions, constraints, and a statement of work for the project. The Project Scope Statement provides a basis for making future project decisions. Project Managers commonly plan project activities so that the project deliverables meet the desired level of quality.
• Project Management Plan - The Project Management Plan defines how the project is expected to behave through the executing, monitoring and controlling, and closing process groups. In addition, it specifies that a quality plan and philosophy will be adopted, and it refers to other quality procedures that may be relevant. The Project Management Plan details the completed project work to be inspected and verified.

While engaged in Quality Planning, there are some common tools and techniques which project managers employ during the process. Quality Planning can be completed using the following tools and techniques:

• Cost-benefit analysis - A cost-benefit analysis evaluates the cost-benefit tradeoffs for making a potential change. Since quality planning is the art of considering tradeoffs, project managers use cost-benefit analysis to determine the cost-effectiveness of assuring product quality.
  The steps to perform a cost-benefit analysis are:
  1. List and calculate the direct and indirect costs.
  2. List and Calculate the Benefits.
  3. Compare the resulting Costs to Costs and Benefits to Benefits.
  
  Direct costs are the estimated financial costs from budget making and planning including expenses from equipment, operators, personnel, training, materials, utilities, contractual services, and facility construction. Indirect cost estimate shared resources including infrastructure maintenance, administration expenses, and safety costs.
• Design of experiments (DOE) – Design of experiments is a statistical method which identifies influencing factors of the product or process being created. This technique provides a way to change all of the influencing factors at once instead of on a factor by factor basis.
• Benchmarking – Benchmarking engages in comparing projects as a basis to measure performance.
• Costs of Quality (COQ) – Costs of Quality are the total costs incurred by investing in preventing nonconformance to requirements, appraising the conformance to requirements, and failing to meet the requirements.
• Additional Quality Planning tools - Additional Quality Planning tools which help project and quality managers are as follows:
  1. Affinity diagramming – The affinity diagram helps to categorize brainstorming ideas.
  2. Force field analysis – Force field analysis examines and evaluates all the forces for and against a decision. Project managers use this method to weigh the pros and cons of a decision.
  3. Nominal group techniques – Nominal group techniques are structured procedures that identify and rank major problems or key issues that need to be addressed. Project managers may use this method to obtain multiple ideas from team members on a particular problem or issue.
  4. Matrix diagrams – Matrix diagrams are used to compare the efficiency and effectiveness of alternatives based on the relationship between two criteria. A project manager can use a matrix diagram to analyze the relationship between project cost and project performance.
  5. Flowcharts - Flowcharts are graphical representations of a process. A flowchart allows a project team to create a diagram of the events in a process. By examining flowcharts carefully, the project team can often identify gaps in workflow that could cause problems and errors.

You can increase your chances of achieving quality in a product by understanding the Quality Planning outputs. The Quality Planning outputs are:

• Quality Management Plan - The Quality Management Plan describes how the team will implement the performing organization's quality policy. The Quality Management Plan should include a way to assure the previous design decisions are valid perhaps through a peer review.
• Process Improvement Plan - The Process Improvement Plan lists the steps for analyzing processes that expedite the identification of ineffective wasteful process or non-value added activities. The components of the process improvement plan are:
  1. Process Boundaries – Process boundaries detail the purpose, start and end of the process, inputs and outputs, data needed, and the owner and stakeholders of the process
  2. Process Configuration – Process Configuration is a flowcharts o the process which assist with analysis of the interfaces detailed.
  3. Process Metrics - Process Metrics are to provide a guideline of control over the status of a process.
  4. Targets for improved performance – Targets for improved performance guides the process improvement activities.
• Project Management Plan updates - Project Management Plan updates result from Quality Planning. Specifically, the Project Management Plan will be updated because you will have developed two of its subsidiary plans: the Quality Management Plan and the Process Improvement Plan.
• Quality checklists - Quality checklists are used to validate that all the steps of a process are complete and that all the components of a deliverable are in place. Using checklists ensures that deliverables are consistent and contain all the necessary information.
• Quality baseline - A quality baseline records the project's quality objectives. The quality baseline establishes the acceptable quality levels by which project deliverables are measured.
• Quality metrics - Quality metrics describe the specific attributes of the project work that will be measured to determine whether the work meets quality standards. Quality metrics are used to provide information on cost, rework, and cycle time to improve the quality of the project deliverables and work processes. Examples of quality metrics include defect density, failure rate, availability, reliability, and test coverage.

Capacity management is the practice of considering future capacity requirements for the current and yet to be implemented IT services. The purpose of capacity management is to ensure sufficient capacity exists to support new services and solutions considering the advances in new technology. Employing a capacity management process helps to ensure there is adequate funding so that new capacity can implemented when needed.

Service capacity management monitors and controls the performance of the customer’s IT services through examining relevant data. Resource capacity management monitors the performance of components within the IT infrastructure. The activities of service capacity management and resource capacity management are:

• Demand management – Demand management is the practice of transferring and transition demand in order to prevent an infrastructure component from becoming overloaded. Demand management reviews capacity requirements from both a long term and short term perspective.
• Monitoring - Monitoring the infrastructure components is a way to measure and assure that the agreed-upon service levels can be achieved. Examples of resources that should be monitored are central processing unit (CPU) utilization, disk utilization, network utilization, and the number of concurrent licenses in use.
  
• Analysis - Trend analysis is utilized as a measure to forecast future utilization needs. An analysis of current systems and components may initiate efficiency improvements or the acquisition of additional IT components.
• Tuning - Tuning helps better utilize system resources or improve the performance of a particular service by identifying steps to take which will optimize the system for current or anticipated workload.
• Implementation - Implementation is the process of implementing the changed or new capacity which was identified during the monitoring, analysis, and tuning activities.

Business Capacity management is the process which predicts future business needs based on the analysis of the data. The activities associated with business capacity management are:

• Modeling – Modeling is a tool which helps to predict the current and future behavior of the infrastructure and to determine capacity requirements based on a given volume and variety of work.
• Application sizing – Application sizing evaluates the necessary resources to run new or changed applications. The resulting predictions include information about expected performance levels, necessary hardware, and costs.
• Capacity planning - Capacity planning analyzes future needs.

The Capacity Database (CDB) contains the relevant Capacity Management technical and business information. When populating the CDB, capacity and performance data from the necessary system components should be added. Data from components that make up the service can then be combined for analysis and provision of technical and management reporting.

Project Quality Management is all about the synergy of continuous improvement of the project and the principal of project delivery. Using a Quality Management approach play a key role in assuring the project meets the customer requirements.
The three processes associated with Project Quality Management are:

1. Quality Planning – Quality planning identifies the standards which are relevant to the project and how to assure the standards are achieved. This is a key process of the planning process group.
2. Perform Quality Assurance – Performing Quality Assurance is the execution of the quality activities during project execution.
3. Perform Quality Control – Performing Quality Control is the monitoring deliverables to evaluate whether they comply with the project’s quality standards and to identify how to permanently remove causes of unsatisfactory performance. This process occurs as a part of the monitoring and controlling process group.

Quality management from a project perspective is to assure that the stakeholder requirements detailed within the Project Scope Document are met. Quality Management is concerned with and about the importance of:

• Customer Satisfaction – Customer satisfaction is the understanding, evaluation, definition, and management of expectations so that customer requirements are met. This approach requires conformance to requirements and a fitness of use for the product or service.
• Prevention over inspection – Prevention over inspection is the common sense principal that the cost of preventing mistakes is generally much less than the cost of correcting them. (Especially when they are uncovered during an inspection)
• Management responsibility – Management responsibility in quality is to provide the resources needed to sustain success.
• Continuous improvement – Continuous improve is following the plan-do-check-act cycle of quality improvement.

There are a couple of costs of quality one needs to be familiar with from a quality management perspective for managing project. Those are:

• Cost of Quality (COQ) – Cost of quality refers to the total cost of all efforts related to quality. The appraisal, prevention, and failure costs are included in this term.
• Cost of Poor Quality (COPQ) – Cost of poor quality addresses the cost of not performing work correctly the first time or not meeting customer’s expectations
• Cost of Doing Nothing Different (CODND) – Cost of Doing Nothing Different is the cost of not changing standard practice, even when it is dysfunctional.

Controlling Cost in a project is the only way to assure the within budget part of a successful project. Cost control involves being diligent of about requested changes and handling those changes through the integrated change control process. A change request can vary between a potential overrun of authorized funding to inappropriate resource usage.

As with all things PMI, there are inputs, tools and techniques, and outputs of cost control.
The inputs are:

• Performance reports – Performance reports provide the actual costs and resource usage based upon completed work. Performance reports yield information on work progress, some common formats are the bar chart, S-curves, histograms, table, and network diagrams which illustrate the current schedule status.
• Approved change requests – An approved change request is one that has been successfully through the Integrated Change Control process and given the stamp of approval.
• Cost Baseline – The cost baseline is a time-phased budget. The purpose of the cost baseline is to provide a basis against which to measure, monitor, and control the overall project’s cost performance.
• Project funding requirements – Project funding requirements are based upon the cost baseline and contingency reserves. Let’s say that a task is running late and there is a change request to add another resource. A PM may look at the baseline and contingency reserves to determine the money is available.
• Project Management Plan - The Project Management Plan and its subsidiary cost management plan details the organizational policies and procedures which need to be followed.
• Work performance information – Work performance information contains the current status on deliverables, costs, and the schedule.

There are common tools and techniques which PMs use to control costs. They are:

• Cost change control system – The cost change control system is a component of integrated change control. Defined in the cost management plan, the change control system lists how cost changes are handled and what is needed to handle these changes.
• Performance measurement analysis – Performance measurement analysis is the usage of the earned value techniques to identify variances and determine if corrective action is needed.
• Forecasting – Forecast is how estimates or prediction of the project’s future are made. This process includes the calculation of EAC, BAC, and ETC.
• Project performance reviews – Project performance reviews compare the activity costs over time, scheduled activities, and milestone progress.
• Project management software – PMIS can be utilized to track costs and forecast the effect of changes on estimated costs. This information can be used to support suggested changes.
• Variance management – Variance management illustrates the varying degrees of variances should be managed. The various management techniques to use on a project are commonly found in the Cost Management Plan. Ideally there is a different way of handling small variances to large variances.

So after engaging in the cost control process, what are the end results? The outputs of controlling cost are:

• Cost estimate updates – Cost estimate updates are approved changes that result in an update to the project documents which depict cost information – normally the activity cost estimate document.
• Recommended corrective actions – Recommended corrective actions are steps which should be by the project management team to ensure that any future work supports the current Project Management Plan.
• Forecasted completion – Forecasted completion is the calculated estimate at completion or the estimate to completion. This value is communicated to the stakeholders and sponsors.
• Requested changes – Request changes are normally resulting from the recommended corrective actions.
• Organizational process assets updates – Organizational process updates are the enhancement added to the organizational process documents. For example, lessons learned on why a schedule variance occurred and how it was resolved.
• Performance measurements – Performance measurement are the calculated earned values used to monitor project cost performance. Typically the CV, CPI. SV, and SPI.
• Cost baseline updates – Cost baseline updates are approved changes to the current cost baseline. By updating the baseline one can use it as a realistic measure against which project cost performance can be judged.
• Project Management Plan updates – Project Management Plan updates encompass any approved changes to the project management plan or any subsidiary management plans.

A key point is that one measure a pm can take to assure a successful project is to control the costs of that project.

A data collection plan creates a factual understanding of the existing process or problem for the team. Remembering that the information you are giving is only as good as your inputs into analysis. A data collection plan needs to be based on solid precise data.

There are five steps in creating a data collection plan:

1. Decide what to measure – Deciding what to measure can be determined either by evaluating what is practical to measure versus what is most useful. Practicality normally depends on whether the data is easy to obtain, the level of complexity, and the cost of collection. Usefulness is dependent on the data’s accuracy and relevance.
2. Identify the sources of data – Identifying the sources of data is a critical component of the data collection plan. The data obtained should be accurate and a good representative of the process currently being analyzed.
3. Identify the data stratification factors – Identifying data stratification factors is the process of categorizing the data through the who, what, when, and where questions. Who is associated with the process problem? What is the type of problem that is occurring? When does the problem occur in the process? Where is the problem occurring?
4. Develop an operational definition – Developing operational definition assures the team has a clear specific description of the item which is being measured. The litmus test for an operational definition is:
   • The requirement being measured should be bought into, agreed upon, realistic, and formalized.
   • The method of measured should be bought into, agreed upon, realistic and formal.
   • The scope of what is not included in the definition should be clear and understood.
   • The customer agrees on the appropriateness of the operational definition.
5. Create a data collection form – Creating the data collection form is the development of the tool for the data gathering process. Some common techniques that are used on the form are:
   • Checklists are used to provide a list of items which can be compared, verified, or identified.
   • Data sheets are normally used to provide a list of items to be measured. The measurement is placed right next to the item.
   • Traveling checklists go with the product or services all the way through the process. Items are recorded at checkpoints along the way.
   • Frequency plot checklists illustrate how often varying data value appear.
   • Concentration diagrams have the collector record the data on a picture which is representative of the product, service, or process.

Having a well define data collection plan is a good place to start off any investigation or audit.

In an IT department, customer alignment is critical. We provide a service and it is a complicated one. One has to be aware of how everything comes together as a whole. Six Sigma is a useful tool for recognizing key processes, pinpointing a problem, and establishing measurements for quality.

System and process alignment refer to a strategy which aligns the variables of an existing system in a way that forms the structure for achieving defined and targeted improvement. Remember way back when to the infamous formula:

y = f(x)

This basic formula is where the inputs, KPIV, of a given work process yield the output of the process, KPOV. The goal is to determine all of the x’s critical to obtaining the desired y’s. Once the root causes have been clearly diagnosed and defined, a resolution can be formulated.

Therefore the Six Sigma methodology can be applied to continually improving the business process. The key point here is that decisions would be made upon quantitative analysis and the outcomes of mapping core business functions with the end goal in mind of identifying and removing the differences between where service production is and where customer demand desires it to be. The steps in this process are:

1. Examine and understand the customer requirements – In order to examine and understand the customer requirements, one needs to obtain them. Take a look around, are there any tools to measure value from the customer perspective? Are there problem in customer relations? Are customers looking to outsource the IT departments work?
2. Implement process baselines – Map and diagram each process use a SIPOC diagram if applicable.
3. Align the business processes - Review your organizations core process and adjust them so that they can meet customer demands.
4. Establish a corporate direction, strategy, and goals – The organizations executive leaders will determine how to collectively bring the organization to a place where it can reach its objectives.

A good time to employ the Six Sigma methodology process and system alignment is during process improvements, process design/redesign, and process re-engineering - the reactive, creative, and/or reconceived applications of system and process alignment.

• Process Improvement – Process improvement is the most cost effective and simplistic way to apply a system and process alignment. The purpose of process improvement is to analyze a problem’s root causes and determine how to prevent it from ever happening again while leaving the essential components in place and functioning.
• Process Design / Redesign – Process Design/Redesign use a form of the DMAIC system, the DMADV (Define, Measure, Analyze, Design, Verify). Process Design / Redesign is the technique used when all or part of the process is being replaced or added. For example deploying this technique would be very useful in implementing an upgrade with new feature/functions that would improve workflow. Process design/redesign can be useful in adjusting a product or service to match customer requirements.
• Process Re-engineering – Process re-engineering is about the rethinking and redesign of a process or a product. For example, the organizations senior leaderships realization that transcription will not be needed with the movement to an Ambulatory Electronic Health Record or the move from a paper based order entry system to an electronic order entry system. Both of these are profound changes in how the organization operates and have a wealth of opportunity for improvement.

Ever wonder what KPIVs and KPOVs are? Well, here is my best understanding, please feel free to add more detail through comments.

As one realizes after a time, every process has inputs and outputs. Inputs to a process can be inherent process inputs, controlled variables, and/or uncontrolled variables. Inherent process inputs are normally the physical materials needed to complete the process. The controlled variables are obviously the inputs one has a degree of jurisdiction to control. Finally uncontrolled variables are those items which are beyond your control. All of these types of inputs can be categorized as Key Process Input Variables (KPIV).

The important outputs of a process are commonly referred to as Key Process Output Variables(KPOV) An example of KPOVs are profits, customer satisfaction, and defect rate.

Cost Budgeting is the process of establishing a budget for the project. This is normally completed by summarizing the estimated costs of the work packages in order to establish a cost baseline. The cost baseline will help to assure that costs are appropriately allocated and distributed by managing changes and variances which affect project costs. The inputs to the cost budgeting process are:

• Project Scope Statement – The project scope statement will normally detail any limitations on budgets or due to contracting conditions.
• Work Breakdown Structure – The WBS details the dependencies between project activities and deliverables.
• WBS dictionary - The WBS dictionary lists the detail information for the work which needs to be completed to construct the project deliverables.
• Project Schedule - The Project Schedule provides the expected dates for specific activities and milestones.
• Activity cost estimates - Activity cost estimates help establish a cost baseline because they provide the cost estimate for each of the expected schedule activities including the resource cost for staff, equipment and materials.
• Activity cost estimate supporting detail - The supporting detail illustrates how the cost estimate was created and includes a description of the activity's scope of work, as well as any assumptions and constraints. It may also include a range of estimates that indicate the expected cost of an item.
• Resource calendars - Resource calendar help to establish when a resource is being utilized. The calendar shows holidays and the days that resources are available, as well as the quantity of each available resource. Sometimes a resource calendar even describes when and how resource costs will be incurred.
• Contract - The contract provides cost information on the resources purchased for the project. Larger projects may have more than one supplier, resulting in multiple contracts.
• Cost Management Plan – The cost management plan provides information about internal organizational processes and procedures that should be considered during Cost Budgeting. For instance, an organization may require that its project managers submit budgets to the financial manager for final signoff.

Once you have the inputs at a convenient place, and have a good understanding of the content provided, there are several tools and techniques which can help a pm create a realistic cost baseline. These tools are:

• Cost aggregation - Cost aggregation is utilized to determine total costs for deliverables and for an entire project. The final sum of the cost estimates is applied as the cost baseline.
  The steps to perform aggregation are the following:
  1. First detail the cost estimate to the work packages at the lowest level of the WBS.
  2. Next, Total the costs for all the activities belonging within the work package. Then summarize up to the next level. Repeat this process for each level in the WBS.
  3. Next, Calculate the Contingency Reserves if applicable
  4. Identify the dates for the cost baseline based on the project schedule.
• Reserve analysis - Contingency reserves are amounts of money set aside for unplanned changes to costs; they are part of the total budget, but they are not part of the cost baseline. The total budget is the approved cost estimate for the entire project. The cost baseline is a tool project managers use to monitor and control project expenditures.
• Parametric estimating - Parametric estimating is a technique that uses a statistical relationship between historical data and other variables to calculate an estimate.
• Funding limit reconciliation - Project managers use funding limit reconciliation to avoid large variations in the periodic expenditure of project funds. They do this by reconciling project expenditures with the funding limits set by the customer. Reconciliation may require the revision of project schedules to regulate expenditures; this in turn affects the allocation of resources.

Cost baselines enlighten project managers of the difference between current costs and what is estimated for future activities. A cost baseline also helps identify possible issues regarding current and future costs when expectations change.
The outputs from Cost Budgeting are:

• Cost baseline – The cost baseline illustrates estimated costs with the due dates for the work packages that incur the costs. It is used to monitor and control cost performance.
• Requested changes – Obviously requested changes will be requested as the project progresses.
• Project funding requirements - These requirements are conditions that account for the possibility that actual costs may exceed the estimated costs during different time frames.
• Cost Management Plan updates – The cost management plan needs to be updated with approved changes which may affect how costs are managed within the project.

As previously mentioned, cost estimating is the process of developing an estimated cost for the resources needed to complete project activities. Cost Estimating normally occurs in the planning process group and is dependent on several of the outputs from the Initiating and Planning Process groups.
The inputs to cost estimating are:

• The Project Scope Statement - This is a narrative description of the project scope, including major deliverables, scope objectives, scope assumptions, scope constraints, and a Statement of Work. The deliverables, acceptance criteria, and the project's products and services are be taken into account in the project scope statement.
• Work Breakdown Structure – The WBS is a hierarchical decomposition of the anticipated work that is required to complete the project objectives and create the necessary deliverables.
• The WBS dictionary – The WBS dictionary details each component in the wbs with an estimated cost, a brief definition of the scope of work, defined deliverable, a list of activities, and a list of milestones.
• The Project Management Plan – The Project Management Plan is is the key document that contains the overall planning, monitoring, and implementing activities to be done in a project. Several subsidiary plans are used in cost estimating. They are:
  1. The Schedule Management Plan – The schedule management plan details the project activity list, activity list attributes, estimated activity resources, and activity duration estimates. The document illustrates the type and quantity of resources and when they are needed to completed the project work.
  2. The Staffing Management Plan – The staffing management plan describes how and when resource requirements will be achieved. It also explains how resources can be removed from or added to a project.
  3. The Risk Register – The risk register contains the results of the risk analyses, risk prioritization and planned risk responses. It details all of the identified risks, including the description, category, cause, probability of occurrence, effect on objectives, proposed responses, owner, and current status.
  
  
• Enterprise environmental factors – Enterprise environmental factors are the external and internal influences and constraints that may affect a project’s success. This includes organizational culture and structure, infrastructure, existing resources, commercial databases, market conditions, and PMIS.
• Organizational Process Assets – Organizational Process Assets are all formal and informal plans, policies, procedures, and guidelines. All of the process documents that can be used to influence a project’s success.

These inputs are very useful in helping to ascertain estimated costs; there are also a number of tools and techniques that can be used to help identify estimated costs. These tools and techniques are:

• Analogous cost estimating – Analogous cost estimating is the process of comparing historical information to forecast the cost of the current project. This approach is common when there is little information about the project.
• Determining resources cost rates – Determining resource cost rates details the resource rate as a unit rate for each resource. One way to do this is to collect quotes from suppliers.
• Bottom-up estimating – Bottom-up estimating identifies and estimates each activity and then summarizes the results to product a project estimate. A bottom up estimate usually involves three steps.
  1. Estimate the cost of each activity that composes the work package. Estimate the cost of each task by adding the labor and material costs; then add the estimated costs of each task, including contingency and cost of quality, to get an activity cost estimate.
  2. Roll up those estimates by totaling the estimates at each level of the WBS. You may use exact figures or rounded numbers, according to the rules of your organization.
  3. Calculate an overall project estimate. This estimate is the cost rolled up to the top level, or the sum of all the items at the level below it.
• Parametric estimating – Parametric estimating bases a parameter into calculate cost commonly used with historical data and other factors. For example, if last time it cost $500 to install 10 network jacks, this time we have 5 network jacks, so it should cost $250.
• Project management software – PMIS is the software used for managing the project. Several PMIS tools have modules for estimating cost as well as simulating alternative mechanisms.
• Vendor bid analysis – In a competitive bid process, you can apply vendor bid analysis to determine how much a project should cost. Comparing bids can help you determine the most likely cost for each deliverable, which will allow for a more accurate project cost estimate.
• Reserve analysis – Reserve Analysis is an analytical technique to determine the essential features and relationships of components in the Project Management Plan to establish a reserve for the schedule duration, budget, estimated cost, or funds for a project.
• Cost of quality – Cost of quality are the prevention costs, appraisal costs, internal failure costs, and external failure costs that come with quality planning, control, and assurance.

Remember estimating begets funding, so it is necessary that you estimating cost as exactly as possible with a contingency reserve. When you have completed the cost estimating process you should have the following outputs:

• Activity cost estimates – The activity cost estimates comprise the quantitative valuation of the probable costs of the resources necessary for carrying out project activities. This should be presented against the Work Breakdown Structure components, or summarized in terms of totals by project phases or major deliverables. Activity cost estimates include the labor costs, material costs, services, equipment, and special categories.
• Activity cost estimate supporting detail – The supporting detail represents a logical and comprehensive explanation for how the cost estimates were derived. Very useful to have when explaining costs to business cases.
• Requested changes - These changes are likely to have an effect on the cost components of the Project Management Plan.
• Cost Management Plan update – Approved changes from the Cost Estimating process will cause an update to the Cost Management Plan reflecting the changes with an effect on the management of costs.

The cost management processes are all about the cost of the resources necessary to complete the project activities. The three processes in the Project Cost Management knowledge area are:

1. Cost Estimating – Cost Estimating is the process of developing an estimated cost for the resources needed to complete project activities. Cost Estimating normally occurs in the planning process group.
2. Cost Budgeting – Cost Budgeting is the process of summarizing the estimated costs of individual activities or work packages to establish a cost baseline. Cost Budgeting normally occurs in the planning process group.
3. Cost Control – Cost Control is how the cost variances and other changes to the project are managed and controlled. Cost Control occurs in the monitoring and controlling process group.

So how does one go about cost planning? Cost Planning activities should occur prior to engaging in estimating and budgeting cost. In order to plan a couple of agreements in how to qualify and quantify cost are necessary, those agreements are:

• A determination of the precision level for schedule activity cost estimates - Schedule activity cost estimates will comply with a rounding of the data to a predetermined precision based on the size of the project and the scope of the activity. (Remember that contingencies may be factored in here.)
• Establishment of a unit of measure for each of the resources – During estimation, it is necessary for the project management team to agree on a standard unit of measure for each resource. For example, the unit of measure for a particular task may be staff-days or staff-weeks.
• Establishment of direct tie ins to organizational procedures - A control account is normally established to control project cost accounting. Individual control accounts are given a code or an account number that is directly linked to your general ledger account system.
• Definition of control thresholds - Planning items for controlling costs should include control thresholds for costs. For example, if a threshold for a given activity is set at $5,000, the project manager must be alerted before the costs exceed this amount.
• Definition of earned value rules – The Earned Value Formulas for computing earned value which determine the estimate to complete are identified.
• Development of the formats for the various cost reports – Standardized reporting formats are established by the Cost Management Plan. Reports are provided to the stakeholders. It is good to use an organizational template here.
• Documentation of each of the three Project Cost Management processes - The three cost management processes should be documented in the Project Management Plan as they relate to the specific project.

The purpose of planning activities is to increase the efficiency and effectiveness in how an organization and project manager manage project costs.

An ever enjoyable aspect of managing a project is the control the project schedule. The managing and maintaining the schedule proactively is your best way to assure the project comes in on time.
In order to be proactive about this process there are some inputs that one needs to understand. The inputs are:

• The Schedule Baseline - The schedule baseline is the current approved version of the project schedule which provides a basis for comparing and reporting on the project performance. The project schedule details the planned start and end dates for the activities.
• Performance Reports – Performance reports are first and foremost a communication mechanism to list what work has been performed by whom. A good performance report should show the planned and actual dates and duration of work activities
• Schedule Management Plan – The Schedule Management Plan details how changes to the schedule can be made and under which conditions such changes are allowed. Project Manager, Project Sponsors, and Functional Managers should adhere to the scheduling guidelines explained within the schedule management plan.
• Approved Change Requests - Approved schedule change requests are an input because the schedule needs to be revise to reflect the approved changes to the project schedule.

Once all of the inputs have been obtained, there are tools and techniques that can be used to review the schedule. If a situation occurs where project performance differs from the schedule, these tools and techniques can be used to correct the situation. Project managers will evaluate how much work has been completed compared with actual performance versus planned performance. If they uncover a schedule variance, the pm should analyze the variance’s severity.

The tools and techniques commonly employed in controlling the schedule are:

• Progress reporting – Progress Reporting is when a report is created detailing the actual start and finish dates of activities and the remaining duration of unfinished activities. It is a good idea to include the percent complete of activities in the progress report.
• Variance Analysis – Variance analysis compares planning data with actual performance in order to discover delays or variations in the project schedule. For example the planned start, duration, and anticipated completion date would be compared with the actual start date, duration, and completion date for that activity.
• Performance Measurement - Performance measurement assesses the severity of delays and other deviations by measuring project performance compared against the project plan. This comparison helps the project manager determine if corrective or proactive actions are need for this project. Some common performance measurement tools are:
  • Schedule comparison bar charts – Schedule comparison bar charts are a way to visualize the differences between the planned and actual performance. This is a good tool to graphically communicate project status.
  • Project Management Software – PMIS is utilized to determine the affect of variance upon individual activities. The PMIS easily calculates the impact of any proposed change to the schedule.
  • Schedule change control systems – Schedule change control systems are described in the project management plan with the integrated change control process. The schedule change control system is the bought into, agreed with, and realistic process to change the schedule. When project managers discover that actual performance is not meeting the schedule, it is a good idea to use the schedule change management process to propose changes to the schedule
  • Schedule variance and the Schedule Performance Index - Schedule variance and the Schedule Performance Index both measure the financial value of the work performed as of a given date.
    SV = EV – PV
    SPI = EV / PV
    Schedule variance and the Schedule Performance Index yield information on the current conditions of the project and can be used to determine whether the project is on or off schedule.

The process of controlling the schedule creates several different types of outputs as follows:

• Performance measurements - The process of controlling the schedule produces measurements of performance to date on a project. The Schedule Variance and Schedule Performance Index are objective measures of project performance that can be used to report the status of the project to stakeholders.
• Requested changes – Requested changes are the proposed changes to start dates, finish dates, activity durations, or project milestones.
• Recommended corrective actions – Recommended corrective actions are changes to resolve a situation with the project schedule.
• Schedule Baseline updates – Schedule Baseline updates are done when approved changes are applied to the existing baseline.
• Schedule Model data updates – Schedule model data updates are updates to the alternative best-case or worst-case schedules, cash flow projections, order schedules, delivery schedules, and other information about schedule constraints and assumptions. The changes must be documented and communicated to project stakeholders.
• Activity List updates – Activity List updates occur when an approved change causes the project manager to add or remove activities from the Activity List.
• Activity attribute updates – Activity attribute updates are updates or changes in the description or relationship of project activities. These changes may require additional actions by some stakeholders, so they have to be communicated.
• Organizational process assets - Detecting a schedule variance and finding a solution provide valuable lessons for future projects. These lessons are documented and kept. They can be shared with others in the organization who executed the project.
• Project Management Plan - Finally, the process of controlling the schedule may generate changes to the overall Project Management Plan. Corrective actions and approved schedule changes may call for changes in the methods, policies, and activities the project manager uses to control the schedule for the remainder of the project. These changes should be documented in the Schedule Management Plan segment of the Project Management Plan.

When project managers control the Project Schedule, they make decisions that alter the project. Outputs from controlling the schedule connect the decisions with actions.

Stage	Description
Forming	At this stage, team members are wondering whether the decision to join the team was a wise one. The team is making inital judgements about the skills and personal qualities of their teammates, as well as worrying about how they will be individually will be viewed by the rest of the team. During this stage, team conversations tend to be polite and noncommittal, as people hesitate to reveal too much about their personal views. In addition, team meetings tend to be confusing, as the team goes throught the growing process to determine who is in command.
Storming	At this stage, the team members begin to assert themselves and control issues emerge. Personality differences begin to arise. Conflicts are resulting from team members differing on the way they want to do the project work, or the way they want to make decisions.
Norming	At this stage, the team starts to work productively, without concern about personal acceptance or control. There are still conflicts but they are normally around process issues. The team is at the starting point to operate off of dependence and trust.
Performing	At the performing stage, the team is working at optimum productivity. Team members collaborate and communicate freely. They solve their own conflict problems. The level of trust between team members make everyone feel trusting and teammates help each other out, finding the best solution for the team as a whole.

The purpose of business process management (BPM) is to assure the objectives of each department are aligned with the quality and long-term goals for the organization. BPM synchronizes activity across the lines of business and improves overall performance, capability, and nimbleness. With Six Sigma, business process management is completed through four strategies.

First, one needs to identify key processes. Identifying the key processes equates to identifying the steps and activities which are vital to the most important functions of the organization.. The end result is commonly a product produced or a service received.

Next, one needs to assign process ownership. Assigning process ownership determines who will investigate the key measures of each process and gather data. The ideal owner is a problem solving individual who can investigate, analyze, and resolve process issues.

The third strategy is to measure effectiveness. Measuring effectiveness is when one determines ways to obtain important data and then extract the information. This commonly refers to establishing a standard of measurement from which data is collected to illustrate current activity. Incidents of failure to meet customer expectations are registered as defects, a crucial term in regard to calculating Six Sigma performance.

The final strategy is to initiate improvement. Initiating improvement equates to identifying how to resolve the problem in the process, and implement the improvement. Once sigma has been calculated for key processes, process owners gather to report their results. Management recognizes the process failures that lead to substandard performance. It may be the first real chance for executives to grasp the reasons why past goals and objectives have been so hard to achieve. Using the factual and statistical data gathered through the Six Sigma process, management can begin to adjust processes and initiate improvements.

Six Sigma is an effective strategy for success because it bases decisions off of factual statistical information with processes that are coordinated according to the goals of the organization.

Earned Value Management is a way to measure a project's performance against the project baseline. An earned value analysis can clue the project manager into trending deviations from the project's cost and schedule plans. Earned Value Management integrates cost, time, and scope completed. It is very useful in forecasting future performance.

The Terminology

Acronym	Term	Description
PV	Planned Value	PV is the authorized budget assigned to the scheduled work to be accomplished for a scheduled activity or work breakdown structure component.
EV	Earned Value	EV is the value of completed work expressed in terms of the approved budget assigned to that work for a scheduled activity or work breakdown structure component. The cumulative EV is the sum of the approved budgets for activities completed during a given period.
AC	Actual Cost	AC is the total costs incurred and recorded in accomplishing work performed during a given time period for a scheduled activity or work breakdown structure component. Actual cost can sometimes be direct labor hours alone; direct costs alone; or all costs, including indirect costs
BAC	Budget at Completion	BAC is the total amount of funds to be spent at the completion of the task.
EAC	Estimate at Completion	EAC is used by project managers to give their best estimate of the total costs of projects based on actual costs to date. The most frequently used formula for EAC is AC plus ETC; this formula is typically used when previous assumptions regarding costs are wrong.
ETC	Estimate to Complete	ETC is the expected cost needed to complete all the remaining work for a scheduled activity, a group of activities, or the project. ETC helps project managers predict what the final cost of the project will be upon completion.
VAC	Variance at Completion	VAC forecasts the difference between the Budget-at-Completion and the expected total costs to be accrued over the life of the project based on current trends.

The Formulas

Acronym	Term	Formula	Description
CV	Cost Variance	CV = EV - AC	CV provides the cost performance of the project to help determine whether the project is proceeding as planned. Subtracting AC from EV calculates the cost variance.
SV	Schedule Variance	SV = EV - PV	SV indicates the project's schedule performance. This value can indicate whether the project work is proceeding as planned. Calculate the SV by subtracting the PV from the EV.
CPI	Cost Performance Index	CPI = EV / AC	For the CPI of individual budgets, divide EV by AC. For a cumulative CPI, divide the sum of all EV budgets by the sum of all ACs. A CPI of less than one indicates that the project is over budget, and a CPI of over one indicates that the project is coming in under the estimated budget.
SPI	Schedule Performance Index	SPI = EV / PV	Project managers can use the SPI to help predict when their projects will be completed. To calculate the SPI, divide EV by PV. An SPI of one indicates the project is on schedule; greater than one indicates it is ahead of schedule; and less than one indicates it is behind schedule.
EAC	Estimate at Completion	EAC = BAC / CPI EAC = AC + ETC EAC = AC + (BAC - EV)	EAC is used by project managers to give their best estimate of the total costs of projects based on actual costs to date. The most frequently used formula for EAC is AC plus ETC; this formula is typically used when previous assumptions regarding costs are wrong.
ETC	Estimate to Complete	ETC = EAC - AC	ETC is the expected cost needed to complete all the remaining work for a scheduled activity, a group of activities, or the project. ETC helps project managers predict what the final cost of the project will be upon completion.
VAC	Variance at Completion	VAC = BAC - EAC	VAC forecasts the difference between the Budget-at-Completion and the expected total costs to be accrued over the life of the project based on current trends.
CPIc	Cumulative Cost Performance Index	CPIc = Σ EV / Σ AC	Cumulative CPI Method forecasts the total amount to be spent by adding costs incurred to date to the remaining work to be earned, which has been weighted against the current CPI performance value. Starts from the 20 percent completion point.

Futher Readings:

• Implementing a Project Dashboard 101


• How do I know I'm ready for the PMP Exam?


• Top 10 Characteristics of a Chaotic Project Management Culture

The project schedule is the PM’s best tool for forecasting how long a project will take to complete. In order to develop the project schedule it is necessary to use several key inputs. The inputs are as follows:

• Project Scope Statement – The project scope statement is the description of the project scope, major deliverables, project objectives, project assumptions, project constraints, and a statement of work.
• Risk Register – The Risk Register is used to have a well thought through and accepted evaluation of risk that may delay or halt the project. The PM should consider these events and make adjustments for them.
• Network diagram – The network diagram is used to obtain the sequencing information of activities.
• Activity attributes – Activity attributes describe the who, what, where, why, and how of the project activities to be completed. This information is just to group and categorize activities on the schedule.
• Activity duration estimates – Activity duration estimates determine the length of time (duration) is needed to perform each individual activity.
• Activity resource requirements - Activity resource requirements detail what type of resource is needed and how many are necessary before the law of diminishing returns hits. This is also necessary for physical resources. For example it is very useful to know what type of platform will be needed and used for testing.
• Activity list - The Activity List is the listing of all of the work activities that must be performed to complete the project. All activities must be included in the project schedule and have resources available to do the work.
• Resource calendars - Resource calendars identify the time periods when specific project team members or pieces of equipment are available. Resource calendars show when team members are committed to other projects, are on vacation, or otherwise unavailable to a project.
• Organizational process assets - The organization's own internal policies may limit the times when work activities can be performed. The organization's policies for employee available hours, overtime, and holidays determine which days—and hours—are work time and non-work time. These are organizational process assets that affect the development of a project schedule.

As with everything the first schedule is a draft which encompasses all the project’s work activities within a defined scope of work. There are two techniques commonly used by project managers to establish a rough timeline:

• The Critical Path Method - The Critical Path Method (CPM) is a technique for calculating the earliest and latest possible start and finish times for work activities in a project. CPM uses the estimated duration of activities and the dependencies among them to determine limits for when each activity can be performed. CPM also identifies activities in a project that will throw the entire project off schedule if they're not completed on time.
• Schedule Compression - Schedule compression shortens the overall duration of a project by reducing the duration of individual work activities. Schedule compression methods include:
  • Crashing – Crashing is the process in which more resources are assigned to an activity. The additional cost of resources is offset by the time saved.
  • Fast-tracking – Fast-tracking rearranges the sequence of activities to allow activities that are normally performed in sequence to be done in parallel simultaneously.

Now that we have our first outline of the schedule, the next step is to review the schedule to assure that we have timing for each activity aligned with a the required resource. The techniques commonly used to accomplish this alignment are:

• Critical chain – The critical chain adds buffers between activities to reduces schedule disruptions caused by missed deadlines or a lack of resources. (These are non work activities)
• Resource leveling – Resource leveling rearranges the sequence of activities to address limited availability of resources. It adjusts the timing of activities so scarce resources can be allocated to the most critical activities, also levels out over allocated resources.
• What-if analysis – The What-if analysis compares and measures the effects of different scenarios on a project. By simulating a project's work flow, information can be gleamed on the impacts of adverse events, such as interruptions in the availability of resources, on the schedule.

Another item the PM needs to consider is the Resource Calendar. The resource calendars portrays the availability of resources and constraints within those resources. For example, equipment and people can be assigned to other projects. By reviewing and applying calendars to a schedule restricts the timing of work activities to periods when adequate resources are available.
While engaged in schedule development, it is a good idea to review the relationships between work activities. In most cases the schedule is passed on a finish to start relationship, however perhaps you need to move up the live date by a couple of days on the critical path, or make it a little later not to inflict another live on the organization. These activities can be accomplished by adjusting leads and lags.

• Leads – Leads are when and activity is scheduled in advance the start date and allowed it to begin before the preceding activity is complete. For example, developing test scenarios can be done a head of time before construction is completed.
• Lags – Lags are a delay in the starting time of the next activity to create a gap between the end of one activity and the start of the next.

A schedule network analysis is used to examine the project activities, this graphic illustrates the activities, their duration, and sequence. It also gives information on early starts and late starts for the work activities. Just keep in mind the latest late start for the first activity is 1, and all early starts for the first activity are now 0, under the latest PMBOK guidelines. Needless to say, manually creating a schedule network in time consuming, thankfully we have project management software to help the process.

The outputs from the Schedule Development process yield a completed project schedule among other items. The outputs of schedule development are:

• The Project Schedule – The project schedule includes start and finish dates for project activities, assignments and timing for specific leaders, workers, or other project resources.
• Schedule Model Data - Schedule Model data is supporting information to the Project Schedule. Schedule Model data includes resource requirements by time period, imposed dates, constraints, and schedule alternatives.
• The Schedule Baseline – The Schedule Baseline is the bought into, accepted, reviewed, and formalize version of the schedule. When schedule changes are approved, the altered schedule becomes the new Schedule Baseline and the previous baseline becomes obsolete.
• Requested Changes – Obviously developing the schedule may reveal the need for changes in other parts of the project plan. The analysis of activities during schedule development may show a need to change deadlines, milestones, or resource allocations.

In addition to these outputs, the Schedule Development process updates information created in other project management processes. The following items may be updated as a result of developing a schedule:

• Resource requirements - The Schedule Development process may produce updates to a project manager's estimate of the resource requirements for a project. Many schedule development techniques adjust the quantity or type of resources, or the timing of when they will be used. For example, crashing a schedule may double the resources on some activities.
• Activity attributes- As Project managers develop schedules, they may realize that changes are needed in where, when, or how some activities are performed. These changes to activity attributes must be recorded and communicated to the project teams responsible for performing the activities.
• Project calendar - Project calendars show the days and shifts during which project activities can be performed. When project managers develop the project schedule, they may find it necessary to add days or shifts to the calendar.
• Project Management Plan - The Schedule Development process produces updates to the Schedule Management Plan, which is part of the Project Management Plan. The completion of the schedule may require new strategies to cope with variances between the schedule and actual activity durations.

The WBS is:

• A deliverables-oriented collection of project components
• Serves as the project scope baseline.

The WBS is an input to:

• Cost Estimating
• Cost Budgeting
• Resource Planning
• Risk Management
• Activity Definition

The WBS Dictionary explains the WBS components, assigned resources, time and cost for each element.

The WBS 8/80 Rule is that Activiteis from the WBS should not take more than 80 hours or less than eight hours.

How long is something going to take? It is the ever nebulous question. An Estimate is the calculated approximation of a result. An estimate is based upon input data which may not be well defined. When constructing a schedule, it is common to ask resources how long an activity is anticipated to take. This process is called Activity Duration Estimating.
The inputs for Activity Duration Estimating are:

1. The Activity List – The Activity list identifies work tasks that will be included on the Project Schedule. Remember only activities that are within the scope appear on this list. The Activity List contains all of the tasks for which a duration needs to be projected.
2. Activity attributes – Activity attributes list the assumptions or constraints about timing and location of activities and who will be responsible for them.
3. Project Scope Statement – The Project Scope Statement is a broad view of the project helps project managers estimate the duration of project activities. Project managers use the Project Scope Statement as an input because it includes deliverables, constraints, and assumptions that apply to the overall project. Specific milestones or limitations imposed by the project's customer, including project deadlines and reporting requirements, are described in the Project Scope Statement.
4. Risk Register – The Risk Register describes the effect and probability of events that may delay or disrupt the project. The likelihood of negative events need to be include in the estimate.
5. Activity cost estimates – Activity cost estimates provide approximate quantities of resources allocated to specific activities. If the budgeted cost for an activity limits how many people or how much equipment can be used for a specific activity, this needs to be accounted for in the duration estimate. Also keep in mind the law of diminishing returns. There is a point in time where resource additions, just won’t help to speed up the project.
6. Activity resource requirements – Activity resource requirement detail the number of hours of effort or equipment time needed to complete an activity. The type and quantity of resources needed are part of the calculation of activity duration.
7. The resource calendar – A resource calendar provides availability for people, equipment, and materials needed to do the work activities.
8. Enterprise environmental factors – Enterprise environmental factors capture the external environment in which a project organization operates. Information about the effect of environmental factors may be gathered from commercially available estimating databases or from the organization's own records.
9. Organizational process assets – Organizational Process Assets should have historical information about previous project and standard operating time to complete a request.

As more information is gathered about the activities included in a project, the duration estimates can be refined. There are common tools and techniques to estimate how long an activity will take. These are:

1. Expert judgment - Experienced coworkers or outside advisers can provide expert judgment. They can recommend shortcuts and identify risks that might be overlooked otherwise.
2. Analogous estimating - Companies perform the same activities in one project after another. Analogous estimating bases estimates on the actual duration of earlier activities.
3. Parametric estimating - Project managers estimate the duration of an activity by calculating how long it will take to complete a required quantity of work at a standard rate for one employee or one piece of equipment. For example, if we know that it takes 4 hours to setup a single server. We could expect it will take 2 days to setup 4 servers.
4. A three-point estimate - A three-point estimate adjusts a duration estimate to reflect the probability of both positive and negative events. It's a weighted average of an optimistic or best-case duration, the most likely duration, and a pessimistic or worst-case duration. It is common to use a most likely weight of 4.
   To calculate a three-point estimate of the duration of an activity, do the following:
   • Determine the duration - Determine the duration for the most likely, optimistic, and pessimistic scenarios.
   • Assign weights that reflect the probability each estimate will turn out to be accurate - A weight of 4 is commonly assigned to the most likely estimate likewise the pessimistic and optimistic estimate receive a weight of 1.
   • Multiply each of the estimates by their respective weights - The result is the weighted duration (WD) for that estimate. Total all the weighted durations, and find the sum of the weights.
   • Divide the sum of the weighted durations by the sum of the weights - The result is a three-point duration estimate that reflects risks and opportunities that can affect the activity.
5. Reserve analysis - Reserve analysis creates a buffer in the schedule. Reserve time is added to the estimated duration of an activity in which delays are very likely. Project managers frequently add reserve time by increasing their initial duration estimates by a fixed percentage. For example, it may be well know that any purchase will take 6 weeks to go through the authorization process.

The process of estimating the duration of project activities creates two resulting outputs which are used as the foundation in developing the Project Schedule.

1. Activity duration estimates - The first of the outputs is activity duration estimates. The estimated durations show how much time is required for each activity that will appear on the Project Schedule.
2. Activity attributes – Activity attributes are updated with the assumptions and constraints that are a part of the estimate.

The Activity Duration Estimating process yields an estimate of how long each activity in a project will take to complete.

So you have a project, now it is time to get the team together. First step is to figure out what type of resources will be needed, then how they will be used and even if they are available. Thankfully all of the hard work we have been putting into planning is about to pay off.

Activity Resource Estimating has six inputs. Those inputs are:

1. Activity List - The Activity List identifies the schedule activities for which resources need to be estimated.
2. Activity attributes - Activity attributes provide detailed information about the resources required to carry out each schedule activity. They are created during the Activity Definition process and might include information such as responsible persons, constraints, assumptions, and physical locations.
3. Organizational process assets - Organizational process assets are a company's policies, procedures, and guidelines that dictate how resources must be acquired and used. Many companies also have historical information about similar projects, which can be used to inform the process of Activity Resource Estimating.
4. Enterprise environmental factors - Enterprise environmental factors can be external or internal to the organization. For Activity Resource Estimating, these factors include considerations about the availability of resources and the company infrastructure, which can affect the success of the project. For example scheduling a project for this year will not do any good, since it is impossible to get a contract through given the timing of the year.
5. Project Management Plan - The Project Management Plan’s subsidiary pan, the Schedule Management Plan, which describes each schedule activity, when it will occur, and how long it will last.
6. Resource availability - Resource availability provides project managers with information about the locations and constraints on the use of resources, such as people, materials, and equipment. This information is necessary to ensure accuracy when estimating activity resources. For example, you can schedule a resource for 40 hours of effort a week, but more than likely shooting for 32 hours a week is high, based on other responsibilities.

Since the resources fulfill the activities that run the schedule and the project timeline, it is best not to guess. There are tools and techniques which can be used to determine what resources will do what activities. These tools and techniques are:

• Expert judgment – Expert judgment involves asking a specialist or someone who has been through this exercise before to assist in Activity Resource Estimating.
• Alternatives analysis – Alternatives analysis yields options if there are other ways to accomplish the activity. For example, if you are manually sending billing files, instead of extending the effort to automate one could ask operations to do the work.
• Published estimating data – Published estimating data can be used to determine production rates and the unit costs of resources. Some companies provide extensive information about labor, equipment, and materials requirements for different trades or for working in specific geographical locations. Ask your vendor partner for this data, it is good to have an idea of what is occurring on average.
• Project management software – Project management software can be used to help you plan, organize, and manage resources. Some sophisticated software programs have additional features that enable you to produce resource calendars and to define resource availability and costs. Check out Primavera, learning curve is high, but that is mainly because the organization is being forced to plan.
• Bottom-up estimating – Bottom-up estimate is a technique that estimates the resources needed to carry out complex activities. The technique entails breaking the activity down to its component pieces of work, estimating the resources needed for each of the pieces, and aggregating the estimates to find a total.

The best result you can get from estimating what resources you'll need for an activity is when you use all the resources, in full, at the end of the activity. Shortfalls indicate that you had not planned as well as you could have. (Be careful of borrowing from peter to save paul)
The outputs of Activity Resource Estimating enable you to work with just enough resources to meet project objectives. The outputs of activity resource estimating are:

• Activity resource requirements – Activity resource requirements provide an estimate of the type and quantity of resources needed to complete activities. The Schedule Development process considers when the required resources will be used.
• Activity attributes updates – Activity attributes are updated because the Activity Resource Estimating process will provide additional information about the nature and amount of resources required to complete each schedule activity. If, as a result of Activity Resource Estimating, approved change requests are generated, then the Activity List and activity attributes are updated to reflect these changes.
• Requested changes - During the Activity Resource Estimating process, scheduled activities are often created, updated, or deleted from the Activity List. These requested changes must be processed through the Integrated Change Control process.
• Resource Breakdown Structure (RBS) - The Resource Breakdown Structure (RBS) displays the hierarchical structure of the categories and types of resources needed.
• Resource calendar - The resource calendar is a composite showing the availability of resources. It describes specific holidays, working hours, and nonworking times.

It's critical that you create these outputs correctly because the information they contain will affect subsequent project management processes. Activity Resource Estimating will help you achieve this and create accurate and realistic schedules as all of the resulting outputs are immediately feed into the Estimating Activity Duration Process.

Sitting in one of too many meetings, the topic was becoming more abstract at a time when things should have been firming up and realization had occurred. So I asked Can you take a minute and explain the dependencies and relationships between the task? Only to get the response of silence, at least we all knew that was the next step.
The relationships between activities and the precedence relationship are all a part of activity sequencing. By declaring precedence and sequencing activities, it is possible to develop an accurate and realistic schedule.
The inputs to Activity Sequencing are:

1. The Project Scope Statement – The Project Scope Statement reference the product characteristics which could impact sequencing.
2. Activity List – The Activity List is a listing of the scheduled activities within project scope. Activity sequencing orders this list so they can be scheduled.
3. Activity attributes – The details about schedule activities that allow scheduling, sorting, and ordering are activity attributes. The attributes may also include activity codes, related activities, physical locations, responsible persons, assumptions, and constraints.
4. Milestones – Milestones are the important events of the project. The Milestone List assures the activity flow meets project requirements.
5. Requested changes – Requested Changes are pretty much self explanatory at this point in time.

To create a schedule, a clear idea of what activities must come first or follow others is necessary. Also can some activities be run in series or parallel? Activity Sequencing develops these relationships and yields and understanding of the dependencies among activities. The following tools and techniques can help the activity sequencing process in ways that are easy to interpret:

• Precedence Diagramming Method (PDM) - PDM is the most widely used network diagramming method. It lets you show four types of activity dependencies: start to start, start to finish, finish to start, and finish to finish. Each activity is represented by a box, or node, and linked by arrows to show which of the four dependencies apply.
• Arrow Diagramming Method (ADM) - ADM is a network diagramming method in which activities are shown as arrows. ADM can only represent finish-to-start relationships. The sequence in which activities should be performed is shown by joining activity arrows at nodes.
• Schedule network templates - When projects have similar requirements and components, project managers can streamline the development of network diagrams by using schedule network templates. A template might deal with all or parts of a project's activities.
• Dependency determination - Determining the types of dependencies is critical to the development of a network diagram. The three types of dependencies used to define the sequence among the activities are mandatory, discretionary, and external.
• Applying leads and lags - Using leads and lags allows the logical relationships between activities to be accurately described. A lead allows for bringing forward the next activity or letting it overlap the preceding activity by a given amount of time. A lag allows for delaying the next activity by a given amount of time.

Sequencing can be performed by using project management software, manual techniques, or a combination of both. The end result of activity sequencing has project schedule network diagrams that provide visual representations of project activities and milestones, and the order in which they need to be done. It is also very useful to unroll the network diagram so everyone understands exactly where they are in the project later on done the road.
Activity Sequencing process results in outputs which assist in scheduling project activities, allocating resources, and assuring good documentation for the needed project activities. The outputs from Activity Sequencing are:

• Project schedule network diagrams – The project schedule network diagram is a schematic representation of the relationships between schedule activities. They are the primary output from Activity Sequencing; they help in developing accurate, realistic schedules and in planning the use of resources to meet project goals. A picture is worth 1000 words.
• Activity List updates – Since the Activity List is a breakdown of the project deliverables into their component activities, approved change requests cause updates to the list.
• Activity attributes updates - During the Activity Sequencing process, the activity attributes are updated to include the relationships between schedule activities and associated leads and lags.
• Requested changes - Any requested changes are considered through the Integrated Change Control process.

A quick word of advice: Take the time to accurately sequence your activities, it will save time later and is well worth the effort.

Capacity management is concerned with having the appropriate IT infrastructure and utilizing the IT infrastructure in the best manner. This process includes proactively adding components, space, or people in a cost justifiable manner while assuring performance is at acceptable levels for new additions and older platforms. Therefore Capacity Management is aligned with the business case and planning process.

The elements of Capacity Management are:

• Inputs – The inputs are the technology, business plans, procedures, processes, and related information used by each of the sub-processes.
• Sub-processes – The sub-processes are the levels of analysis where capacity is considered.
• Outputs – The outputs of the sub-processes include capacity plans, databases, reports, changes, and recommendations.

Capacity Management is about maintaining the balance between cost of capacity and supply in relations to demands. A conundrum may occur where an endless demand of requests for services with absolutely no capital to invest in resources, equipment or supplies. The sub-processes are used to analyze different aspects of capacity in order to help achieve balance.

• Business capacity management – Business capacity management assures future business requirements for IT services are considered, planned for, and implemented as needed. This can be done conjointly with the business planning efforts of the organization.
• Service capacity management – Service capacity management addresses the provision of IT services. It's responsible for ensuring that the performance of all services, as detailed in the targets in service level agreements, are monitored and measured.
• The resource capacity management – Resource capacity management focuses on the technology components supporting the service provision. It validates that all components with declared finite resources are monitored and measured.

The Official ITIL Site
http://www.ogc.gov.uk/

ITSMF — ITIL global forum
http://www.itsmf.com/

Pink Elephant — Consulting and Training
http://www.pinkelephant.com/

Help Desk Institute
http://www.thinkhdi.com/

IT Process Institute
http://www.itpi.org/home/default.php

COBIT — Control Framework
http://www.isaca.org/cobit.htm

Activity Definition is the process of decomposing a project into a number of tasks which are needed to complete the deliverables. The inputs to the Activity Definition process are:

1. Enterprise Environmental Factors – Enterprise environmental factors are all of the external and internal organizational influences which may impact the project’s success. Within the process of activity definition it is useful to review all enterprise environmental factors. Afterwards the pm should determine with factors are important to the project and plan accordingly.
2. Organizational Process Assets – Organizational process assets are the historical information from current or previous projects. The process information can be plans, standard operating policies and procedures, and lessons learned from other projects. These assets are a good qualifying check to determine is the activity appearance of being simple or complex is actually the case.
3. The Project Scope Statement – The project scope statement provides a description of the project scope, major deliverables, objectives, assumptions, constraints, and the statement of work.
4. Work Breakdown Structure –The work breakdown structure is the hierarchical decomposition of the work to be completed to deliver the project. The WBS comprises the scope of the project at a work package level. This document can be in outline and/or graphical format.
5. The WBS Dictionary – The WBS dictionary provides additional information about each component in the WBS. Normally this encompasses a statement of work, the deliverable, associated activities, responsible party, resources needed, cost estimate, quality requirements, and technical reference materials needed among other items. It is useful to identify what other activities may need to be defined.
6. The Project Management Plan – Two components of the project management plan are used as inputs to Activity Definition. They are:
   • The Project Scope Management Plan – The Project scope management plan describes how the project scope will be defined, developed, verified, and controlled. This is a useful checkpoint to assure only activities which are within scope are defined.
   • Schedule Management Plan – The Schedule Management provides how the schedule will be tracked, how changes to the schedule will be managed and how the work will be monitored.

With these inputs, the project manager can use the information provided to clearly define what activities are to be done to complete the project objectives. As we all know re-invention of the wheel is costly in time and effort, there are tools and techniques which can be utilized to assist in the Activity Definition process.

The tools and techniques are:

1. Decomposition – Decomposition is the process dividing each work package into smaller manageable parts. Employing the decomposition technique involves reviewing the work packages and deliverables, then defining the activities required to complete the work package and/or deliverable. The Activity List is then created by this process.
2. Templates – Templates are an organization’s standard documents on how to do things that are similar. So, need an activity list, look at a similar project as a template.
3. Rolling wave planning – Rolling wave planning is an iterative planning approach commonly used with the larger projects. The project begins with a plan at a high level, as time progress the activities necessary to complete the project become more tangible. The planning process is revisited to refine the high level planning to a detail level. A key point is that the planning wave is always moved to stay ahead of the execution wave.
4. Expert Judgment – Expert Judgment is the art of listening to those with experience so one can benefit from that expert. Relevant expertise in similar project can be worth its weight in platinum. For example, when implementing a CPOE, isn’t it better to have people on the team who have been there and done that?
5. Planning component – A planning component is employed when it is difficult to create detailed work packages, because there isn’t sufficient information. A planning component estimates the time and resources necessary to produce the identified work package.
   A planning component comprises two aspects:
   • The control account - A control account is a level within the WBS that can be used to monitor cost and schedule performance. It represents work within a single WBS element, and it is the responsibility of a single organizational unit.
   • The planning package - A planning package describes the work to be done within a control account that has not yet been defined as work packages and schedule activities.

Using the tools and techniques, the project manager will be able to transition the inputs to outputs for the Activity Definition process.

The four outputs of the Activity Definition process are:

1. Activity List – The Activity List is a list of all the activities that will be performed in the project.
2. Activity attributes – Activity attributes are details about schedule activities that allow scheduling, sorting, and ordering. Activity attributes have been known to include activity codes, related activities, physical location, responsible persons, assumptions, and constraints.
3. Requested changes – Request Changes are modifications to the project. When defining activities, requested changes typically pertain to schedule activities and attributes. Requested changes must go through the Integrated Change Control process.
4. Milestones - Milestones are important events that are either reached within the project—such as the completion of a particular phase—or imposed on the project—such as an ordering deadline. The Milestone List is a component of the Project Management Plan.

Simply stated Activity Definition helps you plan ahead and get results.

Time is a valuable resource. It is also the scarcest. Once time passes, it is never again to be recouped. A project manager must be skillful in managing her time and the time of the team.

The easiest way to manage time effective is scheduling activities. A schedule activity is a discrete scheduled component of work performed during the course of a project according to the PMBOK. In order to have a schedule activity, one needs to have an estimated duration, cost, and resource requirements.

The six Project time Management processes are:

1. Activity Definition – Activity Definition is a part of the planning process group. It identifies the specific schedule activities which are performed to produce the deliverables.
2. Activity Sequencing – Activity Sequencing is also a part of the planning process group. It details interdependencies and dependencies among the schedule activities.
3. Activity Resource Estimating – Activity Resource Estimating is another process that is a part of the planning process group. Activity Resource Estimating basically does what is name defines it calculates the type and amount of resources required for each scheduled activity.
4. Activity Duration Estimating – Activity Duration Estimating is also a part of the planning process group. Activity Duration Estimating calculates the duration of time that will be needed to complete a scheduled activity.
5. Schedule Development – Schedule Development involves reviewing the activity sequences, duration, and resource requirements to create the Project Schedule. It is a key component of the planning process group.
6. Schedule Control – Schedule control manages changes to the project schedule and is a part of the monitoring and controlling process groups.

It is the project manager’s responsibility to continually update the Project schedule to have it reflect accurate project activity. Remember an unachievable schedule is the project manager’s fault.

The five Project Time Management processes take place in the Planning Process Group. It is essential that they are carried out accurately in order to obtain realistic costs, resources, and schedules.

The scope control process has two key parts. First, it controls changes to a project’s scope. Secondly it assure that all scope changes are process by the described Integrated Change Control Process. A scope change is any alteration affecting the agreed-upon project scope detailed within the Work Breakdown Structure. Scope Control is a part of the Monitoring and Controlling Process Group.
Project Manager need to evaluate the effect a proposed change can have on a project. Before beginning to analyze the proposed change, the following inputs are needed:

• Project Scope Statement – The Project Scope Statement is the document capturing the project scope including the major deliverables.
• Work Breakdown Structure – The WBS details the scope of the project and the project scope baseline. The WBS is used to determine which work packages could be affected by the change.
• WBS dictionary – The WBS Dictionary defines the statement of work, milestones, and a unique identifier for each component. The WBS dictionary also helps to define the project's scope baseline and is analyzed to determine how a proposed change affects deliverables.
• Project Scope Management Plan – The Project Scope Management Plan describes how the scope will be controlled and how changes to the project scope will be managed. The scope stability section indicates the anticipated variation to scope.
• Performance reports - Performance reports provide information on project status, completed deliverables, and work progress. Unsatisfactory project performance can lead to requests to reduce scope or to perform corrective actions.
• Approved change requests – Approved change requests are requests used within the Scope Control process to expand or reduce the project scope. Only changes processed according to the agreed procedures are authorized and implemented. These changes often impact cost, time, and quality.
• Work performance information – Work performance information provides information on the status of changes to the project scope including the status of deliverables and implementation status for change requests, corrective actions, preventive actions, and defect repairs.

Since the need for change is going to occur, there are some tools and techniques that can be utilized to control scope changes. The tools and techniques used in the Scope Control process are:

• Configuration management system - The configuration management system is a subsystem of the project management information system. It is a collection of documented procedures used to identify and document any changes to the characteristics of a product, and to record and report each change and its implementation status. This system also includes a method for validating approved changes.
• Change control system - The change control system is critical because it contains formal procedures that outline how project deliverables and documentation should be managed and changed. The system contains the formal process for submitting, reviewing, tracking, and authorizing proposed changes. The change control system is integrated with the systems in place that control project scope. Often, a change control system is the subset of a configuration management system.
• Variance analysis - To control your project, you need measurements that help you identify whether your project is on the right track. Variance analysis uses information from the project performance reports to assess any possible variations. This technique involves identifying variance—specifically, the difference between what is expected and what is created, and why those differences occurred. Project managers then use this information to decide whether any corrective actions are required.
• Re-planning – Re-planning must be performed when the proposed scope changes are significant enough to affect existing project documents. A change is considered significant if documents left unrevised become useless as the project progresses. If re-planning occurs, affected documents should be modified. This activity usually includes altering the Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) and the WBS dictionary or the Project Scope Statement.

The quickest way to loose control of a project is the occurrence of arbitrary changes. By controlling changes, project managers can get everyone working towards the same goal – delivering the project on time and within budget.

After reviewing the change, the scope control process has resulting outputs. The outputs are:

• Updates to the Project Scope Statement - Once changes have been approved, the Project Scope Statement needs to be updated. The Project Scope Statement is used to assess any future changes in scope.
• Updates to the Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) and WBS dictionary - The Work Breakdown Structure and WBS dictionary need to be in alignment with all other planning documents, reflecting any approved changes in scope. This is because they are used to verify the work results as part of the project.
• Updates to the scope baseline - The scope baseline needs to be updated because it is used in all aspects of project management, including cost estimates and scheduling.
• Requested changes - Part of the Scope Control process involves dealing with changes. The Integrated Change Control process specifies how these should be handled. After changes have been processed, the approved changes will need to be implemented.
• Recommended corrective actions - Some changes occur because of project performance issues. When these types of problems have been identified, corrective actions must be taken to ensure that project work aligns with the project plan.
• Organizational process assets updates - To learn from variances that occur and how they are handled, the project manager should document the reasons behind the variances and corrective actions, and then update the database so that similar problems can be avoided in future projects.
• Project Management Plan updates - When changes affect baseline documents, the Project Management Plan needs to be revised. Changes to the Project Management Plan and related documents should follow the Integrated Change Control process. The affected documents can include cost baselines and schedules.

First off, it is always a good practice to verify. Verifying project scope is just an outcome of this fundamental truth. Verifying project scope is the process of reviewing deliverables and work results compared to the Work Breakdown Structure dictionary, the project scope statement, and the project scope management plan. Normally this is completed via inspection and ends with having a formal acceptance of project scope. This activity is typically cyclic occurring at the end of each project phase or as a part of milestone reviews after the quality control check.

There are four inputs used to verify the completed project scope:

1. Project Scope Management Plan - The Project Scope Management Plan provides information on how the scope will be verified, and it gives guidance on how project scope will be managed. This information supports why the deliverables were created the way they were.
2. Deliverables - Deliverables are a required input because they are compared against the Project Scope Statement to ensure that they are complete and correct. Deliverables are those items that have been finished.
3. Project Scope Statement - The Project Scope Statement provides a description of the project scope, including major deliverables.
4. WBS dictionary - The WBS dictionary provides a brief definition of the deliverables for each component. Information from the WBS dictionary helps project managers verify that the work results are part of the defined project.

A key component of this process is having the stakeholders participate collaboratively and formally accept project scope to assure that the stakeholders are in agreement with the proposed deliverables. There are tools and techniques that can be used for verifying the Project Scope:

• Measure, examine, and test – Measuring, examining, and testing has the stakeholder review the deliverable to assure that the item was completed satisfactorily.
• Review current deliverables and work results – The review involves auditing the current deliverables and work results again the Project Scope explained within the Project Scope Management Plan and the Project Scope Statement.
• Signed documentation of acceptance – The exercise of signing the acceptance form validates the formal nature of the scope verification process. In the signing of the document, there may be caveats and conditions that are added which need to be put into play as corrective actions. If there is no acceptance signature, then the project may need to be cancelled.

An item to remember, but doesn’t really help with anything, if the scope is fulfilled theoretically the project is complete, even if the customer is not happy. However, you should try to make the customer happy if their business has any value to you or if their influence can be damaging.
The process of verifying the project scope results in three outputs. The outputs are:

• Accepted deliverables - Accepted deliverables refer to formal documents that indicate stakeholder approval of the reviewed deliverables. Typically, a formal document specifies that the primary stakeholder has approved and accepted the deliverable, and it notes any required changes. The documentation may also detail what deliverables were not accepted and the reasoning for not accepting the deliverable.
• Requested changes - Requested changes can occur as a result of the Scope Verification process. Changes may occur because deliverables are being rejected, or a deliverable may be accepted on the condition that slight changes will be done.
• Recommended corrective actions - Recommended corrective actions are the actions that must be taken by the project manager or project team members to ensure that any future work on the project aligns with the Project Management Plan.

The purpose of verifying the project scope is to assures that the project team and stakeholders are on the same page