Page 236 - DCAP304_DCAP515_SOFTWARE_PROJECT_MANAGEMENT

Software Project Management

Notes Introduction

At this point, you have put considerable effort into building and getting approval for a project
plan that describes in great detail how you will accomplish the goal of the project. The project
work has begun, and you want to make sure that it is progressing as planned. To do this, you
will institute a number of reports that are designed to tell exactly how well the project is doing
with respect to the plan and how to correct variances from this plan. The question to consider is
the extent to which you want to maintain control through the reports you require. In this unit we
will study about the monitoring and controlling progress of the project.
12.1 Creating Frameworks

Considering that the Project Management Plan is the baseline for the project. This is guide for
monitoring and controlling the project. As a project manager, one will need access to work
performance information, performance reports, and change request. This information will need
to be at your fingertips as inputs to yield project performance indicators. After analyzing and
reviewing the information, it is time to decide whether corrective or preventative actions are
needed.
The four inputs to monitoring and controlling project work are:
1. Project Management Plan: The project management plan is the main source of information
about how the project will be executed, monitored, and controlled. It is the plan, with all
additional subsidiary plans as needed.
2. Work Performance information: Work performance information is the information about
project activities. This includes status information about progress, deliverables, expenses,
and quality assurance validations.
3. Rejected Change Requests: Reject change request can be enlightening when reviewed in
the context of determining how the progress of the project is fairing.
Remember the quality of the measurement is only as good as the data gathered to ascertain the
measurement. While it may take time, being vigilant and reviewing this information will save
one headaches in the long run.

So how do you sort through the granular details and formulate it into information? Well the
good news is this isn’t a single problem, it affects all project managers, and there are standardized
tools and techniques for monitoring and controlling project work.
These tools and techniques are:

 Expert Judgment: On the basis of current project information and experience with similar
projects, project managers and team members can use expert judgment to make decisions,
such as whether to take corrective or preventive actions.
 Earned Value Technique (EVT): Earned Value Technique (EVT) provides project managers
with a means of calculating current project schedule and cost performance. Project managers
can then use this information to forecast future schedule and cost performance.

 Project Management Methodology: The organizational project management methodology
provides project managers with detailed guidance and procedures to enable effective
monitoring and control through each stage of a project.
 Project Management information system (PMIS): A PMIS allows for monitoring and
controlling parameters such as cost and resource usage. A PMIS can also enable project
managers to calculate and manage earned value information, as well as request and update
project information automatically.
Using the correct tools and techniques will help keep you in the loop of what’s going on with
your project.

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