210 likes | 465 Views
Project Planning. Dr. Jane Dong Electrical and Computer Engineering. Overview. Why do we need design plan? Fundamental components in engineering planning Understand changes. Why do we need a plan?. The project plan defines the work that will be done on the project and who will do it
E N D
Project Planning Dr. Jane Dong Electrical and Computer Engineering
Overview • Why do we need design plan? • Fundamental components in engineering planning • Understand changes
Why do we need a plan? • The project plan defines the work that will be done on the project and who will do it • Without a plan, engineers could • Wasting time finding what to do next • Performing wrong tasks at wrong time • Produce late, low-quality and out-of budget product • A good plan will • Give good estimation of workload and budget • Give reasonable work schedule • Accommodate changes
Topic selection • Broad objectives identified Conceptual Design Engineering Planning is needed Preliminary Design Detailed definition Implementation Validation A linear version of design process User requirement analysis Problem definition
Fundamental Components of Engineering plan • Project definition • Goals and scope • Project rationale • How to define success • Statement of work & personnel • A resource list • a list of all resources that will be needed for the product and their availability • A work breakdown structure and a set of estimates • A project schedule • A risk plan • identifies any risks that might be encountered and indicates how those risks would be handled should they occur
Project definition (1) • Goal and scope of the project • Has been discussed in previous lecture • Project rationale • Background and motivation of the project • Should be considered before planning • Usually included in the project plan to justify the workload/budget • How to define success • Should be considered before planning • Provide metric for evaluation (Performance, cost, timeline)
Project definition (2) • Statement of work (SOW) • Give out specific features of the design • List all work to be done to complete the all features in the project • Personnel • Who will conduct the work? (Team members and task assignment)
Resource List • The project plan should contain a list of all resources that will be used on the project. • A resource could be a person, hardware, space or anything else that is necessary for the project but limited in its availability • The resource list should give each resource a name, a brief one-line description, and list the availability and cost (if applicable) of the resource
Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) • What is WBS? • A tree structure to describe all work to be done in the project
Why breakdown the work? • For a complicate project, it is hard to estimate the work load, timeline, and budget. • It is much easier to track and manage the progress • ATTENTION: the total work includes everything: design, implementation, testing, management, purchasing, etc.
How to breakdown the work? • Two ways: Top-down and Bottom-up • Top-down approach • Convert broad objective deliverables • Break the deliverables to activities • Break each activities to smaller, manageable components • Bottom-up approach • A list of fundamental tasks available • Team divided into groups to discuss how to complete each task • Each group come up with a list of activities needed to complete the task • Analyze the activities to see how they are related to each other • Build up relationship among tasks, add missing link and remove redundant activities
Estimation • Based on WBS, estimation of timeline/workload can be made • A sound estimation includes • Effort estimate for each task • A list of assumptions for the estimation • A buffer to accommodate changes in personnel, resource, etc.
Estimation –Wideband Delphi • Wideband Delphi is a repetitive process to do estimation • How to do estimation using Wideband Delphi? • First, teammate have a kick-off meeting to write down assumptions and agree on an unit of estimation • Individual estimation of each task • Have estimation session to discuss the difference • Repeat the above two steps several times until the difference falls within certain range
Software tools for WSB & Estimation • Available tools: MS project, MS excel
Project Scheduling • Project scheduling is an important part of project plan • Must have WSB and estimation beforehand • Some concepts related to scheduling • Slack • Overhead
How to build a schedule? • Step 1: Resource allocation • Personnel: task assignment • Time allocation for each task (overhead should be considered) • Step 2: Identify dependency & priority • Some task may rely on the completion of others • Different tasks may require the same resources
How to build a schedule? • Step 4: Create the schedule • Most project schedules are represented using a Gantt chart • The Gantt chart shows tasks, dependencies and milestones using different shapes