ITM401 Software Project Management
ITM401 Software Project Management Assignment I Last Date of Submission: 15th October 2014 Maximum Marks:100
Assignment Code: 2014ITM401B1
Attempt all the questions. All the questions are compulsory and carry equal marks.
Section-A 1
Discuss the two approaches used in COCOMO model developed by Barry Boehm’s for cost estimation.
2
Explain in detail the Barry Boehm’s five principles to improve software economics.
3
Differentiate between Project life cycle & product development life cycle
4
What is project estimation? Explain all the stages in software project estimation Section-B The award of Scott contract on Jan. 3, 1977 left Park Industries elated. The Scott Project, if managed correctly, offered tremendous opportunities for follow-on work over the next several years. Park’s management considered the Scott Project as strategic in nature.
The Scott Project was a ten-month endeavor to develop a new product for Scott Corporation. Scott informed Park Industries that sole-source production contracts would follow, for at least five years, assuming that the initial R&D efforts proved satisfactory. All follow-on contract were to be negotiated on a year-to-year basis.
Jerry Dunlap was selected as Project manager. Dunlap was given some of the best employees to fill out his project office as part of Park’s matrix organization. The Scott project maintained a project office of seven full time people, including Dunlap, throughout the duration of the project. In addition, eight were selected from the functional dept. for representation as functional project team members, four full-time, & four half-time. Although the work load fluctuated, the manpower level was constant for the duration of the project at 2080 hrs. per month. The company assumed that each hour worked incurred a cost of $20 per person, fully burdened.
At the end of the June, with four months remaining on the project, Scott Corporation informed Park Industries that, Owing to a projected cash flow problem, follow on work would not be awarded until the first week in march (1978). This posed a tremendous problem for Jerry Dunlap because he did not wish to break up the project office ,if he permitted his key people to be
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assigned to other projects, there would be no guarantee that he could get them back at the beginning of the follow on work. Good project office personnel are always in demand. Jerry estimated that he needed $ 40,000 per month during the “bathtub” period to support and maintain his key people. Fortunately, this period fell over Christmas & New Year’s, a time when the plant would be shut down for seventeen days. Between the vacation days that his key employees would be taking, and the small special projects that his people could be assigned to on other programs, Jerry revised his estimate to $ 125,000 for the entire bathtub period. At the weekly team meeting, Jerry told the team members that they would have to “tighten their belts” in order to establish a management reserve of $125,000. The project team understood the necessity for this action & began rescheduling and replanning until a management reserve of this size could be realized. Because the contract was firm fixed price, all schedules for administrative support ( i.e., project office & project team members) were extended through Feb. 28 on the support that this additional time was needed for final cost data accountability and program report documentation.
Jerry informed his boss, Frank Howard, the division head for project management, as to the problem with the bathtub period. Frank was the intermediary between Jerry & the general manager. Frank agreed with Jerry’s approach to the problem and requested to be kept informed. On sep. 15 , Frank told Jerry that he wanted to “book” the management reserve of $125,000 as excess profit since it would influence his(Frank’s) Christmas bonus. Frank and Jerry argued for a while, with Frank constantly saying, “Don’t worry! You will get your key people back. I’ll see that. But I want those uncommitted funds recorded as profit and the program closed out by Nov. 1.” Jerry was furious with Frank’s lack of interest in maintaining the current organizational membership.
5.
Case Questions:
(i)
Should Jerry go to the General Manager?
(ii)
Should the key people be supported on overhead?
(iii)
If this were a cost-plus program, would you consider approaching the customer with your problem in hopes of relief?
(iv)
If you were t5he customer of this cost-plus program, what would your response be for additional funds for the bathtub period, assuming cost overrun?
(v)
Would your previous answer change if the program had the money available as a result of an under run?
Page No. 2 of 4
ITM401 Software Project Management Assignment II Assignment Code: 2014ITM401B2
Last Date of Submission: 15th November 2014 Maximum Marks: 100
Attempt all the questions. All the questions are compulsory and carry equal marks.
Section-A 1
What do you mean by process tailoring? Why it is required in any organization? Discuss the areas in which any organization focuses, while tailoring the process building blocks. Discuss some building blocks also.
2
Explain why the process of project planning is iterative and why a plan must be continually reviewed during software project?
3
What are the main roles and responsibilities in software project planning?
4
Discuss in brief about responsibilities of project manager and Team Leader. Section-B Case Study
Midas Touch System Inc. is a software company. Midas Touch has a large pool of computer professionals who are the main asset of the organization. Midas Touch undertakes software projects in different countries. Each software project is different in scope and nature. Most of the projects are “onsite” project involving Midas Touch personnel going to the customer’s site for software development and implementation.
For each projects, a project team is formed. A project leader heads the project team . Depending on the nature of the project , the team members are selected. The selection of team member is dependent on the specific skill requirement of the project being matched with the skill set available within the organization. At the end of the project , this team is disbanded and members go back to a “bench” . They remain on the bench till further project requiring specific skill set is available again.
Midas Touch marketing team is constantly working on getting projects for implementation. At times, Midas Touch finds that all their professionals are out on projects and there is no one on the bench. At this time when a new project is finalized, there is a shortage of personnel. Midas Touch finds it difficult to start the work on the project by finalizing the project team. It means that there is a delay in the initial start-up phase of the project. This situation can lead to customer dissatisfaction and would affect further business. Naturally, Midas Touch quickly employs computer professionals to work on new assignments. The newly employed personnel are then rushed to the customer’s site.
Page No. 3 of 4
Project leaders find it difficult to meet the quality and time deadlines for their projects with the “raw hands” . Project leaders always prefer to have team members who have gone through induction and training program of Midas Touch and it so happens that , in a month Midas Touch was busy recruiting computer programmers while two months down the road , a project is completed and the entire team of 20 professionals returned back and was on the “bench” for two months till another project was finalized. Midas Touch, ideally would like to have their “bench” empty as far as possible. At the same time, they would not like the customer’s projects to be delayed for want of computer professionals.
Midas touch would actually like to forecast the manpower requirement and map the available resources to identify the need to recruit and train computer professionals. In order to do this, Midas Touch would like to have an information system that will provide actionable information. Action information would typically be in terms of skill set available, schedules by which individuals will be available for redeployment, expected project requirements and gap between requirement and availability of skills.
5.
Case Questions:
a)
Describe at macro level, the information system that you would recommend for Midas Touch.
b)
Explain the selection process of Project members in Midas Touch.
Page No. 4 of 4
Assignment Code: 2014ITM401B1
Attempt all the questions. All the questions are compulsory and carry equal marks.
Section-A 1
Discuss the two approaches used in COCOMO model developed by Barry Boehm’s for cost estimation.
2
Explain in detail the Barry Boehm’s five principles to improve software economics.
3
Differentiate between Project life cycle & product development life cycle
4
What is project estimation? Explain all the stages in software project estimation Section-B The award of Scott contract on Jan. 3, 1977 left Park Industries elated. The Scott Project, if managed correctly, offered tremendous opportunities for follow-on work over the next several years. Park’s management considered the Scott Project as strategic in nature.
The Scott Project was a ten-month endeavor to develop a new product for Scott Corporation. Scott informed Park Industries that sole-source production contracts would follow, for at least five years, assuming that the initial R&D efforts proved satisfactory. All follow-on contract were to be negotiated on a year-to-year basis.
Jerry Dunlap was selected as Project manager. Dunlap was given some of the best employees to fill out his project office as part of Park’s matrix organization. The Scott project maintained a project office of seven full time people, including Dunlap, throughout the duration of the project. In addition, eight were selected from the functional dept. for representation as functional project team members, four full-time, & four half-time. Although the work load fluctuated, the manpower level was constant for the duration of the project at 2080 hrs. per month. The company assumed that each hour worked incurred a cost of $20 per person, fully burdened.
At the end of the June, with four months remaining on the project, Scott Corporation informed Park Industries that, Owing to a projected cash flow problem, follow on work would not be awarded until the first week in march (1978). This posed a tremendous problem for Jerry Dunlap because he did not wish to break up the project office ,if he permitted his key people to be
Page No. 1 of 4
assigned to other projects, there would be no guarantee that he could get them back at the beginning of the follow on work. Good project office personnel are always in demand. Jerry estimated that he needed $ 40,000 per month during the “bathtub” period to support and maintain his key people. Fortunately, this period fell over Christmas & New Year’s, a time when the plant would be shut down for seventeen days. Between the vacation days that his key employees would be taking, and the small special projects that his people could be assigned to on other programs, Jerry revised his estimate to $ 125,000 for the entire bathtub period. At the weekly team meeting, Jerry told the team members that they would have to “tighten their belts” in order to establish a management reserve of $125,000. The project team understood the necessity for this action & began rescheduling and replanning until a management reserve of this size could be realized. Because the contract was firm fixed price, all schedules for administrative support ( i.e., project office & project team members) were extended through Feb. 28 on the support that this additional time was needed for final cost data accountability and program report documentation.
Jerry informed his boss, Frank Howard, the division head for project management, as to the problem with the bathtub period. Frank was the intermediary between Jerry & the general manager. Frank agreed with Jerry’s approach to the problem and requested to be kept informed. On sep. 15 , Frank told Jerry that he wanted to “book” the management reserve of $125,000 as excess profit since it would influence his(Frank’s) Christmas bonus. Frank and Jerry argued for a while, with Frank constantly saying, “Don’t worry! You will get your key people back. I’ll see that. But I want those uncommitted funds recorded as profit and the program closed out by Nov. 1.” Jerry was furious with Frank’s lack of interest in maintaining the current organizational membership.
5.
Case Questions:
(i)
Should Jerry go to the General Manager?
(ii)
Should the key people be supported on overhead?
(iii)
If this were a cost-plus program, would you consider approaching the customer with your problem in hopes of relief?
(iv)
If you were t5he customer of this cost-plus program, what would your response be for additional funds for the bathtub period, assuming cost overrun?
(v)
Would your previous answer change if the program had the money available as a result of an under run?
Page No. 2 of 4
ITM401 Software Project Management Assignment II Assignment Code: 2014ITM401B2
Last Date of Submission: 15th November 2014 Maximum Marks: 100
Attempt all the questions. All the questions are compulsory and carry equal marks.
Section-A 1
What do you mean by process tailoring? Why it is required in any organization? Discuss the areas in which any organization focuses, while tailoring the process building blocks. Discuss some building blocks also.
2
Explain why the process of project planning is iterative and why a plan must be continually reviewed during software project?
3
What are the main roles and responsibilities in software project planning?
4
Discuss in brief about responsibilities of project manager and Team Leader. Section-B Case Study
Midas Touch System Inc. is a software company. Midas Touch has a large pool of computer professionals who are the main asset of the organization. Midas Touch undertakes software projects in different countries. Each software project is different in scope and nature. Most of the projects are “onsite” project involving Midas Touch personnel going to the customer’s site for software development and implementation.
For each projects, a project team is formed. A project leader heads the project team . Depending on the nature of the project , the team members are selected. The selection of team member is dependent on the specific skill requirement of the project being matched with the skill set available within the organization. At the end of the project , this team is disbanded and members go back to a “bench” . They remain on the bench till further project requiring specific skill set is available again.
Midas Touch marketing team is constantly working on getting projects for implementation. At times, Midas Touch finds that all their professionals are out on projects and there is no one on the bench. At this time when a new project is finalized, there is a shortage of personnel. Midas Touch finds it difficult to start the work on the project by finalizing the project team. It means that there is a delay in the initial start-up phase of the project. This situation can lead to customer dissatisfaction and would affect further business. Naturally, Midas Touch quickly employs computer professionals to work on new assignments. The newly employed personnel are then rushed to the customer’s site.
Page No. 3 of 4
Project leaders find it difficult to meet the quality and time deadlines for their projects with the “raw hands” . Project leaders always prefer to have team members who have gone through induction and training program of Midas Touch and it so happens that , in a month Midas Touch was busy recruiting computer programmers while two months down the road , a project is completed and the entire team of 20 professionals returned back and was on the “bench” for two months till another project was finalized. Midas Touch, ideally would like to have their “bench” empty as far as possible. At the same time, they would not like the customer’s projects to be delayed for want of computer professionals.
Midas touch would actually like to forecast the manpower requirement and map the available resources to identify the need to recruit and train computer professionals. In order to do this, Midas Touch would like to have an information system that will provide actionable information. Action information would typically be in terms of skill set available, schedules by which individuals will be available for redeployment, expected project requirements and gap between requirement and availability of skills.
5.
Case Questions:
a)
Describe at macro level, the information system that you would recommend for Midas Touch.
b)
Explain the selection process of Project members in Midas Touch.
Page No. 4 of 4
