SMART REQUIREMENT IN PROJECT

SMART requirements

One useful acronym for defining requirements is SMART :

Specific : A goal or requirement must be specific. It should be worded in definite terms that do not offer any ambiguity in interpretation. It should also be concise and avoid extraneous information.

Measurable : A requirement must have a measurable outcome, otherwise you will not be able to determine when you have delivered it.

Achievable : A requirement or task should be achievable, there is no point in setting requirements that cannot realistically be achieved.

Relevant: Requirements specifications often contain more information than is strictly necessary which complicates documentation. Be concise and coherent.

Time Bound: In order to be of value requirements must be completed within a defined time frame. As well as T stands for testable. You must be able to prove that the requirement has been satisfied. Requirements which are not testable can leave the project in limbo with no proof of delivery.

FUNCTIONAL & NON-FUNCTIONAL REQUIREMENTS OF PROJECT

Requirements specification is the process of refining the goals of a project to decide what must be achieved to satisfy the clients.

Functional Requirements

Functional requirements are the obvious day-to-day requirements end-users and stakeholders will have for the product. They revolve around the functionality that must be present in the project for it to be of use to them.

A functional requirement typically states as “The system X must perform function Y”. This is known as an ‘assertion’. An assertion asserts or affirms a necessary or desirable behavior for the system or product in the eyes of a stakeholder. Without clear assertions requirements are nothing more than vague discussions which have a regrettable tendency to clutter up your desk and your mind.

Some more ‘better’ statements of requirements:

• A customer account record must contain a unique account reference, a primary contact name, contact details and a list of all sales to the customer within the past sales year
• Contact details must consist of a phone number, an address and an optional email address
• For each contact up to five separate phone numbers should be catered for

Non-Functional Requirements

It is essential to consider the other requirements too, these are called “non-functional requirements” which, to my mind, is a bit of an oxymoron. 

1. Performance : Performance usually covers areas such as responsiveness, throughput and speed of operation. What is the minimum performance that will satisfy your client ?

2. Usability : How “easy-to-use” will the finished product be ? For example do you cater for disabled or handicapped users ? Generic ease of use should be considered though, more than one product has failed by supplying full functionality with an obscure or convoluted interface.

3. Reliability : Reliability requirements deal with the continuous availability of the product to users. They should state what availability is necessary and desirable.

4. Security : In products which deal with confidential or sensitive information, security considerations should be taken into account. Requirements for different levels of access, encryption and protection should be gathered.

5. Financial : There may be financial considerations which will determine the success or failure of the project. For example a bank or investor might specify certain financial constraints or covenants which must be satisfied during the project.

6. Legal :  There may be legal requirements that must be met due to the environment in which your product will operate. Consult a legal expert for these.

7. Operational : There may be a number of day-to-day operational issues that need to be considered. Failure to accommodate these will not delay project launch but may limit or halt its uptake by end-users once it has been launched.

8. Specialist :  In every project there are a number of specialist requirements which are dependent upon the nature of the project or the nature of the business. These should be considered separately and explicitly stated within design docs.

THE MYTHICAL MAN MONTH : SIMPLY ADDING RESOURCES IN PROJECT WILL NOT ENSURE EARLIER DELIVERY

Simply Adding Resources to your Project will not Ensure

 Earlier Delivery

In “The Mythical Man Month” Brooks argues Main article: No Silver Bullet that adding people to a project doesn't  speed it up. While it is true that more resources can speed up the delivery of a software product, the increase in speed is not directly proportional to the amount of resource added. To put it another way, simply adding resources to your project will not ensure earlier delivery.

The Main reason for this is the increased complexity of communications which results from adding more people. As each person is added to the project team the complexity of communications goes up exponentially. For each project there is a break-even limit where adding more people will in fact slow down the project.

The diagram above demonstrates the principle graphically. Note that you need not consider each of the ‘nodes’ in the graph an individual person – they could be a group of people or an organisation within the project that has an interface.

Every additional person brought into a project during the development cycle will need to be trained and briefed on the current status and assigned tasks. As more and more people are added, more of the original team must be devoted to managing the overall structure. This is a truism of all types of management, not just project management.

Adding more people to a project requires ‘bandwidth’ to manage them and can distract you from more important goals at hand.

There are a few things to learn from Brook's “Mythical Man Month” :

1. Small autonomous teams are more efficient than large bureaucratic ones, so divide your project up into manageable chunks and let each group work within some kind of defined boundary.

2. If you want to add people to a project, you had better plan carefully plan how those people are introduced into the team, there will be a lag before they become productive and even be a drain on the productivity of other members of the team. Look for ‘flat spots’ in the schedule to introduce these people to the team.

3. One of your options in the “scope triangle” has just been reduced! If the scope of your project expands you know there’s only a limited benefit in adding more people to the project because of the overheads involved. We’re back to those same two options again :ask for more time; or cut functionality!

SCOPE TRIANGLE IN PROJECT

SCOPE TRIANGLE IN PROJECT

Scope Triangle’ or the ‘Quality Triangle’ shows the trade-offs inherent in any project.

The triangle illustrates the relationship between three primary forces in a project.

• Time is the available time to deliver the project
• Cost represents the amount of money or resources available 
• Quality represents the “fit-to purpose”that the project must achieve to be a success.

In reality the normal situation is that one of these factors is fixed and the other two will vary in inverse proportion to each other. 

For example “Time” is often fixed in a project and the “Quality” of the end project will depend on the “Cost” or resources available. Similarly if you are working to a fixed level of “Quality” then the “Cost” of the project will largely be dependent upon the “Time” available.

A phenomenon known in project management circles as “Scope creep” can be linked to the triangle too. Scope creep is the almost unstoppable tendency a project has to accumulate new functionality. Some scope creep is inevitable since early on, your project will probably be poorly defined and will need to evolve. A large amount of scope creep however can be disastrous. When the scope starts to creep new functionality must be added to cover the increased scope. This is represented by the quality arm of the triangle, representing the ability of the ‘product’ to fulfill users’ requirements. 

More requirements fulfilled = a Better Quality Product

In this situation you have three, and only three options :

1. Add time – delay the project to give you more time to add the functionality

2. Add cost – recruit, hire or acquire more people to do the extra work

3. Cut quality – trade off some non-essential requirements for the new requirements

If the art of management lies in making decisions, then the art of project management lies in making decisions quickly! When faced with such a dilemma you should not hesitate to take one of the three options listed above. Delaying raises the risk of your project failing.

The best project managers will juggle all three like hot potatoes and will make decisions every day which effectively trade-off time vs quality vs resources.

CHANGE WORKING HOUR IN MS PROJECT PROFESSIONAL 2010

Change Working Hour From 11 AM To 8:30 PM for 5 Days in a Week

Please Follow the Below Steps

1. Project > Change Working time. 
2. In the Change Working Time dialog, click the Work Weeks tab and click details. 
3. Select Sunday in the left side, Shift+Click on Saturday to select all  5 days.
4. Click in the option button "Set days to these specific working times" and enter: From: 11:00 To: 20:30 

INSERTING NEW RESOURCES IN RESOURCE SHEET VIEW IN PROJECT PROFESSIONAL

Inserting New Resources in the Resource Sheet View

During the resource planning process, you first build the team of resources to work on tasks in your project. Microsoft Project 2010, like its 2007 predecessor, offers Work, Material, and Cost resource types. A new feature in the software, the Add Resources Pick list, allows you to insert a new resource in the Resource Sheet view, by selecting a resource Type. 

To insert a new resource in your project, complete the following steps:

1. Click the Resource tab to display the Resource ribbon.
2. In the View section of the Resource ribbon, click the View pick list button and select the Resource Sheet view.
3. In the Insert section of the Resource ribbon, click the Add Resources pick list button.

 

4. On the Add Resources pick list, select the Work Resource, Material Resource, or Cost Resource item. 

Microsoft Project 2010 inserts a new resource of the type you selected as  below Resource of each type (Work, Material, and Cost). 

When you insert a new resource using the Add Resources pick list, Microsoft Project 2010 creates the new resource by inserting the name <New Resource> in the Resource Name field, inserting the < symbol in the Initials field, andselecting the Prorated value in the Accrue At field for all three types of resources.

For a Work Resource, the system also selects the Work value in the Type field, defaults the Max. Units field value to 100%, enters $0.00/hr in the Std. Rate and selects the Standard calendar in the Base Calendar field.

For a Material Resource, the system selects the Material value in the Type field and enters $0.00 in the Std. Rate and Cost/Use fields.

For a Cost Resource, the system selects the Cost value in the Type field.