IT Maintenance: Applied Project Management

IT Maintenance

Applied Project Management

IT Maintenance

Applied Project Management

Michael F. Malinowski, PMP

8230 Leesburg Pike, Suite 800

Vienna, VA 22182

(703) 790-9595

Fax: (703) 790-1371

www.managementconcepts.com

Copyright © 2007 by Management Concepts, Inc.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by an information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author and the publisher, except for brief quotations in review articles.

Printed in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Malinowski, Michael F.

IT maintenance: applied project management / Michael F. Malinowski.

    p. cm.

ISBN-13: 978-1-56726-207-0

1. Information technology—Management. 2. Project management—Data processing. I. Title.

HD30.2M355 2007

004.068'4—dc22

                              2007021485

About the Author

Michael F. Malinowski, PMP, has more than 22 years of IT project management and programming experience. His responsibilities have included managing new development projects, process improvements, and IT maintenance. This experience included implementing purchased package systems as well as in-house development projects.

Michael presented portions of this book’s material at Project World Conference (Orlando) 2005, PMI® Congress (The Hague, Netherlands) 2003, and PMI® Congress (San Antonio, Texas) 2002. He has won several Toastmasters Humorous and Motivational Speech contests.

Michael has successfully implemented the book’s content into practice at Exelon, one of the nation’s largest electric utilities with revenues of more than $15 billion. Forbes ranked Exelon as the number one utility company in the United States on its 2005 list The Best Managed Companies in America.

Michael is a member of PMI and received his PMP in 1996. He served on the PMI® Chicagoland chapter board of directors. His education background includes a bachelor of science in electrical engineering, with a minor in computer engineering, from Illinois Institute of Technology, and a master’s certificate in project management from George Washington University. Michael welcomes e-mail at m_malinowski@sbcglobal.net.

Table of Contents

Preface

Acknowledgments

Part I           Initiating Processes

Chapter 1     Introduction

CIO Agenda

Leadership

Book Organization

How to Effectively Use This Book

Chapter 2     Project Management Versus IT System Maintenance

Scope Documents

Defining Work Tasks

Cost Estimate

Team

Longevity

Skills

Knowledge

Numbers of Team Members

Work Tracking

Customer Care

Metrics

Risk

Conclusion

Chapter 3     Outsourcing: The New Challenge

Outsourcing Past and Present

Outsource a Problem

So Why Is Outsourcing Included in This Book?

Undoing Outsourcing

Part II          Planning Processes

Chapter 4     Scope of Maintenance

Process Boundaries

Process Inputs

Process Resources

Policies, Procedures, and Other Documents

Process Outputs

Inside the Process

Customer Care

Work Tracking

Status Tracking

Answering Questions

System Administration

Data Fixes

Defect (Bug) Fixes

Enhancement with Estimates

Vendor New Releases

Monitor Production

Performance Tuning

Backup and Recovery

Disaster Planning

Testing

Migrations

Configuration Management

Summary

Chapter 5     Service Level Agreement

Separate Enhancements

Value Position

Writing the SLA

How to Judge the Quality of an SLA

Chapter 6     Service Breakdown Structure

Chapter 7     Cost Estimate

Labor Estimates

Approach 1: Current Team

Approach 2: New Maintenance Team Established after a Project Team

Approach 3: Service Breakdown Structure

Approach 4: Benchmark

Non-Labor Estimates

Long-Range Plan

Putting It All Together

Chapter 8     Transition Planning

Transition to Existing Maintenance Team

Create New Maintenance Team as Part of Transition

Chapter 9     Documentation

Developing Documentation

Documentation Types

Document Matrix

Operations Guide

Maintenance Manual

Design Document

Business Process Document

System Notebook

Maintenance of the Documentation

Part III         Executing Processes

Chapter 10    Team Management

Team Development

Maintenance/Project Team Structure

Determine Skill Need

Select Team

Divide Up Coverage

Train Team

Manage Team

Chapter 11    Work Tracking

My Story

What to Track

Work Tracking Design

Implementing Work Tracking

Providing Work Tracking Access to the Users

Chapter 12    Customer Care

Service

Customer Care Mechanics

Customer Problems

Customer Care Metrics

Chapter 13    Incidents, Defects, and Enhancements

Incident Definition

Defect Definition

Enhancement Definition

Customer Categorizing Enhancements as Defects

Emergency/Defect Fix Process

Severity Levels

Enhancement Process

Vendors

Grouping Fixes and Enhancements

Metrics

Chapter 14    Testing

Develop Test Plan

Types of Testing

Catch Defects Early

Test Case and Script Development

Test Execution and Control

Earned Value

Part IV         Controlling Processes

Chapter 15    Metrics—Overall Control

Maintenance/Project Difference

Appropriate Metrics

Reporting Metrics

Chapter 16    Configuration Management

Version Control

The Problem

The Solution

Version Control Process

Change Control

Migration Control

Production Control

Environment Control

Chapter 17    Cost Control

Tracking Costs

Cost Analysis and Control

Labor

Purchases

Fixed Costs

Other Costs

Reporting Cost

Chapter 18    Communication and Beyond

Developing a Communications Plan

System Owners

Politics—Beyond the Communication Plan

Politics—The Three Choices

Floundering at a Program Meeting

Political Analysis

Political Planning and Tactics

Implement Plan and Refine

Chapter 19    Risk Management

Risks versus Issues

Risk Management for Maintenance

Risk: Loss of Maintenance Knowledge

Risk: Loss of Business Continuity

Risk: System Disaster

Risk: Security Attack

Risk: New Governmental Regulations

Managing Risks Going Forward

Part V           Assessing and Closing Processes

Chapter 20    Peer Reviews and Formal Audits

What to Review

Maintenance Review Checklist

Formal Audits

Types of Audits

Preparing for an Audit

Chapter 21    Customer Survey

Survey Content

Who Receives the Survey

Survey Use for Best Impact

Chapter 22    Annual Closeout

Closeout Activities

Kick Off Maintenance for the Next Year

References

Index

Preface

Setting up and managing IT maintenance probably would not rank high on your list of exciting and challenging information technology (IT) projects. You may think that the other guy will handle maintenance. But what if you are the other guy?

I was the other guy several times while working for a major utility. I have run new development projects, set up ongoing maintenance for those projects, and managed those maintenance teams. My passion is for project management—delivering something new. So when I began to set up ongoing project maintenance for the third time, I decided to apply my passion for project management to the task of setting up and managing maintenance of a suite of applications. I decided to take a different approach to the task than I had taken in the previous two systems maintenance teams I’d set up. For those systems, I was content with setting up the team, ensuring the team developed the needed skills, and instructing the team to meet the customer’s needs. But I now saw the possibility of a substantial benefit to be gained from treating the maintenance assignment just like a project—but with tighter controls and processes.

As a good project manager, I pulled out an old friend, Project Management Institute’s (PMI’s®) PMBOK® Guide. The PMBOK® Guide does not directly apply to IT maintenance, but its tools and techniques can be expanded, modified, and used to improve how IT maintenance is managed. The results of doing so are in this book.

In my experience, most IT project managers do not run just projects. They also set up and run system maintenance at times in their careers.

Theory or Reality?

Theory is great in college, where it expands our minds and works under ideal circumstances. I don’t want to discount theory or the language used in lectures and scholarly circles. However, you will not find theoretical, esoteric discussions in this book. That is just not my style.

The material contained here is based on my successfully setting up and managing IT maintenance in the real world. The approaches presented have been tested and have proved to be valuable in practical experience.

The language used in this book is the language that business-people use, not the language IT people use. Instead of using terms like corrective changes and perfective changes, for example, this book uses terms like bug/defect fixes and enhancements. In my experience, these are the terms that non-IT businesspeople use. The systems we support exist only because of their business value, so speaking the language of business is most appropriate.

The chapters in this book provide you with practical methods to improve the business of IT maintenance. My overall motivation in this book—the same motivation I had in the lead roles I played—is to improve processes, make them simple, manage them for a period of time, and then turn over a stable situation to others to manage so that I can move on to the next challenge.

Why Should You Read On?

IT professionals on every level—whether from large or small companies, in-house organizations, or outsourced service providers—will benefit from reading this book.

Chief information officers (CIOs) will want to read this book so that they can:

•   Drive standardized processes for the entire IT maintenance organization.

•   Apply proven techniques to lower maintenance costs.

•   Apply proven techniques to improve the delivery of services, thus improving customer satisfaction.

•   Implement continuous improvements.

•   Improve current maintenance operations in order to identify and reap the benefits before outsourcing any functions. Doing this provides greater insight into the outsourced service provider’s real value.

IT maintenance managers will want to read this book so that they can:

•   Reference a great checklist of activities to address.

•   Find cost savings by reducing staff.

•   Improve reporting status and metrics.

•   Improve customer satisfaction.

•   Perform work consistently.

•   Decrease the stress level of staff by stabilizing expectations.

•   Streamline their team operations.

•   Decrease their ongoing workload.

IT project managers will want to read this book so that they can:

•   Decrease time to transition new development projects into maintenance.

•   Deliver a product and process that can be easier to maintain.

•   Understand which documents maintenance teams need.

•   Start beneficial processes that can continue into maintenance.

•   Continuously strive to keep their careers relevant in the ever-changing IT marketplace.

IT team members will want to read this book so that they can:

•   Understand how to simplify their job.

•   Consistently perform their job effectively.

•   Develop the skills needed to be promoted.

This book can help you plan and run IT maintenance with better control, clearer measurements for the customer, and less hassle on you and your team. In other words, you can run maintenance as a project.

Most of the maintenance books to date focus on software engineering best practices, not on how to achieve the corporate goals of decreasing cost and increasing business value and customer satisfaction. This book focuses on the business of system maintenance.

This book is written for the managers who set up and run IT system maintenance teams. Items included can be implemented by these individual managers or be implemented in a large, IT-wide approach by a project management office (PMO) or a CIO.

The examples and information are directed to managers and project managers. But for CIOs, this is vital information to apply to increase the value received from each $1 paid for maintaining systems. CIOs have the authority to mandate the principles found in these pages to implement a systematic organizational change.

The items contained may provide more details than CIOs might want to hear, but they will be interested in the results.

Can I Apply This Book Immediately?

This book provides a complete framework for improving IT maintenance. However, each component can stand on its own so that you can immediately apply a component to reap immediate benefits. Implementing a broadly sweeping change is costly, time-consuming, and fraught with the risk of failure. There are also great benefits to such a change. But proceeding slowly and implementing one or two changes at a time can create immediate success and pave the way to implementing additional improvements.

Do I Have to Be a Techie Programmer or Software Engineer to Benefit?

Knowing firsthand the tasks that your team performs is always beneficial. Understanding and applying the software engineering discipline is an indispensable skill. But you don’t need any special technical skills to use this book.

This book focuses on the business of IT maintenance, from initiating the setup to managing and controlling the maintenance process. After reading this book, any project manager will have the skills and understand the tactics that are necessary to establish and manage a maintenance team. The tools and techniques presented here differ from those of project management, but the management aspects, leadership, and applied process-improvement mindset is the same. Even if you don’t have experience in software engineering, you can still be successful, although you will most likely have to rely on the assistance of knowledgeable senior analysts on your team.

Acknowledgments

There are always those that help and inspire us to be better than we are today. Many have helped me along my professional path and in producing this book.

Thanks to Thomas A. Clewett for his leadership, creative ideas, and the challenging assignment he presented me to improve multiple maintenance teams for greater business value.

Thanks to Brian A. Aurand for his improvements to the configuration management chapter.

Thanks to Paul D. Gianfrancisco, Paul Janis, and John P. Laitar for their review and professional input of early book drafts.

Lastly, thanks to my brother, Joe J. Tshulos, for being a strong example of someone who confidently jumps in and gets the job done.

PART I

Initiating Processes

Part I focuses on why we should modify project management best practices and apply them to maintenance so we can meet the driving interests of any CIO, IT director, or IT manager.

Chapter 1: Introduction

States the reason for the book, its format, and how to effectively use the book to achieve improvements in your company’s IT maintenance organization.

Chapter 2: Project Management Versus IT System Maintenance

Compares project management to maintenance. Project management delivers a product while maintenance delivers a service. Project management techniques do not easily apply and must be modified.

Chapter 3: Outsourcing: The New Challenge

States the current realities of outsourcing and shows how the contents of this book can help both executives, who are enticed by the promise of phenomenal cost savings, and employees, from directors on down, who are concerned over the loss of their jobs.

CHAPTER 1

Introduction

Information technology (IT) professionals worldwide are searching for the next solution that can save money and improve quality. Applying standardized project management tools and techniques is resulting in handsome dividends on new development projects, yet new projects account for only half of IT professionals’ responsibilities. The other half is running system maintenance. It has been years since we saw the maintenance hype for the Year 2000 cleanup effort. Now is therefore an appropriate time to modify project management tools and techniques so they can serve the business of IT maintenance—the next solution!

Maintenance delivers a service, while projects deliver a product. Basic project management thus does not apply to maintenance. IT Maintenance: Applied Project Management modifies basic project management tools and techniques so they can be used to manage systems maintenance. This book demonstrates proven modified tools and techniques, reasons for using them, and ways to use the concepts presented in the book to lower costs while increasing customer satisfaction. Many Project Management Professionals (PMP®) will recognize the book’s concepts as extensions of PMI®-tested best practices in project management.

Unlike most books published on system maintenance, this book does not focus on the traditional software engineering mindset, on programming, or on code maintainability. Software engineering is still a vital component in system maintenance success, but companies are demanding more return on their investment. The management of software engineering is the component that needs to be improved.

This book takes a fresh look at increasing the value and quality of system maintenance in a straightforward and practical way. You will read about workable approaches to managing the maintenance of IT systems during the heat of battle—approaches that can also serve to lessen the intensity of those battles.

These techniques work. I have taken over system maintenance groups and applied these techniques with remarkable results—staff was decreased by 15%, customer satisfaction was increased, the department’s vice president was happier with the status-reporting format, and my workload actually decreased.

CIO Agenda

Top-notch chief information officers (CIOs) strive for world-class performance and financial discipline. To achieve these goals, they:

•   Ensure high-quality operations by meeting availability and other service levels.

•   Clearly define accountability.

•   Enforce life-cycle management, ensuring legacy systems are fully retired when new systems are deployed.

From the perspective of a CIO, maintenance is just one piece of the larger IT pie. CIOs focus on IT’s close alignment with the business and on its delivering business value. I had the opportunity to interview several CIOs who wanted to find ways to control and lower the annual cost of maintenance so they could shift some financial resources to new development projects that would increase functionality. At the same time, they wanted to increase the quality and speed of the maintenance service they provided in order to raise the level of business value and customer satisfaction.

Directors and managers can use the disciplined approaches and controls in this book. This will align the directors and managers with the CIO agenda. Maintenance managers are in the position to create