Software Project Management

Lecture - 1

by:
M. Shahid Farid
1. Course Introduction
2. What is Project?
3. Project vs. Program
4. Project Classification

SPM: What is Project ? 2

A project is sequence of unique, complex,
and connected activities having one
common goal that must be completed by a
specific time
time, within budget
budget, and according
to specification.

SPM: What is Project ? 3

￭ Activity is piece of work
￭ A project comprises a number of activities
￭ Completed in some specified order or
sequence
￭ The sequence of the activities is based on
technical requirements

SPM: What is Project ? 4

￭ The two types of activities are:
￭ Critical activities
￭ Defines the critical path
￭ Non
Non-critical
critical activities
￭ Can be delayed to some extent

SPM: What is Project ? 5

￭ Activities of the project are unique in nature
￭ Every project is unique w.r.t its
￭ Conditions
￭ Requirements
￭ Resources
￭ etc

SPM: What is Project ? 6

￭ Activities of the project are not
￭ Simple
￭ repetitive
￭ Every activity is complex in its nature
nature, for
example, designing an interactive user
interface

SPM: What is Project ? 7

￭ There is a logical or technical relationship
between pairs of activities
￭ Activities are connected because the output
of one activity is the input to another

SPM: What is Project ? 8

￭ Each and every project has a single goal
￭ Large and complex projects are decomposed
into several subprojects
￭ M d l i i
Modularization off the
h project
j iis always
l
encouraged and desired

SPM: What is Project ? 9

￭ Projects have a specified completion date
which may be
￭ Self imposed or
￭ Client specified
￭ Project is over on the deadline, whether or
not it has been completed
p

SPM: What is Project ? 10

￭ Projects have resource limits such as:
￭ Staff
￭ Money and
￭ Machines etc

SPM: What is Project ? 11

￭ Customer expects, from the project, a certain
level
l l off
￭ Functionality and
y
￭ Quality
￭ Functional Specification (FS) document may
not reflect all the requirements, some are
hidden or expected requirements and hence
are not stated

SPM: What is Project ? 12

“One size fits all”

does not work in SPM

Software project Management 13

Each project has different complexity and
business value and thus, cannot be treated
equally.
O methodology
One th d l may fit one type
t off
projects and useless for those of other type.

Software project Management 14

1. Business Value
2. Complexity
3. Length
4. Cost
5. Ri k
Risk

Software project Management 15

￭ On the basis of these characteristics, projects
are classified into four categories:
￭ Type A Projects
￭ Type B Projects
￭ Type C Projects
￭ Type D Projects

Software project Management 16

 Business Length
Class Complexity Technology Risk
Value (months)

Type A High High > 18 Breakthrough High

Type B Medium Medium 9 – 18 Current Medium

Best of the
Type C Low Low 3–9 Low
breed

Type D Very low Very low <3 Practical Very low

Software project Management 17

Thanks!