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Managing Risks of Fixed Schedules

September 30, 2007 | Author: admin | Filed under: Risk Management

Managing Risks of Fixed Schedules
By Ray W. Frohnhoefer

As Project Managers, we often have to perform with a fixed schedule. This type of situation can occur for almost any project or industry, but it is a special issue in the software industry when we want to meet monthly, quarterly, or other periodic release schedules. Here are my top 5 tips for successfully managing the risk and meeting the deadline:

  1. Be sure there is a project charter for each release, with the high level time, resources, budget, and deliverables scoped out. Factor in time off for vacation early since this can have a big impact if it comes as a surprise later. Any surprises warrant an immediate review.
  2. Regularly review delivery metrics. Use experience to improve estimating and the ability to meet targets. Build an incentive/recognition plan around achieving superior metrics (not just meeting the target).

  1. Count on product and project management being between 5% and 20% of your schedule — this rule of thumb will help make sure you don’t stretch the PMs too far. 5% for just scheduling and coordination, 20% for scheduling, coordination, requirements, and documentation. This makes sure there is a consistent level of management.
  2. Complete all your highest effort deliverables early in the cycle.
  3. Don’t make the end date too aggressive or the team too lean. Better to get the team working on the next cycle or drop in a few low effort items toward the end to fill the time if necessary — better to finish early than blow the date.

These are the things the project sponsor, Project Manager, and functional manager can do to assure a fixed schedule is nailed!

Ray W. Frohnhoefer, MBA, PMP is the Director of the Project Support Office at EDmin as well as a consultant, speaker, writer, educator, and mentor on Project Management. Ray is also the Component Mentor for PMI Region 7 (Southwest North America), a Past President of PMI, San Diego Chapter, Inc., and an adjunct faculty member at three San Diego universities. You can find out more about his professional roles at http://www.edmin.com/company/index.cfm?function=showBioDetail&id=80 and through his blog, Tales from the Project Notebook, at http://projectnotebook.blogspot.com.

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1 person has left a comment

[…] we looked at fixed schedule, so its only natural to want to look at fixed costs too. Or perhaps I should more precisely say […]

PM Hut » Blog Archive » Managing Risks of Fixed Costs wrote on October 11, 2007 - 7:23 am | Visit Link

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