managing, measuring & benchmarking offshore application development

© 2003 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.The information contained herein is subject to change without notice

Managing, Measuring & Benchmarking Offshore Application Development

Global Projects

April 12, 2023 page 2

Agenda

• The 4 Key Project Practices

• “Case Studies” missing key practices

• A success story with a geographically distributed team

• Overview of some Statistics


Problem! – “Too Many” Project Practices

Sponsorship

Project Office

Project Metrics Procurement Planning

Return on Investment

Market Research

Quality Planning

Activity Definitions Retrospectives

Cost Estimation

Resource Leveling

Project Infrastructure

Rewards & RecognitionControl Processes

Teamwork Processes

Cost Processes


The 4 Key Project Practices


4 Key Project Management Practices

Team Processes• Have clear startup goals• Involve & Ask• Match skills to tasks• Get personal

Project Processes• Scope• Schedule• Resources

Communication Processes• Match type to time• Prepare & Follow-up• Don’t assume!

Project Sponsorship• High enough• Engaged • Committed


Project Sponsorship

Sponsorship at Appropriate Level (usually vice-president or GM)When? At initiation and involved @ key milestones!Who? Executive sponsor, and management to the project

managerWhat do you need?• Executive sponsorship with project tied into organization

goals• Commitment of resources and management across the

organization• Sponsors help with key stakeholders outside organization• Support and attend kick-off workshop• Buy in to project scope definition• Ensure sponsor not spread thin on too many projects.• Agree to problem escalation and scope change processes up

frontLose a sponsor? • Find a new one ASAP or consider stopping the project!


FY05 Budget

6%10%

9%

11%

46%

18%

Operations

Nextgen Development

Regions

Program Centers

Marketing

Content

Development Project Highest Priority for Division


Communication* Processes

When? At initiation, at meetings, in hallways, emails, when ever and where ever you can

Who? Project Manager to lead, all team members to participateWhat to do?• Match the way you communicate with the circumstances

(place, time, culture, etc – see follow-on slide)• Always have excellent meeting preparation and follow-up• Project status communicated clearly and frequently (“hard” and

“soft” info)• Formal presentations to review, escalate and mark phase

transitions – prepare, REHEARSE, deliver!• Ensure project closure (final reports, retrospectives,

celebrations, thank yous, formal project acceptance)• Don’t assume anything and constantly check in with team on

how practices are working

*This is most important process for dispersed teams after sponsorship!


Matching communication to circumstances

• add more explanation in email, v-mails

• avoid ‘telling’ and try ‘asking’

• ask for input on technologies used to send, store info

• voicemail• email • websites (doc sharing,

forums, discussions)• video / audio tapes• reports

• “War” rooms• “Post-It” notes• White boards• video / audio tapes

DifferentTime

• speak slowly and clearly

• send out prep material as early as possible

• recruit candid “buddies” for feedback

• avoid idioms eg – high roller

• watch voice ‘tone’

• teleconferences (planned / many attendees)

• web based meetings• impromptu conference

calls (unplanned / few people)

• instant messaging• video conferencing

(still technically limited)

• Face-to-face ‘formal’ meetings

• Informal conversations (lunch, ‘water’ cooler)

• Team building / celebrations

• Networking - one on ‘few’ conversations

Same Time

Different Cultures

Different PlaceSame Place


Team Processes

When? Project startup and throughout projectWho? Project Manager to lead and involve teamWhat to do?• Begin team building with startup workshops and face to

face meetings (especially for “new” teams!)• Have and communicate a clear project objective and vision• Involve all ‘leads’ in user needs assessment• Create and clarify processes through team involvement

and input• Choose processes that work best for the greatest number.

Don’t try for “perfection”• Ensure proper skills on team (use skills analysis and

personal knowledge of team)• Allow for team growth and “stretching” of members into

new areas• Get personal! Get to know them and them to know each

other.


Structured Communication needed for offshore / onshore team management

Item Frequency Who

Next Gen Resources & Project Plan

Assignment / workload analysis Monthly Rajesh, Vinitha, Tony, Van, Atul

Detailed listing of personnel and functional areas

Quarterly Peter, Rajesh, Vinitha, Tony, Van, Atul

Personnel

Resume analysis Quarterly Peter, Rajesh, Tony, Van

Skills analysis (strengths and weaknesses) Quarterly Peter, Arun, Rajesh, Peter, Tony, Van

Training Plan for current and new engineers Quarterly Peter, Arun, Rajesh, Peter, Tony, Van

Performance Profile of Engineering team Quarterly Peter, Arun, Rajesh, Peter, Tony, Van

Team management and communication

360 degree periodic feedback on project management

Monthly Rajesh, Vinitha, Tony, Van, Atul, Balaji

Feedback on communication processes and tools Quarterly Peter, Rajesh, Vinitha, Tony, Van, Atul, Balaji

Productivity metrics

Internet Point Function Point or of Lines Of Code Quarterly Peter, Rajesh, Vinitha, Tony, Van, Atul, Balaji


Example from team knowledge base

Name

HP History

DSPP History

Areas worked in DSPP (testing, operations etc.)

Technologies Professional Certifications - Other

N/A

Start March 2001GE Plastics, Singapore – onsite assignmentE-Opportunity Management.-Senior software engineer

Start Nov. 2001

Project Lead; Designed, developed and co-coordinated modules; Application support, onsite

Windows NT, Vignette, tcl, SQL server, Java , Weblogic, Rational Rose, Jbuilder, Delphi, Internet Explorer, Qualiware, IBM Mainframe- MVS, MF Cobol, DB2, Dialog System, Oracle Power Objects (Ver. 1), Oracle 7.0, EJB, Servlets, JSP, HTML, Object Pascal, MS Access, Rumbaugh's, Ø Portal , Content management OMT

Awarded for providing meaningful review comments on the Kuppam HPi Community Portal, that made a difference to the usability of the portal. Nominated for exhibiting Commitment to Quality.


Proactive steps by Technical & Bus. Teams

• Content Mgmnt System User Interface Improvement (v 4.5)

• Internal Tools Developed• Environment Details (Displays the multiple development

streams in progress)

• Dependency Tracking tool (Helps to reduce environment Issues during System Test & Deployment)

• Instant Data Creation tool (Helps in System Testing)

• Server Monitoring tool –(Helps in Production support)

• Download cleanup (Cleans up expired content in download folder)

• Parallel Development (New System Code Management Process using Clear-case)

• Fortnightly Patch process (More defect fixing in minor release)


Project Processes

When? At beginning to get rough idea of scope & schedule. Several versions needed before plan is final and used to manage

deliverables. Who? Project manager leads this effort with project leadsWhat to do?• Use the “iron triangle” of Scope, Schedule and Resources at all

times!• Management must understand and supports project planning

discipline• “Bottoms up” plans and “Tops down” goals rarely synch up at

first. Save time for ‘re-fitting’• Create major risk identification plan and update periodically• Get project team comfortable with simultaneous work in

various areas (eg - user needs & technology capabilities ) and possible re-work

• Once the plan is ‘final’ use it to track, report and verify progress


Create a Structured Project Plan

December January February March

I II III IV I II III IV I II III IV I II III IV

Orientation and Ramp Up (ALL)

Vignette Training (ALL)

Prototype (6 weeks) & System Rules Extraction (4 weeks)

Data modeling and Low level design (10 jweeks)

April May June July


Low Level Design Contd… Development – Coding and Unit Testing (20 weeks)

August September October November


System Test (contd…) (15 weeks) & Migration (5 weeks) & Deployment (5 weeks) Buffer

System Test (15)


Effort & Staffing Status

Staffing

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

Jun-03 Jul-03 Aug-03 Sep-03 Oct-03

Planned Actual Attrition New

Effort data

0100

200300

400

Inv. CUT FT ST Go LivePhase

staf

f-d

ays

Planned Actual


Managing Risk

140 risk factors assessed

Risk Management plan developed

Risks monitored continuously

Risk Overview

1. Client Commitment

2. Engagement Definition

3. Project Schedule

4. HP Experience andCapability

5. Duration

6. Legal and Contractual

7. Technology -- Hardware &Software

8. Complexity

9. Financial

10. Subcontractors

Risk Overview

1. Client Commitment

2. Engagement Definition

3. Project Schedule

4. HP Experience andCapability

5. Duration

6. Legal and Contractual

7. Technology -- Hardware &Software

8. Complexity

9. Financial

10. Subcontractors


Risk Analysis Summary

Key Risks with High/Medium Impact

Identified risk Impact How

likely

Preventive actions Mitigation actions Risk

index

Tracking

Intensity

Status Remarks

Virus attacks &

Resulting Network

outage.

High Medium Timely Installation of OS

patches and upgrade

of Antivirus programs

Extend end date of

the phase or release

date.

0.6 Once in

2 weeks

Open

Delay in detection of

Network / System /

Hardware issues by

MSDD

Medium Medium Investigate issues faced

during ST to find out the

root cause.

Extend end date of

the phase or release

date.

0.36 Once in

2 weeks

Open

Attrition of

experienced

developers

Medium Low Keep the motivation of

the team members high

by rotation of roles &

responsibilities, Team

events, Awards and

incentives.

Quickly ramp up

substitute developer

from within or outside

the team.

0.18 Once in

4 weeks

Open

Impact and How Likely are weighted as 1-High, 0.6-Medium, 0.3-Low;

Risk Index = Impact * How Likely

Tracking Intensity = weekly if Risk Index is high, once in 2 weeks if Medium and once in 4 weeks if Risk Index is Low

Impact and How Likely are weighted as 1-High, 0.6-Medium, 0.3-Low;

Risk Index = Impact * How Likely

Tracking Intensity = weekly if Risk Index is high, once in 2 weeks if Medium and once in 4 weeks if Risk Index is Low


“Case Study of Projects” with key missing practices


When key practices are ‘missing’

“Case Studies”

• Project Sponsorship• Project Planning


“Missing” Project Sponsorship

Problem – Project Sponsorship not at right level in the correct organization.

Issues: • Sponsor had many competing priorities• Improper staffing for project (skills, experience, total

people)• Little cooperation from within organization or outside

stakeholders• No clear user needs list createdOutcomes: • 2 years & $50 million spent• System had few users at launch• Abandoned system within a year of launch


Project Planning Processes not used

Problem – Management not knowledgeable on project planning.

Issues:• No support for documenting user requirements. (just build

something like “Charles Schwab” has)• No understanding of value of project planning tools (eg,

requirements analysis, planning, scope and priority trade-offs)

• Wanted a system built ‘outside’ of existing business processes. “Build it and they will come!”

Outcome:• 1 year and $3 million spent with no functioning system• The technical team ‘abandoned’ the project for more

attractive work• UPSIDE: Failure of project sparked a divisional re-org that

enabled a successful follow-on project.• Lessons from failure informed the follow-on successful

project.


A success story with a geographically distributed team


A More Successful Project

• A Challenging Start

• Causes for Success

• A few lessons from Success


A Challenging Beginning

Challenges:• High degree of organizational complexity (worldwide,

cross divisional software development, cross functional - sales, marketing, engineering – offshore & onshore)

• Compressed timeline – initially a year planned from defining requirements to delivering system

• Team mostly new to each other• Initial Scope unclear • Mix of old and new technologies chosen• Offshore (India) development team new to technology• Business teams and development team never worked

together• 1st time the project manager had worked with off-

shoring model• New division organization• No agreed upon communication and project processes,

or supporting technologies


Why the Project Succeeded (1 of 2)

Strong sponsorship and management support both vertically and horizontally– Upper level management stayed involved and stepped in for key

problems– Project was a top division priority and one of few the sponsor

had– Resources (people, money, technology) assigned as project

scope defined

Support for Project Planning– Vice-President understood the Scope, Schedule, Resource

‘triangle’– Time allowed for detailed project plans– Contingency and backup plans – Risk assessments created & actively managed– Measured progress and re-planned based on metrics


Why the Project Succeeded (2 of 2)

Communication Processes utilized– Cognizance of time, place and with experience, cultural

issues– Project manager (PM) educated team mates on when and

how to use various types of communications based on situation & culture

– PM coached team to assume nothing and to be willing to communicate any news (good or bad) quickly

Team Processes implemented early– Startup meeting held with people flown in for face to face– Caucused team to find out what skills they wanted to

contribute and improve during the project– Created and constantly clarified processes with team input– Built personal relationships via travel, Instant Messaging,

sharing personal stories– Used humor to ensure open-ness. (need to be careful in

using humor in cross-cultural situations! Self-deprecation by PM worked)


A Few Lessons

Project was a success, but still had some big lessons

• Short sighted in adoption of an older technology (tcl scripting language) due to internal political pressures

• We were on the “bleeding edge” of adopting corporate ‘standards’

• Some user requirements were short-changed due to time pressures. - Caused substantial re-work later.

• Didn’t apply prioritization strictly enough and made some parts of application too complex for efficient operation. (tried to do something for everyone!)

• Not enough due diligence on other internal HP corporate divisional “partner” capabilities. - Caused substantial re-work and 6 month timeline slip.


Using Metrics to Manage Onshore / Offshore teams


Operating Offshore / Onshore Technical & Business teams

Key statistics gathered and used to monitor technical team progress and issues

• Tied statistics back to business goals and needs– Monitored both operation and developmental statistics– Monitored release schedule and interaction with technical /

business processes– Effort estimates and actuals versus Phase comparison to

improve planning process– Defects initiation and Phase comparison to address quality

issues– Action plan and Retrospectives


Development and Operational Metrics

Home-Page Performance

1.35 1.40 1.45 1.50 1.55 1.60 1.65 1.70 1.75

Apr. '04

May '04

June '04

July '04

August '04

Sept '04

Oct '04

Seconds

Portal Availability

97.5%

98.0%

98.5%

99.0%

99.5%

100.0%

100.5%

Nov. '0

3

Dec. '

03

Jan. '

04

Feb. '04

Mar

. '04

Apr. '0

4

May

'04

June

'04

July

'04

August '04

Sept '

04

Oct

'04

02468

101214161820

Portal Improvements

Enhancements

Fixes

Nov. 22, H/W

Dec. 5, 2003

Jan. 9, 2004

Feb. 6, 2004

Mar. 12 - Affil.

Apr.27 - SNF4

May 13, HPP

May 28, 2004

June 25, 2004

Jul 30, Admin

Jul 30,Sp.Prog

Sep. 3, 2004

Portal Releases

Major Thematic Patch


Patch Release

Release No Release Date4.5.1 14-Feb-034.5.2 28-Feb-034.5.3 14-Mar-034.5.4 28-Mar-034.5.5 17-Apr-034.5.6 20-May-034.5.7 19-Jun-035.0.1 1-Oct-035.0.2 10-Oct-035.0.3 27-Oct-03

Defects fixed per Patch Release

1 13 11 11

35 2

133 2

5

22

2 2 1

1

1

1 33

21

4 1

3

2

1

21

4

1

2

2 1 1

4

33

1

21

2

0

5

10

15

20

4.05.01 4.05.02 4.05.03 4.05.04 4.05.05 4.05.06 4.05.07 5.00.01 5.00.02 5.00.03

Release Version

Defe

cts

8

7

6

5

4

3

2

1

0


Planned vs. Actual Schedules

M9 Description: Release 5.0

RemarkMstone# Description Original Current Actual Original Current Actual Original Current ActualM9.1 Investigation 14-Apr-03 14-Apr-03 14-Apr-03 59 59 63 17 17 17M9.2.1 CUT 20-May-03 20-May-03 20-May-03 211 211 193 15 15 15M9.2.2 FT 17-J un-03 17-J un-03 17-J un-03 160 160 155 7 10 10M9.3 ST 13-Aug-03 13-Aug-03 28-Aug-03 267 267 303 17 17 17 Virus attack, delays

from operations in fixing network and configuration issues caused schedule and effort variance

M9.4 Live 24-Aug-03 24-Aug-03 06-Sep-03 4 4 4 2 2 2

M10 Description: Release 6.0

RemarkMstone# Description Original Current Actual Original Current Actual Original Current Actual

M10.1 ST 01-Dec-03 01-Dec-03 133 133 10 10M10.2 Live 07-Dec-03 07-Dec-03 6 6 3 3

Schedule variance

effort variance

resource change

Any other Milestones affected

1 11-Aug-03 11-Aug-03 M9.3 14 days 36 m-days Live YesM9.4 14 days 0

Revision Approved?Milestone

with variance

Re-planning triggersPlan Ver. Revised

Plan Date Rev. Date

Reason/Trigger for the revisions/variances above

Schedule Effort Resources

Schedule Effort Resources


Re-planning Triggers

Size Variance

Effort Variance

Schedule Variance

Resource Variance

Any others

M10.1, M10.2

Schedule skips more than 3 days

Schedule is very important in DSPP, if we slip more than 3 days we need re planning

M10.1, M10.2

Change in Requirement

If any major (based on impact)changes in Requirement will trigger replanning

Milestone # Re-planning triggers Remarks/ Basis for trigger


Defect Containment R5.0

0

20

40

60

80

100

120

140

Inv. CUT ST Rel

Investigation

CUT

ST

Rel


Phase-wise defects R5.0

Phase-wise defects foundPhase-wise defects introduced

28%

48%

22%2%

Investigation

CUT

ST

Rel52%

39%

9%

Investigation

CUT

ST


Size & Scope Status

Size estimate/actual R5.0

196 196

3255

12238

593 679

0

2000

4000

6000

8000

10000

12000

14000

Investigation(#FunctionPoints)

CUT (#Templates)

FT (# TestCases)

ST (# TestCases)

EstimatedActual

# Requirement changes during a phase R5.0

0 01

5

0123456

Investigation CUT FT ST

Series1


R 5.0 Defect Prevention & Process Improvements

Defect Data Analysis of internally found defects:

Highlight the PI activities carried out in the review period

Critical MediumLowDesign 26 45 56Code reviews 5 17 11UT 6 55 42

What# of defects (severitywise) Root causes of critical defects (RCA outcome)

PI No.

Process Improvement Activity Relevant to Org or Project Process?

Submitted to Org DB?

1 Retro for R5.0 Project Process Yes

2 Root Cause Analysis done for System Int Migration issues

Project Process Yes


Retrospective Action Items

Issue Causes Recommendation Exp.Date Status/ Owner

Configuration issues

Configuration setting needs more documentation

Documentation of configuration item already planned

Next Major Release

Project Manager/Team

Requirement analysis

Requirement changes at later stage of System Test (ST), and dependency like POP3 server missed

Dependency section in Business Requirements needs to be updated. After sign-off all major changes needs to be taken as Enhancement request and should be logged in CHART.

Next Major Development Release

Team

Dependency in code drop

Difficult to track dependencies released during code drops

We are developing dependency tracking tool

30-Oct-2003

Already Developed

Reviews Reviews were less effective and that resulted in more ST defects

Coding standard, guidelines to be developed

Next major development release

Planned


“The illusion that we are separate from one another

is an optical delusion of our consciousness.”

Albert Einstein

Quote slide

managing, measuring & benchmarking offshore application development

Documents

key practices

project sponsorship

committedteam processes

match skills

success story

distributed teamoverview

clear startup goals