Mission Impossible. Stillborn projects

"When a person does not know to which pier he is heading, no wind will be fair for him." (C) Seneca, Lucius Annay

Foreword

Somehow one of the tops of a reputable software product development company invited me, as an expert, to let me evaluate the quality of a new product. I carefully watched and listened to the presentation. It was evident that colleagues tried very hard and worked for 10-12 hours to make the product look at the highest level. Then they asked me: “did you get a good product or not?” I thanked for the presentation, but asked me to answer my last question: “What processes, and for what purpose are you going to automate using this tool?” For some reason, the question caused confusion at the speakers. After a short pause, the top, which, apparently, was the ideologist of the new product, replied: “If the tool were good, we would find some tools to automate with its help!” I had to say that I could not evaluate the product. Without knowing the business goals, it is impossible to understand the degree of their achievement.



Most of the failed software projects that had to be watched were failures even before they started. The mission was initially impracticable because no one bothered to answer nine simple but necessary questions that define the concept of a future project. The fate of such projects is pitiable. Having invested substantial funds in the development of some kind of crap that did not fly, the investor, as a rule, continues to invest further and further, in the hope that she will fly and the costs will pay off. And only having preoccupied with the conceptual definition of the project, he understands that the mission is impossible and, in order not to fall into even greater losses, the project must be urgently closed.

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For illustration, we use the project "Expedition for the Treasure of Flint"

Nine points of the project concept

#one. What for?

It’s not trivial, but any project must have goals. Goals may be different. From - stupidly earn a million, to - get a plus in the karma of the company's brand. But they must be. Otherwise, the project will be like a ship sailing to an unknown pier. Objectives serve as a criterion that will allow us to determine at any given time whether our project is floating in the wrong direction or if we have lost our course.



Why expedition for the treasure of Flint? - To get rich.

# 2. What?

The answer to this question must determine what we must do to achieve the stated goals. What product or service should be the result of the project, what qualities they should have.



What? - Equip "Hispaniola"; hire a team; swim from Bristol to Treasure Island; find and extract treasure; go back.

# 3. Why?

This section of the concept should answer the question, and why we assume that by implementing the project, we will achieve our goals. Any of our action plan is based on certain assumptions and assumptions, which we must explicitly formulate and analyze for certainty.



Why? - Because we are sure that: treasure exists; no one has dug it yet; treasure value is large; Bons card is reliable; the schooner and crew are reliable; from February to September there will be no storms.



By the way, very many "shipwrecks" happened, due to the lack of elaboration of this particular item of the concept.

#four. Who!

Who participates in the project. Project participants include all interested parties, individuals and organizations, such as customers, sponsors, a performing organization, who are actively involved in the project or those whose interests may be affected during the execution or completion of the project. Each interested party, as a rule, has its obvious and hidden motives that can affect the success of the project.



All the heroes of the novel by Robert Stevenson belong to the interested parties of our project. We list only the main ones. Squire John Trelawney - project sponsor; Dr. David Livesey - Project Manager; Captain Alexander Smollett - Timlide; Jim Hawkins - Systems Architect; John Silver is the informal leader; Flint's former team are outsourcers. Deserves close attention to how the overt and covert motives of these stakeholders influenced the project.

#five. How many?

In order to understand how much a project will cost us, it is necessary to identify and evaluate the resources necessary for its implementation.



It's simple. Our project costs include: “Isanyoly” freight, purchase of supplies and equipment, team payment.

# 6. When?

F. Brooks wrote: “It takes nine months to give birth to a child, no matter how many women are involved in this task. Many programming tasks are of this type, since debugging is inherently consistent. ” He also gives an exceptionally useful, but for some reason rarely used, empirical formula for estimating the term in months of the first delivery of a product according to the complexity of its creation: T = 2.5 (N hours * m.) ^ 1/3. For assessments at the concept level, a very useful formula.

# 7. Possible problems?

This item is about risks. Remember that “a project without risk is the lot of losers. Risks and benefits always go hand in hand ”(C) Tom DeMarco, Timati Lister. First of all, the validity of our assumptions must be considered as risks. Informally, risks are possible problems in a project, and problems in a project are materialized risks.



If we talk about software development projects, then the main risks include:

• Requirements are missing / not complete / subject to frequent changes.
• Lack of working interaction with the customer.
• Lack of necessary resources and experience.
• Incomplete planning. “Forgotten work”.
• Errors in estimates of the complexity and timing of work.

Roman Stevenson simply would not have happened if before the start of the project the main risks were analyzed and a management plan was drawn up.

#eight. Acceptance criteria?

Goals must be measurable and before the start of the project we must understand how we will determine the degree of their achievement.



In this section, we must answer the question of how wealth is measured. Get 1000, 100 000 or 1 000 000 pounds.

#9. Who benefits from this?

It's simple. Achieving the objectives of the project should justify the resources spent on its implementation.



The value of the treasure must cover the costs of the expedition and also our idea of ​​wealth.

Conclusion

The concept can occupy one page or one hundred pages. But she must be. The concept of the project serves as a document that will make it possible for the entire duration of the project to determine whether or not we are on the right track. The lack of concept, as a rule, indicates that the project is stillborn.