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Synergy

Collaborating Project Management for High Performance Business Insight

PMI North India Chapter

April-June 2012 Newsletter

Issue 5

Work life balance, critically yours…

this issue

Managing Complex Business… P2

Cash Flow Management…P3

Organizational Change… P7

Quiz…P9

Rigidity to Agility...P12

Project Management Office…P16

Best Practice Quality Assurance…P18

Past Events…P21

Authors… P22

Editorial Team…P23

From the Editor’s Desk

First Anniversary Issue

It is a proud moment for entire community as our SYNERGY turns 1 year old. I, along with my entire Editorial

team, take pride in releasing the fifth edition as a First “Anniversary Issue”. Successful and timely releases

of SYNERGY reflect the involvement and commitment of entire Project Management fraternity. Timely

releases of SYNERGY would not have been possible without your support. I, on behalf of Chapter board,

eulogize all the authors in the last 1 year who have devoted their valuable time for nurturing SYNERGY

P1

21st June is longest day of the year since sunlight is for longer duration of the day in Northern Hemisphere. We aim to take

this cue from nature and spread the light of knowledge and experience using SYNERGY as a medium for many more years.

We have symbolically chosen 21st June to release our SYNERGY Anniversary Issue as a source of inspiration towards

continuous growth and awareness of Project Management.

I am also grateful for Editorial team's efforts comprising of committed individuals who have zealously worked as a team in

reviewing all inputs and feedback to ensure that a well packaged SYNERGY is released every quarter. Our entire editorial

team is a classic example of executing project using a virtual team. This is due to the fact that our editorial team has never

had a single face to face meeting since the time SYNERGY was conceived! We take pride that we have released every

edition of SYNERGY on the announced date without any schedule overrun.

I urge fellow professionals to read SYNERGY and we always look forward to your critical review that will help SYNERGY to

become a mature adult.

Happy Reading!

despite their other professional and personal commitments.

Regards

Piyush Govil PMP®

Vice –President – Communications


Managing Complex Business Deliverables in Projects

business analyst is focused on the risk analysis of the

business vision and project opportunities. The technology is

changing fast, in the times of recession there is a huge

pressure on the margins and the customer wants the best

at the cheapest rates. Further in case of global

opportunities various legal, geographic specific risk,

political risks need to be assessed.

Technical architect and commercial architect of the

business /project opportunity will have to take project

oriented approach.

Analyze the risks and suggest multiple scenarios to the

customer as well as to the management and will have to

create a balance between customers requirement and

organizations goals of profitability before coming up

with an optimum techno-commercial solution.

It is a trend and most of the organizations today are

hence using teams to analyze these risks and suggest

mitigations and come up with scenarios with technical,

commercial and legal background.

Right project management approach in these kinds of

teams is not currently used to an optimum level at least

in Indian companies and a lot can/ needs be done to

introduce the concept and principles of project

management in such teams.

Project management techniques specially those of

analyzing & mitigating risks like creating risks

frameworks, risk registers etc are the essential need of

business managers/analysts/bid managers in today’s

global volatile business environment.

Business Case – Telecom Industry

Key Inherent Risks for Working Project Managers: Inherent risks in markets (systematic risks)

Specific risks (non systematic risks) which can be

classified as: Market Risk (Market price fluctuations, FX

etc)

A business customer has a requirement which can be served

by a global MPLS based VPN but the customer has a limited

budget and also wants the solution to run for seven years

without impacting its real time requirements.

Techno commercial risks are:

Hardware requirement -suggested may become obsolete.

Technical obsolesce and Capex limitations

Geo political risks are:

Regulatory constraints in the different global locations

may impose different challenges like censorship on the

content and risks which needs to be mitigated by

proper contracting.

Case Study – Telecom Industry Managers:

Project management key essentials Managers:

Current telecom market business atmosphere with

uncertainty and project delivery limitations can be best

managed by a balanced careful approach for project

managers/BA’s/Procurement teams to plan and analyze

potential risks event with mitigation plan for seamless

delivery and satisfied end customer expectations.

In today’s dynamic futuristic world the role of a

Take Away Managers:

By – Ritesh Arora

Save Earth, Go Green P2

Mr. Ritesh Arora Senior Manager-Central Bid team, HCL Infosystems Ltd,

Noida

Ritesh has close to 10 years of Management Consulting, and

Industry wide experience across multiple sectors - Telecom, IT,

Oil & Gas, Government ( e-Governance), BFSI . His key

competencies are: Project & program management, Commercial &

bid management, procurement & vendor management, business

development, relationship and stakeholder for transition & change

management and provide thought leadership. He has worked with

various clients in India & Middle East. He is BE in Computers

Science and Engineering from DIT in year 1998-2002 and MBA from

FMS (part-time).

About Author

Cash Flow Management in Large Infrastructure Projects

costs of different packages, predict the timing of cash

outflow, arrange funds, monitor the actual cash outflow,

identify deviations with respect to plan and modify the

baseline plan as the project progresses so that the actual

cash outflow is within permissible deviation limits. This is a

continuous and intricate process as it involves thorough

knowledge of the commercial order conditions for raising

bills, timing of the bills raised, payments cycle, physical

progress made against each package etc. Large

infrastructure projects are capital intensive and require

funds during the project execution. The source of these

funds may be either debt or equity. Managing the funds

and its efficient outflow synchronizing with the actual

progress made is a complicated task due to the fact that a

track of the incremental physical progress is required to be

kept on real time basis. Efficient Management of funds is

essential to optimize the interest cost and at the same

time ensure that sufficient funds are available to release

payments against the bills being received, without

annoying the vendors and contractors.

P roject Cash Flow Management involves estimating

During the project investment approval, costs are allocated

against each item under the cost head based on market

estimates and in-house cost database. Applicable taxes and

duties if any are also indicated. If required, cost of some of

the items under the cost head are estimated in foreign

currency assuming that such items would be imported.

Thereafter the total cost estimate is derived. Tolerance

limit in estimated cost of +/- 20 % at the time of seeking

investment approval is considered accurate.

Estimating cost for each item under the cost head Managers:

Steps in Cash Flow Management Managers:

By – Asim Prasad

Cash flow management is an integral part of Project

Management. It’s a systematic long drawn continuous

process which starts immediately after the project capital

cost estimates has been prepared. Estimating the net cash

flow over the economic life of the project with accuracy is

important as it affects the wealth creation of the

shareholders. Based on my experience of executing cross

country natural gas pipeline projects the steps required to

be followed for efficient cash flow management for large

infrastructure projects are as under:

Identification of cost heads

Cost heads are identified with the decomposition of the

project at the time investment approval. Large

infrastructure projects involves various cost heads

comprising direct and indirect cost, hard and soft costs as

detailed herein. The project cost estimated at the time of

project investment approval forms the basis for ascertaining

the project cost overrun at the time of project completion.

1

2

Sl. Cost head Total Cost

TCi

1. Procurement packages (P1,P2….Pj) TC1

2. Work Packages(W1,W2….Wk) TC2

3. Owners Management Expenses TC3

4. Contingency TC4

5. Inflation TC4

6. Interest on Debt , Margin Money for Working Capital TC5

Project Approved Cost(Baseline-0 at Time T0) TACB0

Table 1

TACB0 = ∑TCi where i=1 to n; n= total number of cost heads

Mathematically,

The total approved cost=TAC, is a function of time and is

dependent on market forces.

Large infrastructure projects are completed in three to five

years time depending on the project complexity and size. At

the time of investment approval, considering the estimated

project schedule, the cash outflows against each cost head

are forecasted based on project schedule, past experience

and market estimates. Thereafter the total outflow against

each month is calculated.

Further the percentage monthly cash outflow is also

calculated based on estimated costs. Refer Table 2

Calculate the Cash Outflow based on estimated cost 3


Food for thought

Served by – Piyush Govil

Work life balance, are we really serious? or buzz words…

In large infrastructure projects, awarding contracts to

vendors and contractors for procurement and works is a

lengthy process as high value procurement involves several

intricate steps for which standard transparent procedures

and guidelines are followed. This process also involves

different categories of stakeholders who interact with each

other and are influential enough to alter the decision

process. Considering all this, as and when the orders are

placed, the actual order value is recorded. Based on the

execution schedule for the particular order considering the

commercial conditions, the cash flow is determined.

Sl. Cost head Total Cost: TCi Month -1 Month -2 Month-(N-1) Month-N

1 Procurement packages (P1,P2….Pj) TC1 TC11 TC12

2 Work Packages(W1,W2….Wk) TC2 TC21 TC22

3 Owners Management Expenses TC3 TC31 TC32

4 Contingency TC4 TC41 TC42

5 Inflation TC5 TC51 TC52

6 Interest on Debt , Margin Money for Working Capital TC6 TC61 TC62

Total [Basaeline-0] TACB0 TCM1 TCM2 TCM (N-1) TCM-N

% Cash Outflow [Basaeline-0] -

TCM1/ TACB0

TCM2/ TACB0

TCM(N-1)/ TACB0

TCM-N/ TACB0

Table 2

Calculate the Cash Outflow based on actual ordered

cost and scheduled progress [Baseline-1] 4

The cash outflow so calculated is the baseline-0 cost

outflow based on estimated cost.

TACB0=∑TCMm where m=1 to N; N= total number of months for cash outflow

Mathematically,

Sl. Cost head Total

Cost: TCi Total Order

Cost: TCi

Month: Month: Month: Month:N

N-m N-2 (N-1)

1 Procurement packages (P1,P2….Pj) TC1 TOC1

2 Work Packages(W1,W2….Wk) TC2 TOC2

3 Owners Management Expenses TC3 TOC3

4 Contingency TC4 TOC4

5 Inflation TC5 TOC5

6 Interest on Debt , Margin Money for Working Capital TC6 TOC6

Total [Basaeline-1] TACB0 TOCB1

TOCM (N-m)

TOCM (N-2)

TOCM (N-1)

TOCM-(N)

% Cash Outflow [Basaeline-1] - - TOCM(N-

m)/ TOCB1

TOCM(N-2)/

TOCB1

TOCM(N-1)/

TOCB1

TOCM-(N)/

TOCB1

The actual expenditure under cost heads like Owners

Management Expenses, Contingency, Inflation, Interest on

Debt, Margin Money for Working Capital are calculated after

the project completion during capitalization. However,

during execution certain values are estimated based on past

experience and indicated under total cost head. The steps

are repeated till all orders are placed. Refer Table 3

TOCB1 = ∑TOCMm where m=1 to N; N= total number of months for cash outflow

Mathematically,

The cash outflow so calculated is the baseline-1 cost outflow

based on ordered cost.


calculated based on ordered costs.

Table 3


At the time of project execution, recalculate the cash outflow based on balance expenditure to be made and

actual progress made [Baseline-2]

5


calculated based on balance expenditure.

The cash outflow so calculated is the baseline-2 cost outflow

based on balance expenditure. As the project progress, on

month to month basis the balance expenditure and revised

cash flow are calculated. This continuous process improves

the accuracy level of prediction w.r.t. anticipated

expenditure required in subsequent months. Refer Table 4

Sl. Cost head X=Total Order

Cost: TCi

Y=Cumulative Expenditure Made till

previous month

Z=X-Y=

Balance Expenditure till previous month

1 Procurement packages (P1,P2….Pj)

TOC1 TCE1 Z1=TOC1-TCE1

2 Work Packages(W1,W2….Wk) TOC2 TCE2 Z2=TOC2-TCE2

3 Owners Management Expenses TOC3 TCE3 Z3=TOC3-TCE3

4 Contingency TOC4 TCE4 Z4=TOC4-TCE4

5 Inflation TOC5 TCE5 Z5=TOC5-TCE5

6 Interest on Debt (Indirect Cost) TOC6 TCE6 Z6=TOC6-TCE6

Total [Basaeline-2] TOCB1 TCE Z=TOCB1 -TCE

% Cash Outflow [Basaeline-2] - TCE/TOCB1 (TOCB1 –TCE)/ TOCB1

Table 4

Identify the deviations with reasons between the

cash outflow derived in step 4 and step 5 6

The project execution involves uncertainties and often it is

difficult to precisely predict the risk and its outcomes. Risk

may be known-known or known-unknown. This affects the

cash flow during actual execution. Mostly it happens that the

actual physical progress is in variance with the planned

progress. Therefore it becomes important to identify the

reasons for deviations and the corresponding variation in

cash outflow. Once such deviations are identified, the

planned cash outflow can be prepared with higher levels of

accuracy. Accuracy levels in prediction of cash flow on

month to month basis of 95 % are considered good. The

periodicity of such a detailed analysis for ascertaining

deviation is one month.

Once the reasons for deviations under different WBS element

are identified, contingency plans are prepared to minimize

deviations. Implementation of the contingency plan in true

spirit ensures that the project is still on the scheduled path.

Some contingency plans may involve usage of resource like

time, cost and heavy equipment. However, due to scarcity in

resources, it is not always possible to implement contingency

plans due to which projects are delayed. This may result in

cost overrun also. The project manager may therefore

conduct a decision tree analysis along with a cost benefit

analysis before proceeding ahead.

Prepare contingency plan to minimize the deviation 7

Monitor the actual cash outflow 8

Cash outflow is required to be monitored on continuous basis

with the release of payments against running bills. This being

a real time process, some system needs to be designed that

will monitor the progress electronically and provide a

snapshot information to the project manager on aspects like

balance payment against each cost head, look ahead plan for

succeeding months, percentage financial progress made in

each cost head along with overall percentage financial

progress. The percentage progress is measured considering

the overall approved project cost in the denominator.


Overhead by -Kumar Saurabh, PMP®

Project Management – lighter side

The more innocuous the modification appears to be, the further its influence will

extend and the more plans will have to be redrawn.

The above methodology has been applied in execution of

cross country natural gas pipeline projects with high

degree of success in predicting cash outflows with

accuracy within permissible limits. Considering the fact

that debt financing is also involved in large infrastructure

projects, it becomes very important to precisely predict

the future cash outflows on monthly basis for project

completion so that only the portion of amount required for

Take Away Managers:


expenditure in the successor month is borrowed on month to

month basis. The above exercise also helps to prepare budget

estimates for the financial years during the lifecycle of the

project completion. If the company is executing number of

different infrastructure projects of varying size and

complexity, it helps to ascertain the cash flow of the entire

project portfolio at the organizational level.

Mr. Asim Prasad Chief Manager

GAIL (India) Limited, New Delhi

About Author

Mr. Asim Prasad is a graduate in Mechanical Engineering from IIT

Kanpur and working as Chief Manager at GAIL(India) Limited,

New Delhi. He has varied rich experience of the natural gas value

chain comprising Operation & Maintenance of Cross Country

Natural Gas Pipelines, Project Management of Cross Country

Natural Gas Pipelines and Natural Gas Marketing. During the

course of his professional career he completed Post Graduate

Diploma in Project Management, Advanced Diploma in

Management and Executive Diploma in Project Management. He

is a member of PMI USA, ASME USA; Life Member IIGE Kolkotta

and Member IEI Kolkotta.

Organizational Change – What’s in it for me?

By – Anju Agarwal

accelerating at an increasing rate. Factors, such as

globalization, new technologies, mergers & acquisitions,

shifting markets, structural changes and outsourcing, force

businesses to respond effectively in order to survive. Every

organization must change - not only to survive, but also to

retain its relevance in a world of intense competition,

constant scientific progress, and rapid communication.

Though it is very clear that change is necessary, one

question why change efforts fail to achieve the desired

results, or why employees feel totally lost and frustrated

during and after a change, or why the attrition rate

skyrockets during these organizational changes.

C hange is a necessary part of growth and it is

To embrace change, people need to feel comfortable about

the change; they need to understand and appreciate the

reason for the change. Buy-in is also about personal

benefit, and if employees don’t believe that they shall

receive a certain level of individual benefit from the

change, getting buy-in will always be a challenge.

This paper explores why employees are left unappreciated

and undervalued during corporate change programs and

offers some ideas as to how a corporation can

institutionalize change management to become a

constantly evolving success story.

It is very important that

change is identified by the

employees as a stimulator

of their growth. One

cannot drive and motivate

an employee for long, by

providing figures of future

benefits of organizational

changes. Every change

requires an adjustment

and it is very difficult to

get a buy in from an

employee without framing

the change as a “What’s in

it for me? (WIFM)”.

Employees fail to see the reason for the change. It is natural

for employees to view change, first from the perspective of

their own job security, and then from the needs of the

organization. Employee’s concern zone is limited to their

projects or working teams, and thus they fail to connect to

the big picture that the senior management is able to

envision.

Managers need to define the change for the employee in as

Save Earth, Go Green

Top reasons and remedies for employee

dissatisfaction during an organizational change:

Lack of a shared vision 1

much detail and as

early as possible.

Updates should also be

provided as things

develop and become

clearer. The reason or

rationale for change

must be passed to

every single employee

constantly and

consistently.

Employees should be

able to see the clear

objectives to be

achieved by the

company wide changes.

Along with the change, comes the team alignment shifts.

Employees may have new managers, new leadership, team

members, policies, processes, locations or alterations of

working hours.

Implementing change in an organization forces people to alter

how they relate to one another. Not only do their goals,

processes and equipments change but the way they deal with

others in the organization changes. It causes anxiety, which

leads to resistance to the change.

Lack of support, training and guidance 2

P7


One way to counter this is through communication and

education. The top management should instil the need of

change with frequent and early communication to the

employees. Managers should minimize uncertainties by

addressing the employee’s needs and talk about any fears

or concerns with the employees. They should educate their

employees to be “change-ready” as it serves two broad

purposes. First, it enhances employee’s understanding of

the organization’s business so that they comprehend both

where and why change is necessary. Second, education

provides employees with the necessary skills to implement

change.

Loss of direction 3

Often during a change, there is chaos and uncertainty

regarding the to-be policies and new processes. Old

policies may need to be replaced, while the new policies

and process are still not developed. This can cause

confusion in the mind of employees and they feel that

nobody is caring for them with respect to their self growth,

both in monetary and professional terms.

If senior managers can put these processes and new

structures into place early in the change process, the rest

of the change implementation will proceed more smoothly.

As a direct manager, it is important to empathize and

listen to your people so that you understand their fears and

work to address them.

Lack of employee participation 4

Often after the initial announcement of a big

organizational change, the senior management often delays

to present the ancillary plans. They might take a long time

to create a final structure which they think is more

appropriate for sharing with the employees. But a

prolonged roll-out can also exacerbate staff uncertainty

about the future; heighten anxiety, and lower morale. This

leads to a communication gap between them and the

employees, who feel that they do not have any say or

inputs in the supporting decisions. Faced with forced

change, many employees feel threatened and believe that

they will lose power, prestige, competence, and security.

They feel that the situation is beyond their control and

they fear the process.

Here, employee participation is necessary to keep them

engaged with the changes. Employees should be

encouraged to participate, as this will give them a sense of

ownership in the process. Involvement in formulating the

proposals to implement change as well as participation in the

task forces reduces the fear of the unknown and leads to

commitment.

Disengagement 5

Employees need to know what is expected of them. They need

to believe that their needs are important and their value is

acknowledged. They need to know how to contribute and

remain involved in organization.

Organizations cannot afford to lose their skilled employees by

causing them to disengage from the organizational changes.

Managers should do their part in keeping their employees

engaged and they should find projects which justify their skill

set and experience. Employees should not feel that their skills

and abilities have been devalued by the organization and

managers should provide meaningful work to all employees.

Weak leadership 6

To drive organizational change, one needs a very skilled and

matured set of leadership. Often it seems that people are

promoted on a criterion not at all related to the skills needed

to drive this change. This can be a serious mistake and can

jeopardize the organizational change efforts.

Serious consideration and thoughts should be given to the

drivers of these changes – the top management. They should

either have had extensive experience in handling such

changes or must have previously shown their capabilities in

such situations.

Indifference to the change and loss of productivity 7

When people are forced to embrace change or do not see any

benefits for them in the change, the quality of human capital

deteriorates. Highly energized employees start to lose their

passion and stop applying themselves to the process. They

become distracted and lose interest in their current work

responsibilities. Hence a very motivated employee becomes

an indifferent employee. In the worst-case scenario, the

valued employees leave the organization.

A rewards and awards programme is an important binder for

the change drive. An organization should properly

acknowledge and appreciate its people for their support for

change and constantly encourage them for their inputs in the

process and make sure that their voices are heard by the

senior management.

P8


It’s not only the change that people resist, but the

method of the organization’s change management.

Leaders need to identify the business imperative,

communicate the vision, establish the parameters, and

create a supportive environment with the employees so

they understand what is coming and what it means for

them.

As an employee, you have a choice. You can lie back and

have it thrust upon you, whether you like it or not, or

you can try to participate in that change and therefore

have an input into its design and outcomes, to move the

organization towards the goal.

Quiz

P9

By – Abhijit Bharatkumar

Answers to quiz – SYNERGY 4th Edition - http://www.pminorthindia.org/Synergy/Issue04/

1-b, 2-b, 3-d, 4-d, 5-d

No winner for fourth edition

To generate interest and increase the readership along with participation of members, Quiz has been

designed based on the articles published in this edition. To attempt and Win a prize, please read all articles

carefully. Do send your entries ([email protected]), support your SNERGY…

First 3

correct entries will

win a prize

References: Joanne Mowat, The Herridge Group – Managing Organizational Change F. John Reh – Managing Change: Managing People’s Fear

As a manager, you also have a choice. You can either be blind

to the various employee-perspective challenges that any form

of change management brings or alienate your employees, or

you may acknowledge and work together these human

components of the corporation to build a healthy and

profitable enterprise that best survives and flourishes in the

ambiguity of change.

Ms. Anju Agarwal Project Manager

Stryker, New Delhi

Anju has 13+ years of experience in IT. She has worked in various domains like Insurance Sector, Media Industry, Fleet Tracking and Medical Industry etc. Currently she is working as a Project Manager, responsible for designing and developing end to end IT solutions. She had worked in the technical role for more than 10 years and still cannot resist the temptation to fix errors in a team member’s code.

She is an MCA and a certified PMP. She is a passionate Project Manager, who would love to see a world where people acknowledge the work of PM's and would fully understand the significance of this role.

About Author

http://www.pminorthindia.org/Synergy/Issue04/

P10

Managing Complex Business Deliverables in Projects

A. I only B. I and II only C. I, II and III D. II and III only

Organizational Change – What’s in it for me?

Project Management Office – An Integrative Approach


Question 3 Which of the following is NOT a part of emotional intelligence?

Question 4 According to article, which of the

following is NOT a reason for employee dissatisfaction during

organizational change?

A. I only B. I and II only C. I, II and III D. II and III only

Question6 According to the article, which of the following is NOT a step that helped CDAC, Noida to achieve Capability Maturity Model Integration Level 5

index rating?

Question 5 Which of the following is usually NOT

a function of the Project Management Office (PMO)?

A. Understanding employee emotions B. Facility with words and languages C. Motivating employees and executing employee engagement D. Recognizing emotions in team members

A. Lack of a Shared Vision B. Lack of infrastructure C. Lack of Support, Training and Guidance D. Indifference to the change and Loss of Productivity

Question 1 Which of the following activities can be considered project management? I – Quality control of an automobile manufacturing plant II – Budget setting for the next financial year of a venture capital firm. III – Construction of a new tower for a cellular communications company

Question 2 Which of the following statements are true in regards to Risk Management? I – The risk register is the detail documentation of all risks associated to a particular project II – Risks always have a negative impact and not a positive one III – Risk Management is an active part in overall project management

A. Appointing the chief executive officer for the organization B. Providing expert judgement when required C. Act as a hub of central co-ordination of all projects D. Can also be responsible for direct management of a project

A. Appointing the chief executive officer for the organization B. Providing expert judgement when required C. Act as a hub of central co-ordination of all projects D. Can also be responsible for direct management of a project

5th Edition Quiz


Cash Flow Management in large Infrastructure Projects

Question 7 Which of the following is NOT an element of Cash

Flow Management

according to the article?

Rigidity to Agility - A Case Study

A. I – II – III – IV – V B. I – II – V – IV – III C. II – I – V – IV – III D. II – I – III – IV – V

Question 9 Which qualities one should imbibe

to adopt Agile?

A. Estimating costs of different packages B. Predicting the timing of cash outflow C. Generate product sales for required cash generation D. Monitor the actual cash outflow

Question 8 Accordingly to the article, some of the processes required for efficient management of funds are listed below. Please suggest the correct order. I - Identification of cost heads II - Calculate the Cash Outflow based on estimated cost III - Calculate the Cash Outflow based on actual ordered cost and scheduled progress IV - Prepare contingency plan to minimize the deviation V - Monitor the actual cash outflow

A. Transparency, Centre of Importance B. Truth, Honesty & Trust C. Being bossy, Me & Myself over team D. Lies, Dishonest & Distrust

A. 357,000 B. 412,000 C. 288,000 D. 734,000

Question 10 How many dollars did we save by saving man-hours in transforming to Agile?

By - Father of Nation -Mahatma Gandhi

Food for Thought

It’s easy to stand in the crowd but it takes courage to stand alone.

Mr. Abhijit Bharatkumar

Siemens, India

Abhijit is trained as a mechanical engineer from NIT, Bhopal

and works as an Executive in Siemens, specializing in Piping

& Plant design for the world's most efficient natural gas

based power-plant projects.

He has worked on projects in Germany, Oman and South

Korea, as well as several standardized power plants for

Siemens and has worked in India and Germany. Apart from

Project Management, his other interests include finance and

travelling.

About Author


Rigidity to Agility - A Case Study

By – Prashant Malhotra

technology, which is expanding multi-fold, there is always

a threat from new or existing competitors in the market.

Customer loyalty may start shifting and they would think

twice on buying your products if they get better bargains.

How does one survive in such an environment where you

need to produce better, faster & cheaper products?

Companies till now had formulated strategies to meet at

least one end of this triangle i.e. either by producing

cheaper products through mass production or outsourcing,

producing better products by investing in vendors &

employees etc. or by being ‘The First One’ to market. For

past couple of years, companies have been revisiting their

strategies as they could easily see the scope of meeting at

least two corners of the better-faster-cheaper triangle.

And with this, we saw the emergence of Agile

In IT world, everybody nowadays is talking about Agile. In

current scenario, if you don’t know Agile; people would see

you as if you have just arrived from 18th century. Agile has

many avatars and had been surviving in this world since

1950s. As this was the buzz word, we too wanted to be

AGILE by snapping of our fingers in our organization but

this was not sufficient. In order to transform ourselves into

agile, we first went through white pages, articles & blogs

by Agile Gurus. Then, to get a good grasp of the real

potential & contribution of Agile, we attended multiple

conferences, webinars too.

Our immediate manager showcased the potential of agile

to management and finally our management agreed upon

to do a pilot run. Below is a case study wherein, we would

like to present some facts as how our transformation to

agile improved our results.

A s the world grows leveraging the power of

History

The product roll-out used to happen once a year. Then as

competition grew; there arose a need to deliver the

product frequently and yet meeting the quality. The below

project management triangle always plays a role, no

matter what methodology you follow.

The product team had been working in waterfall methodology

for a century or so. From

application architects,

database administrators to

application developers,

testers & support

engineers; everyone

played a critical role at

various phases of the

project lifecycle.

Journey

The biggest task for anyone in adopting Agile was, is & will be

“Changing of Attitude from I, me & myself to We & Ours”.

Truth, Honesty & Trust are valued very high instead of hiding

key facts to remain center of importance or Mavericks.

With agile coming in, the focus was to equip all team

members with attitude as “Jack of All, Master of Some”.

Resources were encouraged to share the knowledge

overcoming their false loss of importance to product; as

transparency was the most important aspect. Fault

acceptance attitude was given more importance instead of

blame games. Walls were covered with Whiteboards that also

acted as status-boards to give a clear picture to everyone on

the progress & hurdles from letting the team move forward.

Each & every Enhancement Request that spanned across

multiple months was broken down to multiple tasks that could

be covered in least possible time. The bridge of trust was

built from both sides (Management & Team) as being a

product team and estimations were taken from team members

directly. The team members automatically turned personally

responsible & accountable for delivery. There were separate

tasks opened up for R & D which were earlier part of a feature

request. Buffer time which was one big culprit in any project

would now no longer exist either at management’s end or at

team’s end.

P12

Overhead by -Kumar Saurabh, PMP®

Project Management – lighter side

If you perceive that there are four possible ways in which a procedure can go wrong, and

circumvent these, then a fifth way will promptly develop.


Below depicting an old work flow using a waterfall method.

With agile coming into practice; the above cycle saw a

change. With newer approach, we broke the big features &

phases to smaller ones. As the deliverables became

smaller, quality team involvement commenced from

understanding the requirement till delivery. Many implicit

requirements that slipped through the cracks during design

& development phase were caught right up front and were

explicitly made part of overall scope.

Below is the diagram that depicts a smaller cycle as

compared to the entire phase.

New work flow

Old work flow

Results & Measure –

Good or excellent are qualitative attributes to a result of

task performed but these can be interpreted in different

scale & style from person to person as each has his or her

own definition or perspective. But if you show numbers

such as 3 out of 5, or let’s say if 4 out 5; people can easily

understand as good or excellent respectively.

So, no matter what you do, how good you do & even if it’s best

for you, your team or company; nothing counts or matters if

the results cannot be quantified. So, in order to measure as

what’s done now versus what’s done earlier; we started

analyzing data from our bug tracking software.

77%

23%

RootCause

Coding Error

Non Coding Error

58%

42%

RootCause

Coding Error

Non Coding Error

Earlier

Current

The above diagram clearly shows that there has been a

noticeable change between ‘Coding’ & ‘Non-Coding’ errors.

Non-Coding errors have increased by about 17%. When we

went deeper, we found that Requirements & Design errors had

increased quite a bit (as seen in the below diagram).

77%

5%

11%

7% RootCause

Coding Error

Enhancement Requests

Design Error

Requirements

58%

4%

21%

17%

Root Cause

Coding Error

Enhancement Request

Design Error

Requirements

Earlier

Current

This made us curious to understand the real root cause of

such a change in numbers.

Results

Results

P13


Upon analyzing, we came across that introduction of quality

/quality team member right in the beginning transformed

implicit requirements to explicit ones. Their way of looking

upon the functionality & technicality of a piece with the

entire system in background made the product owners &

designers revisit their work to incorporate every aspect

before handing over to the team to start off construction or

task.

The above results were something that we noticed in our

product delivery cycle in a one year period. The results may

depend & vary from product to product & service to service.

After the results were quantified, transforming these

numbers for management to comprehend was the next big

step. So, we thought of two ways through which we could

collate results in dollar value –

Saving of man hours to deliver workable software 1

We calculated & compared costs incurred in delivering the

software and we saved approximately 24% of man hours on

yearly-product cycle basis. Converting man hours into

dollars were put to management. In our case, we were

around 20 resources across the globe and if average

resource is $30 an hour; we saved approximately $288K for

this year.

Reducing the cost of fixing a bug

2

It is a well known fact that cost of fixing a defect at an

early stage is always lesser than at later stage as depicted

in the below diagram.

For this, we took numbers reported by bug tracking software

and approx cost of fixing a defect in various stages of SDLC.

To ease our calculations, below is the table that we can use

as reference point –

Requirement

Design

Development

Test

Customer

Time

$ d

ollars

500

450

400

350

300

250

200

150

100

0

SDLC Phase Cost of Fixing ($)

Requirements 100

Design 200

Development & Testing 300

Let’s assume that there total 100 bugs (earlier cycle &

newer cycle), so cost of fixing would come out to be –

SDLC Phase # of Bugs Cost ($) Total Cost

($)

Requirements 7 100 700

Design 16 200 3200

Development & Testing

77 300 23100

Grand Total ($) 27000

Old cycle

New cycle

SDLC Phase # of Bugs Cost ($) Total Cost

($)

Requirements 17 100 1700

Design 25 200 5000

Development & Testing

58 300 17400

Grand Total ($) 24100

From above calculations, its turns out that we saved approx

$2900 for every 100 bugs; the real figures would definitely

be on higher side in a highly evolving product cycle.

Time to market

3

Market growth is something we couldn’t really put into

dollar value but was easily accepted by our management.

Turning agile gave advantage to change our direction on

the fly based on market sentiments. We could now easily

maneuver to meet the ongoing changes in expectations of

customers. Customers were happy and ready to shell in

extra dollars as we helped them remain in competition by

using our fast evolving product.

P14


Food for Thought

Work is a means of living, it is not life itself.


The management saw the benefit and praised us and is

now buying in arguments easily on being agile, but we still

feel we have a long way to go as, still some features of

ours expand over months as partly delivered features

doesn’t add value to base product.

And obviously the other part is Reward. We got rewarded

by another product transformation which is bigger,

complicated.

Project Management Office --- An Integrative Approach

By – Shalu Gupta & R.T. Sundari

nerve of the any organization. Any project starts and ends

with PMO. In projects like infrastructure or product

development the right material used at the right time

constitute 70% of the project execution, where as in IT

projects Human resource utilization is the major that helps

the project delivery in time and within the budget. This

article highlights effective implementation and integrated

approach to PMO in organizations, by taking reference to

such practice adopted in CDAC, Noida.

Control Tower. It is therefore important to consult entire

stakeholders to implement PMO effectively within the

organization.

P roject Management Office (PMO) is the central

Integrative approach of PMO

PMO is constituted to help the project group to plan and

manage the project. The role of PMO should have an

integrated approach based on the nature of projects

running in the organization, be it, Weather Station or

The objective of the restructuring of PMO is to improve project

delivery in terms of schedule, budget and quality. To achieve

the objective we have selected the cross breed of Weather

Station and Control Tower.

Merge QA with PMO: 1

The first step taken was to merge the Quality Assurance (QA)

with PMO. While PMO sets the process and method for project

execution, QA becomes the watch dog in process adherence.

QA has dual responsibility of the project and process audit.

P15

Mr. Prashant Malhotra

Project Manager

Aspire Systems

Prashant has 12+ yrs of work experience in IT, having cross

functional experience in domain of CRM & CEM, HR (401K),

and Consultancy &Membership lifecycle. In addition to an

MBA from IIM Kozhikode in Finance & Operations, he is an

MCA; and currently working as a Project Manager delivering

end to end solutions. Building self propelled effective &

efficient teams is one of his mottos of life.

About Author

This product has more number of centers of development across

the globe as compared to current one.

With customized or hybrid approach, we have achieved such an

improvement; so the bigger question is, should we move

forward to pure agile? If yes, how much scope of improvisation

should we expect? Should we jump onto second product or

should we first transform the first product fully? Any input,

comment or response is more than welcome.


Project performance data and reports are collected by QA

using various innovative tools and submitted to PMO, who

manage the resource allocation and priority issues with the

help of data.

Stakeholder in Projects 2

The turf wars between PMO and project manager that

usually arise when the Control Tower PMO is implemented.

To minimize conflicting roles, the Program Managers are

brought into PMO fold to head the different project groups.

PMO become one of the stakeholders in all projects.

The existing structure consisted of groups organized around

technical groups like Health Informatics, e-Governance,

Language Technology and Embedded Systems. Project

teams were formed within these groups, who were

responsible for design, development, testing and

implementation. This resulted in more emphasis on coding

and little importance was given to design, testing and

documentation. A root cause analysis of the above problem

brought out that it can be solved only with the proper

restructuring of the existing system.

How we did it…

Accordingly a restructuring strategy was adopted by which

the existing groups were demolished paving way to creation

of four verticals viz. Implementation, Design, Development

and Testing. Due to this structure, the documentation has

become a MUST. It became a deliverable from one vertical

to the other.

•Code

•Unit Testing

•System Integration Testing

•HLD

•LLD

•SRS

•Client CR

Implementation Design

Development Testing

The Functional Organogram

Centralized Repository 1

The Centralized Repository of all project documents and

codes was created with PMO having an administrative

control. The baseline documents were uploaded in project

repository for the stakeholders to use. This enabled the

project managers to monitor the activity systematically. The

centralized repository helps in reducing the non-availability

of project related documents.

P16


Food for Thought

There is more to life than simply increasing its speed.

Implementation Team: Responsible for interaction with

the customers for understanding and freezing the

requirements. They prepare the Software Requirement

Specification (SRS) and submit it to the Design Team for

designing.

Design Team: Responsible for creating High Level Design

(HLD) and Low Level Design (LLD) and their review by the

Review Committee before they are handed over to the

Development Team.

Development Team: Responsible for Coding and Unit

Testing and generating Test Reports.

Testing Team: Responsible for System Integration testing

and generating Test Reports.


Coordination and Communication 2

Coordination and Communication between different

functional units were routed through PMO. Based on the

functional area, the new and existing projects got

registered in PMO after filling the project registration form.

Schedule and Cost Estimation 3

The projects schedule and cost were estimated based on

functional area and timeliness. As per estimation of

resources projects cost were segregated among different

functional areas. This helps PMO in monitoring the projects

by each functional area in terms of schedule, cost and

resource utilization.

Monitoring and Control 4

The processes carried out in the organization were

mentored by experts and trainings were provided to

functional area team members leading to effective

implementation of processes in the organization. PMO could

track and control all deliverables of projects.

Benefits achieved

The vertical functional group and horizontal project team of

matrix helped us to speed up our journey towards CMMI Level

5 and finally achieving it..!!

Some of the benefits obtained by restructuring and

implementation of PMO include:

Improvement of project management practices in the

organization.

Reduction in cost and schedule overrun by accurate

evaluation of the schedule and cost estimates.

Improved utilization of resources by centralized allocation

of manpower and resources.

Improved historical data collection for future projects by

better documentation processes.

Increased customer satisfaction through quality and timely

delivery of the projects.

P17

Ms. Shalu Gupta Senior Technical Officer

C-DAC,Noida

Ms. Shalu Gupta, is working as Sr. Technical Officer ’in C-DAC

Noida. She is PMP certified. She has nine years of experience

in software development. She has worked in the field of

NMS, SNMP, Optical comm., DSLAM OCR and Quality

Assurance. She has worked in various companies like C-DoT,

Wipro Technology and Flextronics Software Systems.

Currently she is associated with the Quality Assurance Group.

She has published 9 international and national research

papers. Her area of interest includes Software Quality

Assurance and Software Metrics.

About Author

R.T.Sundari is working as a consultant in C-DAC

Noida. She has a post graduation in management and

more than 30 years of experience in designing,

development, testing and quality assurance. She has

published 5 national research papers. She is currently

heading the PMO and Quality assurance division.

Ms.R. T. Sundari Consultant

C-DAC,Noida

About Author


Best Practice – Quality Assurance Maturity

By – Chetan Mathur

but indispensable component of Project Management.

Essentially comprising of three vital components, quality

management flows top-down within an organization’s

hierarchy. This approach helps project managers understand

customer’s requirements precisely and consistently deliver

the key results that stakeholders expect.

Let’s look at the three vital areas of quality management:

Defining the organization’s vision in terms of delivering

quality – Quality Policy.

Q uality Management is often considered an overhead,

Common scenarios in Quality Management

– Defect Seepage

Increased go to production time performing additional

testing to conform to quality standards.

Fewer adherences to quality assurance process, thereby

releasing products with defects in testing / control

stage.

Defect seepage data is neither maintained nor managed.

Increased Cost – Cost of Non Conformance.

Process definition and

implementation to ensure

deliveries meet their

objectives – Quality Assurance

Make sure the results of what

has been developed are what

was expected – Quality

Control.

Clearly visible, the key

differentiator between QA and

QC is that while QA is process

oriented, QC is product oriented.

It is not an uncommon scenario whereby delivery

organizations are recalling their products from the markets

months after they have been delivered, now at a huge cost

incur – The reason - They failed to implement Quality

Management as a matured process in its essence and failed

to capture and correct the defects internally.

Approximate 60-70% of the defects are being captured

at QC stage or even after release.

Only 30-40% of defects are being captured internally.

Common Root Cause Analysis for Defect Seepage

Inadequate base lined standards being followed

Unit / Component Development Standards

Development / Production best practices

Performance Productivity Baselines

Unstructured Change Management Procedure

Unstructured Reviews being performed

Work In Progress Reviews

Document Reviews – Including Requirements Work

plan, Requirements Analysis Documents, Enterprise

Analysis, Design, Test Plan & Logs

Review checklists not base lined across the Enterprise

and made available as Organizational process Assets.

P18


Food for Thought

Satisfaction lies in the effort, not in the attainment. Full effort is full victory.


Inadequate / Unstructured Testing performed:

Product Level unit testing

Integration testing

Regression / Negative testing

System Level Testing

Black / White Box Testing

Un-available / Un-structured Test Data.

Lack of detailed project planning

Project Reviews not defined / estimated.

Project re-work based upon reviews not defined /

estimated.

Others

Lack of organized team structure

Same resources shared across development &

testing teams.

Other than peer reviews, no cross team /

functional reviews performed

Others

Lack of documentation

Project Plans not being developed, reviewed,

approved and base lined.

Test Plans, Test Cases, Test Logs and Test Data

not developed, reviewed, approved and base

lined.

Configuration Management not implemented

across the projects.

15

12

16

9 10

8

12 10

8

0 2 4 6 8

10 12 14 16 18

Percentage Wise Pareto Analysis

Percentage Wise Pareto Analysis

Defect Level Pareto Chart

Best practices for QA maturity

Development standards to be a derivative of best practices

and industry standards.

Development standards should be base lined either across

enterprise or for a customer or across a vertical. This should

be done in order to.

Avoid conflicts during implementation.

Create synchronization between reviewer and

developer.

Optimum utilization of man-power.

Save duplicate work / repetition cost.

Formalize Change Management Procedure and make the

customer / Delivery teams / Vendor / Partner aware of the

same.

Formally Release Change Management procedure.

Conduct training sessions across stakeholder groups for

change management.

Track and report changes and change parameters.

Do Not Gold-Plate.

Structure & Formalize Reviews

Formally Release Review checklists for Component /

Unit and Document Reviews – Including Requirements

Work plan, Requirements Analysis Documents,

Enterprise Analysis, Design, Test Plan & Logs

Conduct training sessions across stakeholder groups for

necessity and usability of the checklists.

Track and report checklist compliance across projects.

Review teams to be

structured separately

than the development

teams.

Reviews & associated

Re-work to be estimated

and workforce managed

separately from

development.

Stages of reviews to be

planned including Peer,

Functional, Cross

Functional, Quality just

to name a few.

Have a “Review” Center

of Excellence in place.

P19


Structure & Formalize Testing

Requirement Traceability across all testing

stages to be maintained.

Test Plans, Test Cases, Test Data and Test Logs

to be reviewed and review logs maintained.

Automation testing tools to be used as far as

possible.

Testing teams to be structured separately than

the development teams.

Testing to be estimated and workforce managed

separately from development.

Have a “Testing” Center of Excellence in place.

Implement Release, Problem and Configuration

Management.

Develop Requirements Work Plan – Make sure no

requirements fall through the cracks. Maintain

Requirement Traceability across the life cycle of the

project.

Conclusion

Quality assurance (QA) consists of a means of monitoring the

engineering processes and methods used to ensure quality.

The purpose of Quality Assurance is to define and implement

the techniques, procedures, and methodologies that will be

used to assure timely delivery of the application / product

that meets specified requirements within project resources.

With a focus on improved Customer Satisfaction and

enhanced business opportunities, a matured QA process aims

at controlling defect seepage and enhancing the percentage

of defects detected internally before being released to

production to close to 80-90%.

An un-matured QA Process

A matured QA Process

35%

65%

Defected detected before being released to Production

Defects detected post Release

85%

15% Defected detected before being released to Production

Defects detected post Release

P20

Mr. Chetan Mathur Asst. Director - IT

Sistema Shyam Teleservices Limited (MTS

India)

Chetan has rich 16 years of experience in End to End Program Delivery. He is a certified PMP and is also certified on ITIL and eTOM best practices and a member of IIBA and is a nominated Champion by PMI India. He has managed and delivered various end to end projects and programs from RFP, Discovery, Due-diligence, Transition (KT, Shadowing, and Reverse Shadowing), Transformation (Analysis, Design, Development, Testing & Implementation) to Application Support & Maintenance phases.

Chetan has been managing large teams and multiple projects, ensuring deliveries are completed on time & within budget and in strict compliance with quality systems/procedures in an onsite offshore model.

About Author

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_engineering

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_engineering


Past Events:

25th

March’2012

13th

– 15th

April

Chapter Networking / Knowledge Sharing Event at Jaipur, Rajasthan

Rajasthan Chamber of Commerce & Industry Sukhadia Bhawan, M.I. Road, Jaipur

“21”

PDUs

“4”

PDUs

PMI Agile Certification Training Workshop

On 25 March, the chapter held “Project Management:

Infrastructure and IT Projects” in Jaipur, Rajasthan. In an

effort to conduct effective discussions on infrastructure

projects, the chapter invited senior officials of the Rajasthan

government. Mr. Vinod Garg, managing director, PROMAC,

commenced the event, followed by an address by Mr. Manoj

Gupta, president, PMI North India Chapter. Mr. Rakesh Verma,

IAS, principle secretary, Planning Department, Rajasthan

Government, was the chief guest and Mr. Atmaram Gupta,

chairman, Federation of Rajasthan Trade and Industries, was

the guest of honor.

Highly experienced Subject Matter Experts participated in a

panel discussion on “The Importance of Standard Practices for

Efficient and Effective Completion of Infrastructure

Projects.” The panelists were Mr. Mukund Joshi, chief

engineer, Central Public Works Department – North Zone - III;

Brig. Balbir Singh, additional command chief engineer,

Headquarters, South Western Command – Indian Army; Mr.

Puneet Mittal, managing director and CEO, Pratham Software;

Mr. Alok Ranjan, chairman, Indian Institute of Architects,

Jaipur Chapter; Mr. Tushar Sogani, secretary, Indian Institute of

Architects, Jaipur Chapter; and Dr. Vanita Ahuja, assistant

professor, Gautam Buddha University, Greater Noida. Mr

Hemant Seigell shared Risk Management Best Practices.

Panel Discussion

Chief Guest Welcome

The two and a half day training, conducted by Mr. Hiren Doshi, trainer, Practice Agile, served as a primer for those

involved in teams adopting agile techniques or those planning to take the PMI Agile Certified Practitioner (ACP)

examination.

Watch out this space for upcoming events. Be involved

Past One Year, Authors Felicitation






P22

SYNERGY First Edition SYNERGY Second Edition

SYNERGY Third Edition SYNERGY Fourth Edition

Mr. G Ravi Mr. Kumar Saurabh Mr. Nirmallya Kar Mr. Amit Tambi Mr. Maneesh Dutt Mr. Navin Das Ms. Archana Sharma Mr. Hemant Seigell Mr. Piyush Govil

We are grateful to you to nurture SYNERGY to 1 year old…

Mr. G Ravi Mr. Kumar Saurabh Mr. Nirmallya Kar Mr. Maneesh Dutt Ms. Pauline Jacqueline Mr. Prabhu Jha Mr. Tathagat Varma Mr. Hemant Seigell

Mr. Piyush Govil

Ms. Vidhi Singh Mr. Vikas Dua Mr. Chetan Mathur Mr. Hemant Seigell Ms. Pauline Jacqueline Mr. Suhail Qadir Mr. Anshul Chetal Mr. Kumar Saurabh

Mr. Piyush Govil

Mr. Prashant Malhotra Mr. Vikas Dua Mr. Chetan Mathur Mr. Asim Prasad Mr. Arun Gupta Mr. Abhijit Bharatkumar Ms. Vanita Ahuja Mr. Kumar Saurabh

Mr. Piyush Govil

Previous Editions

Special thanks to Mr. Pritam Gautam – VP Technology - PMINIC for publishing every edition on Chapter Website.






Editorial Team

Piyush Govil Manoj Gupta Kumar Saurabh Nirmallya Kar

Hemant Seigell Abhijit B Kumar Jitin Bindlish

Felix George Pooja Kapoor Nitin M Singh Prashant Malhotra


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