IT Buzz Overview

Editor's Notes

• #2: On behalf of CAI we would like to welcome everyone to today's webinar of ITBuzzITBuzz brings Visibility, Control, and Optimization to your IT organization
• #3: Today's presenter is Dave Smith. ITBuzz Product Manager, CAI.My name is Markian Fedoriw and I am the facilitator of the ITBuzz webinar series. You will be able to hear Daveand myself as panelists but as a reminder, all other audio lines have been muted. Dave Smith is a senior technology executive at CAI with 25 years of experience leading complex, challenging IT initiatives for industry-leading firms and Fortune 500 client companies. He specializes in the design, development, and launch of technology solutions and processes. ITBuzz was developed by CAI. CAI is a global IT services and outsourcing firm that is currently managing active engagements with over 100 fortune 1000 companies and government agencies around the world. CAI is delighted to present ITBuzz and we are looking forward to a productive and informative webinar.At this point, we are ready to begin today’s webinar. Dave, please proceed.
• #5: <Read questions>I asked these questions because most managers can relate to them.Why is that?Because it has happened to us all.<Click>The answers to these questions are indicative if you will be successful
• #6: I asked these questions as a setup to my background story….Well, we began to answer “Yes” to these questions<Click>We were beginning to make mistakesWe needed to quickly get a communications, visibility, and enforcement system in place<Click>This led us to create a system for projects we callAPO (Automated Project Office)We implemented APO internally<Click>We then saw commercial viability and began installing this for clientsOur clients saw a need for visibility, control, and optimization beyond just projects and this led us to create ITBuzz
• #9: Portfolio Management. This establishes standard criteria for evaluating proposals making it easier to compare projects on an apples-to-apples basis. It ensures that all work is authorized, valuable, aligned, and balanced.
• #10: Automated Project Office. Ensures that the project’s cost, scope, schedule and risk profile are fully developed, documented and agreed upon by all stakeholders before development starts. You can verify that the project plan is feasible from the point of view of the team charged with the work.
• #11: Service Management. Service Management provides oversight of the IT products and services deployed to support the day-to-day operations of your business. It monitors performance, stability, conformance to service level commitments, fit-for-purpose and helps track end user satisfaction.
• #12: Results Management. Find out how your projects performed. Did you deliver on time and on budget? Did you deliver all the functionality that was expected? Did the project result in a high quality solution?
• #13: Capability Management. Leverage experience on concluded projects to refine your formal processes for future projects. This includes processes for estimating the work required, managing the risks, controlling scope, handling communications.
• #42: Return to the 5-domain model and focus now on Portfolio Management
• #43: We have a couple of scenarios to considerA periodic planning cycle, such as quarterly or annually where we select those projects that need to move forward in the next budgetary cycle.Handling a new opportunity when the portfolio is full
• #44: Proposal submitted via a plugin or input from client infrastructureProposed Project NamePurpose of the ProjectProblem solved or opportunity exploitedEstimated Cost (Build & Maintain)Estimated Benefit (Financial & Non-Financial)Strategic Business AlignmentRisks and Rewards
• #45: With respect to Cost, we need to identify the total cost of ownership – not just the build cost. So we must consider the expected product life and the annual support cost. These need to discounted back to the current day. Similarly we need to know the financial benefit (Costs displaced and revenues or other ‘value’ established over the same time frame and similarly discounted)
• #46: Monitor project for conformance to CSSQ plus other factors that contributed to the selection of this project in the first placeNeed to take into account the sunk cost when deciding whether or not to kill the projectMonitor Business imperatives for impact on inflight projects
• #47: Need to validate the cost/revenue and business alignment claims through peer reviews (conducted through AMI assessments)
• #48: Once we have completed the peer reviews for all candidate projects we chart them in a number of different fashions.In chart on far right, any projects that fall below the diagonal have a negative ROI making them candidates for rejection. Similarly for the charts in the center chart, the projects in the ‘red’ square have low business alignment and low probability of success. All other things being equal, these too are candidates for elimination
• #49: Earlier we needed to know the total cost of ownership which included both the build costs for a new product as well as the annual support cost. Now were are really only concerned with the build cost, but need it in terms of the various resources that will be consumed. So, how many developer hours are required and how many project manager hours, etc.(We also need to know how much additional non-labour cost exists)
• #50: OK, so we are ready to decide which projects to authorize for the next planning period.In this example we are assuming that planning is done on a quarterly basis.Here we show two inflight projects that are expected to continue into third quarter.We also see some ongoing support activities that will continue throughout third quarter and into the future<click> So which projects do we authorized?We note that there are two projects that have been deemed mandatory for some reason or another.For example, they may be required for government reporting purposesSo we need them<click>
• #51: This is the meat and potatoes of PPMThere are three primary capacity constraints to be considered when deciding which projects to implement: money, people and plant. How much non-labour capital is available for new projects? How much capacity do we have in terms of architects, developers, data base administrators, technical writers, testers and project managers? And finally, how much capacity do we have in our server farms, mainframes (yes, they’re still out there) and telecomm infrastructure?Resource Planning People are the most critical, and generally the most expensive resource and so we need to deploy them to maximal advantage.Before we can consider what projects we can implement we must adjust our capacity by three factors:Support commitmentsMandatory ProjectsInflight ProjectsSupport for the business usually comes first and so this bandwidth is not available for new project work – except perhaps in extraordinary circumstances. Many personnel with support responsibility are dedicated to that task but others come to the tiller when needed. This will pre-empt their other development activities. We need to plan for and expected level of such interruptions and reduce our capacity accordingly As we have seen, some projects are mandatory, imposed on the IT organization out of necessity, by management whim or fiat or by government dictate. The resources needed to perform those projects must be subtracted from our discretionary pool. Finally, some of our people are already tied up on projects that are carry-overs from previous planning cycles. Once again we need to reduce our capacity by these requirements. There may be a case to be made in some circumstances for winding those other projects early or placing them on hold so as to redeploy the resources to new projects. More about that option later. OK, so now we have reduced our staff’s capacity by support, activities, mandatory projects and inflight projects. Hopefully there is some left for our new projects.
• #52: So how do we move forward?There are two basic approaches. The first is to use some form optimization algorithm to have the computer solve the problem for us. Here we need to formulate and “Objective Function”, such as Maximize ROI and a set of constraints (e.g. total developer hours for the selected projects cannot exceed the developer capacity, and so on for all resources)Alternatively we can pursue a process of trial-and-error. Add and select projects and see the impact on resources and portfoliosIn practice, one would probably start with an optimized solution as a starting point and then adjust manually as necessary to allow for factors not covered by the optimization algorithm
• #53: EgalitarianismMay want to ensure that all departments are supported equally and the all the resources are not hogged by Marketing, say.
• #54: We might also want to ensure that we invest in a balance of strategic and operational projects, and perhaps, that some monies are invested in move the company into new markets.
• #55: When you manually adjust the—so called—optimal solution and end up with a higher value solution, you will inevitably have violated one or more constraints.This is not necessarily a bad thing. It allows us to identify areas for additional staffing, retraining and/or outsourcing (assuming a staffing constraint was violated)
• #56: OK, so we are ready to decide which projects to authorize for the next planning period.In this example we are assuming that planning is done on a quarterly basis.Here we show two inflight projects that are expected to continue into third quarter.We also see some ongoing support activities that will continue throughout third quarter and into the future<click> So which projects do we authorized?We note that there are two projects that have been deemed mandatory for some reason or another.For example, they may be required for government reporting purposesSo we need them<click>
• #59: Monitor project for conformance to CSSQ plus other factors that contributed to the selection of this project in the first placeNeed to take into account the sunk cost when deciding whether or not to kill the projectMonitor Business imperatives for impact on inflight projects
• #60: Alternative are to:Cancel existing project(s) or throttle them back in order to staff the new porject.
• #61: Alternative are to:Cancel existing project(s) or throttle them back in order to staff the new porject.