Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
7.5 Different Project Plans
While full life cycle development projects prepare several plans, especially in
large projects, we limit our discussion here to the plans relevant to requirements
management. They are:
1. SPMP—Software Project Management Plan—this is the primary project plan
and is referred to by many names including Software Project Plan, Software
Development Plan, and Project Plan etc. This is the top level plan for a project
and all other plans are subordinate to this plan. Other plans are spawned into
separate documents only if the project is very large and deserves a separate plan
for each of the other aspects of project management.
2. SCMP—Software Configuration Management Plan—this plan would include
all activities focused on ensuring the integrity of all the code artifacts and
information artifacts as well as controlling the changes to the artifacts that are
subjected to the rigor of the organizational configuration management process.
3. SQAP—Software Quality Assurance Plan—this plan would include all activ-
ities focused on ensuring that quality is built into all the project deliverables.
They include the quality control activities of verification and validation besides
various processes, procedures, standards, guidelines, formats, templates and
checklists selected for use in the project.
4. Induction Training Plan—this plan would include all activities focused on
bringing newly allocated human resources up to speed quickly on the project. It
includes the required topics of training for each role, duration for each topic, the
methodology of imparting the training, faculty specifications, evaluation of the
feedback received from the completed training programs and so on.
5. Project Schedule—this is a PERT/CPM (Program Evaluation and Review
Technique/Critical path Method) based project schedule. It will include all the
activities that need to be completed in order to execute and complete the
proposed project. It will contain the sequence in which the activities need to be
performed as well as the sets of activities that can be performed concurrently
and those that need to be performed sequentially.
There are other plans like the implementation plan, master data creation plan,
deployment plan, end user training plan, system changeover plan, software
maintenance plan and so on that are used in especially large projects. But the five
plans discussed above are most frequently used in the management of project
requirements. Therefore, I have not delved deep into the details of the remaining
plans.
Project planning is a large subject in itself and to cover it comprehensively is
beyond the scope of this topic. I have included sparse material about planning here
as a prelude to planning activities relevant to the management of project
requirements. Interested readers are advised to refer to ''Mastering Software
Project Management: Best Practices, Tools and Techniques'' referred to earlier in
this topic.
Search WWH ::
Custom Search