Unit-3

Managing Software Projects

Topics to be Covered
Looping
➢W5 of Project Management
➢Software Metrics
▪ Process, Product and Project Metrics
➢Software Project Estimations
➢Software Project Planning (MS Project Tool)
➢Project Scheduling and Tracking
➢Risk Analysis and Management
➢Risk Identification
➢Risk Projection
➢Risk Refinement
➢Risk Mitigation
Software Project Management
W5HH of Project Management
Boehm suggests an approach (W5HH) that addresses project objectives, milestones and
schedules, responsibilities, management and technical approaches, and required
resources
Why is the system being developed?
Enables all parties to assess the validity of business reasons for the software work. In another words
- does the business purpose justify the expenditure of people, time, and money?

What will be done?

The answers to these questions help the team to establish a project schedule by identifying key
project tasks and the milestones that are required by the customer

When will it be accomplished?

Project schedule to achieve milestone
W5HH of Project Management Cont.
Who is responsible?
Role and responsibility of each member

Where are they organizationally located?

Customer, end user and other stakeholders also have responsibility

How will the job be done technically and managerially?

Management and technical strategy must be defined

How much of each resource is needed?

Develop estimation

W5HH
It is applicable regardless of size or complexity of software project
Terminologies
• Measure ➢Indirect Metrics
• It provides a quantitative indication of the ➢ Aspects that are not immediately quantifiable
extent (range), amount, dimension, capacity ➢ Ex., Functionality, Quantity, Reliability
or size of some attributes of a product or
process ➢Indicators
• Ex., the number of uncovered errors ➢ It is a metric or combination of metrics that
provides insight into the software process, project
• Metrics or the product itself
• It is a quantitative measure of the degree ➢ It enables the project manager or software
(limit) to which a system, component or engineers to adjust the process, the project or the
process possesses (obtain) a given attribute product to make things better
• It relates individual measures in some way ➢ Ex., Product Size (analysis and specification
• Ex., number of errors found per review metrics) is an indicator of increased coding,
• Direct Metrics integration and testing effort
• Immediately measurable attributes ➢Faults
• Ex., Line of Code (LOC), Execution Speed, ➢ Errors - Faults found by the practitioners during
Defects Reported software development
➢ Defects - Faults found by the customers after
release
Why Measure Software?
1 To determine (to define) quality of a product or process.
2 To predict qualities of a product or process.
3 To improve quality of a product or process.
Metric Classification Base
• Process
• Specifies activities related to production of software.
• Specifies the abstract set of activities that should be performed to go from user needs to final
product.
• Project
• Software development work in which a software process is used
• The actual act of executing the activities for some specific user needs
• Product
• The outcomes of a software project
• All the outputs that are produced while the activities are being executed
Process Metrics We measure the effectiveness of a process
• Process Metrics are an invaluable tool for by deriving a set of metrics based on
companies to monitor, evaluate and improve outcomes of the process such as,
their operational performance across the
enterprise
Errors uncovered before release of the software
• They are used for making strategic decisions
• Process Metrics are collected across all Defects delivered to and reported by the end users
projects and over long periods of time Work products delivered
• Their intent is to provide a set of process
indicators that lead to long-term software Human effort expended
process improvement Calendar time expended

Conformance to the schedule

Ex., Defect Removal Efficiency (DRE) metric
Relationship between errors (E) and defects (D) Time and effort to complete each generic activity
The ideal is a DRE of 1
DRE = E / ( E + D )
Project Metrics
• Project metrics enable a software project manager to,
• Assess the status of an ongoing project
• Track potential risks
• Uncover problem areas before their status becomes critical
• Adjust work flow or tasks
• Evaluate the project team’s ability to control quality of software work products
• Many of the same metrics are used in both the process and project domain
• Project metrics are used for making tactical (smart) decisions
• They are used to adapt project workflow and technical activities
• Project metrics are used to
• Minimize the development schedule by making the adjustments necessary to avoid delays and
mitigate (to reduce) potential (probable) problems and risks
• Assess (evaluates) product quality on an ongoing basis and guides to modify the technical
approach to improve quality
Product Metrics
• Product metrics help software engineers to gain insight into the design and construction
of the software they build
• By focusing on specific, measurable attributes of software engineering work
products
• Product metrics provide a basis from which analysis, design, coding and testing can be
conducted more objectively and assessed more quantitatively
• Ex., Code Complexity Metric
Types of Measures
Categories of Software Measurement Software Measurement
Direct measures of the Indirect measures of the Metrics for Software
Software process Software product Cost and Effort estimations
Ex., cost, effort, etc. Ex. functionality, quality, Size Oriented Metrics
complexity, efficiency,
Software product
reliability, etc. Function Oriented Metrics
Ex., lines of code produced,
execution speed, Object Oriented Metrics
defects reported, etc.
Use Case Oriented Metrics
Size-Oriented Metrics
• Derived by normalizing (standardizing) quality and/or productivity measures by
considering the size of the software produced
• Thousand lines of code (KLOC) are often chosen as the normalization value
A set of simple size-oriented metrics can  Size-oriented metrics are not universally accepted as
be developed for each project the best way to measure the software process
Errors per KLOC (thousand lines of code)
Defects per KLOC $ per KLOC Opponents argue that KLOC measurements
Pages of documentation per KLOC Are dependent on the programming language
In addition, other interesting metrics can Penalize well-designed but short programs
be computed, like Cannot easily accommodate nonprocedural languages
Errors per person-month Require a level of detail that may be difficult to achieve
KLOC per person-month
$ per page of documentation
Function Oriented Metrics
• Function-oriented metrics use a measure of the functionality delivered by the application as a
normalization value
• Most widely used metric of this type is the Function Point
• FP = Count Total * [0.65 + 0.01 * Sum (Value Adjustment Factors)]
• Function Point values on past projects can be used to compute,
• for example, the average number of lines of code per function point
• Advantages
• FP is programming language independent
• FP is based on data that are more likely to be known in the early stages of a project, making it
more attractive as an estimation approach
• Disadvantages
• FP requires some “sleight of hand” because the computation is based on subjective data
• Counts of the information domain can be difficult to collect
• FP has no direct physical meaning, it’s just a number
Object-Oriented Metrics Use Case Oriented Metrics
• Conventional software project metrics  Like FP, the use case is defined early in the
(LOC or FP) can be used to estimate software process, allowing it to be used for
object-oriented software projects estimation before significant (valuable)
modeling and construction activities are
• However, these metrics do not provide initiated
enough granularity (detailing) for the
schedule and effort adjustments that  Use cases describe (indirectly, at least) user-
visible functions and features that are basic
are required as you iterate through an requirements for a system
evolutionary or incremental process
 The use case is independent of programming
• Lorenz and Kidd suggest the following language, because use cases can be created at
set of metrics for OO projects vastly different levels of abstraction, there is no
• Number of scenario scripts standard “size” for a use case
• Number of key classes (the highly  Without a standard measure of what a use case
independent components)
is, its application as a normalization measure is
• Number of support classes suspect (doubtful).
 Ex., effort expended / use case
Function Point Metrics
• The function point (FP) metric User / Event
can be used effectively as a
means for measuring the
functionality delivered by a Other
User / Event external Applications
system inquiries (EQs)
• Using historical data, the FP
metric can be used to external
external interface
• Estimate the cost or effort required inputs (EIs)
files (EIFs)
to design, code, and test the
software
• Predict the number of errors that external
will be encountered during testing outputs (EOs) Internal
• Forecast the number of Logic Files
components and/or the number of
projected source lines in the
implemented system Function / Application
Function Point Components Cont.
Information domain values (components) are defined in the following manner
• Number of external inputs (EIs)
• input data originates from a user or is transmitted from another application
• Number of external outputs (EOs)
• external output is derived data within the application that provides information to the user
• output refers to reports, screens, error messages, etc.
• Number of external inquiries (EQs)
• external inquiry is defined as an online input that results in the generation of some immediate
software response in the form of an online output
• Number of internal logical files (ILFs)
• internal logical file is a logical grouping of data that resides within the application’s boundary and is
maintained via external inputs
• Number of external interface files (EIFs)
• external interface file is a logical grouping of data that resides external to the application but
provides information that may be of use to the another application
Compute Function Points
Value Adjustment Factors
FP = Count Total * [ 0.65 + 0.01 * ∑(Fi) ]
• F1. Data Communication
Count Total is the sum of all FP entries • F2. Distributed Data Processing
• F3. Performance
Fi (i=1 to 14) are complexity value adjustment factors (VAF).
• F4. Heavily Used Configuration
Value adjustment factors are used to provide an indication of problem
• F5. Transaction Role
complexity • F6. Online Data Entry
• F7. End-User Efficiency
• F8. Online Update
• F9. Complex Processing
• F10. Reusability
• F11. Installation Ease
• F12. Operational Ease
• F13. Multiple Sites
• F14. Facilitate Change
Function Point Calculation Example
Used Adjustment
Factors and assumed
values are,
F09. Complex internal
processing = 3
F10. Code to be reusable =
2
F03. High performance = 4

FP = Count Total * [ 0.65 + 0.01 * ∑(Fi) ] F13. Multiple sites = 3

F02. Distributed
FP = [50]* [0.65 + 0.01 * 17]
processing = 5
FP = [50]* [0.65 + 0.17]
Project Adjustment
FP = [50]* [0.82] = 41 Factor (VAF) = 17
Function Point Calculation Example 2
Study of requirement specification
for a project has produced following
results 7 28
10 40
6 18
Need for 7 inputs, 10 outputs, 6
inquiries, 17 files and 4 external 17 119
interfaces 4 28
233
Input and external interface
function point attributes are of
Value adjustment factors (VAF) = 32 given
average complexity and all other
function points attributes are of low
complexity FP = Count Total * [ 0.65 + 0.01 * ∑(Fi) ]
= 233 * [ 0.65 + 0.01 * 32]
Determine adjusted function points
assuming complexity adjustment = 233 * 0.97 = 226.01
value is 32.
Software Project Estimation
To achieve reliable cost and effort estimates, a number of options arise:
• Delay estimation until late in the project (obviously, we can
achieve 100 percent accurate estimates after the project is
complete!)
• Base estimates on similar projects that have already been
completed
• Use relatively simple decomposition techniques to generate
project cost and effort estimates
It can be transformed • Use one or more empirical models for software cost and
from a black art to a effort estimation.
series of systematic
steps that provide
estimates with
acceptable risk
Software Project Decomposing
• Software project estimation is a form of problem solving and in most cases, the
problem to be solved is too complex to be considered in one piece
• For this reason, decomposing the problem, re-characterizing it as a set of smaller
problems is required
• Before an estimate can be made, the project planner must understand the scope
of the software to be built and must generate an estimate of its “size”
Decomposition Techniques

1. Software Sizing 3. Process based Estimation

2. Problem based Estimation 4. Estimation with Use-cases
LOC (Lines of Code) based,
FP (Function Point) based
Software Sizing
Putnam and Myers suggest four different approaches to the sizing problem

• “Fuzzy logic” sizing

• This approach uses the approximate reasoning techniques that are the cornerstone of
fuzzy logic.
• Function Point sizing
• The planner develops estimates of the information domain characteristics
• Standard Component sizing
• Estimate the number of occurrences of each standard component
• Use historical project data to determine the delivered LOC size per standard component.
• Change sizing
• Used when changes are being made to existing software
• Estimate the number and type of modifications that must be accomplished
• An effort ratio is then used to estimate each type of change and the size of the change
Problem Based Estimation
• Start with a bounded statement of scope
• Decompose the software into problem functions that can each be estimated
individually
• Compute an LOC or FP value for each function
• Derive cost or effort estimates by applying the LOC or FP values to your baseline
productivity metrics
• Ex., LOC/person-month or FP/person-month
• Combine function estimates to produce an overall estimate for the entire project
• In general, the LOC/pm and FP/pm metrics should be computed by project domain
• Important factors are team size, application area and complexity
Problem Based Estimation Cont.
• LOC and FP estimation differ in the level of detail required for decomposition
with each value
• For LOC, decomposition of functions is essential and should go into considerable detail (the
more detail, the more accurate the estimate)
• For FP, decomposition occurs for the five information domain characteristics and the 14
adjustment factors
• External Inputs, External Outputs, External Inquiries, Internal Logical Files, External Interface Files
• For both approaches, the planner uses lessons learned to estimate,
• An optimistic (Sopt), most likely (Sm), and pessimistic (Spess) estimates Size (S) value for
each function or count
• Then the expected
Historical LOCSize
orvalue S isiscomputed
FP data as
then compared to S in order to cross-check it.
• S = (Sopt + 4 Sm + Spess)/6
Process Based Estimation
• This is one of the most commonly used technique
Process-based estimation is
• Identify the set of functions that the software needs to perform as
obtained from “process obtained from the project scope
framework” • Identify the series of framework activities that need to be performed
for each function
Framework Activities
Frame • Estimate the effort (in person months) that will be required to
accomplish each software process activity for each function
• Apply average labor rates (i.e., cost/unit effort) to the effort
Effort required to estimated for each process activity
Application
Functions

accomplish • Compute the total cost and effort for each function and each
each framework framework activity.
activity for each • Compare the resulting values to those obtained by way of the LOC
application and FP estimates
function • If both sets of estimates agree, then your numbers are highly reliable
• Otherwise, conduct further investigation and analysis concerning the
function and activity breakdown
Estimation with Use Cases
Developing an estimation approach with use  Before use cases can be used for estimation,
cases is problematic for the following reasons:  the level within the structural hierarchy is
• Use cases are described using many different established,
formats and styles—there is no standard form.  the average length (in pages) of each use
case is determined,
• Use cases represent an external view (the
user’s view) of the software and can therefore  the type of software (e.g., real-time,
be written at many different levels of business, engineering/scientific, WebApp,
abstraction embedded) is defined, and
 a rough architecture for the system is
• Use cases do not address the complexity of the considered
functions and features that are described
 Once these characteristics are established,
• Use cases can describe complex behavior (Ex.,
interactions) that involve many functions and  empirical data may be used to establish the
features estimated number of LOC or FP per use
case (for each level of the hierarchy).
• Although a number of investigators have
considered use cases as an estimation input.  Historical data are then used to compute the
effort required to develop the system.
Empirical Estimation Models
Source Lines of Code (SLOC)

• The project size helps to determine the resources,

effort, and duration of the project.
• SLOC is defined as the Source Lines of Code that are
delivered as part of the product
• The effort spent on creating the SLOC is expressed in
relation to thousand lines of code (KLOC)
Source Lines of Code (SLOC) • This technique includes the calculation of Lines of
Code, Documentation of Pages, Inputs, Outputs, and
Function Point (FP) Components of a software program
• The SLOC technique is language-dependent
Constructive Cost Model
(COCOMO) • The effort required to calculate SLOC may not be the
same for all languages
Software Development Project Based on the development complexity

Software Development Project Classification

Organic Semidetached Embedded

Application programs Utility programs System programs

e.g. data processing programs e.g Compilers, linkers e.g OS real-time systems
A development project can be A development project can be A development project is
considered of organic type, if considered of semidetached type, considered to be of embedded
the project deals with if the development consists of a type, if the software being
developing a well understood mixture of experienced & developed is strongly coupled
application program, the size inexperienced staff. Team to complex hardware, or if the
of the development team is members may have limited strict regulations on the
reasonably small, and the team experience on related systems but operational procedures exist
members are experienced in may be unfamiliar with some
developing similar types of aspects of the system being
projects developed.
Software Development Project Cont.

Not Tight Dead Line

Little Innovation
Project Development
Model Size Nature of Project Environment
Organic Typically Small Size Project, Experienced developers in
Familiar &
2-50 the familiar environment, E.g. Payroll,
In-house
KLOC Inventory projects etc.
Semi Typically Medium Size Project, Medium Size Team,

Medium

Medium
Detached 50-300 Average Previous Experience, e.g. Utility Medium
KLOC Systems like Compilers, Database Systems,
editors etc.
Complex hardware &
Embedded Typically Large Project, Real Time Systems, Complex

Significant

Tight
Required
Over 300 interfaces, very little previous Experience. E.g. customer Interfaces
KLOC ATMs, Air Traffic Controls
COCOMO Model Basic COCOMO Model
The basic COCOMO model gives an approximate estimate of the project parameters
COCOMO (Constructive
Cost Estimation Model) The basic COCOMO estimation model is given by the following expressions
was proposed by 𝑬𝒇𝒇𝒐𝒓𝒕 = 𝑎1 + 𝐾𝐿𝑂𝐶 𝑎2
𝑃𝑀 𝑻𝒅𝒆𝒗 = 𝑏1 × 𝐸𝑓𝑓𝑜𝑟𝑡 𝑏2
𝑀𝑜𝑛𝑡ℎ𝑠
Boehm
• KLOC is the estimated size of the software product expressed in Kilo Lines of Code
• a1, a2, b1, b2 are constants for each category of software products,
According to Boehm, • Tdev is the estimated time to develop the software, expressed in months,
software cost estimation • Effort is the total effort required to develop the software product, expressed in
person months (PMs).
should be done through
three stages: Project a1 a2 b1 b2
Basic COCOMO Organic 2.4 1.05 2.5 0.38
Semidetached 3.0 1.12 2.5 0.35
Intermediate COCOMO
Embedded 3.6 1.20 2.5 0.32
Complete COCOMO
Basic COCOMO Model Cont.
• The effort estimation is expressed in units of person-months (PM)
• It is the area under the person-month plot (as shown in fig.)
• An effort of 100 PM
• does not imply that 100 persons should work for 1 month
• does not imply that 1 person should be employed for 100 months
• it denotes the area under the person-month curve (fig.)
• Every line of source text should be calculated as one LOC irrespective of the actual
number of instructions on that line
• If a single instruction spans several lines (say n lines), it is considered to be nLOC
• The values of a1, a2, b1, b2 for different categories of products (i.e. organic,
semidetached, and embedded) as given by Boehm
• He derived the expressions by examining historical data collected from a large number
of actual projects
Basic COCOMO Model Cont.
• Insight into the basic COCOMO model can be obtained by plotting the
estimated characteristics for different software sizes
• Fig.1 shows a plot of estimated effort versus product size
• From fig. we can observe that the effort is somewhat superlinear in the
size of the software product
• The effort required to develop a product increases very rapidly with
project size Fig. 1
• The development time versus the product size in KLOC is plotted in fig. 2
• From fig., it can be observed that the development time is a sublinear
function of the size of the product
• i.e. when the size of the product increases by two times, the time to
develop the product does not double but rises moderately
Fig. 2
• From fig., it can be observed that the development time is roughly the
same for all the three categories of products
Basic COCOMO Model Cont.
• Effort and the duration estimations obtained using the COCOMO model are called
as nominal effort estimate and nominal duration estimate
• The term nominal implies that
• if anyone tries to complete the project in a time shorter than the estimated duration, then
the cost will increase drastically
• But, if anyone completes the project over a longer period of time than the estimated, then
there is almost no decrease in the estimated cost value
Example: Assume that the size of an organic type software product has been estimated to be 32,000 lines of
source code. Assume that the average salary of software engineers be Rs. 15,000/- per month. Determine the
effort required to develop the software product and the nominal development time
𝑬𝒇𝒇𝒐𝒓𝒕 = 𝑎1 + 𝐾𝐿𝑂𝐶 𝑎2 𝑃𝑀 𝑻𝒅𝒆𝒗 = 𝑏1 × 𝐸𝑓𝑓𝑜𝑟𝑡 𝑏2 𝑀𝑜𝑛𝑡ℎ𝑠
= 2.4 + 32 1.05 𝑃𝑀 = 2.5 × 91 0.38 𝑀𝑜𝑛𝑡ℎ𝑠
= 91 𝑃𝑀 = 14 𝑀𝑜𝑛𝑡ℎ𝑠
Cost required to develop the product = 14 x 15000 = Rs. 2,10,000/-
Intermediate COCOMO model
• The basic COCOMO model assumes that effort and development time are functions of
the product size alone
• However, a host of other project parameters besides the product size affect the effort
required to develop the product as well as the development time
• Therefore, in order to obtain an accurate estimation of the effort and project duration,
the effect of all relevant parameters must be taken into account
• The intermediate COCOMO model recognizes this fact and refines the initial estimate
obtained using the basic COCOMO expressions by using a set of 15 cost drivers
(multipliers) based on various attributes of software development
• For example, if modern programming practices are used, the initial estimates are scaled downward
by multiplication with a cost driver having a value less than 1
• It is requires the project manager to rate these 15 different parameters for a particular
project on a scale of one to three.
• Then, depending on these ratings, appropriate cost driver values which should be
multiplied with the initial estimate obtained using the basic COCOMO.
Intermediate COCOMO model Cont.
The cost drivers can be classified as being attributes of the following items
• Product: The characteristics of the product that are considered include the
inherent complexity of the product, reliability requirements of the product, etc.
• Computer: Characteristics of the computer that are considered include the
execution speed required, storage space required etc.
• Personnel: The attributes of development personnel that are considered include
the experience level of personnel, programming capability, analysis capability, etc.
• Development Environment: Development environment attributes capture the
development facilities available to the developers. An important parameter that is
considered is the sophistication of the automation (CASE) tools used for software
development
Complete COCOMO model
• A major shortcoming of both the basic and intermediate COCOMO models is that
they consider a software product as a single homogeneous entity
• Most large systems are made up several smaller sub-systems
• These sub-systems may have widely different characteristics
• E.g., some sub-systems may be considered as organic type, some semidetached, and some
embedded
• Also for some subsystems the reliability requirements may be high, for some the
development team might have no previous experience of similar development etc.
• The complete COCOMO model considers these differences in characteristics of
the subsystems and estimates the effort and development time as the sum of the
estimates for the individual subsystems
• The cost of each subsystem is estimated separately
• This approach reduces the margin of error in the final estimate
Project Scheduling & Tracking
It is an action that distributes estimated effort across the planned project duration, by
allocating the effort to specific software engineering tasks

Scheduling Principles

Compartmentalization Interdependency Time Allocation Define Responsibilities

Define Outcomes Define Milestones Effort Validation
Scheduling Principles
• Compartmentalization
• The product and process must be decomposed into a manageable number of activities and tasks
• Interdependency
• Tasks that can be completed in parallel must be separated from those that must completed serially
• Time Allocation
• Every task has start and completion dates that take the task interdependencies into account
• Effort Validation
• Project manager must ensure that on any given day there are enough staff members assigned to
complete the tasks within the time estimated in the project plan
• Define Responsibilities
• Every scheduled task needs to be assigned to a specific team member
• Define Outcomes
• Every task in the schedule needs to have a defined outcome (usually a work product or deliverable)
• Defined Milestones
• A milestone is accomplished when one or more work products from an engg task have passed
quality review
Effort Distribution
• General guideline: 40-20-40 rule
• 40% or more of all effort allocated to analysis and design tasks
• 20% of effort allocated to programming
• 40% of effort allocated to testing
• Characteristics of each project dictate the distribution of effort
• Although most software organizations encounter the following projects types:
• Concept Development
• initiated to explore new business concept or new application of technology
• New Application Development
• new product requested by customer
• Application Enhancement
• major modifications to function, performance or interfaces (observable to user)
• Application Maintenance
• correcting, adapting or extending existing software (not immediately obvious to user).
• Reengineering
• rebuilding all (or part) of a existing (legacy) system
Scheduling methods
• Two project scheduling methods that can be applied to software development.
• Program Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT)
• Critical Path Method (CPM)
• Both techniques are driven by information already developed in earlier project
planning activities:
• estimates of effort
• a decomposition of the product function
• the selection of the appropriate process model and task set
• decomposition of the tasks that are selected
• Both PERT and CPM provide quantitative tools that allow you to:
• Determine the critical path—the chain of tasks that determines the duration of the project
• Establish “most likely” time estimates for individual tasks by applying statistical models
• Calculate “boundary times” that define a “time window” for a particular task
Project Schedule Tracking Gantt chart
• The project schedule provides a road map for a A Gantt chart, commonly used in project
software project manager.
management, is one of the most popular
• It defines the tasks and milestones. and useful ways of showing activities
• Several ways to track a project schedule: (tasks or events) displayed against time.
• Conducting periodic project status meeting
• Evaluating the review results in the software process On the left of the chart is a list of the
• Determine if formal project milestones have been activities and along the top is a suitable
accomplished
• Compare actual start date to planned start date for each time scale.
task
• Informal meeting with practitioners Each activity is represented by a bar;
• Using earned value analysis to assess progress the position and length of the bar
quantitatively
reflects the start date, duration and end
• Project manager takes the control of the schedule date of the activity. This allows you to
in the aspects of see at a glance:
• Project Staffing, Project Problems, Project Resources,
Reviews, Project Budget
Gantt chart Cont.
What the various
activities are

When each activity

begins and ends

How long each activity

is scheduled to last

Where activities
overlap with other
activities, and by how
much

The start and end date

of the whole project
Risk analysis & Management Risk
A risk is a potential (probable) problem – which might happen and
might not

Conceptual definition of risk

• Risk concerns future happenings
• Risk involves change in mind, opinion, actions, places, etc.
• Risk involves choice and the uncertainty that choice entails
Two characteristics of risk
Uncertainty Loss

The risk may or may not happen, If the risk becomes a reality
so there are no 100% risks (some and unwanted consequences or
of those may called constraints) losses occur
Risk Categorization: Approach-1
• Project risks Sub-categories of Business risks
• They threaten the project plan  Market risk
• If they become real, it is likely that  Building an excellent product or system that no one
the project schedule will slip and really wants
that costs will increase  Strategic risk
• Technical risks  Building a product that no longer fits into the overall
• They threaten the quality and business strategy for the company
timeliness of the software to be  Sales risk
produced  Building a product that the sales force doesn't
• If they become real, implementation understand how to sell
may become difficult or impossible
 Management risk
• Business risks  Losing the support of senior management due to a
• They threaten the feasibility of the change in focus or a change in people
software to be built
 Budget risk
• If they become real, they threaten the
 Losing budgetary or personnel commitment
project or the product
Risk Categorization: Approach-2
• Known risks
• Those risks that can be uncovered after careful evaluation of
o the project plan, the business and technical environment in which the project is being developed, and other
reliable information sources (Ex. unrealistic delivery date)
• Predictable risks
• Those risks that are deduced (draw conclusion) from past project experience (Ex. past turnover)
• Unpredictable risks
• Those risks that can and do occur, but are extremely difficult to identify in advance

Risk Strategies (Reactive vs. Proactive)

Reactive risk strategies Proactive risk strategies
• "Don't worry, I will think of something“. • Steps for risk management are followed
• The majority of software teams and managers rely on this approach • Primary objective is to avoid risk and to
• Nothing is done about risks until something goes wrong
have an emergency plan in place to
• The team then flies into action in an attempt to correct the problem
handle unavoidable risks in a controlled
rapidly (fire fighting)
and effective manner
• Crisis management is the choice of management techniques
Steps for Risk Management
Risk Identification
1. Identify possible risks and  Risk identification is a systematic attempt to
recognize what can go wrong specify threats to the project plan
2. Analyze each risk to estimate the  By identifying known and predictable risks, the
project manager takes a first step toward,
probability that it will occur and  avoiding them when possible
the impact (i.e., damage) that it  controlling them when necessary
will do if it does occur  Generic Risks
3. Rank the risks by probability and  Risks that are a potential threat to every software
impact. Impact may be negligible, project
marginal, critical, and  Product-specific Risks
catastrophic.  Risks that can be identified only by clear
understanding of the technology, the people and the
4. Develop a contingency plan to environment, that is specific to the software that is
to be built
manage those risks having high
probability and high impact
Known and Predictable Risk Categories
• One method for identifying risks is to create a risk item checklist
• The checklist can be used for risk identification which focuses on some subset of
known and predictable risks in the following generic subcategories:
• Product Size: risks associated with overall size of the software to be built
• Business Impact: risks associated with constraints imposed by management or the
marketplace
• Customer Characteristics: risks associated with sophistication of the customer and the
developer's ability to communicate with the customer in a timely manner
• Process Definition: risks associated with the degree to which the software process has
been defined and is followed
• Development Environment: risks associated with availability and quality of the tools to be
used to build the project
• Technology to be Built: risks associated with complexity of the system to be built and the
“newness” of the technology in the system
• Staff Size and Experience: risks associated with overall technical and project experience of
the software engineers who will do the work
Risk Estimation (Projection)
• Risk projection (or estimation) attempts to rate each risk in two ways
• The probability that the risk is real
• The consequence (effect) of the problems associated with the risk
• Risk Projection/Estimation Steps
• Establish a scale that reflects the perceived likelihood (probability) of a risk. Ex., 1-low, 10-
high
• Explain the consequences of the risk
• Estimate the impact of the risk on the project and product.
• Note the overall accuracy of the risk projection so that there will be no misunderstandings
RMMM
• Risk Mitigation, Monitoring, and Management (RMMM)
• An effective strategy for dealing with risk must consider three issues
• Risk mitigation (i.e., avoidance)
• Risk monitoring
• Risk management and contingency planning
RMMM

Risk Mitigation is a problem avoidance activity

Risk Monitoring is a project tracking activity

Risk Management includes contingency plans that risk will occur

Risk Mitigation
• Risk mitigation (avoidance) is the primary strategy and is achieved through a plan
• For Ex., Risk of high staff turnover
• To mitigate this risk, you would develop a strategy for reducing turnover.
• The possible steps to be taken are:
• Meet with current staff to determine causes for turnover (e.g., poor working conditions, low
pay, and competitive job market)
• Mitigate those causes that are under your control before the project starts
• Once the project commences, assume turnover will occur and develop techniques to
ensure continuity when people leave
• Organize project teams so that information about each development activity is widely
dispersed
• Define work product standards and establish mechanisms to be sure that all models and documents are
developed in a timely manner
• Conduct peer reviews of all work (so that more than one person is “up to speed”).
• Assign a backup staff member for every critical technologist
RMMM PLAN
Risk information sheet (RIS)
• The RMMM PLAN documents all work
performed as part of risk analysis and
used by the project manager as part of the
overall project plan
• Some software teams do not develop a
formal RMMM document, rather each risk
is documented individually using a Risk
information sheet (RIS)
• In most cases, RIS is maintained using a
database system.
• So Creation and information entry, priority
ordering, searches and other analysis may
be accomplished easily.
• The format of RIS is describe in diagram
• Software Engineering (3150711)

• Dr. Pradyumansinh U. Jadeja

• Computer Engineering Department

• pradyuman.jadeja@darshan.ac.in
• 91-9879461848