Total Project Estimation - Business Time Requirement Estimation
Guest post by
Jaideep Ranjan Vijayakar, Principal Consultant - Banking and Capital Markets, Oracle Practice, Enterprise Solutions, Infosys Technologies Ltd.
In the previous installment we discussed how to arrive at the effort estimate for the implementation team based on the complexity of the technical components underlying. These effort estimates can also be used to arrive at time requirements for the business IT counterparts (Business System Analysts and Business Technical Leads). We can pair them with their implementation team members and use a percentage of that effort. However we are missing a key portion of the implementation effort. BUSINESS TIME REQUIREMENTS.
The importance of estimating and allocating appropriate business resources at the right time cannot be understated. Many projects paint themselves into this corner by underestimating this time and not dedicating enough time on part of their business users to participate in design validation and testing phases. This result in either time overruns or compromises on quality as more is required to be done by less. It can also result in the project team working double/triple shifts in order to meet deadlines causing tremendous stress on all concerned.
In our recent implementation we faced similar pitfalls and realized we needed to come up with a guideline that the Global Process owners could use to estimate the time requirements of their SMEs. This requires breaking down the overall implementation project into its component phases and guestimate the typical effort required to be spent by business users in each phase. This guestimate can be hours per day during testing or CRP period or %age of IT time during requirement gathering and design review period. This is what we came up with which helped the business staff the critical phases of the project with the right people by hiring temps, moving resources between departments or re-prioritizing day to day activities.
|
Month |
Implementation Phases |
Business Participants |
Activities |
Time required |
|
Sep-10 Oct-10 |
·Requirement Decomposition ·Functional Design ·Technical Design ·Development |
·Global Process Owner (GPO) ·SME |
·Provide Business Requirements ·Review BRDs ·Review Fit/Gap Analysis ·Review FDs ·Prioritize and Approve Additional Requirements ·Review Specifications for Data Migration |
·2-6 hrs per day each ·1-2 SMEs per GPO |
|
Nov-10 Dec-10 Jan-11 |
·Configuration ·Technical Design ·Development ·CRP |
·Global Process Owner (GPO) ·SME |
·Review Configuration Docs (BR100) ·Review Conversion and Data Migration Strategy ·Review Training Plan |
·8 -10 hours per week each ·1-2 SMEs per GPO ·Additional Time would be required during CRP period- 4-6 hours per day |
|
·Application Owners |
·Provide Inputs for Functional Configurations ·Finalize Configuration Docs (BR100) ·Provide inputs for Data Mapping for Conversion ·Finalize Conversion Routines ·Provide clarifications for Technical Design Team |
·2 -4 hours per day each ·1-2 Application Owners per GPO ·1-2 SMEs per GPO | ||
|
Feb-11 Mar-11 Apr-11 May-11 |
·Testing and Deployment ·Training ·SIT ·UAT ·Cut Over ·Go-Live |
·Global Process Owner (GPO) ·SME |
·Participate in UAT ·Sign Off on Configuration and RICEWP Components ·Sign Off on Training Plan and Documents ·Participate in Cutover Activities ·Go-No Go Decision |
·2-6 Hours per day each (time required increases from Apr-11 during UAT and Cutover- 6-8 Hours per day) |
|
·Application Owners |
·Participate in Data Migration Testing, SIT, UAT ·Undergo Key User training under the "Train the Trainer" approach ·Validate Cutover Data |
·1-2 FTEs per GPO ·(time required increases from Mar-11 for Training, SIT, UAT and Cutover 6-8 Hours per day) | ||
|
·Project Resources |
·Participate in Data Migration Testing, Functional Testing, SIT |
·1-2 FTEs per GPO |
Depending on the amount of information we have about the project implementation plan upfront, while initiating the engagement, it's even feasible to consider incorporating the table above in the SOW (or at the end of Discovery) to indicate Client Responsibility towards the success of the implementation. Again the table is still work in progress and we are still in the process of coming up with the best possible way to estimate this time and effort. It could be possible, based on empirical evidence from the vast number of engagements that are executed by SIs and through pro-active data capture we could generate "Estimate factors" which could be used to provide realistic "Business Time" requirements to the Client from the word go. Please send in your comments and responses to the above and let me know if you have any ideas or strategies that could be used for this.
