Develop Procurement Plan

The last planning activity within the Planning phase is to identify the elements of the Project which will be acquired from external suppliers to the project. The Procurement Plan provides a detailed description of the Products (i.e. goods and services) to be procured from suppliers, the justification for procuring each

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product externally, as opposed to from within the business, and the schedule for procurement. It also references the process for the selection of a preferred supplier ("Tender Process") and the process for the actual order and delivery of the

procured products ("Procurement Process"). 4.7 The Software Development Plan (SDP)

The project development plan is one of the first formal documents produced by the project. Within this document, the project manager describes in detail:

ƒ How the project will be developed? ƒ What resources will be required? ƒ How these resources will be used?

The project development plan assures that the development of the project is well charted before the main development activities begin. In -addition to the basic development schedule, the plan addresses such issues as:

ƒ The timely provision of equipment and tools so that they are available to developers when needed.

ƒ The availability of staff to perform the development tasks in accordance with the schedule.

ƒ Provision of contingency plans in the event that project risks materialize ƒ The designation .of duties within the development team, and the assignment

of these duties to the team members.

Preparing the project plan for a software project helps you ensure that the specified requirements and objectives are met successfully. It is a collation of all planning activities that have happened for a software project. This includes activities such as design and analysis, activity definition, risk planning, and cost estimation. To create the plan, you assess all planning activities, organizational policies regarding the creation of the project plan and assumption and constraints for the project. To implement the software project plan, you require management skills, such as leadership, communication, and problem solving, along with the basic knowledge about the software. You also need to ensure that the senior management bf the company has authorized work on the software project. Knowledge management techniques help you to make informed decision regarding the project plan.

After the project plan is executed, you manage the changes to it in such a way that the performance measurement baselines are not impacted, To manage the project plan effectively you monitor the project plan, periodic performance status reports, and requests for change. The primary tool that you can use to control the changes in the project plan is the change control mechanism: This is a set of formal procedures for changing the project plan.

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The Project Plan is a vital part of the project initiation stage. The plan should normally contain the following information:

1. Introduction and status of the plan 2. The authorisation procedures 3. Statement of project objectives 4. Statement of requirement 5. Deliverables in the project 6. A Work Breakdown Structure 7. The project milestones

8. The resource requirements 9. Interdependencies of work 10. The timetable of events

11. Staffing, organisation and responsibilities 12. Development methods and toolsets to be used 13. Source documentation

14. Resource and financial summary

This information creates the generation of a Project Book (log). The log should be in a loose-leaf binder with clearly identified sections and version control exercised over the documentation sets. These logs are now often retained as computer file, which enables a greater level of security to be maintained over them and version control to be established as an automatic feature.

4.7.2 Software Development Plan (SDP) Steps/items required

The contents of the project development plan may be adapted to the size of the project; it may be a large document or just a few pages. Table 1 presents an outline of some of the subjects covered in the project development plan. Not all subjects in Table 1 are applicable to all projects. For example, many projects do not administer their own budget. Some organizations have a financial officer responsible for the administration of project budgets. The interface with external sources is another area riot applicable to all projects. The term, external sources covers such activities as interfacing with

subcontractors, vendors and representatives of the customer.

Many standards have been produced for the project development plan. The formal structure or the project development plan document differs,

depending on the actual documentation standard used. For example, the US DOD standard 2167 provides the option of describing the testing,

configuration management and quality assurance plans in three separate documents. For large projects, this option can become a requirement.

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The IEEE standard 1058.1 describes what is referred to as the software project management plan, which is essentially the same as the project development plan. This standard is largely compatible with the 2167 project development plan, although it is significantly less detailed.

This standard, too, provides the option of including configuration

management and quality assurance plans, or of describing them in separate documents. The project development plan should be prepared as a

standalone document, in the sense that it should be read and understood without the need to refer to other documents.

A general overview of the project is therefore usually included in the first section of the document. References for additional detail, of course, should always be provided, including pointers to such documents as the project contract, the concept document or the market research analysis.

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Table 1: Software project development plan items 1. System overview

2. Software development management