Refine Your Estimation Practices With Top-Down Allocations
Refine Your Estimation Practices With Top-Down Allocations
Don’t let bad estimates ruin good work.
Onsite Workshop
Bad project estimates:
Cause overruns that compound budgeting problems.
Shrink scope, diminish quality, increase costs, and decrease customer satisfaction.
Damage employee engagement and confidence in their capabilities.
Improving your estimation practices:
Boosts team morale and improves product throughput.
Provides clarity to project sponsors and allows for negotiations and discussions around project requests.
Helps contain the impacts of risks and issues without damaging the rest of the portfolio.
Module 1: Develop the Foundations of Organizational Memory
The Purpose
Track key performance indicators on past projects to inform goals for future projects.
Key Benefits Achieved
Developed Project History List.
Refined starting estimates that can be adjusted accurately from project to project.
Activities:
Outputs:
1.1
Build project history.
Project History List
1.2
Analyze estimation capabilities.
T-Shirt Sizing Health Check
1.3
Identify estimation goals.
Estimate Tracking Plan
Module 2: Define a Requirements Gathering Process
The Purpose
Outline the common attributes required to complete projects.
Identify the commonly forgotten attributes to
ensure comprehensive scoping early on.
Key Benefits Achieved
Refined initial estimate based on high-level insights into work required and resources available.
Activities:
Outputs:
2.1
Develop a list of in-scope project attributes.
Identified list or store of past project attributes and costs
2.2
Identify leadership priorities for deliverables and attributes.
Attribute List and Estimated Cost
Required Skills List
2.3
Track team and skill responsibilities for attributes.
Module 3: Build an Estimation Process
The Purpose
Set clear processes for tracking the health of your estimate to ensure it is always as accurate as possible.
Define check-in points to evaluate risks and challenges to the project and identify trigger conditions.
Key Benefits Achieved
An estimation process rooted in organizational memory and lessons learned.
Project estimates that are consistently reevaluated to predict and correct challenges before they can drastically affect your projects.
Activities:
Outputs:
3.1
Determine Milestone Check-In Points.
Project Lessons Learned Template
3.2
Develop Lessons Learned Meeting Agendas.
3.3
Identify common risks and past lessons learned.
Historic Risks and Lessons Learned Master Template
3.4
Develop contingency tracking capabilities.
Contingency Reserve and Risk Registers
Module 4: Improve Business Alignment With Your Estimation Plan
The Purpose
Bridge the gap between death march projects and bloated and uncertain estimates by communicating expectations and assumptions clearly to your sponsors.
Key Benefits Achieved
Clear estimation criteria and assumptions aligned with business priorities.
Post-mortem discussion items crucial to improving project history knowledge for next time.
Activities:
Outputs:
4.1
Identify leadership risk priorities.
Estimation Quotation
4.2
Develop IT business alignment.
Risk Priority Rankings
4.3
Develop hand-off procedures and milestone approval methods.
Hand-Off Procedures
4.4
Create a list of post-mortem priorities.
Post-mortem agenda planning
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Onsite Workshops offer an easy way to accelerate your project. If you are unable to do the project yourself, and a Guided Implementation isn’t enough, we offer low-cost onsite delivery of our Project Workshops. We take you through every phase of your project and ensure that you have a road map in place to complete your project successfully.
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