My talk at Stryker on their Project Management Day in Gurgaon, Sep 21

1. SOFTWARE
PROJECT
EXCELLENCETATHAGAT VARMA
KNOWLEDGEPRENEUR
HTTP://THOUGHTLEADERSHIP.IN

2. A $7 Billion Disaster…
doesn’t happen by accident!
http://youtu.be/0_O5bcq1dBw

3. When failures are routine…
Success seems like an exception!
Failed
19%
Challenged
52%
Successful
29%
CHAOS Report 2015 studied 50,000 projects, https://www.infoq.com/articles/standish-chaos-2015

4. Overruns are normal…
and might perhaps be sign of life, after all!
http://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/business-technology/our-insights/delivering-large-scale-it-projects-on-time-on-budget-and-on-value

5. Happily struggling.
At least since 1994 :)
CHAOS Report Data, 1994-2015

6. How does a project
get to be a year
late?
Fred Brooks,
The Mythical Man-Month, 1975
…One day at a time!

7. Projects die slow death…
Day-to-day decline is often invisible!
“…When one hears of disastrous
schedule slippage in a project, he
imagines that a series of major
calamities must have befallen it.
Usually, however, the disaster is due
to termites, not tornadoes; and the
schedule has slipped imperceptibly
but inexorably.”
Fred Brooks, The Mythical Man-Month, 1975

8. Imagine a project…
Pretty much anything can be seen as one!
Scope:
whatever
you can
implement
Time:
whenever
you are
ready
Cost:
whatever
it costs

9. Iron Triangle of PM
Constraints facilitate success criteria!
Cost
Time
Scope

10. Holy Grail of Software
Faster, Better, Cheaper
Increase Scope
Decrease Time
Decrease Cost

11. Reality…?
You can choose only two at a time!
Increase Scope
Keep time fixed => Costs Go Up!
Keep cost fixed => Time Goes Up!
Decrease Time
Keep Scope fixed => Costs Go Up!
Keep Cost fixed => Scope Must Come Down!
Decrease Cost
Keep Scope fixed => Time Goes Up!
Keep Time fixed => Scope Must Come Down!

12. Case Study: Delhi Metro
Modern day wonder…from India!
https://youtu.be/eYLQbPaQpnM

13. Delhi Metro
Timeline and Achievements
1995: Planning began
1998: Construction started
2002: First trains ran
2016: 2.6m passengers a day
2021: To carry 6m passengers a day. Will be bigger than London Metro
Credentials:
Every stage completed on time, within budget
99.97% trains arrive within a minute of schedule
They are clean, cool and safe
It is profitable!
http://www.smh.com.au/comment/delhis-metro-success-a-lesson-for-australia-20130401-2h2w8.html

14. Case Study: Medtronic
Timeline
1949: $8 revenue in first month of operation!
1962: Revenue $500,000. Losses $144,000. On the edge of bankruptcy
1963: Revenue $985,000. Profits $73,000.
1980-90s: Enjoyed 18%+ y-o-y growth
1989: 2 year old products accounted for 40% revenues, up from 14% just
6 years back
Company
53,000 Patents
Employees with good ideas given $50k initial funding
More than 2/3rd revenue come from products introduced in last two years
http://www.medtronic.com.au/about-medtronic/our-story/index.htm

15. Medtronic
The original Roadmap
The Art of Business: In the Footsteps of Giants - Raymond Tzuu Yeh, et all

16. Reinventing Medtronic
Increased R&D budget from 9% to 12%
Initiated 12 radical innovations that challenged traditional businesses
Organised around small venture units, incubating them separately (and far
away) from existing businesses, with full support from execs.
Had independent budgets and greater freedom to deploy these “small bets”
Examples:
reinvention of mainstream coronary artery bypass surgery. Now accounts
for 20% of heart surgeries!
Super low-cost pacemaker that reduced production costs by 80%. but
never became a big seller, but its ideas led to 40% cost reduction across
the product lines.
https://hbr.org/2012/11/this-article-led-to-10-years-of-growth

17. 15 Keys to R&D Success
Art Colins, 2016
1. While organizational structure and process count, creative and
motivated people ultimately make the difference.
2. The popular concept of “Too Big Too Fail” that has been used to
describe some mega banks can be modified to read “Too Big Will Fail”
for most R&D organizations.
3. Beware of excess layers of bureaucracy and unnecessary meetings—if
an activity or structure adds value, streamline it; if not, get rid of it.
4. Listen to your customer, and ALWAYS clearly define what problem
you are solving for BEFORE commencing any R&D project.
5. Only invent what is required: greater invention (both amount and
magnitude) = greater complexity and risk.
http://acorn-advisors.com/fifteen-keys-to-research-and-development-success/

18. 6. Since every new product has a defined life cycle and endpoint, time to market is critical for
overall success.
7. Include early input from those who will eventually bring the product to market (e.g., clinical &
regulatory, manufacturing & distribution, marketing & sales, etc.).
8. Clearly define objectives, assign authority and responsibility for key activities and decision-
making, and always focus on the critical path items.
9. Be aggressively realistic with schedules—create a sense of urgency, but remember that “all
green lights” scenarios hardly ever happen.
10.Don’t be afraid to go outside for expertise if it is needed, continually guarding against the
“not invented here” syndrome.
11.Killing a project that will never be successful does not equate to failure; R&D teams should
be rewarded rather than punished if they recommend this course of action.
12.Attempting too many projects at once generally ensures that none of the projects will be
successfully concluded.
13.Encourage people to attack ideas, but never each other—this is very easy to say, but hard
to put into practice.
14.ALWAYS comply with existing laws and regulatory requirements, and NEVER sacrifice safety.
15.Don’t forget to celebrate individual and team victories (both large and small) as they occur
—and while you should take what you do very seriously, don’t take yourself too seriously!

19. Any hope for
software ?

20. Success Factors
Executive Sponsorship
Emotional Maturity
User Involvement
Optimization
Skilled Resources
Standard Architecture
Agile Process
Modest Execution
Project Management Expertize
Clear Business Objectives 4%
5%
6%
7%
8%
10%
15%
15%
15%
15%
CHAOS Report 2015, https://www.infoq.com/articles/standish-chaos-2015

21. Waterfall vs. Agile
15%
30%
45%
60%
Waterfall Agile
18%
3%
27%
7%
58%
44%
Small Size Projects Medium Size Projects Large Size Projects

22. Agile Manifesto, 2001
agilemanifesto.org

23. Benefits from Agile
VersionOne 10th State of Agile Report, 2016

24. Recap
Projects are vehicles of progress. The higher the risk,
the larger its impact. However, high risk often invites
failures!
However, projects by themselves are fairly useless! It is
the people who plan, execute and deliver them.
In software, agile has better success rate than
traditional waterfall-driven methods.
Agile is more of mindset and culture than method,
process and tools

25. References
The Mythical Man-Month - Fred Brooks
Interview: Jim Johnson of the Standish Group, https://
www.infoq.com/articles/Interview-Johnson-Standish-
CHAOS
Standish Group 2015 Chaos Report - Q&A with Jennifer
Lynch, https://www.infoq.com/articles/standish-chaos-2015
The Idea that Led to 10 Years of Double-Digit Growth,
https://hbr.org/2012/11/this-article-led-to-10-years-of-
growth