Guidelines: Important Decisions in Project Management

Artifacts > Environment Artifact Set > Development Case > Guidelines > Important Decisions in Project Management

Topics

Decide How to Perform the Workflow
Decide How to Use Artifacts

Decide How to Perform the Workflow

The following decisions should be made regarding the Project Management discipline's workflow:

Decide how to perform the workflow by looking at the Project Management: Workflow. Study the diagram with its guard conditions, and the guidelines. Decide which workflow details to perform and in which order.
Decide what parts of the Project Management workflow details to perform. The following are some parts that can be introduced relatively independently from the rest.

Part of workflow	Comments
Iterative development	Some customers have an existing project management workflow, but are interested in introducing the parts of the Rational Unified Process™ Project Management discipline that focus on iterative, risk-driven development: Workflow Detail: Plan for Next Iteration, Workflow Detail: Manage Iteration, and Workflow Detail: Evaluate Project Scope and Risk.
Project start-up	Some parts of the Project Management discipline focus on the start of the project and should be introduced early in the project: Workflow Detail: Conceive New Project, Workflow Detail: Evaluate Project Scope and Risk, and Workflow Detail: Develop Software Development Plan.

Decide when, during the project lifecycle, to introduce each part of the workflow. More information look at Project Management: Workflow.

Document the decisions in the Development Case, under the headings Disciplines, Project Management, Discipline.

Decide How to Use Artifacts

Decide which artifacts to use and how to use each of them. The table below describes those artifacts you must have and those used in some cases. For more detailed information on how to tailor each artifact, and a discussion of the advantages and disadvantages of that specific artifact, read the section titled "Tailoring" for each artifact.

For each artifact, decide how the artifact should be used: Must have, Should have, Could have or Won't have. For more details, see Guidelines: Classifying Artifacts.

Artifact	Brief Tailoring Comments (see the artifact for details)
Business Case	Must have. In every project, you need a business case.
Iteration Assessment	Must have. After each iteration, you need to do an assessment.
Iteration Plan	Must have. Every iteration needs to be planned.
Measurement Plan	Could have. Use this if you collect metrics.
Problem Resolution Plan	Could have. Use it if necessary.
Product Acceptance Plan	Could have. Use this if there's a need for a separate plan.
Project Measurements	Could have. Use this if you collect metrics.
Quality Assurance Plan	Could have.
Review Record	Could have. Use this for formal reviews.
Risk List	Must have.
Risk Management Plan	Could have. Use when necessary.
Software Development Plan	Should have.
Status Assessment	Could have. Use this to capture the status between iterations.
Work Order	Could have. Use this if the project manager needs it to communicate with project members.

Tailor each artifact by performing the steps described in the Activity: Develop Development Case, under the heading "Tailor Artifacts per Discipline".

Rational Unified Process