Taken from the article: Web Project Management:
Seven Deadly Sins – Part 3 |
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www.thesambarnes.com |
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Working
with a detailed Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) document makes this a much
easier task.
Everyone will have their own take on creating a WBS, but this is mine
step-by-step: |
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1. Transfer the different high-level
stages of the project to pieces of paper – one phase goes on one piece of
paper – or put it in an Excel file, if you want |
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2. Think about the competency
contributions you will need for each of the phases and how they relate e.g.
What do you need to get done by Web Designers in each phase? Is there
anything that Software Architects or Web Developers can contribute, prepare,
or review in a particular early phase of the project? |
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3. Add according lines to your
paper, or add empty lines to your Excel. If the phases are in column A, put
the tasks to be performed by particular competencies to column B. In both
cases add marks to who is contributing in a separate column |
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4. Put all deliverables that you
need as input for any of the phases in the upper left corner of every sheet.
Making sure to note down which competency is contributing to which item in a
separate column in the same place |
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5. Finally, try to envisage how the
different contributions fall together into separate tasks. A Web Designer
surely has to: |
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a) Select the images for the web site |
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b) Manipulate
the images |
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c) Finish them for web usage with sharpening, compression and
naming them according to the defined naming conventions |
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6. Think about who uploads these
images to the web site repository: the Web Developer? A Content Editor? The
Project Manager? The Holy Ghost? |
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7. You will find both new tasks
which are not covered in the basic project agreement new assignments which
haven’t been thought of yet |
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What
you will end up with, is complete knowledge you can present to your team,
superiors and client on what action sequences need to happen in order to
deliver e.g. There no point in uploading images which haven’t been selected
and/or made ready for web usage, right? The dependency is created. |
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In the
end, add the outcome of this examination to your sheets (preferably with a
different colour). |
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Deliverables
are marked with a right arrow (deliverable_X -> phase_Y), inputs to
further phases are marked with a similar arrow on their left
(phase_Y->input_X). Make sure every deliverable of one phase matches an
input to another phase. Assign numbers with high-level phases get a single
digit number “1″, subsequent packages get “1.1″; particular
competence contributions get “1.1.1″ and so on… |
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And
there you have it, a WBS document, matching both the output dimension of
phase X and the input dimension for phase Y. Split by competencies, bound to
web project phases and reflecting the actual deeds and work packages for
everyone to see and track throughout the project’s lifecycle. Splendid! |
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