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Workshops & Tutorials

 

Workshop on Managing the Client Value Creation Process in Agile Projects (VALOIR)

Workshop Presentations

Collective efforts of agile software engineering (SE) practitioners and researchers have yielded a variety of agile approaches aimed at helping clients generate product and business value in a predictable and repeatable way. While it is generally known that the suitability and effectiveness of most of these approaches is contingent to the context in which they are applied, the body of empirical studies that investigate which technique is generating what specific instances of client’s value in which context is relatively small. Agile methodologists tacitly assume that for SE professionals it is self-evident to figure out how exactly the application of the agile practices would create product and business value on an ongoing basis throughout a project. For example, little is known about the impact that product complexity and non-functional requirements have on the product creation process, and also on the trade-offs that need to be made between complexity and product value. With few exceptions, little has been done to systematically aggregate the empirical evidence that can possibly confirm or disconfirm the claims of how the different (commercially viable) agile approaches create client’s value (both product and business value) and how some agile-unique practices (as on-site site clients, story point counting, reprioritization) solve particular value-creation challenges. This workshop calls for the explicit discussion on uncovering the mechanisms through which combinations of agile practices create client’s value in agile projects in specific contexts. We consider both product and business value. We promote the position that for the agile organizations to make a lasting impact on the product and business value creation, the interplay between organizational context and use of agile practices needs to be understood in sufficient depth so that the organizations know the challenges specific to value creation through agile practices in certain contexts and the remedies that are likely to confront these challenges. The overall goal of the workshop is to make the knowledge on value creation and management explicit. As part of this goal, we would like to encourage the discussion on the use of measurement and estimation approaches in managing value in agile project. A

Accepted papers must conform to the ACM author guidelines and will be published in Volume 2 of the PROFES 2011 proceedings. Publication is dependent on at least one author registering to attend PROFES 2011.

ACM author guidelines can be found here: http://www.acm.org/sigs/publications/proceedings-templates

Submission deadline: April 30 2011
Notification of acceptance: May 2, 2011
Camera Ready: May 15, 2011
 

More information and the CfP can be found at: http://www.semq.eu/pdf/VALOIR2011-Cfp.pdf

 

Workshop on project and knowledge management trends (PKMT)

PKMT 2011 provides an opportunity to researchers and practitioners to exchange knowledge on new models, methods and techniques supporting project management in the context of organization of organizations. Project achievement costs represent a significant fraction of Gross National Products of the developed and developing countries.To keep under control project schedule, cost and quality, consolidated management methodologies and techniques are today widely used, especially in the context of single organizations and medium scale projects. Organizations are very complex systems that are able not only to cooperate in order to develop projects but, at the same time, to transfer knowledge about:

(i) application domains,
(ii) ways of working,
iii) best practices, and how skills and knowledge have to be transferred or made available in the context of an open framework network.

In order to carry out complex, large scale projects, more and more cooperation among enterprises is pursued in various forms such as alliance, co-opetition, networks and virtualcommunities. In this rapidly changing economic scenario, where organizations operate under the pressure of new competitive challenges,the discipline of Project Management needs further research contributions. Relationships between different management approaches, such as Project Management, Service Science and Viable System Approach should also be investigated. Best practices are welcome, with the related case studies from both industry and research institutions.

Accepted papers must conform to the ACM author guidelines and will be published in Volume 2 of the PROFES 2011 proceedings. Publication is dependent on at least one author registering to attend PROFES 2011.

ACM author guidelines can be found here: http://www.acm.org/sigs/publications/proceedings-templates

Submission deadline: May 7, 2011
Notification of acceptance: May 16, 2011
Camera-Ready: May 25, 2011
 

More information can be found at: http://serlab.di.uniba.it/pkmt2011 serlab.di.uniba.it/pkmt2011

 

TUTORIAL: Establishing and improving project management using assessment models for process capability and organizational maturity.

Keywords: Process improvement, project management, CMMI, SPICE, ISO/IEC 15504, process capability, organizational maturity

Duration: 4 hours (1/2 day)

Tutor: Antonio (Tony) Coletta

Abstract: The tutorial will explore the relationship between Project Management and internationally recognized models/standard for process assessment and improvements such as CMMI and SPICE (ISO/IEC 15504). The tutorial will begin with an overview and some historical background on concepts and terminology related to the so called “process approach” (from ISO 9001) and the PDCA (Plan, Do, Check, Act) cycle as applied in process improvement in many ISO standards. It will then proceed with an overview of the CMMI (Capability Maturity Model) suite of models for process improvement (DEV, SVC and ACQ) and its relationship with the international standard ISO/IEC 15504 better known as SPICE (Software Process Improvement and Capability dEtermination). CMMI and SPICE are based on two process improvement representation known as Staged and Continuous. The Staged approach deals with process improvement from an organizational point of view. According to this representation, an organisational unit matures progressively through 5 Maturity Levels that go from level 1 (Initial) up to level 5 (Optimizing). The Continuous approach is based, instead, on the concept that processes (or process areas as CMMI calls them) can be improved individually by progressively increasing their capability through 6 levels that go from Capability Level 0 (Not performed) to Capability Level 6 (Optimizing). The process models defined in CMMI and SPICE always include the Project Management process as one of the area whose capability can be improved. In doing so they define in detail the goals or outcomes to be achieved by this process together with effective practices that enable the achievement of these goals at different levels of capability and maturity. The tutorial will explore in detail these elements of the models specifically related to Project Management. It will also provide pointers to ISO/IEC standards related to the project management that organizations can adopt to meet the requirements of these models. In the second part, the tutorial will offer another point of view. It will explore how the Project Management activities contribute to the improvement of all other processes by enabling their progression to higher levels of capability. Specifically, process capability Level 2 (Managed) requires that the process activities be planned and monitored in addition to performing quality controls on process inputs/outputs. This capability is obviously provided by project management. Similarly project planning (PP) and project monitoring and control (PMC) are two basic project management process areas essential for the achievement of an Organizational Maturity Level 2 (Managed). At this maturity level an organization achieves process institutionalization, an ingrained way of doing business followed routinely as part of its culture. The tutorial will provide a detailed understanding of these concepts in order to enable participants to manage structured process improvement according to internationally recognized approaches. With a particular focus on Project Management.

Content: The tutorial will cover the following topics:

  • Process quality as an essential factor for product quality
  • The process approach in international quality management system standards
  • Process improvement and the PDCA cycle International standardization of process assessment and improvement models
  • Standard de facto in process assessment and improvement
  • Overview of CMMI and SPICE (ISO/IEC 15504)
  • Capability models vs maturity models
  • Project management process areas in CMMI
  • Project management processes in SPICE compliant assessment models
  • Project management processes as enabling elements of higher level capability/maturity
  • Establishing and improving the project management processes using international standard de jure e de facto

Short Bio: Antonio (Tony) Coletta is an international expert and freelance consultant in the area of process engineering. In the past he has worked at Olivetti as a Chief Software Engineer leading a project for the development of a CASE environment and has conducted extensive research on software process quality at the Science Park Tecnopolis. He is a certified ISO 9000 and ISO/IEC 20000 Lead Auditor and ISO/IEC 15504 Principal Assessor, and has an extensive experience in supporting software organizations in implementing process improvement based on international standards (12207, 15504, CMMI). On behalf of DNV, he participates actively in international standardization activities and has been member of the ISO/IEC JTC1 SC7 Software and System Engineering Committee since 1993. He has contributed to the development of the standard ISO/IEC 15504 as co-editor of part 3 and part 8 and is currently active in the working group dealing with the revision of the IT service management standard ISO/IEC 20000.

  

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