The Dashboard Effect

BI Project Initiation, with Anne Eisenach

October 21, 2022 Brick Thompson, Jon Thompson, Caleb Ochs Episode 48
The Dashboard Effect
BI Project Initiation, with Anne Eisenach
Show Notes Transcript

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In the third episode of our series on BI project management, Brick and Anne discuss the project initiation phase. When this is done well, all project participants are well aligned from the start which minimizes project risk and optimizes the outcome.

Blue Margin helps private equity owned and mid-market companies organize their data into dashboards to execute on strategy and create a culture of accountability. We call it The Dashboard Effect, the title of our book and podcast

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#projectmanagement #PM #BI #projectinitiation #businessintelligence #reporting #dashboard #datawarehouse

Brick Thompson:

Welcome to The Dashboard Effect podcast, I'm Brick Thompson. And this week, I've got Anne Eisenach back with me as our Senior Project Manager, and we're going to be talking about project initiation as part of our ongoing series of BI project management. How's it going Anne?

Anne Eisenach:

Well, thanks for having me back.

Brick Thompson:

You bet. Your last podcast was very well received, so we're looking forward to doing this.

Anne Eisenach:

You bet.

Brick Thompson:

So tell me, what is project initiation? Actually, let me back up. So we've done project scoping. That's what you talked about. We talked about resource assignment. That was with Jenny last week. So now we're up to project initiation. We're kind of going in order here with a project, what is project initiation?

Anne Eisenach:

Makes sense. As a PM, I'm interested in doing this sequentially.

Brick Thompson:

Exactly.

Anne Eisenach:

So this fits in with those other two steps, it really comes next. This is our bridge from what we've done in sales, and the scoping process, resource assignment to now, "How do we set ourselves up well to execute the project?" So transitioning from our sales process into our actual delivery and execution?

Brick Thompson:

Okay, and if you do it well, what does it achieve?

Anne Eisenach:

I think it helps you be efficient in execution. It ensures that we have scope alignment, both internally and with the full team of project stakeholders at the outset of the project before we jump in and start developing heads down.

Brick Thompson:

Okay, so alignment between all the people on our team, and all the people on the client's team, and in between all of those.

Anne Eisenach:

That's right.

Brick Thompson:

So basically, kind of clearing uncertainty, getting in a good place to kick off the project in a good way.

Anne Eisenach:

Yeah, exactly. It's a pretty short step. But one that we found, if done well and done intentionally before just jumping in, it sets us up for for good projects.

Brick Thompson:

Yeah. Okay. What are some of the outcomes that can happen if you don't do this well?

Anne Eisenach:

We've seen a lack of alignment. So that's why the goal here is getting that scope alignment early. We talk a lot about scope in this series, as you've heard, but it's really in alignment. But it is central to the upfront discussions, and then also being successful in our project execution. I think when we haven't done this step, or maybe we've rushed it, we have found that a couple of weeks in somebody else on the project team or on the client side, may have had different expectations. So this allows us to align early, and everybody knows what to expect as far as deliverables, their involvement that we're going to need, anything like that. It just kind of helps us clear that from the jump.

Brick Thompson:

That makes sense. So sort of baseline alignment, and then you'll continue to align during the project.

Anne Eisenach:

Right.

Brick Thompson:

I've heard from clients of ours who have worked with other BI vendors, in at least two cases where they stopped a project early because the project initiation didn't go well. And what I heard specifically was that there didn't seem to be tight coupling between what sales had sold, and what delivery was planning to deliver. And so immediately in the project, they were looking at scope misalignment, change orders, that type of thing. So if you do this well, you have none of that.

Anne Eisenach:

That's right. Yeah, we don't want those outcomes, so this helps us helps us remove that. You touched on a big piece of this, which is just bridging what sales, and essentially our consulting and scoping team, has learned up front. Taking what they've heard and learned and making sure that we, in executing, are are well attached to it. Before we get there, we can talk about how we do it and the tools that we use.

Brick Thompson:

Yeah, let's talk about tools. So what tools are we using?

Anne Eisenach:

So this is kind of how I see the project manager setting up a good infrastructure, kind of the hub, that's how I think of it for running an organized and efficient project. Just from that kind of administrative PM side of the project management that we do. But if you set this up well, early, you're gonna have a good project from from start to finish. So the components of that hub that I'm talking about are a couple of different tools. We start with teams, Microsoft Teams.

Brick Thompson:

Let's just make sure people know what teams is. I know it's kind of ubiquitous at this point, but it's a platform, it was sort of Microsoft's answer to Slack. So there's chat capability, there's file stores and file sharing capability. It's got video meeting capability, sort of like zoom. We're an office 365 company, and so it comes with, and that's our main thing. Each client gets its own team, sort of their self contained space. And then engineers and various other project participants will get invited into that.

Anne Eisenach:

Yeah, that's good. Good clarification. So once we get the SOW sign, the PM will, just offline or in the background, get that team set up, if it's not already. We'll get a new project setup. It may seem really tactical, for me to be talking about something as simple as a file structure. But it's something that we've found is actually a small change that has created a big efficiency for us. We actually have a templatized file structure. So our engineers and our PMs know exactly what to expect from client to client, from project to project, they know where to go to find the information that they need. And that's actually huge. If you don't have that, you know, there's no reason for anybody who's spending more time than they need to to find a meeting recording, right?

Brick Thompson:

And everybody knows where to put stuff too.

Anne Eisenach:

Exactly.

Brick Thompson:

So there's no hunting around, no asking for things. One of the things we do with teams is to make sure never to send attached files, we always send a link to the file, so everybody's always working on the same version of the file. There's a lot of capabilities like that, that you can use to really align well.

Anne Eisenach:

Exactly. It also gives us a good place to put all the materials that were comprised in the sales process and in the design process. So our team can actually start at this point, getting themselves some context on the project even independently, which we encourage our team to do before we get to our next step, which is a kickoff.

Brick Thompson:

So all that stuff just moves over from sales into executing, and into delivery.

Anne Eisenach:

Yep. So once we have our teams in place, our team's infrastructure, we move into Microsoft DevOps, which is where we run our projects and execute our projects out of. It enables the project manager and the project team to view things at a project level, milestone level, all the way down to the task level.

Brick Thompson:

Yeah, and some people use a tool like Jira, or there's various other tools out there for development. Microsoft has their DevOps tool they've had for a long time under different names. It's all online now which allows us tofigure out effort for different tasks, and who the resources are, and what the sprint's look like, and keep that all in one place.

Anne Eisenach:

It also is pretty easy to report off of so, side bonus.

Brick Thompson:

Yeah, I mean, it has some of its own reporting, but also the API to pull data out of it is really slick.

Anne Eisenach:

So the PM will set up the project structure in DevOps, that's at the project level. And then our next level down in the hierarchy are the milestones. Quick sidenote on that. So we, in the scoping process, if you remember, we talked about establishing our project sequence and duration and the resources that are going to be needed to complete the work, we stay at a pretty high level at that scoping point. But it does serve as our roadmap for the project when we get into executing. So the PM is going to translate that workflow

Brick Thompson:

Okay. into the milestone structure within DevOps. And what I mean by that is, we'll take our let's say, we establish a milestone of a data source ETL, might be one to two weeks, we'll plug that in at the milestone level, and establish the start and end dates right there within DevOps. So we have kind of our roadmap at that high level, straight from the scoping process into our executing process. And will that produce a Gantt chart for you?

Anne Eisenach:

It will not produce a Gantt chart for you.

Brick Thompson:

Something like that though, if you're not a PMI certified PM.

Anne Eisenach:

All right. And so we also establish at that point in the project, even in that project level, we put our risk log and our change log and our issue log directly in there. So it's something we set up. Again, setting up a good infrastructure in our tools enables us to know exactly where we're plugging things in throughout the project. And we're not scrambling around wasting time on something like tracking.

Brick Thompson:

So yeah, critical to have good tools, you know, you don't want to be winging it.

Anne Eisenach:

Yep exactly.

Brick Thompson:

Okay. So once the tools are set up, what's next?

Anne Eisenach:

We'll do an internal kickoff and sprint planning meeting. This is where we bring our team who was involved in the scoping or sales process. So that's usually a senior consultant, a senior technical resource, likely a PM if we can, and then also, we'll bring in what we refer to as the executing team. So that's who we've established in the resource planning process. Those are engineers who are going to execute on the work that we've scoped out.

Brick Thompson:

Okay, so important point in there is that in that internal kickoff, the sales team comes to that so that we have a really clean and not misaligned handoff there.

Anne Eisenach:

We want to make sure there's no ambiguity. And this gives our executing team an opportunity to ask questions, if there's any uncertainty over the scope or what was discussed in the sales process. We can't do everything in one meeting. So of course, there's ongoing discussions, but this gives us a really good starting point for for launching into an aligned project team.

Brick Thompson:

Okay.

Anne Eisenach:

And so that's really the goal of that internal kickoff component. And also, a quick note, team formation is important her. We we operate in development teams, which are comprised of a PM and then four to five engineers ranging from our architects to our data visualization engineers. So we're familiar with each other generally. When we can, there's efficiency in working within that team. So we're well formed and know how to work well together. But it's also good to have an intentional step where we say, "Are there specific things that I can do as a project manager that are going to help you be successful on this project?" Maybe that's something as far as, you know,"Can you make sure that you tell me if it's an urgent or non urgent team's message?" Just something like that, that kind of clears disruption where we can. So having a discussion about that is good.

Brick Thompson:

Okay. And as we were discussing this, before we started recording, I think you said you do some initial sprint planning in this first internal meeting, too.

Anne Eisenach:

We do. So generally, our sprint planning is always in two weeks.

Brick Thompson:

Two week increments?

Anne Eisenach:

Two week increments.

Brick Thompson:

Gotcha.

Anne Eisenach:

Generally, we'll do that independently as an executing team through the project. But we do our first one with the full team that's done the scoping, so that we really make sure that we're tight on what was discussed up front and make sure that we're following the plan that was discussed. But we get to a more tactical level. We've just seen that make sure it sets up a good foundation.

Brick Thompson:

Yeah, I mean, you all sort of leave the starting line at the same time in the same direction.

Anne Eisenach:

Yeah, exactly. And so we'll go down to the task level. I talked about projects, milestones, and then tasks that are gonna help us accomplish those milestones, looking at the next two weeks. It's important that we keep the milestone targets in line and the PM is really responsible for making sure that we're tracking to those milestones, we're keeping that overall level. The engineers do manage their own tasks moving forward. We're in sync well, we have client team meetings every week, internal meetings every week to make sure that we're on track.

Brick Thompson:

Okay, so those tasks that the engineers are tracking, have to roll up to milestones in a way that makes sense for the schedule.

Anne Eisenach:

That's right. And make sense to them. That's actually something I found out in my career in project management. Having an engineer attached to the tasks that they're trying to complete has a huge impact, or has the potential to have a huge impact. That sounds silly, I can see you're looking at me skeptically here.

Brick Thompson:

No, I actually, I think, well, I'm gonna guess what you're gonna say is not just "Okay, I had to do this task," but, "What what milestone or goal does this task support?" Is that right?

Anne Eisenach:

Yeah, that's part of it. And even down to just the granular "What does done mean for this task?"

Brick Thompson:

Oh, okay.

Anne Eisenach:

I'll give maybe an example of counterpoint to what what I'm getting at. We used to have templatized project plans, you probably remember that.

Brick Thompson:

Oh, yeah, hundreds of lines.

Anne Eisenach:

Yeah, hundreds of lines of project plans. It created some efficiency, I think upfront in the project planning process. But we found that it would kind of come back to haunt us in project execution. Because if the person doing the task doesn't actually understand what is supposed to be done in that, they actually don't know. As a PM, I'm asking them, "Is this task done?" And they're like, "I think so, but I don't know what the intention was or what the expectataion was."

Brick Thompson:

Yeah, because it's slightly generic, because it's in a template. You know, the lead engineer who came up with that task may know exactly what it means, but someone else may not.

Anne Eisenach:

Exactly. So it just helps them stay attached and kind of creates some ownership of what done looks like for those.

Brick Thompson:

Way more agile too. Okay, good. What's next?

Anne Eisenach:

Next, we'll go from the internal kickoff and sprint planning session, as quickly as we can, into the client kickoff. Like I said, I think this is a pretty quick and efficient phase in our overall process. Because we are trying to get to the point where we're executing, so we don't want to spend all our time planning, but it's important that we do this. So we do the client kickoff. This is usually a relatively brief meeting. We invite again, from our side, the scoping and executing team. There are times where we don't have we can't get all members, right. But it's important, I think, that we have that continuity through the whole process for our clients. And it's not as though the folks who scoped it go completely hands off either, in executing. They remain involved to kind of provide advisory to the team and answer any questions. So there's definitely continuity, but it is helpful to get our executing team engaged to actually get the work done.

Brick Thompson:

Yeah.

Anne Eisenach:

So it's also important to note that in the sales process, we may not have engaged with all of the client side stakeholders yet. We may be working with just a selection of them in the scoping process. And so this is where we try to get together anybody who's going to be assisting us with data source access and questions, assisting us with metric definition, or really just being the project sponsor or project manager on their side, to make sure that we have alignment with all stakeholders of the report on the client side as well as ours.

Brick Thompson:

Yeah, that probably would include people who are assigned from the client side to sign off on work, to approve a direction, design, something like that.

Anne Eisenach:

Exactly. SMEs that we're going to need those types of things. So basically all of the key people that are going to participate in the project from the client side. That's right. One of the things that we go over is the roles and responsibilities matrix and, you know, something that we pre-populate from what we've learned in the sales process, and confirm with them, "Okay, we've heard that so and so is going to be the key to getting access to this source, can you make sure that that's right?" Just making sure that they, and also that person, know what they're reading sign up for, and what they can expect.

Brick Thompson:

And it's an interesting point that access to data seems like it can be an afterthought if you're not careful, but it can actually stop the whole project. And so you really need to get that figured out upfront.

Anne Eisenach:

That's a great point, we've actually made data source access a prerequisite to even starting a project. If we don't have that we can't get very far, even if we try.

Brick Thompson:

Yeah, that's for sure. We've learned that the hard way more than once.

Anne Eisenach:

So other things were discussing on that client kickoff is, again, since we may have some stakeholders who haven't had a formal introduction to the project scope, we'll make sure to go through that to catch any of that misalignment. You're hearing that word again. And then also look at the project plan and duration, and we'll tell them key points where they may have heavier times of involvement versus, "Okay, this is hands off." One of the most important things that we need to establish is user acceptance testing, often referred to as you UAT. So that's part of a lot of our projects. I would say most. The clients do have an opportunity at all points of the project, really, we're meeting weekly. We try and really avoid the black box concept. We don't want to go away, develop, you're not going to see anything for six weeks, and then hand it over.

Brick Thompson:

Right.

Anne Eisenach:

Right. And so we have weekly development reviews, and they will have a chance to see progress on a weekly basis. But the UAT phase is where they can really get engaged. We've completed the report development to the requirements and they'll get an opportunity. Generally, it's about a week duration, and so it's important that they block that in for anybody who they want on their site to be able to do that UAT, play with the report, give us initial feedback. So that's one of the heavier involvement weeks for our clients. So we want to make sure that we're planning for that so they know what to expect and when.

Brick Thompson:

Okay, great. All right. That's a lot of stuff for project initiation. I mean, it happens pretty quickly. Really key stuff. I mean, if I was gonna summarize, it's all about alignment, alignment alignment, both internally and with the client. And if you get that, then you're way more likely to have a successful project. I will say that our projects are overwhelmingly very successful. I can't even think of the last one where it wasn't, and I have a feeling this as a as a big role in that.

Anne Eisenach:

I'd like to think so. And then when we're done with this, we're off to the races.

Brick Thompson:

All right. Great. This was this was illuminating. What's our next topic?

Anne Eisenach:

Project execution.

Brick Thompson:

Okay. So, see you in a week for that.

Anne Eisenach:

I think you might be with Jenny for that.

Brick Thompson:

Okay, all right. Well I'll look forward to seeing you soon. Thanks, Anne.

Anne Eisenach:

Yeah, thank you.