The ability to adapt and overcome technical changes enables software project to succeed writes, Dr R Srinivasan

It has been mentioned in my last article that changes made during and after software development process is inevitable. However, better planing will lead to fewer changes. The primary objective of the project plan should aim at minimising the changes. During the development stage, it is very essential to understand the concept of change and what would be the impact on the project and the impact on the project and the organisation. In this context William Brown, et.al., in their book 'AntiPatterns in project Management', draw a parallel with US Marine Corps where the motto is, "adapt, overcome, succeed" as the fundamental fabric of training. In a similar way, it is the ability to adapt and overcome that enables software projects to succeed. Changes may happen either under the planned environment or in an unanticipated environment. In either case the impact may be organisational or individual or in the project. Consequently the results of change impact could be strategic or technical, making it directly related to the project. In his book 'Managing Strategic Change', Noel Tichy points out that the change with respect to the organisation is implemented through three specific change model - technical, cultural and political changes affect the way in which an organisation achieves affect the way power base is employed, and cultural changes affect what is deemed or perceived to be appropriate behaviour. We will describe these later when we take up discussing AntiPatterns in this area.

In order to have an efficient monitoring and control of changes during the life cycle of a project it is very necessary to have a good change control procedure. Change control is the practice of evaluating, controlling and approving important changes made during the project and of making sure that all stakeholders of the project are aware of the changes that affect them. According to Stave McConnell, in 'Software Survival Guide', basic change control procedure involves five important steps. They are: 1(. There no change control needed during the initial development stages and so changes can be made freely. 2). In order to get a certification with respect to the completion of a work product, it is subjected to a rigorous technical review. 3). A "change board", consisting of project manager, marketing, quality assurance, documentation and preferably user support, has to be constituted to which the work product is submitted and baselined. 4). The software revision control programme may be instituted at this stage to study and suggest if any version change has to be made. 5). Further changes to the work product, if needed, are treated in a systematic manner via change proposals, describing the type of changes to be made and their impact on schedule, efforts and the cost benefit.

McConnell advises that creating a change proposal is a good idea even in the small projects, because it provides a record of the project's decisions that is far more reliable than people's memories. The change proposal is then distributed to the concerned parties by the change control board so that they can assess the costs and benefits of the proposed change. This feedback from the parties with respect to the changes are prioritised by the change control board and a decision is taken whether to accept, reject or defer the changes to a later data. The final decision is then passed on to all the concerned parties. The main aim of this exercise is, "Assess change impacts before making changes".

Successful software development orgenisations have proved that adapting good change control procedure leads to lot of benefits particularly in protecting the project from unnecessary changes. Software Gurus like McConnell stress the point, "Addition of unnecessary features, through changes, is traditionally one of the most serious software development risks because of the related increases in software complexity, destablilising affect on design and code, and increased schedule/cost associated with expanding product concept". Through the improved visibility of necessary changes and the involvement of concerned perties, the style and quality of decisions improve which in turn will have direct impact on the project team's ability to track progress. It is very important to observe that if the change control has to work, the members of the project and the organisation must have commitment to this procedure. At the same time the change control board should ensure that the project team be subjected only to a few barrage of change request.

(The author is Chief Technology Officer, Internet Component Management Group, Bangalore and can be contacted at: r.srinivasan@iCMGworld.com)