Implementing a Business Intelligence System at Temper Tinglary Soho Art Gallery - Assignment Example

Continuation of project charter for implementing a business intelligence system at Temper Tinglary SOHO Art Gallery-Yarra Valley Project quality management The quality management plan for the business intelligence system project will detail what need to be done in order to ensure that a quality BI system is implemented at the end of the project (Sobh, 2010). Thus quality management is intended to ensure that quality is planned and managed; quality assurance and control activities are defined and that acceptable quality standards are defined (Eckerson, 2010). The product quality of this project will be based on integrated quality approach for the definition of quality standards, measurement of quality and continuous improvement quality (Thierauf, 2001). The product quality of BI system project will be based on the ability of the system to meet the firm’s current objective of implementing a system which can offer the firm an opportunity to explore, integrate, aggregate and carry out a multidimensional analysis of data originating from various information resources (Eckerson, 2010). Process quality of the BI system will focus on the sourcing, vendor identification and tailoring of the system to suit Temper Tinglary SOHO Art Gallery-Yarra Valley needs (Sobh, 2010). It addition process quality will be dependent on the comprehensiveness of training offered to the users of the system at the firm. The specific quality standards of the project (both product and process) will be developed by the project team in conjunction with the company’s quality group (Czemicki, 2009). All the documents developed for quality of the project will become part of the BI system project and will be transitioned to operations if the project is completed successfully. In order to measure the quality of BI system project throughout its lifecycle for the processes and product, metrics will be developed (Schwalbe, 2009). The definition, measurement and analysis of metrics will be developed by the Temper Tinglary SOHO Art Gallery-Yarra Valley quality group manager and the project team. The success of the project will be determined by these measurements of product and process and thus will have to be reviewed by the project sponsor (Thierauf, 2001). The metrics that will need to be defined will include schedule, resources, cost, process performance, product performance and customer satisfaction. The identification of any improvement on quality will be open to any member of quality group or project team (Sobh, 2010). All such suggestions will undergo reviews to determine their cost effectiveness against the benefit in addition to the impact of such improvements on the whole project product or processes (Czemicki, 2009). Any improvements will need to be updated in the project documents by the project manager. Since Temper Tinglary SOHO Art Gallery-Yarra Valley does not currently have any product and process quality on BI system, product and process specific quality standards will need to be identified by the project team and quality group (Czemicki, 2009). Once this is done the standards will be reviewed and incorporated into the firm’s documentations if approved by the quality group (Sobh, 2010). The identified quality standards will be communicated to stakeholders. The acceptable quality control margins for BI system project will be established upon ten consecutive trail runs. Quality assurance of the BI system project will entail continuous measurement of process metrics, analysis of process data and continuous improvement of the processes. Assessments of the process will be performed at planned intervals by the BI system project manager and the project team (Sobh, 2010). This will ensure that all processes are implemented and executed correctly. The quality of BI system project will be both information quality and the overall capabilities of the system. The extensibility and flexibility of the BI system in terms of Temper Tinglary SOHO Art Gallery-Yarra Valley business themes and cubes will determine whether the product is a qualitative one or not. This will be based on the pre-defined logical data models, established foundation dimensions and a centralized data warehouse metadata. The ability of the BI platform to provide the capabilities which will be able to satisfy new requirements of Temper Tinglary SOHO Art Gallery-Yarra Valley quickly will also determine the quality of the Bi system implemented (Thierauf, 2001). The ability of the system to satisfy new requirements quickly will be based on the extensibility and flexibility of the dimensional model and the ability of the system’s architecture to do data lineage. The quality of the project will also be based on its ability to provide capability to easily support future application needs of Temper Tinglary SOHO Art Gallery-Yarra Valley. The BI system implemented will need to be scalable to be able to handle any increases in the number of users without impacting negatively on the performance of the system for it to be said that it is a quality one (Sobh, 2010). The quality of the system will also be based on its scalability to handle increased complexity of queries (Abraham, Koppen, and Franke, 2003). Furthermore the quality of the BI system implemented will be based on its scalability to handle the increase in the volume of data and its ability to support and facilitate the integration of data from multiple systems (Czemicki, 2009). Process audits and quality management will be provided by the quality manager on daily basis. reviews and scheduling of regularly occurring projects will be done by the project manager on weekly basis. Reviews, assessments and findings will help in improvement of the quality of the project and will be documented appropriately. Communication management The role of effective communication management will be proactively be handled by the BI system project manager. Communication to the sponsors of the project will be presented in a summary format since the sponsors of the project are owners of Temper Tinglary SOHO Art Gallery-Yarra Valley who are at the executive level communication. However, upon request, detailed communication will be presented to them. The program manager of BI system project will be overseeing the project at the portfolio level and will own most of the resources assigned to the project. Since he will be responsible for overall program costs and profitability they will need more detailed communications as compared to the project sponsors (Thierauf, 2001). The project manager will be the main distributor information since he is the person responsible for the execution of the project. The project team will be involved performing work on the BI system project and thus they will need a clear understanding of the work to be completed and the framework in which the project will be executed (Sobh, 2010). Thus the project team will require a detailed level of communications which will be attained via daily interactions with the project manager and other members of the team alongside weekly team meetings. Employees will be using the new system to run the firm and thus they will need a lot of communication on the benefits and how to use the new system. This will reduce any cases of rejections of new ways of transacting business at Temper Tinglary SOHO Art Gallery-Yarra Valley. Different departments of Temper Tinglary SOHO Art Gallery-Yarra Valley will be represented by respective management officers and will make up the steering committee. The committee will provide a strategic oversight for changes that will impact the firm overall. The committee will ensure that changes brought about by implementation of BI system benefits Temper Tinglary SOHO Art Gallery-Yarra Valley as a whole. Thus the committee will require communication on matter which will change the scope of the BI system project and its deliverables. Since the BI system will be implemented by a chosen vendor, one of the vendor’s personnel tasked with implementation process will be a technical lead (Czemicki, 2009). Technical lead will be responsible for ensuring that all technical aspects of the project are addressed and that the project is implemented in a technically sound manner (Thierauf, 2001). He will be involved in technical designing, overseeing implementation of designs and developing as build documentation. Thus he will needs to closely communicate with the BI system project manager and the project team (Abraham, Koppen, and Franke, 2003). The contact information of all persons who will be involved in communication management is presented in the table below. Role Name Email Phone Project Sponsor Program Manager Project Manager Project Team Technical Lead Employees Project human resource management Human resources management plan is essential in the implementation of BI system. This will act as a tool for managing the BI system project’s human resource activities throughout its lifetime until it is completed. The plan includes the roles and responsibilities of team members during the project implementation process, project organization charts and staff management plan (Thierauf, 2001). The plan aims at attaining the project success by ensuring that the necessary skills are acquired, resources are trained, and team building strategies are defined and effective management of team activities. The project manager (one position) will be responsible for ensuring that the implementation of BI system at Temper Tinglary SOHO Art Gallery-Yarra Valley is successful. He will be involved in authorization and approval of all project expenditures. In addition, project manager will be tasked with ensuring that acceptable quality standards are attained as BI system is implemented. The project manager will required to report the status of the project as outlined in the communication management plan (Abraham, Koppen, and Franke, 2003). He will also be involved in the evaluation of all project team members and communicating their performance to their respective functional managers. He will also coordinate with functional managers to acquire project human resources (Thierauf, 2001). The project manager will be required to posses’ leadership/management, budgeting, scheduling and effective communication skills. The software installation engineer (two positions) will be responsible for installation of the BI system and gathering coding requirements for tailoring the BI system to fit the needs of Temper Tinglary SOHO Art Gallery-Yarra Valley. They will be responsible for installation of BI system software and code tailoring and testing of the installed BI system. They will help in networking all the firm’s computers to the BI system. They will also be responsible for communicating on timely basis to the project manager as required by the communication management plan. The performance of the installation software engineer will be managed by the project manager and communicated to the vendor (Thierauf, 2001). The installation software engineer will be provided by the software vendor and will need to be proficient in programming html, java and C++ programming languages. Implementation manager (one position) will be involved in distributing, implementing and monitoring the implementation of BI system at Temper Tinglary SOHO Art Gallery-Yarra Valley. He will work closely with the software installation engineer to ensure that the new system conforms to the required quality standards of the firm. He will coordinate other departments at the firm in facilitating the rollout of the BI system (Abraham, Koppen, and Franke, 2003). He will report to the project manager on the status of the project. The performance of implementation manager will be evaluated by project manager who will in turn report to the network manager. Training lead (one position) will be responsible for training all Bi system users on the features provided by the BI system. He will coordinate training times and locations with different departments at Temper Tinglary SOHO Art Gallery-Yarra Valley. The training status will be communicated to the project manager accordingly. Two functional managers will help in provision of resources for the project in accordance with the plan of project staffing even through they will not be part of project team (Thierauf, 2001). They will work with the project manager in determining the skills required in the project and approving resource assignments. They will be conducting performance appraisals of assigned resources based on the feedback of project manager on project performance. The following chart indicates how project tasks are related to team members. Any adjustments will need to be approved by the project manager. Such changes will need to be proposed in line with change control process of the project. Approved changes will go hand in hand with updating of project documents and redistribution of tasks accordingly. Project Manager Software installation Engineers Implementation Manager Training Leads Functional Managers Department Managers Requirements Gathering A R R C C I Coding Design A R C C I Coding Input A R Software Testing A R C I I Network Preparation A C R I I Implementation A C R C C C Conduct Training A R C C Key: R – Responsible for completing the work A – Accountable for ensuring task completion/sign off C – Consulted before any decisions are made I – Informed of when an action/decision has been made Most of the staff will be from the Temper Tinglary SOHO Art Gallery-Yarra Valley. However, the software installation engineer and the training lead will be provided by the chosen vendor. The implementation manager will need to be hired since the current employees are not conversant with the BI system. The implementation of the BI system at Temper Tinglary SOHO Art Gallery-Yarra Valley will last for three months. All resources are required prior to commencement of the project. All users of the BI system will need to be trained on how to use the system since most of them have never used it (Thierauf, 2001). Each employee will need to undertake at least two day training on the use of the system. Training is scheduled to commence immediately the BI is successfully implemented so as to ensure that the employees and other stakeholders are trained as they practice. Each project team member assigned work activities will be reviewed by the project manager at the beginning of the project and all expectations of work to be performed communicated accordingly (Thierauf, 2001). Evaluation of each project team member’s performance and their effective completion of assigned duties will be carried out throughout the project by the project manager. The project manager will first meet appropriate functional manager and provide feedback on employee project performance before releasing project resources (Abraham, Koppen, and Franke, 2003). Once this is done, the functional manager will carry out a formal performance review on each team member. A party will be held to celebrate successful implementation of the BI system project and in attendance will be family members of the project team. Procurement management plan The procurement framework for this project is set in this procurement management plan. It will guide procurement processes throughout the project. All procurement activities of this project will be managed by the project manager. Items to be procured will be identified by the project manager with assistance of the project team (Thierauf, 2001). The identified items will be reviewed by the project management office which will in turn submit it to purchasing and contracts department (Rose, 2005). The purchasing and contracts department will review the items, select vendor, and initiate purchasing and contracting process if the items are deemed advantageous (Dinsmore and Cabanis-Brewin, 2010). Once the project team is constituted, it will identify and approve purchases for items required for the project. the team will work with purchasing and contracting department to define item types, quantities, services and required dates of delivery (Thierauf, 2001). Bids from different vendors will then be solicited by the purchasing and contracts department to help in procurement of the required items on timely basis and at reasonable prices (Kimball and Ross, 2010). Prior to contract approval process, the required items or services will be determined, cost analysis done and solicitations send to vendors. Once vendor proposals are received approval process will begin (Rasmussen, Goldy and Solli, 2002). The approval process here will involve conducting a review of vendor proposal to identify the vendor which meets the established criteria. Any purchases less than $1, 500 will only need the approval of the project manager (Abraham, Koppen, and Franke, 2003). Any purchases above this will need the approval of the contract review board. The board will be made up of representatives from project team, finance, contracts and purchasing department and the project management office. The selection criteria will be based on the ability of the vendor to provide quality, cost effective items by the required delivery dates. Past performance of the vendor will also be considered. Decisions will be made based on the resources available and the above criteria. Vendors will be managed by project manager (Thierauf, 2001). The manager will meet the purchasing and contracts department and the vendor on weekly basis to ensure the procured item is delivered on time. the meetings will help in provision of reviews on the procured items. The procurement activities for this project will be based on the following metrics rated on 1-3 scale as shown in the table below. Vendor Product Quality On Time Delivery Documentation Quality Development Costs Development Time Cost per Unit Transactional Efficiency Vendor #1 Vendor #2 1 - Exceptional 2 – Acceptable 3 – Unsatisfactory References Abraham, A., Koppen, M., and Franke, K. 2003. Design and application of hybrid intelligent systems. London: IOS Press. Czemicki, B. 2009. Next-Generation Business Intelligence Software with Silverlight 3. New York: Apress. Dinsmore, P., and Cabanis-Brewin, J. 2010. The AMA Handbook of Project Management, 3rd Ed. New York: AMACOM Div American Mgmt Assn. Eckerson, W. 2010. Performance Dashboards: Measuring, Monitoring, and Managing Your Business, 2nd Ed. New York: John Wiley and Sons. Kimball, R., and Ross, M. 2010. The Kimball Group Reader: Relentlessly Practical Tools for Data Warehousing and Business Intelligence. New York: John Wiley and Sons. Rasmussen, N., Goldy, P., and Solli, P. 2002. Financial business intelligence: trends, technology, software selection, and implementation. New York: John Wiley and Sons. Rose, K. 2005. Project quality management: Why, what and how. London: J. Ross Publishing Schwalbe, K. 2009. Information Technology Project Management, 6th Ed. London: Cengage Learning Sobh, T. 2010. Innovations and Advances in Computer Sciences and Engineering. New York: Springer Thierauf, R. 2001. Effective business intelligence systems. London: Greenwood Publishing Group. Read More