Projects Are Temporary In Nature

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

1. Introduction:

"Projects are temporary in nature; have definite start and end dates; produce a unique product, service, or result; and are completed when their goals and objectives have been met and signed off by the stakeholders" (PMI's PMBOK4th Edition) and the process of managing the activities of the project with the help of set of tools and techniques known as project management. One of the sub disciplines of project management is the software project management. The software project management is an art of planning, monitoring and controlling of software projects.

The purpose of project management is to conduct a successful project. And the basic criteria generally agreed for the project success is the completion of project within budget and on time with achieving the key objectives of the project. According to Standish report, Software development projects have a maximum no. of failure rate as compared to another industry’s projects. Every project faces some challenges during its life cycle which resist the project to complete on time and within budget and the major challenge which software project management faces is control of quality throughout project life cycle (Phan, George and Vogel, 1995). ISO 8402 standard state that quality, is "the totality of features and characteristics of a product or service that bear on its ability to satisfy stated or implied" If the quality does not monitor or control from the starting of the life cycle it could cause deterioration in quality of the final product.

The quality of the software project majorly affect by the large number of unresolved errors which rise at different phases of life cycle. During software project life cycle due to time line pressure the project personnel do not give attention to the small errors (technical/processes) and leave them behind unsolved. In the absence of any specialize or standard quality control or improvement techniques these small errors reoccur at different phases of life cycle. And as the project progress, these small errors increase their size and affect the final product quality and also become a cause of schedule and cost overrun of the project. To achieve the affected product quality the company has to pay the non conformance cost. The cost of non-conformance is the amount of money spent to redo work, refund the money to the customers, loss due to project failure, fines. In the past few years many IT/software organization understand this problem and trying to work out some process or technique to get consistent quality control throughout the project life cycle (Gupta, 2003).

To overcome or reduce the re-occurrence of these errors in the software projects this report will try to provide a frame work for software project management life cycle which integrate the six sigma methodology (specialize in quality control measure activities).

1.1 Project Rationale:

The rationale behind this report is to highlight the importance of quality in the software project life cycle and the effect of absence of quality on the success of software projects. Although there are some tool and techniques present in the project management but due to the rapid changing working environment they are not enough efficient to control and monitor the quality in the software project life cycle. In software industry, the final deliverable of each software project is the "Software". The characteristics of the final deliverable can change with every new project but the basic processes (like programming, testing etc) of the project life cycle remain same. If the error or problem present in the processes of the project life cycle then it is necessary to rectify or resolve those errors from their roots otherwise those error will regenerate in the next project but the project management’s tools do not concentrate on the solving the problem from its root.

To find the root cause of the problem and its solution there are some specialized quality control tools/techniques proposed by the researchers like Six Sigma. Six Sigma is more concentrate toward solution of problem from their root cause and prevention of their recurrence in contrast of attempting to control potential cause of problem on a project by project basis.

1.2 Project Environment:

This report will integrate the project management life cycle and six sigma’s methodology to enhance the quality control measures in software projects. The integration of process control strength of project management and troubleshooting strength of six-sigma help the organization to create a highly effective trouble shooting system, which helps to achieve the deliverable of the project in a cost-effective manner, and ensures that organizational objectives are also achieved.

The integration of methodology of Six Sigma like DMAIC into the project management life cycle will help to reap up the maximum benefit of business like reduce the probability of human error and oversight.

1.3 Aim:

To integrate the Six Sigma ‘DMAIC’ methodology in the software project life cycle to achieve the consistent quality level throughout the project and reduce the effect of quality on cost and schedule overrun in software projects.

1.4 Scope:

This research will provide a framework which will help to integrate the monitoring aspects of project management tools/processes with the problem –resolving and quality centric trouble shooting features of six sigma. While the quality improvement tools of six-sigma ensures that qualitative objectives will achieve, the project management helps to make a health report of the project progress at every small step (known as milestone) throughout the project life cycle.

1.5 Objectives:

To analyze the importance of quality for the software project’s success.

To understand the basic differences and similarities between project management and six sigma methodologies.

To identify and analyse the methodology of Six Sigma for integration in the software project life cycle.

To develop an improve software project life cycle framework includes important six sigma quality control methodology in it.

1.6 Consideration:

The major consideration is the issue/error resolving strength of six sigma methodology from its root cause. The project management life cycle structured approach.

1.7 Assumptions:

The major assumption of this project is that the integration of these two techniques will create the positive results and increase the efficiency of the software project life cycle. The project life cycle is enough flexible to accommodate the external tools and techniques in it without any hassle.

The other assumptions are:

Some individuals may not complete the survey, possibly creating bias in the collected data. Because of this, incomplete survey questionnaires will immediately be invalidated and will not be included in the analysis.

Individual participant survey will be confidential. In this way, the researcher will be able to ensure the full cooperation of the participants.

1.8 Limitations:

The major limitation of this project is that there are so many quality control tools and techniques available but we cannot use or study all the techniques in such a short time. So project has to identify only one or two major techniques and concentrate on it.

The Project does not cover any risk management activity in any phase of project life cycle to highlight or resolve the problems arise throughout the life cycle.

1.9 Budget/Resource Requirements:

There were no major budget related issues faced by the researcher during the course of this study. This can be a reason of research orientation that is kept secondary in nature. Further, along with the exclusion of primary research, this research doesn’t required any type of consent or permission from higher authorities, which made it the process of data collection free from the aspect of financial contributions.

1.10 Chapter Outline:

This chapter highlights the need and background of the topic. It highlights the probable constraints, and assumption of the topic. In this chapter the major things which want to convey is that usage of quality improvement techniques in project management life cycle can create an extremely effective integrated tool which will suit almost every kind of organization from Transactional to manufacturing, from small to big/complex projects. This report concentrates on the integration of six sigma methodology in software projects. In the next chapter "literature review" the major points like importance of quality in project, six sigma tools will be discuss further.

2.0 Literature Review:

Recent research done by standish group shows that many of the Software projects have ‘failed’, in the combination of budget and/or schedule overruns and/or for not meeting users’ requirements. The well known and now widely quoted Chaos Report by Standish Group declared that software projects are in chaos.

Table 1 provides a summarized report card on project outcomes based on the Report. Type 1 projects are those completed on time and within budget, with all required functions and features initially specified. The ‘‘challenged’’ projects, though completed and operational, suffered budget overruns and/or program slips, and offered fewer functions and features than originally specified. The ‘‘impaired’’ projects are those cancelled or abandoned at some point during the development cycle. It is anticipated that many of the software projects would continue to be ‘challenged’ or ‘impaired’. The truly ‘successful’ stories from the outset will be relatively rare.

(Standish Report: Table 1)

According to the above table, the success percentage of Software projects is only 16.2% and the report stated that major reasons behind the failure is cost and schedule over run.

2.1 Relation between Quality and the project success:

In his book Project Portfolio Management, Harvey Levine states that "Almost everything written about measurements of project success dwells on the four pillars of success: scope, time, cost, and quality".

Cost

Quality

Time Scope

According to the above fig. the quality plays a centre pillar role between all the three major factors Cost, Time and Scope responsible for project success and all four are interlinked with each other and Change in quality can affect the cost time and scope. Quality is the absence of deviations from the planned new state and the usefulness of this new state for the future operations (Knopefel, 1989).

One of the major reason behind the cost and schedule overrun of the project is the inconsistent level of quality in the project. If we control and monitor the quality in the project we will be able to reduce the chances of cost or schedule overrun and increases the chances of project success.

DeLone & McLean (1992) proposes six major dimensions of project success, which they refine to include: project’s system quality, information quality, service quality, user satisfaction and net benefits to organization.

Project’s system quality: The quality of the system used to achieve the project objective. The system includes the processes, methodologies, templates etc.

Information quality: The quality of the information flow and communication between project personnel.

Service quality: The quality of the service provided to the customer after handling the product of the project. e.g. maintenance, refund.

User Satisfaction: The satisfaction of the customer with the product quality.

The above stated major dimension for project success stated that it is not only final deliverable quality that describes the project success or failure, the quality of the processes; systems used in each phase to achieve the final deliverable make impact on the project success too.

From a long time the project managers of software companies in the developing countries experience difficulty in the quality control management function, i.e. managing the implementation of the project within a certain quality level conforming to predetermine specifications. The reason behind the problem, is the absence of a well structured framework for the quality control in each phase of project life cycle. The research shows that in the absence of suitable quality control measure at each phase of project life cycle increases the repetition of error (Yaseen & Marashly, 1989)

2.2 Effect of absence of quality control techniques in software projects:

Dtivid S. Alberts (2004) examined the impact of programming errors on the life cycle cost of software Projects. Such errors may occur early in the development phase, or later during the operational phase when software maintenance (i.e., change) is required.

About half of the IT project life cycle costs are attributable to errors which are made with equal probability in these two phases (Bremer et al., 2006)

Several software products contain thirty to two hundred thousand lines of coding. The average cost of ‘repeating" an error made during the development phase but not discovered until the software attained operational, was 139 times greater than the cost of writing that one line in the first place (Richards, 2007).

From the above statements it is clearly state that in absence of proper quality control framework just one line could cause a huge different in project budget. And overrun of project budget is one of the major factors behind the project failure. If quality control measures are strongly placed and executed during project life cycle phases then the control on the overrun of the budget could be possible.

2.3 Software Project Life Cycle:

The four major software project management life cycle steps are initiation, planning, execution, and testing test and close out for each case. Each of these project management steps yields standard deliverables, such as business requirements, system requirements, information flow diagrams, test cases, system architectures, etc (Hake,1991)

Role of quality control procedures/techniques at different phases of software life cycle:

2.4.1 Initiation phase: The major activities of this phase are to define the problem, creating the business case and get the customers/stakeholders perspective toward the project deliverable. These activities include lots of data collection and their effectiveness depends on the quality of the data and the data collecting processes. In the absence of proper quality tools it is difficult to get high quality reliable data from the stakeholders and the customers and it is difficult to map the effectiveness of the processes used in this phase.

2.4.2 Planning Phase:

The software investment in private and government industry are often accompanied by poor vision and implementation approaches, insufficient planning and coordination and are rarely linked to business strategies. The successful implementation of new and innovative software requires the development of strategic implementation plans prior to software project commencement. The effective planning should go some way to reduce the current gap between output and expectation from software’s investments.

As stated above, the planning plays an important role in software project life cycle. The planning phase is an important phase of software project life cycle because it includes the detail planning related to cost and schedule to achieve the objective of the project. All the necessary precaution or control measures for any risk associated with project are planned in this phase.

The absence of quality tools in planning phase cause difficulty to set realistic baseline for cost and schedule because data gathered from the planning processes are not validated by any statistical tools (Six Sigma Academy, 2002). The Brook (2004) emphasize on the usage of quality control statistical tools. The statistical tools like Poisson distribution or gauge repeatability and reproducibility (GR&R) can help the validation of the processes and data used in planning phase.

2.4.3 Execution Phase: During Execution phase the coding, programming and testing of the software take place. The usage of quality control tools in the execution phase is become necessary because lots of programming and coding involves lots of chances of error. If proper quality measurement techniques are installed in this phase they can help to find out the performance level of processes used in this phase and also help to find out the root cause of the error and selecting the best solutions, assessing the risks of each solution, and finally, implementing the best solution (Siviy, 2001). Statistical tools and techniques in this phase include brainstorming, benchmarking, solution screening, and FMEA to generate potential solutions. At the end of this phase the testing of the software will be done to match the software with its specified characteristics with the help of specified quality tools.

2.4.4 Closeout phase: In the close out phase all the necessary documents and reports will generate. The lesson learnt report, testing report, control review report generated to check that project deliverable match its objectives before handing it to the customer. The quality control tools make sure that product is match with the customer requirement and all the documentation work of the close out phase is done efficiently and accurately.

2.5 Quality control and monitoring tools:

There is several quality tools has been used by the organizations like ISO, Kaizen, Six Sigma, Total Quality Management (TQM). After observing the function and benefit of the various quality tools the results shows that, Six sigma is a sophisticated quality assurance tool for improving the existing processes. It includes several techniques into it which control and monitor the quality at different stages of the projects (Bremer et al., 2006). Six-sigma has found out more flexible and compatible with the software project management. So this report concentrates on the usage six sigma methodologies to integrate with software project life cycle to created integrated project management model for the software project.

2.6 Overview of Six-Sigma:

Six-Sigma was developed by Motorola Corporation in the early 1980s as a method of reducing product failure and eliminating defects. Snee & Hoerl (2003) identified two meanings for Six Sigma: the first as a measure of quality, and the second as a quality system, which includes a methodology for process improvement. Six-Sigma provides organizations measurable ways to track performance improvement and identify processes that are working well.

The six sigma methodology is a rigorous and focused application of quality improvement tools. The term six sigma refers to the idea of striving for near perfection at the infinitesimal rate of 3.4 problems per million opportunities. Beyond its role in quality assurance, six sigma helps the organization become more profitable. While it uses many traditional quality methods found in TQM, six sigma's ability to measure project success in terms of profit or cost savings is appealing to many executives.

2.7 Six Sigma methodologies: DMAIC approach

To implement into the project, six sigma approach is divided into five phases known as DMAIC (define, measure, analyze, improve, and control).

Different Phases of DMAIC approach

The Define phase, according to the Six Sigma Academy (2002), begins with a problem. This phase helps to clarify what the problem is and why the problem requires a solution.

In the Measure phase, statistical tools are applied to establish and validate the measurement system that will be used to measure the process for both baseline and target performance of the process (Six Sigma Academy, 2002).

The Analyze phase of Six Sigma is a tool box of tools and techniques to identify the critical factors of a good process as well as the root causes of process defects (Brook, 2004). The typical flow of activities in the Analyze phase is analyzing the current process; understanding why defects are in the process; and analyzing the data from the process and verifying the reasons for defects, particularly any cause and effect relationships.

The Improve phase of Six Sigma focuses on developing, selecting, and implementing the best solution to improve the process (Brook, 2004). The typical flow of activities in the Improve phase consists of generating potential solutions, selecting the best solutions, assessing the risks of each solution, and finally, implementing the best solution.

During this phase, controls are implemented so that the process improvement can be sustained over time. This phase employs tools such as control plans, hypothesis testing, statistical process control (SPC), and control logs.

DMAIC is the centerpiece approach to control the quality at different phases of project (Brue, 2002). In its different phases DMAIC includes variety of tools like Fishbone diagram, Pareto diagram, Cause and Effect diagram etc. which find out the root cause of the problem/error and remove that cause. It helps to reduce the probability of reoccurring of error/defects in each new project.

Chapter Outline:

This chapter has highlighted the importance of quality in software projects and how quality can affect the project success, the software project life cycle, Quality tools available, Six Sigma as methodology, with the support of thoughts/views from different writers. The usage of the other important tools of six sigma will be discussed in detail in the last chapter "Conclusion".

The next chapter is "Research Methodology" will provide information about the research methods utilized in this report, to find out the opinion of the different project management personnel over this topic with the help of quantitative method.

3.0 Research Methodology:

The aim and objectives of this study has identified in the first chapter and the views of the different author has been gathered and analysed in the second chapter. Due to the time constraint and nature of the report secondary research has taken into consideration for this study. But for the future perspective if primary research will carry out then it can follow the research plan proposed in this chapter.

3.1Research Plan:

To understand the level of awareness of quality tools, knowledge of six-sigma and project management procedures among the employees involved in software projects. This report has followed the following research plan. This research plan work as a tool for researcher to gather the real time information regarding project management and six-sigma from the respondents.

3.2 Research Philosophies:

The research philosophy contains the important assumptions, which help us to underpin the research strategy and the methods integrate into that strategy.

For this study, selecting an overall research philosophy is the choice between two primary alternatives: a positivist or a phenomenological philosophy.

Positivism research philosophy states that reality is in the form of hard-facts and figures, and researcher is not a part of the built-environment he/she is studying (Easterby-Smith et al., 1991), but in contrast the Phenomenology asserts that reality is subjective in nature, and a researcher should be focusing on meanings rather than facts. It also asserts that researcher is a part of the environment he/she is studying (Easterby-Smith et al., 1991).

3.2.1 Selection of research philosophy for this study:

This research report reality is objective in nature and based on the facts and figures so the favourable philosophy for this report is positivist research philosophy.

3.3 Research Approach:

To achieve the aim and objective of this study this research has to identify appropriate research approach between the following two approaches:

Deductive Approach: Deductive approach is the study to develop the theoretical and conceptual structure which is then tested by empirical observation (Hussey & Hussey 1997). Deductive approach worked from more general to specific. And its structure is like a top down approach.

Inductive Approach: Inductive approach is the study of observing the specific data and then summarise the general result from it. It is similar to the bottom up approach.

3.3.1 Preferred research approach: As this research is dealing with project management and six-sigma so it is necessary to get the data from both the fields. Later after analysis the data the specific framework related to software project can be propose. Therefore deductive approach would be suitable for this study.

3.4 Research Method:

Quantitative Method: Quantitative approaches seek to gather factual data and to study relationships between facts and how such facts and relationships accord with theories and the findings of any research executed previously (literature). Scientific techniques are used to obtain measurements -quantified data.

Quantitative approach generally involves:

Surveying technique/strategy: which involves a large group of people (usually several hundred), and

Using a questionnaire as a data collection instrument that contains mainly closed-ended or forced-choice, questions.

Qualitative method: Qualitative research involves detail analysis of data such as pictures (e.g., video), objects, words (e.g., from interviews). It doesn’t just depend on the numbers or statistics, which are the domain of quantitative researchers.

Major data collection methods used in the qualitative approach is:

Face to face interviews.

Focus group.

Observation.

Documentation.

Differences between the Quantitative and Qualitative research approach:

Qualitative

Quantitative

The aim of qualitative method is to do a complete detail analysis of data.

The aim of quantitative method is to classify the characteristics, measure them, and create statistical models in an effort to explain what is observed.

No statistical tests

Statistical tests are used for analysis

Instrument like in person interviews used for the gathering of data.

Tools, like questionnaires used to collect numerical data.

Qualitative data is large in size and it’s a time consuming method.

Quantitative data is more accurate and able to test hypotheses, but it does not give important to contextual details.

It is more subjective: describes a problem or condition from the point of view of those experiencing it

It is more objective: provides observed effects (interpreted by researchers) of a program on a problem or condition

It recommended during earlier phases of research projects.

It recommended during latter phases of research projects.

Time expenditure lighter on the planning end and heavier during the analysis phase

Time expenditure heavier on the planning phase and lighter on the analysis phase

(Saunders et al 2003:2007; Bernard 2000; Creswell 2003; Blaxter et al 2001)

3.4.1 Preferred research method: The qualitative research approach is very useful in primary research methodology to get detail subjective data by field work like conducting interviews. The interviews are not possible to conduct in this report as this method would have required the author to visit each company and speak with various members of project teams which is not practical within the given time period. So due to the budget and time limitation this report is based on the secondary research not on the primary research. To fulfil the requirements of secondary research within the specified time limit the quantitative research approach has been used in this report.

3.5 Research strategy or data collection technique:

This report is based on the secondary quantitative research method and surveying is the primary data collection method of the quantitative research so the data collection techniques use for this report is surveying.

3.6 Survey:

Surveys operate on the basis of statistical sampling; only extremely rarely are full population surveys possible, practical or desirable. The principles of statistical sampling - to secure a representative sample - are employed for economy and speed. Commonly, samples are surveyed through questionnaires or interviews. Surveys vary from highly structured questionnaires to unstructured interviews. Irrespective of the form adopted, the subject matter of the study must be introduced to the respondents

3.7 Sampling Population:

Sample is the collection of made up of some of the members of a population. (Collis & Hussey, 2003)

This research study will administer a survey on a company deploying software projects with an approximate population of 1000-3000 employees. The survey shall determine the effectiveness of software project within the company. The sample size that can represent the population of the organization was two hundred (200) respondents. This is based on the sample size calculator of the survey system (Creative Research Systems, 2003).

Respondents were randomly selected in order to ensure the impartial selection of the participants of the study. In this way also, the researcher can assure the validity of the outcome of the survey.

3.8 Data collection Instrumentation: Questionnaire (Quantitative)

Survey will send in the form of questionnaire to software project management’s employees in the company for the quantitative portion of the study.

The survey questionnaire consisted of two parts. The first part of the survey questionnaire would delve into the demographic profile of the respondents. Participants’ characteristics such as age, gender and the number of years in the company was asked and second part contain the questions regarding this research. The personal profile of the respondents is necessary information for the study because it influences the kind of response given by the participants. In other words, the outcome of the survey can be partially explained through the demographic profile of the respondents.

The second part of the survey includes identification of the different issues that significantly affects the success of information projects. The questions in the second part of the questionnaire will try to gauge the level of knowledge of six sigma methodology, the project management processes among the software project management personnel.

The major question of the second part of questionnaire on which whole research is based is:

Do the Integration of Software Project Management Life Cycle and Six Sigma Techniques improve the success rate of software projects by providing consistent quality control?

The hypothesis for this problem is stated as follows:

H1: The integration of project management life cycle and six sigma techniques can significantly improve the success rates of software projects by providing consistent quality control.

H0: The integration of project management life cycle and six sigma techniques cannot significantly improve the success rates of software projects by providing consistent quality control.

3.9 Questionnaire’s assumption, consideration and limitation:

The assumed sample size for the survey respondents would be two hundred (200) employees, of which 140 surveys (i.e., 70%) questionnaires will expect to return. Statistical tools will used to process the control and predictor variable data derived from the survey and their relationship to the dependent variables.

As Blaxter et al (2001), described whilst constructing the questionnaire, careful consideration was given to phrasing to avoid ambiguity and leading or complex questions, ensuring a logical order was followed and minimum technical jargon used. In simple words, the questionnaire will be design in such a way that it will easy to read and understand, less time consuming.

Firstly, only those who have knowledge of project management and quality control will be contact for questionnaire. Secondly, time will be a considerable constraint for the respondents, so the focus will be on obtaining the critical information. Finally, the study is not a comprehensive research investigation but instead smaller-scale projects limited by word count.

For the questionnaire developed for this study please refer appendix no.1

4.0 Data analysis:

Due to the time constraint and the nature of the report the data analysis cannot be performed in this report. But in future if primary research will carry out then the five point Likert scale can be used to collect the data from the questionnaire and later it can be analyzed by Weighed mean method.

4.1 Ethical Consideration:

The ethical consideration of the study would be the confidentiality of the identity of the respondents involved in the survey. In particular, the identity of the respondents was not disclosed in the paper in order not to compromise the value of the information they provided. The data collected from the respondents is indispensable in the study. As such, the researcher greatly observes the condition of confidentiality among the respondents. It is in this way that the researcher can expect full cooperation on the part of the respondents.

4.2 Chapter outline:

The research plan has developed in this chapter to collect the data and theory on project management and six sigma methodologies. The deductive approach and quantitative method will be used to analyse the data. Both the approach and methods are described in this chapter. The survey has chosen as a sampling technique in this study and questionnaire as instrument to gather the data.

In the next chapter, the conclusion and recommendation of this report will discuss in detail.

5.0 Conclusion:

This research has emphasized on the quality management aspect of the software project and tried to find out the relation between quality and the project success. However the further discussion proves that in the absence of specialized quality control tools it is difficult to maintain the consistent quality level throughout the project. The major factors highlighted in this research behind the project failure are Cost overrun, Schedule Overrun and insufficient quality in the project processes and deliverable. Behind all the three factors the one thing which is common is Quality; critically evaluation of the author views proves that the reoccurrence of unresolved errors leads to a cost and schedule overrun. To control these errors there is a need to implement the quality control tools at each phase of software project.

The research approach is based on secondary research methodology and provides a questionnaire to understand the perception of the employees of the software industry over the integrated project management model and to overcome the quality issues at different phases of project life cycle. After considering all the facts highlighted in the above sections this research provide an integrated project management model framework which created by the integration of the six sigma’s DMAIC methodology and the Software project life cycle.

5.1 Proposed framework for integration of six-sigma’s DMAIC methodology at different phases of Software Project life cycle:

The outer blue ring indicates the various key activities of software development at different phases of software project life cycle.

The inner green ring indicates the integration of six sigma’s DMAIC methodology with different phases of software project life cycle.

The above shown proposed framework shows the integration of the Six Sigma’s DMAIC Methodology at different phases of software project life cycle.

The Major activities involved in initiation phase are requirement gathering and prototype design. Requirement gathering is an initial research for the project requirements. It includes what all the things are required for this project. And the prototype design is a process to design the sample based on the initial requirements to see how the final project deliverable works. This helps in gap analysis between the sample and the project final deliverable.

5.1.1 Define Phase of six sigma + Initiation phase of software project life cycle:

The integration of Define phase of six-sigma in the initiation phase of software project life cycle helps to clarify what the problem is and why the problem requires a solution. The common chain of activities in the Define phase includes constructing a business case, clarifying how the problem is linked to the customer, understanding the current process, and forming the project team. The Define phase consists of quality tools such as voice of the customer (VOC), Critical to Quality (CTQ).

Voice of Quality (VOC): It includes reviewing customer complaints and using interviews and surveys to gain a better understanding of the customer’s perception of the problem. VOC help to create an effective business case.

Critical to quality (CTQ): This tool is intended to provide more clarity around the VOC. It is the next step after VOC to validate the data and ensure the characteristics of the product or process must met with customer requirement. CTQ’s Target value characteristic help in creating an effective budget plan in business case. Target value is the value that would always be achieved if there is no variation in the product or service.

Benefits to the Initiation phase:

1. Data is reliable and validated.

2. Better understanding of the customer requirements.

3. Process performance can track and measure against customer requirements.

3. Effective business case

5.1.2 Measure/Analyze/Improve and Control Phase of six-sigma + Planning phase of software project life cycle:

In the planning stage the major activities undertake is design validation and project development plan. The design validation process involved the validation of the design data gathered in the initiation stage. To create an effective project development plan the validation of the data is very necessary. Validation of the data ensures that data has taken from and with the help of proper authenticated resources. The DMAIC’s Measure/Analyze/Improve/Control helps in measuring the depth of the problem, analyze the reason behind the problem, provide solution to improve it and control the happening of same situation.

The common chain of activities in the Measure phase includes developing process measures; collecting data from the process; checking the quality of the data; understanding the current performance of the process; and determining the potential capability of the process (Brook, 2004). The measurement system itself can be test using gauge repeatability and reproducibility (GR&R), which is a statistical study to quantify precision errors in the measurement system.

The Analyze phase includes many statistical tools and techniques, beginning with detailed process maps, failure mode and effect analysis (FMEA) and Ishikawa diagrams to analyze the current process and to search for root causes of defects. Data are then analyzed graphically using histograms, dot plots, time series plot, box plots, scatter plots, and Pareto charts to understand what the data is saying. Data are also analyzed statistically using normality testing, statistical process control (SPC), hypothesis testing, simple and multiple regression, and design of experiments to help understand the causes of process defects (Six Sigma Academy, 2002). Once the causes of process defects have been identified, the project team can move toward to find the solution of the problem to improve the current process structure.

The typical flow of activities in the Improve phase consists of generating potential solutions, selecting the best solutions, assessing the risks of each solution, and finally, implementing the best solution. Statistical tools and techniques in this phase include brainstorming, benchmarking, solution screening, and FMEA to generate potential solutions, as well as analysis of variance (ANOVA), regression analysis, and simulation to help determine optimum settings for process outputs (Six Sigma Academy, 2002).

After implementing the solution of the problem the controls are implemented so that the process improvement can be sustained over time. This phase employs tools such as control plans, hypothesis testing, statistical process control (SPC), and control logs. With the help of suitable control procedure repeatability of the error can be reduced.

Benefits to planning phase:

The quality tool and activities involve in the measure phase help to gauge the depth of the problem accurately.

The combination of six sigma quality’s measure, analyse, improve and control activities ensure that problem or error will remove from their root.

The usage of specialised quality tools make planning phase more effective and error free.

5.1.3 Improve and Control phase of six-sigma + Execution phase of software project life cycle:

In execution phase, the coding processes carry out and after the programming the testing process starts. Due to involvement of the large no. of the developers/designers and the restricted time line there are lots of chances of generation of technical/nontechnical errors. In this phase the DMAIC’s Improve/control processes used to improve the current processes by finding out the solution for the errors and implementing the control procedures to reduce the re-occurrence of those errors. The execution phase includes the software’s testing activity at the end of the phase. Testing and Coding are the very important activities of the execution phase and there is always a scope available for process improvement in this face. Statistical tools like Brain storming and solution screening and FMEA can be used in this phase to improve the processes.

Control charts helps in testing phase to ensure that all the processes undertaken during testing activity are in under control and monitored regularly. If the charts show that processes are not in control then by analyzing the charts amount of variation will be identified and suitable measurable action can implement.

Benefits to the Execution phase:

Reduce the rework cost.

Reduce the revision of work.

Better quality improvement and control procedures.

5.1.4 Control phase of six-sigma + Closeout phase of software project life cycle:

In the closeout phase, the control logs dully filled by the quality engineers that all the proper control procedures has implemented in the project. Control logs works a checklist for the quality control engineers and it also help to track down and analyze the performance of the quality tools throughout the project life cycle. After the control logs, the important control procedures from the DMAIC’s methodology integrate into lesson learnt report to make sure that all the control measures are fully documented and integrated to avoid reoccurrence of the errors into same kind of future projects.

Benefits to the closeout phase:

It ensures the effective closure of the project.

Strong lesson learnt documentation for the future project.

Track the performance of the quality control tool used in the project.

The below figure shows the flow chart, containing key activities of software project life cycle at different phases with DMAIC methodology’s quality tools:

5.2 Benefits of the proposed framework:

1. Redundancy in repeatability of errors.

2. Customizable according to the organization and project size.

3. Enhanced quality control at different phases of project life cycle.

4. Reduce the risk of cost overrun and schedule overrun due to the quality issues.

5. The usage of highly specialised quality tools like pareto charts, Failure mode effect analysis make this framework effective and reliable.

Since the integrated project management model can be viewed as the management of change, it can be said that this technique is highly suitable in managing software projects. The success of software projects is always temporary because new portal of threats develop regularly. As such, the constant changes that occur are deemed to be best addressed through project management models that integrate the traditional project management life cycle approach with six sigma tools and techniques. The benefits of such an integrated project management model especially in software projects can be measured in various ways. For instance, it can be measured through benchmarking, by determining the satisfaction acquired by the customers, project cycle time, project profitability and many more.

This report provides a questionnaire to understand the perception of the employees of the software industry over the integrated project management model and to overcome the quality issues at different phases of project life cycle.

Generally six sigma uses in manufacturing organization, where project management finds its best application in bigger and complex projects but this framework has specifically designed for the software industries’ project. The merging of both these processes creates an extremely effective integrated tool to enhance the project success rate by reducing the quality issues related to the project. With the increasing competition by the minute, the need of integration of Six Sigma with the Project management will felt even more in the coming days. Those business/organization who will manage to accomplish this, will be able to do justice with the voice of customer and will be in a better position to increase their benefit and market shares.

6.0 Recommendation:

With this report, it is recommended that future research should delve into the aspect of an integrated project management model or framework, that encompasses life cycle approach as well as six sigma tools. Further studies on the role of integrated project management systems can yield significant findings on its great role as a catalyst for the success of software projects.

Indeed, future research on this topic can also give emphasis on the other component of the software project. This means that aside from an integrated project management, one can also focus on the other components of software project. For instance, one can concentrate on the role of user acceptance level in the achievement of success of the projects. There are also emerging issues and problems in the implementation of software projects that need to be addressed. Undeniably, this research is very limited in the sense that it is done by secondary research. To a certain extent, the findings of the study cannot be generalized to all organizations of different industries.

The results show the perceptions of the employees by the use of indirect interactive method i.e. usage of questionnaire. It is therefore suggested that with a greater number of resources, such as time and financial supports, it would be better to conduct the study on a larger scale with the help of primary research which includes large no. of interviews session with employees of different software firms.

While this study is limited to a secondary research, the findings are still indispensable. It has paved the way for a greater understanding of the critical components of software projects like effect of quality on the project success. The major concepts that have been evaluated in this paper are the integrated project management life cycle model for software firms. In future after the primary research and the necessary modification based on the results of the primary research, the further study can be done on the performance of the proposed model by implementing it into some software firm on a trial basis and the result should be document and analyze.

Also the further research should focus on the behavior of the quality tools under project management environment and the user friendly attribute of those quality tools. While doing the primary research the major factor like the awareness of the quality in the interviewing organization should be note down. Finally, the sustainability of software projects is also an issue that needs to be addressed. In spite of the high cost of projects, its sustainability is still not achieved. Indeed, the rapid pace of technological development and information explosion are among the factors that prevent the sustainability of majority of software projects. With this, it is necessary to examine the long-term performance of the project after implementing the proposed life cycle model.

Through these recommendations, the researcher believes that this research can serve as a foundation for future research.