Project Management

Owner: PM Last revision: 12.11.2021

During the lifetime of a project, we need to go through numerous steps to ensure our work is efficient, timelines can be met, and product quality assured. This page describes these steps and provides checklists.

Kanban Boards
Definition of Done
Time Tracking
Checklists

Kanban Boards#

By default every project should have a Productive project attached with a Backlog and at least a Kanban board
In most cases the Backlog board should have the following columns:
- Backlog
- To be estimated
For greenfield projects, a Kanban board should have the following columns:
- Selected for development / To do - tasks/user stories on which work can start will be dragged here by PM
- In progress
- QA (internal)
- QA (external)
For support projects, a Kanban board should have the following columns:
- Selected for development / To do - tasks/user stories on which work can start will be dragged here by PM
- In progress
- QA - may be separated into QA (internal) & QA (external)
- Ready for deployment
- Deployed
All tasks on the boards, should have an assignee (except in when in Backlog column)

Kanban Pull System#

Board should be walked from right to left first, and top to bottom second. This means tasks that are furthest to the right should be handled first. If there are more tasks in the rightmost column, items on the top have higher priority.

Questions on Tasks#

if you have a question on an task, leave a comment and re-assign task to the person you asked the question from;
if you answer a question, leave a comment and re-assign task to the person who asked the question.

QA#

if you finished working on an task, move the task to QA column, and re-assign it to the person responsible for QA;
if you finished QA, and found issues, leave a comment, move task back to In progress column and re-assign it;
if you finished QA, and found no issues, move task to Ready for deployment column and re-assign to person responsible for deployment.

Deployment#

whenever deploying tasks from Ready for deployment, task should be moved to Deployed.
PM will mark task as completed at the next grooming session.
if there is no Ready for deployment column, tasks can be marked as completed after client approval from QA (external).

Definition of Done#

A task is considered done, when:

changes are pushed to version control (staging branch)
changes are tested on staging server

Time Tracking#

We use Productive’s built in timer to track time on all our company-related activities.

General Rules#

Always try to start the timer, whatever you’re working on
If no project, budget or service exists for the activity you are doing or you are not part of the project team, ask the project manager to create it/add you

All project related tasks should have a task selected on top of the project and service. If no task exists, ask the project manager to create it for you, or do it yourself. E.g.:

Non-project tasks#

For non-project tasks, use the Internal project.

Checklists#

Greenfield Projects#

Before kick-off

BA Did we have a kick-off meeting (BA, PM, project lead)? If not, do it!
BA Do we have a backlog of user stories defined?
BA Do we have wireframes / high-definition prototypes?
Project lead Do we have a risk assessment matrix?
PM Do we have project roles established? If not, do it!
- PM
- Project lead
- Sitebuild
- Frontend
- Backend
- QA
- Code reviewer
- DevOps
Project lead Did we have an onboarding meeting with development team?
DevOps Do we have a server with CI/CD set-up? If not, do it!
PM Do we have a Productive project set-up? If not, do it!
- Backlog board
- Kanban boards
- Tasks
- Budgets
- Documentation (as notes)
Do we have a Slack channel set-up?
Project lead Do we have an IPS set-up? If not, do it!

During project

PM Is user story backlog up-to-date (backlog grooming)?
PM Do we have sprint planning for next 2 sprints?
PM Do we have all the necessary answers, information, materials to complete next sprint? If not, do it!
PM Did we schedule a sprint demo? If not, do it!
QA Are all tasks tested (UAT) and ready for sprint demo? If not, do it!
PM Did we include client bug reports in the next sprint?
PM Did we include client feedback and change requests in backlog?

Change requests

PM Did we create task in backlog? (mark with CR flag)
PM Did we communicate changes in deadline / budget?

Communicate CR deadline changes / value even if we offer it for free / at a discounted price!

Closing project

QA Did we perform final end-to-end user-acceptance testing (UAT)?
PM Did we schedule a retrospective meeting?
PM Do we have a delivery certificate? If not, do it! (this marks the start of warranty period)
PM Do we have any outstanding billable hours? If yes, invoice it!

Support projects#