Project management

[dancingbrook]

Hi,

I'm mentoring Program/Project Management with this year's team, but didn't start until a couple of weeks into the season (after recognizing the need). As most of you know, it is now a bit like herding cats, and not the ideal position to be in at this point. Nonetheless, we are plowing forward.

(I did get some related info when I asked about team structure)

What would help is any info you folks have regarding this. Do you have an M$Project plan? Are you willing to share it?

Do you use something else?

Mostly I'd love to see a variety of plans.

(Maybe there ought to be a subgroup on CD for Project Mgt?)

Thanks,

PM

[DonRotolo]

We don't use MS Project, instead we do it by hand, but the principles are the same.

Each task is unique to the specific team structure and robot design, so we re-do it every year. And, we always fall behind the schedule - but at least we know that we're behind!

One mentor (who is the organized type) has a good picture in his head of what has to happen and when, and every day we have a powerpoint slide listing the things that have to get done that day.

I'd love to see a student take this on, but to date we have not yet found a student who understands the complete process, as well as time requirements to complete a task, well enough to do it.

Don

[MrForbes]

I'll echo what Don said, although we don't have a daily updated "to do" list until about this time of the build...when the list is down to only one page, and we really need to get all the little things done.

We did start out at the beginning of the build by making a rough schedule, and we mostly stuck to it. The major milestone slip was that we didn't get the chassis/drivetrain done anywhere near on time, but we were able to use last year's chassis for mechanism prototyping/development and programming, so it wasn't a big issue.

Yesterday we had an almost complete, fully functioning robot....and a week to go before it needs to be in the crate...needless to say we left the meeting feeling pretty good.

[dancingbrook]

Originally Posted by Don Rotolo

I'd love to see a student take this on, but to date we have not yet found a student who understands the complete process, as well as time requirements to complete a task, well enough to do it.
Don

Thanks Don.

We have a couple of students who understand enough, but they are too busy getting the work done.

[dancingbrook]

Originally Posted by squirrel

Yesterday we had an almost complete, fully functioning robot....and a week to go before it needs to be in the crate...needless to say we left the meeting feeling pretty good.

Thanks squirrel,

You are more than a bit ahead of us thus the need for our project mgt. Everyone really should be doing something along these lines.