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Inspections in Outsourced Projects |
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Reviews in outsourced projects can be highly time-consuming; much more
so, in fact, than in an in-house project. In an in-house project, the
team is already familiar with that particular organization’s standards,
and there are usually plenty of examples to work from. The project
manager doesn’t need to spend nearly as much time making sure that the
team understands the work being accomplished. What’s more, an in-house
team normally understands the mission of the organization and the needs
of its users. Many project managers take this for granted, and don’t
think to communicate these things to the vendor. It requires
constant effort and vigilance on the part of the project manager to
make sure that the needs are properly understood when moving work
outside the organization. In addition to knowledge transfer, reviews
are also important tools for collaboration. It is important to
encourage collaboration between the project team members at the vendor
and the team members within the organization. When an inspection team
is made up of people from both organizations, the only way for them to
reach consensus on a work product in order to approve it is to
collaborate on identifying and fixing the defects in that work product.
After the inspection, everyone has a better understanding of the work
to be done, as well as of how everyone else thinks about that work.
Inspections in Outsourced Projects
The script below is an inspection process that has been modified to be
used with an outsourced project. This script differs from the normal
inspection process in that it does not require an inspection meeting.
Instead, the inspectors prepare comments and send them back to the
moderator, who consolidates them and works with individual inspectors
to identify solutions that they all agree on. This requires much more
time than a single inspection meeting because, instead of having one
single discussion about each defect, the moderator must have many
different discussions with individual inspectors regarding each defect.
It also requires that the moderator who is selected have extensive
familiarity and expertise with the work product being inspected. This
may mean that the project manager must serve as the moderator, but
that’s not always the case.
Name
| Inspection script for use in multiple organizations
| Purpose
| To run a moderated inspection (without a meeting) for a team with members in different organizations
| Summary
| In an inspection, a moderator leads a team of
reviewers in reviewing a work product and fixing any defects that are
found. The inspectors are in multiple organizations, so they never meet
face to face.
| Work Products
| Input
Work product being inspected
Output
Inspection log
| Entry Criteria
| A moderator must be selected, as well as team of
three to ten people. A work product must be selected, and each team
member has read it individually and identified all wording which must
be changed or clarified before he or she will approve the work product.
| Basic Course of Events
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- Preparation. The moderator distributes a printed or
electronic version of the work product (with line numbers) to each
inspector, along with a checklist to aid in the review. Each inspector
reads the work product and identifies any defects that must be
resolved, compiles those defects into a single document, and returns it
to the moderator.
- Compile the draft inspection log. Each list of
defects returned by each inspector must be compared with the others, in
order to identify and combine overlapping defects. The moderator
compiles a draft of the inspection log that includes all distinct
defects found by inspectors. The log does not yet contain any solutions
to those defects.
- Identify conflicts. The moderator searches for any
defects reported by different inspectors which contradict each other.
For each set of conflicting defects, the moderator holds a discussion
(either in person or via teleconference or video conference, or using a
collaboration tool like a mailing list or instant message system)
between the inspectors who identified those defects, in order to
identify the assumptions behind the defects and resolve them into a
single defect. The inspection log is updated to reflect the combined
defects.
- Identify solutions. The moderator uses the same
means to meet with individual inspectors to identify solutions to the
defects and add those solutions to the inspection log. If more than one
person identified the same defect, they must all be involved in
creating the solution. Inspectors may also identify additional defects
which were not originally found, as well as their solutions.
- Compile and distribute inspection log. The moderator
compiles all solutions identified in Step 4 into the inspection log.
Any defects which were not resolved are left as open issues to be
resolved by the author. The moderator sends the final inspection log to
all inspectors for confirmation. When the inspectors have confirmed
that the log is correct, it is sent to the author of the work product.
- Rework. The author repairs the defects identified in the inspection meeting.
- Follow-up. Inspection team members verify that the defects were repaired.
- Approval. The inspection team approves the work product.
| Alternative Paths
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- During step 5, if one or more team members find errors in
the inspection log, the moderator must address those errors before
rework can occur. The script returns to step 2.
| Exit Criteria
| The work product has been approved.
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