Project Execution Engineering Service

PROJECT EXECUTION ENGINEERING

Software construction projects are often a nightmare to manage. They are challenging to execute, and there’s always an error. They require a lot of time, money, and resources, and most fail to deliver as promised.

Software manufacturing is one of the most expensive endeavors you can take on. Projects are also hazardous, with the potential for failure looming around every corner.

The stakes are high in software development. The quality of your plan can make or break your business, and you need to be sure that you’re doing everything in your power to make it succeed.

Truth Shield’s project execution engineering service uses advanced dependency analysis to design optimal software construction projects. We use mathematical models to balance minimal time, cost, and risk and optimize success.

Before any investment, and especially with millions of dollars, don’t you want to know:

• Will your investment be worth it?
• Will it be completed in time to meet market needs?
• What’s the likely total cost?
• What are the technical, manufacturing, and business risks?
• What are the contingency plans to course-correct if things are off track?
• How will you know if you are off-track?
• What are the manufacturing options?
• What’s the best tradeoff of time, cost, and risk to meet your unique business needs?
• What’s the optimal staffing strategy?
• What areas of expertise do you need, and how many people do you need within each specialty?
• How do you ensure no one will be idle where you are wasting money?

You need to overcome a different yet distinct set of challenges for every project. Some projects are more challenging, expensive, and risky than others. And some are so demanding they don’t make financial sense and should never start.

Projects have been systematically, efficiently, and successfully executed for decades across military and industrial projects producing everything from new chemical compounds to skyscrapers. There are decades of research and study on completing ambiguous invention projects, precisely as we see with software projects.

With your money and future on the line, wouldn’t you expect the same level of diligence for your software project?

The Old Way

When the software industry was born, the manufacturing processes had not yet adapted to the nature of the technology. People still used manufacturing processes for producing physical products.

When producing a physical product like an airplane, you need every aspect laid out in excruciating detail. Before you even start manufacturing. There is an extensive list of materials and suppliers that need to be selected and vetted. You need detailed inventory tracking of every item to prevent production delays. Then, when you start manufacturing, there are massive amounts of inspection processes and quality control measures that ensure a high-quality finished product.

This manufacturing model was modern at the time, but software presents considerable opportunities to do things more efficiently with less initial overhead. And the software manufacturing industry has adapted appropriately. Most companies now have production processes that are leaner and more efficient than old models.

However, there is a problem where many misapply lean manufacturing techniques intended to optimize assembly processes to discovery and invention processes. As you would expect, an extreme pendulum swing in any direction will not be effective. As with most things, achieving an effective balance is vital.

And you can’t achieve agility without preparation. Essential preparation is absent in many of today’s software development practices, despite only taking a bit of rational thought and knowledge of manufacturing history.

The hard fact is that you need to engineer and design agility ahead of time for business, process, and project success.

The Typical Way

Today, software projects typically start by assembling one or more hodgepodge teams with varied expertise. While we know we require certain specialties like product manager, project manager, and technical management lead. Unfortunately, there is little rhyme or reason to most technical staffing strategies, and it is often not based on the system under development or business objectives.

Before hiring, there is usually little knowledge of how long the whole project will take. Companies throw a pile of people in a room and have them figure it out as they go.

Teams just put their collective thumbs in the air and guesstimate how long things will take.

With this approach, the risk of missing budget and time constraints is massive.

There is no upfront project modeling. No financial assessment. No risk analysis.

You staff up and start as if you jumped in a car to travel from New York to London with no plans on how to get there and what it will take before staffing up for your journey.

So It’s no surprise that 90% of projects fail to meet one or more critical objectives, 30% completely collapse, and 15% implode and threaten your company’s existence.

You burn through the money like cheap fuel until you are out. You don’t know if you will meet your objective. Not only that, but you don’t know if or when things have gotten to the point where you can’t succeed. You can’t stop while you are ahead, reassess and reinvest.

You keep blindly burning until the gas tank runs dry. Then you drift to the side of the road, cancel the project, and put your thumb out to hitch a ride back to town.

It sounds crazy, but this is how many companies manage their software engineering investments.

The entire development process becomes a gamble, producing massive amounts of stress for anyone with skin in the game. You live with a razor-sharp ax over your head, knowing the next speed bump can cause it to come crashing down. And the next roadblock hit can leave you with nothing.

And the sad truth is that we can do better. We have to do better.

The Agile Way

Want more sensible software development?

Want to know the realistic range of costs before starting?

Do you want to know when to pull the plug, pivot, or hit the gas?

Achieving agility takes energy.

You need known expectations. And you have to establish continuous feedback to assess where you are and if you are meeting expectations. You have to constantly calculate your next step and ensure you are on an optimal path to your objective. And you have to adjust continually.

This level of agility requires preparing a well-informed, practical, and effective plan. A bit of preparation adds rocket fuel to today’s agile processes and takes your entire organization to new heights of success.

• You avoid disaster with contingency planning.
• You know when to stop, pivot, or hit the gas.
• You know your risks and enter with eyes wide open.

Truth Shield helps you analyze your objective, plan for surprises, design the journey, and calculate the total cost of executing it.

While we acknowledge and understand that no project goes to plan, this is no excuse to ignore professional responsibilities and skip performing due diligence, risk analysis, and delivering good time and cost estimates.

You may already realize that the old-school waterfall methodology is unworkable. We also know that flying blind is incredibly risky. We need a balanced approach specifically engineered to meet our project execution needs.

Apply time-tested optimization techniques developed and optimized by more mature engineering and manufacturing industries to provide maximum insight, control, and safety.

Execute responsibly. Staff intelligently. Track and adjust—all in real-time.

Know ahead if something is ahead on the tracks that will ultimately derail your effort. Know your time, cost, and risks before you start.

Need help?

Truth Shield’s project execution engineering service provides the insight you need to execute a software project safely. We use time-tested techniques designed and refined across many mature engineering and manufacturing industries to provide you with the transparency you need to complete a software project safely.

Know your time, risks, and costs before you begin.

If you are interested, let’s talk.

Apply Today!