Other Role Issues

I have identified the key roles to be enacted by the outsourcing organization's PMO, but we should discuss some additional role issues in the outsourcing situation.

Developing a Data Model

On large projects involving complex business domain processes, developing a single data model can help the contractor analysts understand the business. Figure 4-2 shows the logical placement of an individual in this role as analyst/data modeler.

Figure 4-2. Organization for data model and common code development

Developing Common Code

The earlier section on the PMO project architect mentioned contractors duplicating effort by developing common code. On large projects, where multiple contractors need code to manage the same abstractions in the problem domain, the question is, who should develop this common code?

Having the contractors direct the development of the common code creates as many problems as it solves. Here are a couple examples:

• The developers are controlled by the contractor for which they work. There is a strong tendency for the contractor to have that developer first focus on common code needed only by the contractor, possibly contrary to the project's needs as a whole.

• If the contractor gets behind schedule, it might pull that developer off the common code tasks to focus on the contractor's scheduled items. This helps the contractor but may be detrimental to the project as a whole.

Consider the organization shown in Figure 4-2 as a possible solution. In this organization, the developers shown may, in fact, work for the contractor, but in this capacity, they report directly to the PMO project architect. With this organization, the developers are not subject to the pressures on the portion of the project controlled by that contractor. Note that depending on the amount of common code needed, these positions under the PMO project architect may need to be only part-time.