Measuring KPI's or Key Performance Indicators is a way to check health of a project. As the name suggests, these indicate the performance of a project.
It is essential to define the KPI's at the start of the project, in fact at the proposal stage. These can vary depending on the type of project (support, development, testing). In this article, I will be focusing on Development project KPI's. These are just a set of guidelines and you can change, add and modify these based on the requirement of your specific project.
KPI's can typically be divided into 5 broad groups: Schedule, Productivity, Quality, Governance and Customer Experience
e.g. 1 release per Quarter
Number of Story Points Committed vs Delivered
e.g. 20 story points per Sprint. Similar KPI can be defined and measured at a Release level (Release comprises of many Sprints)
Number of weighted defects per story point
Defects can be weighted as per the Priority of the defect. e.g. High priority defect given a weight-age of 10, Medium priority 5 and Low Priority 1. In case of 1 High Priority and 3 Low priority defects, total weighted defects can be counted as 1 x 10 + 3 x 1 = 13 weighted defects.
This KPI can be measured in Development as well as UAT phase of the project.
Total Number of system test defects / (Total Number of system test defects + Total Number of UAT defects) * 100
If required this KPI can be compared as per the priority of the defects to give a fair comparison of pre and post UAT defects.
Number of Defects reopened / Total number of UAT defects
The above list is only a sample of KPI's to get you started. You can think of many more that suits your project needs. While it is always a good idea to define and measure KPI's in such a way that it reflects the true health o f the project, but let me warn you with a word of caution. Do not get blind folded only by the numbers KPI dashboards give !!! Though formal customer communication is showcased as one of the KPI's above, but nothing can beat a casual talk with customer, so just pick up the phone can call him/her now:-)
It is essential to define the KPI's at the start of the project, in fact at the proposal stage. These can vary depending on the type of project (support, development, testing). In this article, I will be focusing on Development project KPI's. These are just a set of guidelines and you can change, add and modify these based on the requirement of your specific project.
KPI's can typically be divided into 5 broad groups: Schedule, Productivity, Quality, Governance and Customer Experience
Schedule KPI's
Number of Releases Agreed vs Actual
Defines the number of development releases a team shall do in a specified time period.e.g. 1 release per Quarter
Schedule Variance
One of the most common ways to measure the schedule it to calculate how early or late release was delivered as compared to the baseline date.Productivity KPI's
Number of Stories Committed vs Delivered
In case of a Agile project, it defines the number of stories that were committed at the start of a Sprint vs actual number of stories that were delivered. Another variation of this which makes slightly more sense isNumber of Story Points Committed vs Delivered
e.g. 20 story points per Sprint. Similar KPI can be defined and measured at a Release level (Release comprises of many Sprints)
Quality KPI's
Defect Density
Number of weighted defects per story pointDefects can be weighted as per the Priority of the defect. e.g. High priority defect given a weight-age of 10, Medium priority 5 and Low Priority 1. In case of 1 High Priority and 3 Low priority defects, total weighted defects can be counted as 1 x 10 + 3 x 1 = 13 weighted defects.
This KPI can be measured in Development as well as UAT phase of the project.
DDE (Defect Detection Efficiency)
This KPI's measures the the effectiveness of the testing team to detect defects before it goes to next phase of project life cycle, typically from Development phase to UAT phase and a good way to judge the teams QA effectiveness. It is defined asTotal Number of system test defects / (Total Number of system test defects + Total Number of UAT defects) * 100
If required this KPI can be compared as per the priority of the defects to give a fair comparison of pre and post UAT defects.
Reopened Defects
A good way to measure the quality of fixes in a phase is the measure how many of the defects are being reopened. This is measured asNumber of Defects reopened / Total number of UAT defects
This KPI can be measured in Development as well as UAT phase of the project.
Test Coverage
Test coverage is a good indication of how good testing team is thinking of various testing scenarios. Better test coverage shall result in more DDE.Number of functional test cases per Story Point
Code Coverage
Writing unit test cases for the code is a good way to prevent the kind of defects which are difficult to capture as part of functional testing.
Number of Unit Test Cases per 1000 Lines of Code
Story Acceptance
Story acceptance by Product Owner is a great way to test if development has been done by team as per story specifications
Number of stories Accepted/Number of stories Delivered
Governance KPI's
Often ignored, but one of the most important set of KPI's are Governance KPI's. Why ? Lets see..
Weekly meetings planned vs Actual
Communication with customer both formally as well as informally is the need of the hour as more often than not communication failure is a reason for project failures.
Number of weekly meetings planned /Number of actual meetings
This KPI is a great way to measure customer engagement and same can be measured for monthly Governance meeting or Quarterly Business meetings which are more strategic in nature
Customer Experience KPI's
Customer Satisfaction Survey (CSS)
Taking formal feedback from the end customer is the ultimate way to gauge the quality of services provided. This shall be taken at least quarterly and can be measured on a scale of 1 to 5.
Number of escalations in a quarter
Number of formal escalations by customer per quarter is measured as a to gauge the Voice of Customer.
The above list is only a sample of KPI's to get you started. You can think of many more that suits your project needs. While it is always a good idea to define and measure KPI's in such a way that it reflects the true health o f the project, but let me warn you with a word of caution. Do not get blind folded only by the numbers KPI dashboards give !!! Though formal customer communication is showcased as one of the KPI's above, but nothing can beat a casual talk with customer, so just pick up the phone can call him/her now:-)
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