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.These are covered in detail in Chapter 15.The fourth difference alsosupports externalization of rules and is the set of tasks for your rules repository,covered in Chapter 15.These include documentation of meta data and rule repositoryrequirements, a rule metamodel, and the decision on a rule storage mechanism.Youwill need a rule repository user guide, and perhaps training materials.If your projectinvolves excavating rules from existing systems, you will need procedures on how to dothis, and perhaps training materials here also.You may need to know the prioritysequence in which to seek rules (from people or from program code).If you arefortunate, you will include tasks for establishing a rule stewardship program thatidentifies formally those roles in the organization that accept responsibility for policy,which leads to responsibility for rules.The fifth difference enables the positioning of rules for change.This is supported by aproject plan that incorporates the opportunity to test and deploy commercial rulestechnology.When you have completed these tasks, you are ready for the discovery phase.For tutorial purposes, this chapter presents the project plan in a rigid waterfallapproach, where each phase appears quite separate from the other in the plan.In truth,especially if following object-oriented, iterative, incremental development, your projectmay not happen this way at all.You may naturally iterate among design alternatives forprocess flow and, definitely, for rule evolution and correction.So, as indicated inChapter 4, you may have concurrent discovery tracks, analysis tracks, and so on.Youmay take one increment through iterative development and back to discovery andanalysis again in which you refine and correct rules.Each methodology chaptercontains a section on how to incorporate its concepts into an iterative developmentapproach.However, the purpose of this book is to present the different tasks, guidelines, anddeliverables for a business rules approach.The simplest way to do this is to assume,for now, that phases are separate, deliverables are separate, so that we can explainthem better.What Are the Purposes of Project Planning?The overall purposes for a project plan, then, are to:Formalize the scope and definition of the final deliverable(s), so you havea basis for issue management, change control, risk management.Highlight important interim deliverables and timeframes (schedule), so youcan set tangible expectations to project sponsors and stakeholders.Establish critical checkpoints (milestones) against which to monitorprogress or adjust the plan over time, as needed.Gain an understanding of knowledge and skills needed and of timecommitments required.Depict task dependencies, so you can be proactive in accommodatingdeviations in schedule.121 What Are the Deliverables from Project Planning?While the primary deliverable is the project plan, there are other deliverables that maybe useful to the business rule project manager.These include:Team policy documentTeam organization chartTeam communication procedures documentTeam knowledge sharing procedures documentChange management procedures documentIssue log proceduresSteering committee proceduresHigh-level architecture solution paper or diagramMeta data and rule repository requirementsDetailed project scheduleWe will now examine each of these in greater detail.Team Policy DocumentThis document outlines guidelines and rules for the project team members.Forexample, it includes policies and procedures regarding vacation time, holidays, workingfrom home, personal time, flex time, and training time.Team Organization ChartThis chart establishes the roles and responsibilities, with reporting accountability, forthe various functions needed to deliver a business rules system.Let s look more closelyat the roles and responsibilities of the project team members.At the very least, considerfour new roles because of your emphasis on business rules.A rule analyst isresponsible for capturing rules from business conversations, documents, or programcode.A rule designer is responsible for determining where rules are to be enforcedwithin an application architecture.A rule implementer is accountable for coding theexecutable rules, although this role will likely be played by application developers ordatabase administrators, depending on where the rules are implemented.A ruleintegrator or manager is the role for analyzing rules across business events and acrossapplications to ensure high quality rules for the organization.This role probably alsoselects and manages the repository into which rules are entered and from which rulesare managed.Team Communication Procedures DocumentThese include the frequency and format of status reports and status meetings.It alsomay include procedures for submitting changes to the project plan.For large projects, the project manager may want to conduct formal weekly meetingswith the leaders of each team within the team organization.Each team leader may wantto conduct a weekly formal meeting with team members.On a monthly basis, theproject manager may wish to hold a full team meeting.The purpose of full teammeetings is to review project status and share accomplishments among the teams tofoster a strong sense of teamwork, respect, and support.Team Knowledge Sharing Procedures DocumentThese are procedures by which the project team shares knowledge gained about thebusiness area under study and about the business rules approach itself.You canaccomplish the sharing of team knowledge through informal procedures or throughformal procedures regarding a regularly scheduled series of knowledge sharing122 meetings.You may also want to introduce formal procedures for posting finaldeliverables.Consider creating a knowledge center about the business rules project.A knowledgecenter is a single point of communication whereby a person can discover intellectualcapital pertaining to the project or aspects of the project.Your knowledge center can bean internal Web page from which interested parties can gain access to interestingproject collateral, such as the latest project plan, the current status of projectdeliverables, completed project deliverables, project methodologies, and projectpersonnel.The knowledge center can serve as a training mechanism in that people canuse it to learn about the benefits and progress of a business rule methodology.Change Management Procedures DocumentThese include mechanisms whereby the project sponsor or project members registerformal requests for changes in scope.People can log requested scope changes into achange management system or database from which the project manager cannegotiate changes in project plan for accommodating acceptable requests for changemanagement.Consider creating your own change management system.You can do so usingstandard desktop software and provide access to the system via Web browsers
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