Many software and IT projects fail in completing theirs objectives because different causes of which the management of the projects has a high weight. In order to have successfully projects, lessons learned have to be used, historical data to be collected and metrics and indicators have to be computed and used to compare them with past projects and avoid failure to happen. This paper presents some metrics that can be used for the IT project management.Project Management, Information Technology, Metrics, Indicators

Paul POCATILU

English

Research Papers in Economics

Revista Informatica Economică, nr. 4 (44)/2007 
 
122 
IT Project Management Metrics 
 
Paul POCATILU, Bucharest, Romania, ppaul@ase.ro 
 
Many software and IT projects fail in completing theirs objectives because different causes of 
which the management of the projects has a high weight. In order to have successfully pro-
jects, lessons learned have to be used, historical data to be collected and metrics and indica-
tors have to be computed and used to compare them with past projects and avoid failure to 
happen. This paper presents some metrics that can be used for the IT project management. 
Keywords: Project Management, Information Technology, Metrics, Indicators 
 
ntroduction 
•  Project management is a new way 
to manage in order to complete the goals 
having the cost minimized in different do-
mains like industry, constructions, medicine, 
education, research. The management of a 
project involves several sub-processes:  plan-
ning, coordination (project implementation), 
project end, and on a regular basis project 
control (figure 1). Different projects man-
agement standards are presented in [PMI04], 
[IPMA06], and [GARE04]. 
 
Control 
 
Start  Coordination/ 
          Implementation 
End 
Fig. 1 Project management process 
Project initiation (project start) is usually or-
ganized as a workshop, after the project 
manager was assigned. The project’s plans 
are developed in this process. Project coordi-
nation/implementation is a continuous proc-
ess, and it is based on the plans developed in 
the project start process. Periodically is done 
the control process, in order to assure that the 
project is according to the plans. The close-
down process is the last project management 
process, where all the project information is 
transferred to the organization. 
IT projects include the development or the 
implementation of software and hardware 
systems, data communication, video, voice or 
integrated systems [APMR02]. Examples of 
IT projects are: 
  the development of a new software 
  hardware equipments acquisition 
  software acquisition 
  designing and installing a network com-
puters in a company 
  the maintenance of an existing system 
  implementation of a software system. 
IT project failure, especially on software pro-
jects, occurs frequently.  In order to reduce 
the degree of failure for new projects, data 
have to be collected and metrics to be com-
puted. With this information,  
2. Metrics Classification 
As defined in [IVAN04] a metric represents a 
mathematical model developed around an 
equation having the following form: 
y = f(x) 
A mathematical model consists of one or 
more equations, inequations, and objective 
functions and it has the role to describe the 
associated system state. The metrics measure 
the project or product characteristics based 
on the characteristic’s influencing factors. 
Using project metrics is created a basis for 
projects hierarchies and classification.  
The metrics have the following functions: 
  Measurement 
  Comparison  
  Analysis  
  Synthesis 
  Estimation 
  Verification 
Defining the metrics for IT projects consists 
of building models and indicators that start 
from values measured with objectivity, such 
as the number of objectives, number of mile-
stones, budget, number of modules, number 
of phases, number of activities etc. 
Projects metrics and historical data are very 
important for project oriented organizations. 
Often happens these records are missing, in-
complete, incorrect, or are not centralized 
I Revista Informatica Economică, nr. 4 (44)/2007 
 
123
and metrics are not computed 
The factors that can be measured and used in 
IT project management metrics are classified 
in: personnel, process and project/project in-
dicators. 
The personnel evaluation could take into ac-
count: 
  education level 
  certification level 
  social abilities  
  experience 
  project team homogeneity degree 
  personnel productivity. 
The evaluation of the process is focused on 
the maturity of the IT project management. 
The quality of the project deliverables cannot 
be obtained without a high quality process, 
but a quality process does not guarantee qual-
ity products. The quality of the process is 
certified through quality standards. Regard-
ing the evaluation of the process, the follow-
ing factors can be used: 
  development techniques and method-
ologies used 
  company certification level 
  the degree of novelty for software and 
hardware 
  programming language used 
  degree of reuse. 
Some factors derive from the product/project 
characteristics and its related environment. 
There are several factors related to the pro-
ject/product evaluation, like: 
  project complexity 
  number of users/stakeholders 
  the existence of similar product on 
the market 
  software application specific.  
Table 1 presents some project management 
metrics. 
Table 1 Some metrics used in IT Project Management 
Category Metrics 
Productivity  The number of lines of code/modules/classes/deliverables etc. 
developed on time unit or per resource 
Quality Project  complexity 
Portfolio complexity 
The degree of client or executive management satisfaction by 
completing the project objectives 
Deliverables  The ratio between the achieved deliverables and the planned de-
liverables 
The number of reworks because of no concordances between the 
specifications and the results 
Costs  Statistics regarding different costs categories 
Project portfolio value 
Resources  Statistics regarding resources usage 
Statistics regarding resources costs 
Statistics regarding resources loading and distribution 
Risks The  number  of identified risks 
The number of raised risks 
The number of avoided risks 
The metrics from the table 1 are examples of 
project management metrics. These metrics 
have to be classified and grouped in systems 
of metrics and they have to be tested and 
validated after they will be used in practice. 
3. Quantitative metrics 
Quantitative metrics are considered those that 
are based on factors that can be easily meas-
ured or counted. Such metrics include: work 
productivity, project/portfolio value, resource 
usage, costs etc. and some of them will be 
presented in this section. 
Work productivity based on inputs: 
∑
∑
=
= = m
j
n
i
i
Ij
O
W
1
1
1
 
where: 
Oi – the output i (deliverables, results) 
Ij – the input j (manpower, resources per time 
unit) 
n – the number of outputs 
m – the number of inputs 
Work productivity based on time: Revista Informatica Economică, nr. 4 (44)/2007 
 
124 
T
O
W
n
i
i ∑
= =
1
2
 
where:   T – period of time 
A project portfolio value at a given moment 
of time is computed as: 
) ( ) (
1
t VP t PPV
s k
i
s
i
s ∑
=
=
 
where: 
PPV
s(t) – project portfolio s value at the 
given moment t 
s
i VP  – the value of project i from the portfo-
lio s 
ks – the number of projects in the portfolio s. 
The degree of resource loading for a portfo-
lio of projects is given by: 
∑
∑
=
= = t
i
i
s
j
j
RR
UR
LD
1
1
 
where: 
URi – the number of resources involved in 
the project s 
  RRi – total number of required re-
sources for the project s 
The  degree of resources usage at a given 
moment of time: 
TR
t NR
t DU
) (
) ( =
 
where: 
  NR – the number of resources in-
volved in a project 
  TR – total number of resources avail-
able 
The cost of resources takes into account the 
category of resources and the cost per unit 
for each category: 
∑
=
=
w
i
i i i p d NR C
1  
where: 
 NRi – number of resource from the 
category i 
  pi – price per unit for the resource 
category i 
  di – units of usage for the resource 
category i 
Relative complexity assumes the existence of 
a project as a basis for comparison, and its 
level of complexity is evaluated. 
i
k
i
i r r C 2
1
log ∑
=
=
 
where: 
k – the number of chapters in the project; 
r – the number of the different resources in-
volved in the project. 
4. Qualitative Metrics 
These metrics are based on subjective 
evaluation of the factors that depend on. 
These include quality of work, personnel 
quality, degree of satisfaction etc. 
Social abilities depend on the communication 
skills and knowledge. This could be quanti-
fied using well known models. 
The personnel experience is very important 
in project management evaluation. It could 
be computed using the years of experience in 
the project’s specific field. 
The  degree of homogeneity of the project 
team is based on the difference of skills, 
training and social behavior between the pro-
ject team members. It also takes into account 
the relationships between team members and 
if they were worked together in other pro-
jects. 
The degree of satisfaction can be computed 
as: 
TR
DSR
DS
p
i
i ∑
= =
1
 
where: 
  DSR – the degree of satisfaction for 
the requirement i 
  TR – total number of requirements 
  p – the number of requirements 
The degree of satisfaction for a customer of 
executive requirement is a value from 0 (no 
satisfaction) to 1 (fully satisfied). 
5. Conclusions and Future Work 
The uses of metrics and indicators for IT pro-
ject management evaluation have the advan-
tage of providing rigorous information re-
garding the required effort and the bounda-
ries of the IT deliverables. Also, a basis for 
analysis and classification of process and re-
sult is created. 
There are also some disadvantages. They are Revista Informatica Economică, nr. 4 (44)/2007 
 
125
due that data contains errors and the metrics 
quality depends on the quality of data used in 
models. Also, if the conditions the models 
are based on are modifying, the actual con-
text could not be valid. 
The next step is to validate these metrics and 
to use them on running projects or for new 
projects. 
 
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Project Management – a System Approach to Planning, Scheduling and Controlling, Eighth Edition,

IT Project Management Metrics

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IT Project Management Metrics

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