Download White Paper Microsoft Solutions Framework version 3.0 Overview

Microsoft Solutions Framework version 3.0 Overview
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a team role cluster (commonly shortened to role). The related skills and knowledge areas are
called functional areas and define the domains of each role. The Program Management Role
Cluster, for example, contains the functional areas of project management, solution architecture,
process assurance, and administrative services. Collectively, these roles have the breadth to meet
all of the success criteria of the project; the failure of one role to achieve its goals jeopardizes the
project. Therefore, each role is considered equally important in this team of peers, and major
decisions are made jointly, with each role contributing the unique perspective of its
representative constituency. The associated goals and roles are shown in the following table.
Table 1: MSF Team Model and Key Quality Goals
Key Quality Goal
Delivery within project constraints
Delivery to product specifications
Release after addressing all issues
Smooth deployment and ongoing management
Enhanced user performance
Satisfied customers
MSF Team Role Cluster
Program Management
Development
Test
Release Management
User Experience
Product Management
The MSF Team Model represents the compilation of industry best practices for empowered
teamwork and technology projects that focus on achieving these goals. They are then applied
within the MSF Process Model to outline activities and create specific deliverables to be
produced by the team. These primary quality goals both define and drive the team.
Note that one role is not the same as one person—multiple people can take on a single role,
or an individual may take on more than one role—for example, when the model needs to be
scaled down for small projects. What’s important in the adoption of the MSF Team Model is
that all of the quality goals should be represented on the team and that the various project
stakeholders should know who on the team is accountable for them.
The MSF Team Model explains how this combination of roles can be used to scale up to
support large projects with large numbers of people by defining two types of sub-teams:
function and feature. Function teams are unidisciplinary sub-teams that are organized by
functional role. The Development Role is often filled by one or more function teams. Feature
teams, the second type, are multidisciplinary sub-teams that are created to focus on building
specific features or capabilities of a solution.
The MSF Team Model is perhaps the most distinctive aspect of MSF. At the heart of the
Team Model is the fact that technology projects must embrace the disparate and often
juxtaposed quality perspectives of various stakeholders, including operations, the business,
and users. The MSF Team Model fosters this melding of diverse ideas, thus recognizing that
technology projects are not exclusively an IT effort.
For more information on the MSF Team Model, see the MSF Team Model white paper
located at www.microsoft.com/msf.