A Case Study In

Project Management
A CMLS Technology Section Council White Paper

published by
Council of Multiple Listing Services
330 N. Wabash Avenue

Chicago, IL 60611
 


A Case Study In
Project Management
A CMLS Technology Section Council White Paper

A Case Study In Project Management is a CMLS

Technology Section Council white paper that covers
how some MLSs leverage technology to improve the
effectiveness of MLS project management. This white
paper shares some of the tactics and techniques of
Patrick Williamson, a CMLX2 graduate, at My Florida
Regional MLS.

Written by CMLS business parter Victor Lund, partner at

WAV Group and CEO of RE Technology, in collaboration
with Patrick Williamson, vice president of development
and operations with My Florida Regional MLS, and
published by the Council of Multiple Listing Services.

2018 CMLS | Edition 1.0

 


Background

About My Florida Regional MLS

My Florida Regional MLS (MFRMLS) is a

regional Multiple Listing Services provider based
in Orlando, Florida. Its service area covers
central Florida and the most densely populated
area along the state’s west coast. The company
provides services to a subscriber base of more
than 50,000 real estate agents and brokers
across 14 shareholder associations. It lends
some services to three others. MFRMLS is one
of the largest providers of Multiple Listing Services in the world.

MFRMLS also has a team of project managers led by Patrick Williamson. Williamson
earned a Project Management Professional (PMP) certification from the Project
Management Institute.

About The Project Management Institute

Project Management Institute (PMI) certified executives lead projects in nearly every
country around the world. The program was developed for companies that have
adapted many principles of project management, including approaches such as Scrum,
Kanban, Lead, extreme programming, and test-driven development.

Project Management Professional (PMP) certification requires a 4-year degree along

with 4,500 hours of project management involvement (or 7,500 hours without a 4-year
degree), 35 hours of project management education, and the successful completion of a
rigorous certification exam. PMPs are also required to earn 60 professional
development units every three years. For more information, visit the Project
Management Institute.

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Overview

While MLS providers have varied staffing capabilities in the United States, only the
largest MLSs in the nation seem to be able to afford highly trained full-time project
managers. For the most part, these project managers collaborate between the MLS
and its vendors.

Appreciating this, Williamson provided one example of a project plan developed to

launch ePropertyWatch, a product offered by CoreLogic as a free service to MLSs.
The project management techniques applied in the scheduling and launch of
eProperty Watch can be considered a best practice applicable to MLSs of all sizes.

Even if your MLS may not have a dedicated project manager, your organization is still
involved in project management. A common critical component of successful project
management, for example, is defining what needs to be done and how it is going to
be done. Once these items are defined, someone has to develop a plan and manage
the scope and schedule of the project, especially as inevitable changes occur.

Like most management models, Williamson

identified processes that serve to organize
the ongoing activity of the project —
planning, executing, and controlling. Each
process may also include additional steps
within the project, such as initiating and
closing, but each must be clearly defined.

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ePropertyWatch Plan Outline
Initiation and Planning
Create Charter and Stakeholder Assessment
Identify and Document Requirements
Scope Work and Conduct Risk & Opportunity Assessment
Create High Level Plan
Conduct Project Kickoff Meeting
Executing, Monitoring and Controlling
Implement in Staging Environments
Create QA Plan
Conduct QA
Review QA Results Report from Staging
Implement in Production Environment for QA
Conduct QA in Production Environment
Review QA Results Report from Production
Create Training Documentation
Create Support Center Documentation
Create Marketing Plan and Materials
Conduct Go/No-Go Meeting
Send Association Staff Coming Soon Communications
Conduct Staff Training
Send Customers Coming Soon Communications
Send Association Staff Pre-Launch Notice
Launch Day
Expose Product Links to Customers
Conduct Post Launch QA
Send Launch Day Communications
Closing
Conduct Lessons Learned

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Defining Timelines

Every step in a project needs to be clearly defined and assigned an estimated time of
completion in advance of the project launch. The overall timeline for this project is
83.75 hours. Time estimates were based in part on experience.

Here are the some details of how each step in the ePropertyWatch project are
defined, assigned to a responsible party, and provided a time estimate. In addition to
this information, MFRMLS scoped the work effort and conducted the risk/opportunity
assessment, which was critical to the success of implementation.

ePW Plan Timeline   83.75

hrs
Initiation and Planning   14 hrs
Create Charter/Stakeholder Assessment Sponsor, Project Manager 4 hrs
Identify and Document Requirements Vendor, Sponsor, Project Manager 3 hrs
Scope Work and Conduct Risk & Scope Work and Conduct Risk & 4 hrs
Opportunity Assessment Opportunity Assessment
Create High Level Plan Project Manager,Vendor 2 hrs
Conduct Project Kickoff Meeting Project Manager, Marketing 1 hr
Coordinator, QA Technician,
Sponsor, Trainer, Vendor
Executing, Monitoring and Controlling 53.75
hrs
Implement in Staging Environments Vendor 8 hrs

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 Create QA Plan QA Technician, Vendor 4 hrs
Conduct QA QA Technician 6 hrs
Review QA Results Report from Staging Project Manager, Vendor, QA 1 hr
Technician
Implement in Production Environment/QA Vendor 8 hrs
Conduct QA in Production Environment QA Technician 3 hrs
Review QA Results Report from Prod Project Manager, Vendor, QA 0.5 hrs
Technician
Create Training Documentation Trainer,Vendor 6 hrs
Create Support Center Documentation Project Manager, Vendor, Support 1.5 hrs
Center Manager
Create Marketing Plan and Materials Marketing Coordinator,Vendor 8 hrs
Conduct Go/No-Go Meeting Project Manager, All Department 1 hr
Managers, Sponsor, Marketing
Coordinator, Trainer, QA
Technician, Support Center
Manager
Send Association Staff Coming Soon Marketing Coordinator .25 hrs
Communication

Conduct Staff Training Trainer, Staff 3 hrs

Send Customers Coming Soon Marketing Coordinator 0.25 hrs
Communication
Send Association Staff Pre-Launch Notice Marketing Coordinator 0.25 hrs
Launch Day   3 hrs
Expose Product Links to Customers Vendor 1 hr
Conduct Post Launch QA QA Technician 1 hr
Send Launch Day Communication Marketing Coordinator 1 hr
Closing   1 hr
Conduct Lessons Learned Project Manager, Marketing 1 hr
Coordinator, QA Technician,
Sponsor, Trainer, Vendor
Project Management Task/Bucket Project Manager 15 hrs

As you can see from the detail of this project, many responsibilities were shared among
the various departments at MFRMLS. These responsibilities were overseen by the
executive in charge, which MFRMLS identifies as a “sponsor.”

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Along with the sponsor, a project manager serves as the lead orchestrator of the daily
activities. He or she acts as a supervisor over all aspects of a project, ranging from the
initial task assignment to final accountability.

In this case, the project also includes a vendor. Those responsibilities belong to
CoreLogic, developers of ePropertyWatch.

Another principal player is the marketing coordinator. This person is responsible for all
creative and communication materials that will be required to launch the project. This
would include simple collateral material such as flyers or larger promotional efforts, such
a digital campaign, as needed.

The trainer is responsible for developing an ePropertyWatch training program. Such

programs are typically divided into training programs needed at the onset of a project
launch and are needed to sustain the product as a valued member benefit.

The quality assurance technician is responsible to make sure that the product is properly
tested before the launch. The support center manager is also involved to ensure the
proper handling of the product’s implementation and operations.

Tracking Projects To Completion

While most plans are written to assume a perfect world, reality requires certain
contingencies are built into the plan. One way to handle a contingency event is to create
a predecessor, which is defining what needs to happen before something else happens.

As you see on the next page, MFRMLS provided an estimated percentage of completion
for each step of the project. Along with tracking the percentage of project completion, it is
considered a best practice to also track start and stop times to review actual time vs.
estimated time.

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Task Name Predecess % Duration Start Finish
ors Comp.

ePW Plan   100% 40.61 Tue 1/3/17 Tue

days? 2/28/17
Initiation and Planning   100% 4.83 days? Tue 1/3/17 Mon 1/9/17
Create Charter and   100% 0.25 days? Tue 1/3/17 Tue 1/3/17
Stakeholder Assessment
Identify and Document 2FS+1 100% 0.19 days? Wed 1/4/17 Wed 1/4/17
Requirements day
Scope Work and Conduct 3FS+1 100% 0.25 days? Thu 1/5/17 Thu 1/5/17
Risk & Opportunity Assessment day

Create High Level Plan 4FS+1 100% 0.13 days? Fri 1/6/17 Fri 1/6/17
day
Conduct Project Kick Off 5FS+1 100% 0.02 days? Mon 1/9/17 Mon 1/9/17
Meeting day
Executing, Monitoring and   100% 30.78 days? Mon 1/9/17 Tue
Controlling 2/21/17
Implement in Staging 6SS 100% 1 day Mon 1/9/17 Tue
Environments 1/10/17
Create QA Plan 6FS+1 100% 0.25 days? Mon 1/16/17 Tue
wk 1/17/17
Conduct QA 9FS+1 100% 0.75 days? Wed 1/18/17 Wed
day 1/18/17
Review QA Results Report 10 100% 0.04 days? Wed 1/18/17 Wed
from Staging 1/18/17
Implement in Production 11FS+1 100% 1 day Thu 1/19/17 Fri 1/20/17
Environment for QA day
Conduct QA in Production 12FS+1 100% 0.38 days? Mon 1/23/17 Tue
Environment day 1/24/17
Review QA Results Report 13 100% 0.02 days? Tue 1/24/17 Tue
from Prod 1/24/17
Create Training 14FS+1 100% 0.38 days? Wed 1/25/17 Wed
Documentation day 1/25/17
Create Support Center 15SS 100% 0.06 days? Wed 1/25/17 Wed
Documentation 1/25/17
Create Marketing Plan and 16SS 100% 1 day Wed 1/25/17 Tue 2/7/17
Materials

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 Conduct Go/No-Go Meeting 14FS+3 100% 0.07 days? Fri 2/10/17 Fri 2/10/17
days,
15FS+3
days,
16FS+3
days,
17FS+3
days
Send Association Staff 18FS+1 100% 0.03 days? Mon 2/13/17 Mon
Coming Soon Communication day 2/13/17
Conduct Staff Training 18FS+1 100% 0.19 days? Mon 2/13/17 Tue
day 2/14/17
Send Customers Coming 20 100% 0.03 days? Tue 2/14/17 Tue
Soon Communications 2/14/17
Send Association Staff Pre- 21FS+4 100% 0.03 days? Mon 2/20/17 Mon
Launch Notice days 2/20/17
Launch Day   100% 0.38 days? Tue 2/21/17 Tue
2/21/17
Expose Product Links to 22FS+1 100% 0.13 days? Tue 2/21/17 Tue
Customers day 2/21/17
Conduct Post Launch QA 24 100% 0.13 days? Tue 2/21/17 Tue
2/21/17
Send Launch Day 25 100% 0.13 days? Tue 2/21/17 Tue
Communication 2/21/17
Closing   100% 0.02 days? Tue 2/28/17 Tue
2/28/17
Conduct Lessons Learned 26FS+1 100% 0.02 days? Tue 2/28/17 Tue
wk 2/28/17
Project Management Task/ 2 100% 1.88 days Tue 1/3/17 Thu 1/5/17
Bucket

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 Flexible Schedules



One of the principles of project managing is

called team calendaring. Since most people who
own tasks endeavor to schedule their work and
stay on track, changes in the timing of
predecessors have a waterfall effect on the
planning and scheduling of future tasks.

For example, if a user has a task that is due on the Friday before an event but the
predecessor task is not complete, then the entire project timeline will be altered. It
is important to allow for not only the additional time to complete the predecessor,
but also other scheduling conflicts (such as a project manager being out of the
office or another previously scheduled project). This means a one day delay could
potentially delay a project for four or five days as the waterfall effect impacts tasks
and timelines down the line.

An important best practice in project management, and the hardest thing to

manage, is not only planning your work but working your plan. The best project
managers are able to work with an agile, elastic workflow. In real life, things
happen faster or slower than estimated.

A key job of the project manager is coordinating changes that impact scheduling
and timelines. In the case of MFRMLS and other MLSs, this can be very complex
when managing multiple projects at the same time.

Expect from the onset of any project that assignments, deliverables, and dates are
likely to change on a daily basis. By observing the best practice of agile planning,
uncontrollability and flexibility are factored into the plan and adjustments are
made on a daily basis.

Feel free to download this spreadsheet of the full project plan for launching
ePropertyWatch. You can use this as a template for other projects.

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Conclusion

Project management best practices are key to

operating an efficient and effective multiple listing
service. Recognizing that every organization is
structured differently, with varied staff and
capabilities, MLSs may have to establish a
benchmark suitable to their structure rather than
the one set by MFRMLS.

What is important to remember is that the key principle of successful project

management requires proper planning, communication, and execution. Thinking
through the project plan in anticipation of a product launch is an imperative foundation
for setting expectations around product or service delivery.

When organizations fail to set the right expectations, even projects that require
months to complete will begin to feel long and drawn out under the best of
circumstances. By communicating expectations up front and then keeping
subscribers or members up to date on the progress being made — whether by daily
messaging services or newsletters — project stress is typically reduced, performance
improved, and the question “when will it be ready” never asked by those who know
the answer.

CMLS Technology Section Council

The CMLS Technology Section Council works to improve industry standards through
the development and establishment of MLS Best Practices as they relate to Technical
and Information Technology (IT). This includes technologies that range from copiers,
phone systems, networks and automated support services to MLS systems and other
software that promotes productivity, responsiveness, and profitability.

For more information about CMLS or the CMLS Technology Section Council, visit
councilofmls.org.