Technical Year Planning

The technical year plan is a crucial deliverable for the team, as it is presented to external stakeholders such as the RvT. The general year plan (done by the management team and the team manager) must include the technical year plan. This plan is rarely perfectly followed until the end of the year, as the work within student teams can be very unpredictable due to dependence on sponsors and the various study loads of part-timers and half-timers. However, the yearly plan should aim to establish some general objectives for the team to have a clear direction throughout the year. It is strongly advised to make more detailed plans during the year (every 10 weeks/module) based on the state of the system and the team at that specific moment. An example of year planning can be found here.

The technical year plan should be created during the TTM (Technical Team Meeting). These meetings are generally joined by team leads to discuss both technical, logistical, communication, and social challenges faced by their respective subteams. Other team leads are encouraged to listen and propose ideas to troubleshoot challenges. The TTM meets regularly (up to the team to decide how often and when). Any plan during the year should be created based on the needs and goals of each subteam. However, it can become very quickly challenging to consider everyone's wishes, and hence, tradeoffs should be found. During the year plan discussion, it is important to ensure that each subteam lead understands why certain things must be planned at a certain time to reduce frustrations.

A good technical manager must be able to think a few weeks ahead by being aware of the weaknesses and the current challenges of the team. The goal is NOT to blame the team, but always to reach out on time and find solutions with the team or work around the problem with them. This means that new versions of the year plan can be created throughout the year.