Comments for Project Management Articles - PM Hut

Comment on Change Management - Change Management Process by Cathy Gallagher

Cathy Gallagher — Fri, 18 May 2012 14:22:03 +0000

In my experience, Change Control Boards that do not have user representatives as voting members are doomed to failure. It should be up to the users to set the priority of each change request and determine the release (time permitting)in which the change will be included. If the users have no vote and can only propose change they will end up feeling powerless and very unhappy.

Comment on 4 Easy Questions About How to Prioritize by Barnaby Davies

Barnaby Davies — Tue, 15 May 2012 21:23:58 +0000

Speaking for myself - I’ve found MoSCoW to have a number of limitations. I took long and careful aim here: http://pmfizz.blogspot.com/2012/05/requirements-part-1.html

Comment on The Five Stages of Project Team Development by Columbus Franklin

Columbus Franklin — Tue, 15 May 2012 16:31:30 +0000

I really am thankful to read this information to prepare me through my stages of group development. I feel every student needs to take time and read this to prepare for group projects!

Comment on What Is Construction Project Management? by Dereje

Dereje — Mon, 14 May 2012 19:44:52 +0000

wow, so good, beautiful approaches and categorization. I am an engineer working at the planning office and project manager, hence I would like to get a full volume on the project construction planning and management technique.

thanks a lot…

Comment on Project Management and Dealing With Bullies at the Work Place by Christy

Christy — Mon, 14 May 2012 15:48:07 +0000

Thank you for this article. I too am being bullied by my boss and a coworker who has been in the group longer than I have. Although unfortunately in your case it meant you leaving your job and the bully still reigning over the group, at the end of the day its about what’s best for you. Although I am also wanting to stand my ground and have the bully be dealt with, politics will most likely win out on what’s right. So I’m learning you can’t worry about the manager (or bully)and what’s “right” in the situation but just do what is right for you and your sanity. If you believe in Karma, the bully will get what they deserve. Maybe not now, but at some point. No one wishes bad things on anyone but you rest assured that what goes around usually comes around too.

Comment on Complexity and Project Management - Exercising Practical Judgement in Conditions of Uncertainty by Helen Rawlinson

Helen Rawlinson — Sun, 13 May 2012 23:16:21 +0000

I really like this article. For a long time I’ve recognised the limitations of the prevailing planning processes in organisations that work purely on the assumption of linear progression. The fact that we think we can plan for a whole year, or more, in advance given the fast pace of change is an extremely narrow way to view our future. As with the context of this article around project management, once the plan has been made we tend to restrict our focus such that we do not pick up on the evolving and changing environment that could be alerting us to the need to change or adapt our strategies. In my organisations there have been several attempts to impose a rigid project management methodology into an organisational development contxt and they have all failed to gain engagement now the decision is for us to all get trained in Prince2. Chris, you have confirmed my belief that Prince2 will also prove to the wrong tool

Comment on Limitations of Agile Software Development by Bob Allen (@CuriousAgilist)

Bob Allen (@CuriousAgilist) — Sun, 13 May 2012 13:52:33 +0000

Urk! Wrong turn.
“When dividing the project into agile-manageable subprojects, we minimize dependencies through architecture.”…”Therefore, the agile definition of “progress” … has to be adjusted”.
Sorry but no. This flies squarely in the face of slicing stories vertically (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vertical_slice) and it fails to deliver business value.

If you want an example of how mini-teams can be used effectively, see Michael Dubakov’s excellent report on their team’s evolution http://bit.ly/JunB2Q.

Comment on Project Management and the Development Environment by Magnus Nord

Magnus Nord — Wed, 09 May 2012 20:14:28 +0000

Interesting post!

I agree totally that you shouldn’t make the PM Scrum Master. It is two very different roles. I usually advocate having the “traditional” project manager become Product Owner. In a small project, I think it’s ok to have the same person act both PO and PM.

In a bigger context, maybe you need to separate the two roles, but I’m not sure it’s a good idea letting the PM interact with the development team directly. Depending, of course, on exactly what that means :-)

Comment on Top Ten Signs You Might Not Be A Project Manager by Ben Ferris

Ben Ferris — Wed, 09 May 2012 15:23:21 +0000

Great post, Bruce. Instead of a career change, however, it may be time for the non-project manager to study up on what it takes to be a proper project manager. It can be learned!

Also, how about some tips for the accidental project manager.

Comment on Top Ten Signs You Might Not Be A Project Manager by Thomas

Thomas — Wed, 09 May 2012 10:41:38 +0000

I like the list except for number nine. I think this (someone who doesn’t work late) is a sign of someone that is good at what they do and maintains a work and life balance. As a project manager, if you have to work nights and weekends I would question whether you know what you are doing. Yes, there are exceptions like launching during off hours, but generally speaking you should have a life beyond your projects. So I would change number nine read “must work nights and weekends or carry home a full briefcase.”

Just a thought!

Comment on Avoid Communication Breakdowns - Listen to Your Team by James Clements

James Clements — Fri, 04 May 2012 20:49:09 +0000

Very good post and it reminded me of when I was a bit younger and a bit more bullish as a PM, as much as I hate to admit that.
We were doing defence projects, I was working for a defence contrator and we had daily meetings with the team, the military reps would come to the meetings every day, but they would never make a decision, I got wound up, thumping the table etc. couldn’t work out why. After a while, I worked it out, they were too low ranking to make any comment or decision, they were relaying everything back to the officers on a daily basis. Once I realized this, just pick up the phone or visit the appropriate officer, decision made, fixed. Boy it took a while and a lot of frustration to figure that out, but I now immediately identify who are the decision makers, and if in fact if there is anyone in the client team that is authorized to make a decision, hoist the red flag if not.

Comment on Stakeholder Analysis and Stakeholder Management by Dennis Murphey

Dennis Murphey — Fri, 04 May 2012 15:56:29 +0000

I always saw stakeholders as mud in the gears blocking my progress because they did notunderstand the system or trust my judgement. MANY years later you realize, poorly managed stakeholders can derail a project and a Project Manager. This series was light read but informative. It helped to frame the stakeholder role and align the importance. It still requires a ton of patience to execute properly. PM’s need lots of Patience.

Comment on Tips on Managing Multiple Projects by Magnus Nord

Magnus Nord — Fri, 04 May 2012 11:29:08 +0000

Great tips! I especially agree that communication and focused team members are important.

I think avoiding micro-management is applicable to planning as well: if you put too much details in the plan it will be difficult to keep it up-to-date.

Comment on The 5 Laws of Social Project Management by Samad Aidane

Samad Aidane — Fri, 04 May 2012 02:04:44 +0000

Charles,

You are absolutely right when you say that conventional project management is not social.

Conventional project management became formal after WWII. At the time, there was very little awareness about what really motivates people in general. In fact, I would argue that at that time, organizations didn’t really need to worry about people that much, let alone how they are motivated. Post-WWII Project Management in defense & aerospace, pharmaceutical, construction industries, which influenced the founding fathers and mothers of conventional project management, only needed few smart “planners” at the top to develop an “efficient” plan. These industries were dealing with mostly proven technologies and the masses of eager and less educated workers were ready and willing execute the plan without much thought. The assumption was that the workers’ feelings, thoughts, behaviors can be held constant, since they really can’t be (and don’t need to be) planned.

Conventional PM approach to planning and even the process groups and knowledge areas we are still taught and used today are from that bygone era.

This top down approach is still taught in our PM “Education System” today, despite the realities and challenges of the current knowledge-based economy and workplace.

So yes, I agee: conventional project management is not social. We are ready for a refresh!

Samad Aidane
Managing Editor
GuerrillaProjectManagent.com

Comment on Leading Admirably, Leading Authentically by Heather

Heather — Wed, 02 May 2012 00:46:11 +0000

I rather a leader be straight forward with me than try and guess what the real deal is. On the other hand, sometimes it is nice to have a leader to tell me I’m great so that I can just focus on my job and stay motivated. I think there is a trade off to both styles, although my style would undoubtedly be very straight forward, as I have a hard time saying anything other than what I really think. Part of being honest is to know when you really need to express that particular opinion and when you really need to just keep your thoughts to yourself.

Comment on What Do Abbott and Costello Have To Do with Good Project Management? by Taru Jain

Taru Jain — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 19:46:03 +0000

So right on the money! I just saw someone get a big promotion, even under very difficult financial circumstances, because they asked and asked. I realized the same thing that you mention in this blog - I need to ask. Now, I am pretty well notorious for asking things that I need to keep my projects moving forward, but never did pay that kind of attention to myself. I do have to agree - there is nothing to lose by asking, and yes, asking is an art, one has to be tactful about it.

Comment on Getting Projects Done With or Without a Certified Project Manager by Daniel

Daniel — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 11:33:52 +0000

Interesting contribution, sponsors can really be a challenge. The challenge for me with this article was that the headline mislead me - I see this is really valid for the capability of the PM as a whole. Not certification, which in the most ideal of all cases would evaluate that capability.

Comment on Expensive Sentences Creating Scope Creep: How to Turn a $100k Project to an $800k Project by Heather Christian

Heather Christian — Sun, 29 Apr 2012 23:07:24 +0000

Wow, powerful example. I’ve seen this happen so often. Funny thing is no one ever talks about the impact on the project cost. This may be because I’ve never worked on a project where a good project manager has been involved. Usually someone from the department is just plugged into that role. As a Business Analyst there is a lot I can do to prevent this sort of thing from happening, at least when the lines of communication are preserved and I don’t have users going directly to technical to make requests. I will watch more closely for this in the future. Thanks for the post.

Comment on Agile Management Enablement by Krupal

Krupal — Fri, 27 Apr 2012 11:18:35 +0000

The article looks like an advertisement for versionone, it looks like you alone did all the sprint planning loaded the team to work on the sprint! Are there any better articles on PMhut?

Comment on The Five Stages of Project Team Development by Todd

Todd — Fri, 27 Apr 2012 11:12:13 +0000

Thank you so much for this article it has been a great resource and a major reference for my final year Team Project Written report!

Comment on 5 Project Planning Tips For Project Sponsors by Ian Page

Ian Page — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 07:28:58 +0000

I forget about the 5th tip. Thanks for reminding me because it really flashes me some ideas that I control the whole project and the power was still on my hands. Thanks!

Comment on Economic Uncertainty and the PMO Profit Center by Claire Marrero

Claire Marrero — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 13:32:47 +0000

Abid,
We need more PMO leads to partner with CFO’s as you are absolutely right, the C suite need to see value delivered, or PMO’s will continue to be seen a simply overhead and be one of the first casualties of our continued uncertain economic times. At the South Florida Chapter of PMI we have begun an initiative named the “Center of Excellence” aimed at supporting PMO’s to help ensure they are delivering maximum value, and building relationships with the C Suite to help educate them what a well run PMO can deliver to an organization… we would love to have you contribute, or perhaps even speak at one of our forums…. Please connect.
Claire Marrero, Director Center of Excellence, South Florida PMI, Principal, The Talent Source, Inc

Comment on Power: The Functional Manager’s Meat and Project Manager’s Poison? by Pacha

Pacha — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 18:49:14 +0000

I agree with Gerald Neal. Integration is the larger and more complex phenomenon we have in dealing with modern organizational imbalances. This is speacially true for companies or corporations, and even in among countries and governments in a global economic environment. I sincerely hope that we could achieve this in the next 50 years.

Comment on The 5 Questions You Should Ask Any Social Project Management Vendor - Part 1 by The 5 Questions You Should Ask Any Social Project Management Vendor - Part 4 - PM Hut

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 13:07:30 +0000

[...] in post one, we argued that for a social project management software product to be considered “social”, it [...]

Comment on 5 Steps to Meeting Quality Targets on Projects by Magnus

Magnus — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 13:01:30 +0000

I think you have a good point in defining what quality means for the project. One important part of getting back on track is also to ask why quality suffers.

In my experience, one contributing factor might be inability by management to understand the importance of not introducing technical debt.

I think it’s fine to compromise functional quality to meet a tight timetable. However, it is not ok to compromise design/implementation quality.

Here, the PM has an important role as an educator and a bridge between management and development teams.

Comment on The Success of Canceled Projects by Steve Romero

Steve Romero — Sat, 21 Apr 2012 20:14:16 +0000

Conrad and Janet, you are both correct. First, Conrad is correct in noting that not every “cancelled” project should necessarily be considered a “successful outcome.” If it indeed takes too long and huge amounts of investment are lost, it could hardly be considered a success. The tweet I quoted simply wanted to point out that cancelling projects shows success in project or investment decision-making - success in project and portfolio management (PPM). The spirit of this success characterization would not hold up under habitual cancellations or cancellations occurring far later than they should.

And Janet is correct in saying the decision to cancel should always be objective and based on fact - uninfluenced by anticipated “consequences.” Minimizing waste is the successful outcome of which I speak. With that said, Conrad’s comments convey the unfortunate reality that exists in many organizations - objective decisions are not always made because of the fear of failure and the “consequences” that result from it.

The ability to apply fact-based objectivity to project investment decision-making and realize the “success” described in the tweet is entirely dependent on the organizations attitude toward “failure.” Most organizations (and most humans for that matter) have an absolute aversion to “failure” because it is perceived as “egg on face” vs. “opportunity to learn and improve.” I addressed this pervasive problem in the following post http://www.itgevangelist.com/blog/2011/10/9/embracing-and-learning-from-failure.html.

And I like the idea of “phased” approaches for complex and lengthy project efforts. It makes it much easier to pull the plug and minimize the waste.

Comment on Six Sigma vs. Total Quality Management by King Menelik

King Menelik — Sat, 21 Apr 2012 09:18:18 +0000

TQM is universal. Six Sigma was an attempt by America USA to bring something new. A turn coat of some sort. I believe if you practice TQM properly then you will get all what the author is saying about 6 sigma. Remember 6 sigma comes from the Histogram-a tool of TQM and a long time tool of operations management/QC/QA.
DMAIC is PDCA –if you really know what is PDCA–then the need for DMAIC is minimal–it like Pepsi Cola and Coca Cola. Or drinking the various varieties of bottled water.
I will still vote for TQM with some adjustments to fit modern business occurrences.
King Menelik-Nairobi Kenya

Comment on The 5 Questions You Should Ask Any Social Project Management Vendor - Part 1 by The 5 Questions You Should Ask Any Social Project Management Vendor - Part 3 - PM Hut

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 19:05:39 +0000

[...] the first two posts of this series (here and here), we discussed that the first order of business when dealing with a social project [...]

Comment on The 5 Questions You Should Ask Any Social Project Management Vendor - Part 1 by The 5 Questions You Should Ask Any Social Project Management Vendor - Part 2 - PM Hut

Thu, 19 Apr 2012 15:54:58 +0000

[...] the first article in this series, we argued that in order for a project management software provider to claim that it [...]

Comment on The Success of Canceled Projects by Janet Loughran

Janet Loughran — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 13:12:22 +0000

It is best to make the decision to cancel/kill any project as objective as possible, regardless of how long into a project lifecycle you are. If the cost of continuing with the project is less than the benefits to be gained, taking account of dis-benefits, e.g. resourced tied up that could more effectively be used on other work, then cancel it. Of course consider partial delivery of objectives as a business option; However if the Sponsoring Organisation and “Responsible” Executives are themselves mature and effective in their roles, they should understand that their main concern should not be “egg-on-face”.
Money and time should only be considered as “wasted” if there had been an opportunity to minimise the “waste”, and this wasn’t taken.

Project Manager, effectively managing projects to agreed successful outcomes for 10 years.
(I like the “Killed” status and will use this in future - thanks!)

Comment on Is Your Company Ready for an Agile Process? by Carl Manello

Carl Manello — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 12:35:08 +0000

Heather,

I’m glad you found the post useful. Testing is always a challenge; it tends to get ignored first, and repeatedly. Within Agile, the atmosphere is little different.

However, given the nature of an agile sprint, testing (from a usability and functionality perspective) is done within every sprint as product is shared with the users. Other testing (performance, end-to-end) do get overlooked in the realm of “release it quick” and fix it later.

Comment on Important People Doing Important Stuff That No-one Else Could Possibly Understand? No, I Don’t Think So. by Mark A. Tipping

Mark A. Tipping — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 01:39:30 +0000

Yes, I do agree with you - CHAOS report is outdated and used very tough criteria. As I stated, the challenge is getting up-to-date, accurate and realistic research.

Because of this, my company is now collaborating with La Trobe University and will be sponsoring several research projects around project management and success rates.

Do you have any well-researched and credible up-to-date information/research - I couldn’t find anything I felt was reliable enough.

cheers

Comment on Important People Doing Important Stuff That No-one Else Could Possibly Understand? No, I Don’t Think So. by H. Breevoort

H. Breevoort — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 22:19:42 +0000

I don’t understand why people still refer to the Standish CHAOS report. Even the most CHAOS report is completely inaccurate - how about a report that was published almost 2 decades ago?

The CHAOS report considers anything that is one dollar above budget or one day behind schedule to be challenged. The success rate in the CHAOS report is ridiculous and does not represent actual data.

Comment on The 5 Questions You Should Ask Any Social Project Management Vendor - Part 1 by H. Breevoort

H. Breevoort — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 22:15:47 +0000

@Suzan,

Social Project Management is the act of using a collaboration tool that everyone on the team can use. It’s a buzzword but it exists and it means something!

Comment on Scrumban Makes My Teeth Laugh! by Jamey

Jamey — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 20:55:14 +0000

Do you have technical writers in your teams? If so, how do they respond to the topic oriented method of writing? … and do they drink a-lot?

Comment on The Success of Canceled Projects by Conrad Weisert

Conrad Weisert — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 17:59:53 +0000

A cancelled project is a success if it is cancelled EARLY before the sponsoring organization has made huge investments of money, time, and lost opportunity. Once vast effort has been expended it becomes unacceptable for responsible executives to face the consequences of canceling it, admitting that the money and time have been wasted. That’s why a phased development life cycle remains essential for non-trivial projects.
http://www.idinews.com/waterfall.html

Comment on The 5 Questions You Should Ask Any Social Project Management Vendor - Part 1 by Ben Ferris

Ben Ferris — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 15:22:24 +0000

I completely agree, Suzan. The term Social Project Management sounds to me like a buzzword thrown around to represent collaboration features within project management software. More of my thoughts can be found in this recent blog post:

What the #$*! is Social Project Management?

If you read the rest of the series they seem to talk more about plugging in project management software into an enterprise-wide social tool that crosses multiple discipline. That part of the discussion makes a little more sense to me.

Comment on The 5 Questions You Should Ask Any Social Project Management Vendor - Part 1 by Suzan T.

Suzan T. — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 13:34:22 +0000

I always thought that a social project management tool is (more or less) a collabration tool (but with different, catchier name).

Comment on “Mad” Management by Johan Van Staden

Johan Van Staden — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 12:40:29 +0000

Found this to be very interesting. Thanks.
Feel free to share more 60’s stuff like this.

Comment on “Mad” Management by SGK

SGK — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 10:05:56 +0000

Thanks for the lovely article. Hope to see few more pointers from the book you found.

Comment on How Much Power We Actually Have As Project Managers? by Anson

Anson — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 07:33:35 +0000

Is this post accusing PM is a unpopular dictator? Absolutely not.

Comment on Project Metrics: The Double-Edged Sword by Anson

Anson — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 07:20:54 +0000

Funny is that why we have to make a fixed budget and set a stupid tolerance ratio on it to make projects equally costy.

Comment on “Mad” Management by Anson

Anson — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 07:00:19 +0000

“Mad” management is interesting.

Comment on 6 Project Leadership Super Powers by Jim Shaffer, PMP

Jim Shaffer, PMP — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 17:54:57 +0000

I like this list. It combines what should be common sense (in my opinion) with the reality that it isn’t common sense. There are many project leaders out there that just go by the book, without question or consideration for the real things that make projects successful . . . the people.

Comment on Is Your Company Ready for an Agile Process? by Heather Christian

Heather Christian — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 20:24:42 +0000

It was helpful for me to read the changes in role for the business analyst. Thank you for not leaving us out. How do you feel that testing comes into play in Agile? I support internal software and reporting changes and we do a lot of testing after each change. This is the most time consuming part of what we do and I’m wondering how it changes under the agile method.

Comment on Project Metrics: The Double-Edged Sword by Guilllermo Viale

Guilllermo Viale — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 14:20:04 +0000

I agree, and this is a huge problem in the State budget. The projects must have a lower cost but if the budget are not spend next year their funds will be cut and people will think that they did not work.

Comment on Project Metrics: The Double-Edged Sword by PMBookClub.com

PMBookClub.com — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 13:32:21 +0000

Pam, I love this story. True is your point about metrics… you get the results of what you measure. So you must be careful about what you measure!

I get frustrated by the notion that we should measure projects on schedule, budget, and scope (the traditional triple constraints). A project can meet all three and still be a massive failure. I’m not saying you should throw out those measures… but they should be balanced with measures from the business… revenue generation targets, operational efficiency targets, customer satisfaction, etc.

Thanks for a great post!

Thomas

Comment on Were the Three Stooges Really Good Project Managers? by Steve

Steve — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 12:24:58 +0000

Very Clever! It really gives you a different perspective. As someone who likes to utilize analogies to communicate concepts of IT project managements, I love stuff like this!

Comment on How Much Power We Actually Have As Project Managers? by Ben Ferris

Ben Ferris — Wed, 11 Apr 2012 16:00:13 +0000

Here is my second attempt to get the link to the article correct, sorry for the double post:

This is an interesting topic. We just posted an article on our blog today that is similar to this topic: Are You a Project Manager or a Project Leader?.

Comment on Were the Three Stooges Really Good Project Managers? by Larry Kunz

Larry Kunz — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 23:08:23 +0000

Nyuk, Nyuk, Nyuk back atcha! I enjoyed reading that, and you’ve made a persuasive case. For the Stooges to maintain such a steady rate of productivity, without sacrificing quality, was quite a creative and managerial feat.

Comment on PMP Certification: Is It Worth It? by Harshad Rathod

Harshad Rathod — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 14:52:43 +0000

Good, helpful article no doubt! I am myself debating if I should get certified. However, I bag to differ on the analogy of medical grad. A nurse in a hospital has 25 years of experience when I visit an ER. Will I be satisfied with her seeing me or I would like at least a new medical resident to examine me! A nurse is a nurse and a physician is a physician. My concern with PMI PMP is that it’s not an institute like that of Chartered Accountants. PMI PMP certification lacks underlying training and testing. It’s more like a course completion certificate rather than a qualification. And that can help someone change her/his career and get a junior position of a in PM but certainly not qualify anyone as a good PM.

Comment on Why Projects Succeed: Risk Identification by gannabattula

gannabattula — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 08:59:25 +0000

One thing we should realized here is the phrases used to elicit information or changing perception.
Why won’t this work? giving the same tune as per existing mood in team and getting all risks. Next one is turning thoughts to “can we make it work?”. Yes leadership is all about directions and getting right thing done…

It is nicely explained to get risks from team only when the team already half way through the project. If we do this at the start of project, we get suggestions based on past experience and most of the time we see blank faces. I believe that’s why we try to recruit/use similar line experience folks to foresee the issues.

Comment on How Much Power We Actually Have As Project Managers? by Xin Joe

Xin Joe — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 06:03:02 +0000

I don’t know I’m getting a sense from your article that it’s downgrading the rapport of project managers in a team and an organization. I feel like if developers or a team members read this article, it might shed project managers respect to them. From my experience being a project manager, a PM is a pivot and a very important member in the team when it comes to leading and executing a project. I’m talking about a real project manager and not a show manager. Of course there are lot differences in show Vs real manager, hope you know it already!

Comment on Differentiating Between Project Success and Project Management Success by Mark

Mark — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 23:07:43 +0000

Nonsense. The reality here is that we are often working to standards set within a project by ourselves that no one else could give a toss about. If you’ve ever delivered projects you’ll know that a successful project can easily be over budget and time as long as you’ve brought the key stakeholders with you. The real challenge is establishing project quality. What is quality? As we also unfortunately know, the stakeholder is not always the best judge of quality. And please don’t start bleating on about requirements, we’re not business analysts (well most of the time) and you’re just moving the fundamental problem from project management to requirements gathering. Let’s just go ahead and make it all the same thing. What is quality?

Comment on The Dependency Cycle: How Managers Create It and How to Avoid It by Heather

Heather — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 22:27:35 +0000

I see this all the time. I’m not a manger but my manager frequently assigns me responsibility without also giving the authority and resources needed to make the task happen. I think that this also happens to her though, and is entrenched in the company culture.

Comment on Why Projects Succeed: Risk Identification by Thomas

Thomas — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 21:57:12 +0000

Excellent article. Facilitation skills are so important to a PM for all the reasons you have mentioned. I had been considering doing a team workshop on risk identification on my next project, this article will save me a lot of time in planning it.

Thanks

Comment on Project Management Foundations on Project Churn by Project Management Foundations - Managing Your Project Issues - PM Hut

Project Management Foundations - Managing Your Project Issues - PM Hut — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 12:55:26 +0000

[...] me the most annoying, and sometimes the most disruptive type of project churn is issue related churn. Open issues distract team members from the work at hand, and often slow [...]

Comment on Critical Chain Method (CCM) - A Short Definition by Jamie

Jamie — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 10:20:28 +0000

Weak/misleading article. Critical Chain is the title of the 1997 book by Eli Goldratt - the person who coined the phrase Critical Chain Project Management (not to be confused with Critical Path). How any definition of Critical Chain can fail to mention Goldratt is beyond me. In fact the article shows that author does not understand what Critical Chain Project Management is. Do your research!

Comment on Setting Stretch Goals… and Avoiding SNAP Goals by Mark Gray

Mark Gray — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 07:38:39 +0000

I’ve also come across DUMB objectives: Diffuse, Unmeasurable, Meaningless & Boring… I think these are even worse than SNAP for de-motivating a team.
Also, the impact of intrinsic vs extrinsic rewards in goal-setting has to be considered. I like the fact that you use the idea of “generating excitement” rather than proposing larger and larger rewards (Daniel Pink has a few good things to say on this topic).
Good article!

Comment on The 3 Day Sprint Experiment for Project Management in the Fast Lane by Ashmini

Ashmini — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 00:24:21 +0000

Good read. I’m a developer on an agile project team and we practice 2 week sprints right now. It works out okay, but I do appreciate the notes about the focus that the team has for that 3 days. I think our two week sprints work because the first couple of days start out a bit rocky, with people still trying to understand their stories or tasks, and the time that the two weeks gives us is enough to push to get everything completed. But I’d love to consider giving 1 week sprints a try.

Comment on Types of Project Management Communication - Developing a Plan by Mahamed Boakai

Mahamed Boakai — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 08:24:41 +0000

This is an interesting article. I am consulting on behavior change to promote fiscal probity and I always push my clients to ensure a workable and achievable communications plan. Without a comminucations plan, any institution is non-functional or ineffective in the eyes of the public; and no project will succeed without a well thought out plan to communicate success.

Comment on The Agile Project Manager - The Cost of Transparency by Luke W

Luke W — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 15:36:03 +0000

A creeping lack of transparency is a sure sign of a frustrated project. Positing defensiveness as immature and negative from the off is perhaps a good tactic for a Product Owner: being transparent in the need for shared transparency.

Really thought provoking article, thanks very much for sharing Bob,

Luke

Comment on Setting Stretch Goals… and Avoiding SNAP Goals by Anju aggarwal

Anju aggarwal — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 06:48:49 +0000

Very nice article. Good comparison with Stretch and SNAP goals. This has been a practice in worldwide , management asks for stretch goals from employee and then come back to it during the appraisal cycles. On the contrary it should be more of a hand in hand exercise, where the manager and the member together help each other to attain that goal. Right now it has become more a means for another discord between the senior management and employees.

Comment on 25 Questions that Pinpoint Your Stakeholders by Coreen Lawrence

Coreen Lawrence — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 16:30:55 +0000

Hi Christian, I love this article and these are great questions! The stakeholder group that I see missing here are external community/environmental stakeholders. The kind of projects that I work on are often large industrial developments and the potentially affected community members that live where the development is proposed have a major potential to impact the success of the projects. I don’t think every project needs to consider external stakeholders, but one quick question such as: is there any potential impact to residents, community or engo’s?
If so, then take it further: Is there any part of this project that could be seen/heard or smelled offsite? What is the environmental impact of this project? Is there any organization that may see the project as a threat to their environmental objectives? What are the current issues being discussed in the community right now? Is there any way that the project could exacerbate those issues?
Christian, if these questions are coming back with “yes!” What do you recommend the project manager do? How do they gain the resources necessary to address these issues?
Regards,
Coreen

Comment on Should Project Managers be Professionally Licensed or Chartered? by Joe Tinger, MBA, MS

Joe Tinger, MBA, MS — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 15:38:53 +0000

The notation of license requirements for the project management profession will most likely be subjective to other requirements and debates. Definitely criticize the profession due to education requirements. An MBA is a sort of license requirement for manageing projects. That said, gaining education is a plus to the profession and not just meeting controversial hours and taking a test.

Comment on How to Get People to Use the Software Tool by Magnus

Magnus — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 09:52:21 +0000

Recently when introducing a new issue management system, I faced exactly this problem: struggling with adoption.

We felt (don’t you always) we had good reasons to start using it, and everyone agreed we needed to communicate issues more often, as it was a distributed team.

In the end we had “bug review meetings” which everyone agreed was a good idea. At those meetings, we sneaked the tool in and started adding, updating and delegating issues in it. In the end adoption improved, perhaps mainly of two reasons:

- Users realized how we wanted the tool to be used, and the benefits of using it

- We got a better understanding of how discussions played out and how we needed to configure the tool to match the real world.

Comment on Should Project Managers be Professionally Licensed or Chartered? by Phil

Phil — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 20:53:10 +0000

CPAs do not tie to a specific industry, but basic accounting doesn’t vary much between industry to industry. Credits are credits, debits are debits, profits and losses are profits and losses.

By contrast, effective project management can vary widely depending on the industry. PMing the construction of a new office building is very different than PMing the production of a video game.

The problem with a license is that you have to set a standard, and a standard may not be good for your industry.

I wouldn’t want an agency to license me to be a software developer because I’d be afraid of what would get imposed on me in practice.

Comment on The Word on Risk by Don McAlister

Don McAlister — Sun, 25 Mar 2012 14:37:22 +0000

David,

Good article. As in everything, good communication is critical. Well done.
Don

Comment on Optimal Decision-Making: Turning Data into Actionable Information by Kevin Black

Kevin Black — Fri, 23 Mar 2012 18:15:40 +0000

Great article! I like those “4 Cs” and will use them in the future!

But what are you going to do with the information?

From your example: The next planned trips on the project could be impacted as well, and that’s a risk to the project’s budget, schedule, and more.

To use 1 of your 4 Cs: identify the risk according to the context. Did the blizzard happen in December? With 2 more trips planned in January & February? Or was the blizzard at the end of March and the danger of a recurrence is low?

Further, the travel budget might have to grow because of the blizzard. But what if the stakeholders won’t accommodate the increase in cost? How are you going to reduce budget and still get the work done? A possible remedy is to rearrange the WBS so that they can do more tasks on site all at once to make fewer trips. Another is to reduce the scope altogether.

…or maybe (a remedy for both cost and risk) next trip your resources will simply have to take the bus. :-)

Comment on Five Ways to Optimize Your Projects and Resources by Joe MacNish

Joe MacNish — Wed, 21 Mar 2012 21:40:48 +0000

Being able to cross-reference resource availability with project schedules is critical, but it’s also important to be able to track resources by ability and value, not just skill sets. There are simply some resources that perform more strongly than others, and some that need some coaching.

Comment on The Word on Risk by anand chittoor

anand chittoor — Wed, 21 Mar 2012 20:32:35 +0000

Excellent article Dave. Common misconceptions in the industry are hopefully cleared now. I have been trying to educate people on opportunities vs threats as well as mitigation. Mitigation is only a risk response strategy.

I have used all these above mentioned concepts in my own risk management software vue-matrix (www.Vue-matrix.com). Just recently released. If you can, please take a look let me know your thoughts

Great that we are on the same page with concepts and our approach to Risk Management.

Regards,
Anand.

Comment on Planning and Budgeting in Scrum Projects by Lars

Lars — Tue, 20 Mar 2012 12:58:38 +0000

Thanks - this was indeed a very useful intro on Scrum and budgeting!

Comment on How to Tear Down the Organizational Silos That Block Project Success by Jim Yates

Jim Yates — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 19:11:48 +0000

A couple of useful techniques to focus thinking. My only concern is that they could produce a relatively negative stance and potentially sow the seeds of failure.

The second one in particular is amenable to an alternative more positive approach: using creative visioning.

This would involve getting the team to focus on having achieved the project objectives and done better than anyone could have imagined. They would the be given the task of writing a magazine article or similar explaining how they did it.

It can be useful to use visual approaches and get the participants to try producing collages, illustrations, page mock-ups etc. This has the tendency to overload the logical “left brain” [I know it is a metaphor] and generates room for more positive creative thinking.

I’ve never tried this in a project setting but have used it successfully in business development visioning where it prevents linear extrapolation.

There needs to be strong facilitation, some warm up exercises can help and trust needs to be developed both within the team and with the facilitator before this is tried.

Comment on A Good Manager Does Not Give Orders by Joe MacNish

Joe MacNish — Fri, 16 Mar 2012 22:42:55 +0000

I think one final step to this process should be constructive feedback to the employees when they complete their tasks. If they did well, talk about was contributed to their success. If their work is incomplete or unsatisfactory, discuss what needs to be done to bring it up to snuff, and what they need to do in future tasks to be successful.

Joe MacNish
http://www.TrackerSuite.Net

Comment on Why Projects Succeed - Articulating the Value of Project Management by Why Projects Succeed - Proactive Risk Management - PM Hut

Why Projects Succeed - Proactive Risk Management - PM Hut — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 18:55:49 +0000

[...] This article is part of a series, the previous article can be found here. [...]

Comment on Knowing When to Delegate by Kasper Jorgensen

Kasper Jorgensen — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 18:35:25 +0000

Interesting article and I completely agree that good (project)managers are the ones who authorize and delegate to their team and the staff.
Its not just about delegating to one person that brings value to the project, but in my experience delegating to the team.

When you empower your team - you actually empower yourself as a leader/manager!

But before you can delegate you need to make the team know that you trust them, trust is a prerequisite for delegating authority - so lets assume that we have this and that the sufficient competencies in the team are available.

After you have delegated the task - trust the team/individual to make the right moves - mingle if necessary, avoid meddling! That will remove the trust and create a suspicious team/individual.

When you have outlined the project and completed the initial planning, scoping, scheduling activities you will also be able to assess which ares you can delegate and how much authority you will delegate.
Remember to re-visit this, if your team grows you are able to delegate more, if they are not able to act with-in the authority you have empowered them you will need to assess how future activities are delegated.
So you need to be careful if it is a new team how much you delegate from the start, once you have delegated authority, it can be difficult to withdraw.

Comment on 5 Must Have Features of a Social Project Management Tool by Thomas

Thomas — Wed, 14 Mar 2012 09:03:44 +0000

I love your last point, about the importance of seeking solutions that meet your specific needs. All too often we try to solve it all, even problems we don’t yet have, instead of targeting the specific issues at hand. There are many tools to support project managers and project teams. Social media is quickly growing into an invaluable asset for project managers and project teams. I recommend the book “Social Media for Project Managers” by Elizabeth Harrin. We plan to start an online study of her book in about a month. Should be a eye-opening learning experience.

Comment on The Project Manager: A Hero in Project Management by Nancy Burrows

Nancy Burrows — Tue, 13 Mar 2012 22:09:14 +0000

These are all great points! Communication is definitely an ability that all PMs need to have. Tailoring each message to include exactly what that individual needs to know to do their job successfully is a crucial ability of PMs! Thanks for your great post!

Comment on Increasing The Maturity of Your PMO by PM Hut

PM Hut — Mon, 12 Mar 2012 14:16:50 +0000

Hi Simon,

Sorry about that. The issue is now fixed.

Comment on Increasing The Maturity of Your PMO by Simon

Simon — Mon, 12 Mar 2012 13:16:26 +0000

Would someone please proof read the article before publication.

Comment on Scrum vs. Kanban by Eilon Reshef

Eilon Reshef — Sun, 11 Mar 2012 22:03:58 +0000

Nice post.

I just wrapped up a lengthy discussion on advantages we’ve found in the Kanban approach. Very much related.

Link below:
http://onsaasproducts.wordpress.com/2012/03/09/developing-saas-forget-scrum-check-out-kanban-and-similar-approaches/

Comment on The Project Manager: A Hero in Project Management by Ally

Ally — Fri, 09 Mar 2012 21:49:50 +0000

I agree, all good qualities! I think good PMs are also excellent logical thinkers.

Comment on The Cost of Agile by Luke W

Luke W — Fri, 09 Mar 2012 19:28:31 +0000

Fully agree that not losing sight of the user stories is key in terms of overall project stategy, but at a more granular level, agile can still be effective used simply as a quick-fire methodology to get things done, keep teams moving and keep everyone motivated. As you said, “everyone likes standups”. Thanks for sharing your insights.

Luke W
Community Manager
OneDesk

Comment on 10 Reasons We Have Daily Stand Up Meetings by Annemarie

Annemarie — Thu, 08 Mar 2012 03:32:32 +0000

I recently interviewed for a career advisor position at a local technical college where they have up to three standups a day, one of which was at around 11:00a.m. I had never heard of such a concept before, and found it to be too structured and disruptive. I can understand why it is important to communicate with the rest of the team, but three standups a day….I think that’s a bit much and smacks of micromanagement to me. What if an employee is on an important phone call, or is in a meeting with a student? I could never work in such an environment….I would feel smothered.

Comment on What Is the Reason That Projects Fail? by Bill Brantley

Bill Brantley — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 15:17:57 +0000

Dig a little deeper and you will find that poor communication is the root cause for all the causes you cite.

Comment on Forget About Feedback by Trevithj

Trevithj — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 04:37:59 +0000

This is good advice on how to give effective criticism. The example with Bob and Tom is clearly a case of learning from failure, but preserves Tom’s dignity and pride of workmanship. Nicely put.
I do feel that the use of the term “feedforward” does muddy the waters somewhat. The example is clearly a case of negative feedback: an error was corrected. The terms “positive”, “negative” and “feedback” seem to be poorly used in most management contexts, adding to their ambiguity. This article doesn’t really address that.

Comment on Common IT Project Management Mistakes by Ally

Ally — Tue, 06 Mar 2012 18:25:02 +0000

Confusion about who is doing what role can be a problem (although that probably fits under ‘Poor Communication’). I think it’s important for everyone to at least understand what everyone is responsible for - the onus shouldn’t just fall on the PM.

Comment on Oscillation versus Iteration by David Lyback

David Lyback — Mon, 05 Mar 2012 13:01:51 +0000

Good point. I agree that if not having an understandable and communicated theme for an iteration or release, extra struggle are introduced as assigned people try to grasp for meaning and context and overall direction. Instead of getting on with some reasonable work towards working software, there will be unfruitful and frustrating forms of guessworking. Thus oscillations.

Comment on Do You Love Your PMO? by David Lyback

David Lyback — Mon, 05 Mar 2012 12:04:23 +0000

I like the way you blended functional objectives of an organizational staff-level entity with interpersonal aspects like motivation for working together for improvement, and that you topped it by also throwing in some really good and useful metrics. Its like a book worth of practical knowledge compressed into two pages. Thanks.

Comment on Setting and Resetting Expectations by Ralph

Ralph — Mon, 05 Mar 2012 11:59:52 +0000

Hi there,
Good list. Common sense always rules in my mind. Managing expectations is a fundamental kep to project success. Considerably A-1 on my list every time.

It not only goes for the client but it also goes for your team(s), your superiors, your family, your friends, etc. Managing expectations, to me, is fundamental to how we live our lives. Ask yourself what you think happened the last time someting went off the rails. Mis-communication likely. Someone’s expectations or even yours were misaligned and the only way that could happen is through communication.

Great post and love the list. If anything you could change the Don’ts to Do’s and explain what you will do and the Primary could be followed up with “critical path” considering that is what you are describing.

Thanks for putting this out there for consideration.

Comment on Knowns and Unknowns - The Core of Risk Management by Keith Wilson

Keith Wilson — Mon, 05 Mar 2012 00:40:07 +0000

“we don’t know what we don’t know” has become a catchcry in many training fields these days. In cacpacity building third world countries it is highly relevant because it isn’t all that easy to find out what you don’t know. Few in these countries wish to volunteer such information and they really do make you ‘investigate’ then ‘ask the right questions’ before the ‘unknown’ can be gleaned. I believe the one thing we have to do is balance the risk against the need to progress. Risk aversiveness is becoming so prevalant that it threatens the ‘decision making’ ability and need for a decision in many managers. having said that I sometimes feel that our Government agencies spend very little time analysing ‘risks’ or simply don’t care as seeing progress is more important than any consequences that may occur. The simple ‘SWOT’ analyis is at least some acknowledgement of possible adverse outcomes from hasty decisions and that threats do actually exist. Maybe students need to be introduced to ‘risk analysis’ as a way of convincing them that they can make the right decision about temptations and social activity put in front of them that may prove a serious impediment to their future well being and prospects. Risk Analysis really is the ‘hub’ around which projects and life rotate.

Comment on The Five Stages of Project Team Development by Aaron Howard

Aaron Howard — Sat, 03 Mar 2012 00:06:44 +0000

I very much liked the example that was given here. It really brought home the whole point of the lesson. I hope that I get a chance to put some of what I have learned here to good use.

Comment on Do We Need Project Managers? by Neil Killick

Neil Killick — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 02:59:40 +0000

“Do people in agile teams ever wonder where their team came from, or how their budget and timescale came to be what they are? Or who allocated their product owner? That was project management who did that.”

Actually, in Scrum the Product Owner manages budgets and timescales. And if “project management” were the ones who put the team together or allocated the Product Owner then that is incidental. If a company has a PMO then why not use it to do these things, to justify its existence?

But think - is it actually necessary that the PMO are the ones who put the team together and choose the PO? And is it the best way of doing things? It’s like saying “Who actually sells your house? The Estate Agent does.” - well, yes, because they exist to make money from doing that, but it’s actually far better to sell your house privately. In a small business with no PO, the owner or CEO puts the teams together.

I would argue that the best candidate for PO is normally the natural fit from the business as to who has most accountability around the product being delivered and has availability to the team. Teams based on cross-functional skills across the organisation should already be in place to deliver value streams for the business - too often do PMO’s chop and change teams, which is verging on negligent where high-performing teams are involved.

In an “agile project”, as you put it, The PO and ScrumMaster handle all of the activities normally associated with a Project manager and focus on delivery of the product rather than delivering the “project” (whatever that means).

It is time, as many companies are realising, to try and eliminate the wasted cost and time associated with managing a project and focus on the actual delivery of value.

Comment on There’s Something Rotten in the World Of Project Management by Anju Aggarwal

Anju Aggarwal — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 15:55:38 +0000

According to me , a project manager is known by their project execution. No matter they are good managers or leader or both, but they are accountable for the success of their project.Level of processes depends on an organization’s culture but still the end goal is project success.

Comment on The Five Stages of Project Team Development by Ronnie Cubit

Ronnie Cubit — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 15:54:45 +0000

I appreciate the way the team came together and accomplished their goal and got the job done.Well Done!

Comment on Why Projects Succeed - Articulating the Value of Project Management by simon

simon — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 15:00:36 +0000

Great article and very true.

For so many years, PMO’s have been considered low value due to the benefits not being artuculated in a language the Business understands.

i.e. release of platform xyz in a status report or milestone chart. Not very exciting to the Business.

However, new product launched in Europe will excite the Business as that equates to a vision and strategy they understand.

Thanks

Simon

Comment on Why Projects Succeed - Executive Sponsorship by Why Projects Succeed - Articulating the Value of Project Management - PM Hut

Why Projects Succeed - Articulating the Value of Project Management - PM Hut — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 13:55:25 +0000

[...] This article is part of a series, the previous article can be found here. [...]

Comment on What Is a Successful Project? by Ed Ritter

Ed Ritter — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 20:35:04 +0000

Success is relative to where you sit. As the PM, meeting/beating the triple constraint is success. As the business owner, success is the benefits the project delivers as you indicate. This raises the point on when a project is over. Is it over on delivery or, sometime after launch when data is available? Having those measures (and, their related duration) specified as part of the business case and/or success criteria keeps everyone aligned.

Comment on What Is a Successful Project? by Giacino

Giacino — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 18:29:22 +0000

Maybe we could differentiate a successful project and a successful product (or project outcomes). A successful project would be based on the triple constraints (with quality) and a successful product would be based on the added value/benefits for the client/stakeholders. Those are 2 different sets of criteria and they aren’t measured the same way nor at the same time.

Comment on Why Software Projects Fail by Kyle D

Kyle D — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 18:23:19 +0000

Interesting points Bruce. The rate of failure is alarming and if reduced could save organizations thousands, if not millions of dollars.

We have a free PDU accredited webinar on the same subject that you and your readers may be interested in. “Why Do Software Projects Fail” on Wednesday 2/29 at 2:30 Eastern time.

Comment on The Five Stages of Project Team Development by Dorothy Graham

Dorothy Graham — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 17:38:52 +0000

I think the five steps help me immensely, In the work force it is always great to have people that will have your back when necessary. It helped me to understand how important it is to communicate with my peers as well. It also brings about a sense of unity.

Comment on Project Management - Is Education More Valuable Than Experience? by Lindsay Scott - Arras People

Lindsay Scott - Arras People — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 09:37:49 +0000

Hi Owen
Excellent article. I wanted to leave a comment which shows what the hiring managers look for in their project managers when hiring. Interestingly hirers look for project management experience first, then domain/sector knowledge, then personality/personal style, then professional accreditations (PM related) and then finally educational achievement.
These rankings were taken from our latest benchmark report which is due out soon: http://www.arraspeople.co.uk/project-and-programme-management-resources/the-project-management-benchmark-report-from-arras-people-2012/

Comment on Project Management Foundations - Managing the Creep by Joshua Ramirez

Joshua Ramirez — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 04:33:16 +0000

Steve,

Exceptional post! I agree that “suffering from scope creep” really does translate into inability to effectively manage change.

But is it always just the project managers (PM) fault? I don’t think so. From my experience as a Project Controls Engineer (PCE), on our project, we were able to manage the change very well. But that was because we monitored changes to our baseline. Although the scope wasn’t well defined (and I couldn’t get management to invest the time to put together things like a WBS dictionary) we managed the critical path very well, and changes and delays were well captured. But the PM relied heavily on the PCE, as he was usually tied up in approval processes, technical issues, and day to day management. Where I have seen projects fail to manage change is where neither the PM or the PCE understood change control. Someone has to understand it and have the support to implement, otherwise you’re definitely in a pickle.

To summarize, a lot of the data sets you mention in your post are the responsibility of the PCE. So it’s not just the PM that’s to blame for project failures or the CREEP getting in and destroying things, some blame should be assigned to project controls as well (assuming the project has project controls, of course).

Regards,

Joshua Ramirez, MSM-PM

Comment on Unleashing Intrinsic Motivation Through Servant Leadership by Jim Grinnell

Jim Grinnell — Sun, 26 Feb 2012 13:45:34 +0000

Bill, yes you are correct that there is an extensive lineage of motivation theorists. Pink does not claim to be offering a new theory. Rather what he does (and does quite effectively) is take this rich but forgotten stream of research and reinvigorates it in light of the shift toward knowledge-based, creativity-oriented work. His work is well grounded in the literature and he gives credit where it is due. Pink’s book is well worth the read even for those who know the motivation literature!

Comment on Unleashing Intrinsic Motivation Through Servant Leadership by Bill Duncan

Bill Duncan — Sun, 26 Feb 2012 13:33:03 +0000

Pink is a bit behind the curve. Herzberg laid out most of this back in the 1960s.

Comment on The Emerging Servant Leadership Paradigm by Unleashing Intrinsic Motivation Through Servant Leadership - PM Hut

Unleashing Intrinsic Motivation Through Servant Leadership - PM Hut — Sat, 25 Feb 2012 13:36:10 +0000

[...] model fits hand-in-glove with the servant leadership approach. Servant leadership expert Jim Laub defines servant leadership as such: “Servant leadership [...]

Comment on Agile PM - Traditional PM Triangle be Damned, Keep Quality First! by Daniel Beverly

Daniel Beverly — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 12:10:23 +0000

I enjoyed this post. Particularly that it makes the important point that agile and iterative approaches require strong management and discipline. Just as much (and ore so?) than more traditional approaches.

Comment on 7 Things I Learned About Project Management by Daniel Beverly

Daniel Beverly — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 11:54:23 +0000

Enjoyed this post - thanks.

#8 for me: learn to manage up (stakeholders) and down (team).
#9 for me: be a galvaniser of teams.

Dan.

Comment on 7 Things I Learned About Project Management by Matthew Collinson

Matthew Collinson — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 17:52:39 +0000

Hi there Jeremy,
Thank you for the great article. I just got my degree in Business Management and am working to get into project management. Any information like this is great.

Comment on Using Project Management Software to Manage Risk in the Project Plan by Ally

Ally — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 16:57:01 +0000

It’s interesting how we can so easily miss how risks can impact on other project milestones! I’ve always found that letting the software recalculate the start/finish dates for other tasks (as you suggested) can really help the overall finish date.

Comment on The 9 Warning Signs of Bad Project Management by Jim Yates

Jim Yates — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 11:43:52 +0000

An excellent post Preben!

Like you, I am an MBA graduate and started my studies after about 15 years as a working manager in a project based business.

I concur with virtually all of your comments, in particular, the need to balance the art, science and craft of management, “book” knowledge needs to be tempered by experience as you say. Henry Mintzberg’s writings are usually thought provoking and I have found that his 1987 HBR paper “Crafting Strategy” provides many insights into the way business actually works.

I now tutor on the final module of the same MBA programme that I studied and Mintzberg’s “Managers not MBAs” is one of the key starting points for the module. The ethos of the module is to challenge the students to integrate theory, practice and learning by undertaking an Evidence Based Initiative. There is a strong emphasis on self-directed, reflective learning. The most critical step in the process is to encourage them to think critically about these three components, the interplay between them and the situation they are facing.

As with much in life and management, finding an appropriate way of thinking about the issue is crucial. Unfortunately much [project]management is based on poor, inappropriate or superficial thinking.

Thanks for your important contribution to the debate!

Comment on 7 Things I Learned About Project Management by Samir Kamat

Samir Kamat — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 09:51:05 +0000

Hi Jeremy,

I am pleased to have read this article.It is an awesome display of those 7 crucial points which I too believe are absolutely important for a project manager.I would like to connect with you over phone or google chat.I would also like to know more about what do you think are important things a PM should know about controlling project risks or project planning.

Samir

Comment on The Five Stages of Project Team Development by Lorna Johnson

Lorna Johnson — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 00:33:35 +0000

I will use this method in my college studies and in the future in work studies.Thank you so much for this article.I will be using this in my life and it does and will help me out.Good break down of the five stages in a project of team development.

Comment on Life After Waterfall by Andre Vermeulen

Andre Vermeulen — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 20:38:21 +0000

An interesting article on the Agile Software development approach. It is clear that this team spent time to set the rules to all stakeholders, and realised the importance of their buy-in to the process.
As a retired CEO of an ICT services company, it is heartening to read case studies like this one where speed of development is increased without losing control, maintain quality, and keep the business involved throughout the development process.
Good article, thank you for sharing it, and well done!

Comment on Agile PM - Traditional PM Triangle be Damned, Keep Quality First! by Magnus

Magnus — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 12:08:53 +0000

I can only agree. Personally, though, I use the project management triangle only as a visual aid to show stakeholders that they cannot change all constraints *without* affecting quality. In a way, quality is the most important attribute of the project triangle.

In Scrum, a sprint has both time, cost and scope fixed. Or at least it may seem so. In reality, scope varies and is adjusted based on the team’s velocity. That is - as you point out - *scope* is the only variable.

Comment on Agile Methodologies Are Not the Answer to All Projects! by Michael Gentle

Michael Gentle — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 14:19:19 +0000

Definitely, one size does not fit all. While I clearly lean towards iterative techniques, I’m also aware of their limits. An excellent book that covers the pros and cons of iterative/agile vs traditional methods is “Balancing agility and discipline - a guide for the perplexed” by Boehm and Turner.

Comment on Why Throwing Resources at a Project Won’t Save It by Johan Van Staden

Johan Van Staden — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 15:47:40 +0000

Hi Michelle,
nice read, thanks.

I always think of Brooks’s law when I read this sort of thing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooks%27_law

Comment on Are You Foolish For Believing In PRINCE2 As A Project Management Methodology? by Kev

Kev — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 04:06:55 +0000

Wow, I’ve never seen such a clear expose of a lack of knowledge in how to apply a methodology. (I thought it was ‘Projects IN…, not ‘Project Management IN… I must check the old red book. Or the slightly newer, light blue one).

Of course you can apply PRINCE2 to a construction project.

Look up stage planning, tolerances and, what will likely apply if I understand the hint correctly; the exception process. The whole point of a methodology is that you apply what works for the problem situation. PRINCE2 is only bureacratic if you erroneously believe that you should apply every single aspect of it to every part of the project. Even a basic understanding of products you’re responsible for delivering and issuing work packages to suppliers to deliver these is applying the methodology.

You’d monitor and control delivery of products. If risks occurred, you’d manage them. You’d report highlights to whoever is paying the bills and regularly check the status of what is being delivered. You’d have a pre-project stage where you’d get approval to start the project. You’d have a customer and supplier representative to discuss progress with and someone would check that you’re managing the project according to your client’s requirements. Wouldn’t you?

It’s all in there.

Don’t take everything literally. If it’s useful, use it. If it isn’t (such as the suggested directory structure in the 2000 version), don’t.

Comment on Micromanagement of Projects Is a Dangerous Business by david poole

david poole — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 02:02:59 +0000

As an observer, practitioner, and experimenter, I have found that the most successful teams here in Australia are those led by people who understand that their people generally are well educated, and keen when gievn the opportunity. That as far as possible, they are part of a “self managed ” team. there is more at our website , http://projectcoach.com.au/leading-edge-e-learning/

Comment on The Power of Process: How Bad Project Management Kills Great Ideas by Paul Brinkman

Paul Brinkman — Sat, 18 Feb 2012 21:36:38 +0000

Great article…history, diagnosis and remedy. When you get this right, everything else works. As the one who carries the override button, I try to do my part by engaging early, heavy and periodically. Then life takes over. As you point out, projects with high complexity, multiple modalities, overlapping timelines and complementary teams fall victim to these “Oh boy!” moments. Sometimes re-looping as if you’re starting over helps…anything to keep people aligned, engaged and confident.

Comment on Genius PMO: Five Steps to An Honest Project Team! by Gilad Lev-Shamur

Gilad Lev-Shamur — Sat, 18 Feb 2012 20:10:29 +0000

Good points.
In addition I would focus on Ego problems. You can not eliminate it, just to reduce its impact.

Gilad

Comment on Why Not Velocity as an Agile Metric? by Vishal Somal

Vishal Somal — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 16:40:37 +0000

This is nicely illustrated by Esther.

I agree to all the points but I have also experienced
- convincing Senior Managers in the organisation who would want ‘at least some metrics’ to prove that its in control…
- I have also seen PMs acknowledging team members by the number of stories delivering every sprint/iteration!

And I think the problem is more about the cultural thing in the organisation so the change has to come from the Senior Management… Just teams doing SCRUM/TimeBoxing wouldnt help.

~Vishal

Comment on The Five Stages of Project Team Development by karen law

karen law — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 01:29:38 +0000

I agree the breakdown of the five stages of a group do make it easier to understand how to complete aproject as a group and the importance of working together as a team

Comment on What is Stakeholder Analysis? by S.Babou

S.Babou — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 17:53:25 +0000

Thanks to all of you for valuable comments.

Comment on What is Stakeholder Analysis? - Part 2 by S.Babou

S.Babou — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 17:52:13 +0000

Hi Abiye, Thanks for your comment. Let me check the diagram and correct it.

Comment on Which Life Cycle Is Best for Your Project? by Enver Rakovic

Enver Rakovic — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 03:13:29 +0000

Even EU grant projects are using Agile approach with end user in mind. Quality of products must be in line with end customer, for who the project is financed.
I belive that project life cycle is a question of strategy and it must be choosen before WBS.

Very good article. All the best.

Comment on The Cost of Bad Project Management by Magnus

Magnus — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 09:20:51 +0000

Very interesting article! I totally agree that the motivation of project members plays a key role in the success of a project.

It’s a bit sad but it has become the norm for many in the IT industry that projects fail. This creates a vicious circle.

I think another thing that contributes to projects failing is that not everyone recognizes the difference between traditional “mass production” manufacturing and software development, and consequently choose methodologies and price models that suite the former.

It would be interesting to see some statistics on differences internally between different kinds of IT projects, for example a completely new product vs customizing a well known system.

Comment on Suggestions For Better Project Planning by Darrell Andersen

Darrell Andersen — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 02:21:09 +0000

Arash,

This was a great article, thank you for writing it. I work for a consulting company called Digineer and we are often called by our clients to help them mature their Project Managers in the creation of their work plans.

I often find that the maturity of the organization is just as important as that of the Project Manager. In a organization with lower maturity, the Project Manager might know the right things to do, but does not have the support of management and team members to be successful. When it comes to “Planning is a collective effort..”, especially in a matrixed organization, educating those who have to estimate, which is not always that team members, can become very tricky.

Moving the organization to at least a level 2 (documented) in maturity will dramatically improve the success of group planning. By standardizing the expectations of the different planning roles, you enable the Project Manager to drive conversation, risk mitigation and proper contingency planning during the process. An organization that takes the increased maturity approach to the stakeholders through training and knowledge management from lessons learned stands a much better chance of engaging the sponsor as an advocate to high quality project management versus an opponent to ad-hoc project planning.

Communication is the straw that breaks the camel’s back, as the old saying goes, when it comes to keeping your plan on track. Ensuring an organization has a documented and scheduled communication rhythm, often seen at a level 3 of Project Management maturity, supported through standardized project status, enables a consistent audience to assess and take corrective action as new project schedule updates occur.

http://www.digineer.com

Comment on The 7 Essential Behaviors of Accountable Leaders by Dr. Tony Bolden

Dr. Tony Bolden — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 15:25:11 +0000

Great article, Alan. I wrote an ebook called “The 9 Signs of Effective Leadership” and I address a few of the same behaviors you mentioned above. I agree with your summation: leaders MUST model the behavior they want to see in their subordinates.

Comment on The Role and Significance of an Interior Design Project Manager in Commercial Construction by hogarismo

hogarismo — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 07:20:55 +0000

There appears to be much conceit and competition in our industry where architects and interior designers just don’t mesh well as collaborative entities. Interior designers unbenounced to me, do not want the responsibility of what an architect provides, but rather desire to take the architect’s interior shell of the structurally sound and mechanically, electrically, and plumbing approved project to a different level.

Comment on Top 10 Personality Traits of a Project Manager by When Reality Hits - Project Managers Roll With It - PM Hut

When Reality Hits - Project Managers Roll With It - PM Hut — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 00:38:25 +0000

[...] how to cope? You have the core personality traits to make it all OK, use [...]

Comment on Root Cause Analysis and Corrective Action for Project Managers by Rob Kraft

Rob Kraft — Sat, 11 Feb 2012 17:23:09 +0000

As a software developer, I’ve learned that the most important question I need to answer all the time is, “What is the most valuable thing for me to spend my time on right now?”. If the software you participate in developing takes longer than expected, has lower quality than desired, or tends to come out with features not meeting client expectations, then it is probably worth your time to perform a Root Cause Analysis as suggested in this article to see if you can discover something that makes a difference. You may find that by implementing a simple checklist, or adding a nightly build, or adding a single unit test can catch quality defects at the source and prevent them from being bugs to be dealt with later. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure; and that is what Root Cause Analysis is all about. Good article guys! It looks like there is a lot of good stuff on this site.

Comment on Low Bid Project Award: Friend or Foe? by Lisa Cooley

Lisa Cooley — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 21:32:42 +0000

What a great summary of all that is wrong with low-bid. This kind of commentary and dialogue is sorely need in today’s world where boards and councils seem to be reverting to low-bid in the current “buyer’s market” for construction.

The only thing I would add to your list of delivery methods is Job Order Contracting, which has many of the same benefits as Design-Build, IPD, and CM At-Risk but is really the only delivery method that can be effectively employed for smaller projects like renovations and retrofits. With tightened budgets and an emphasis on using space more efficiently we are going to see more of these than capital projects, making Job Order Contracting even more important.

Thanks for a great article to share!

Comment on Why Projects Succeed - Clear Business Objectives by Why Projects Succeed - Executive Sponsorship - PM Hut

Why Projects Succeed - Executive Sponsorship - PM Hut — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 19:56:04 +0000

[...] This article is part of a series, the previous article can be found here. [...]

Comment on The Power of Process: How Bad Project Management Kills Great Ideas by Marc Lussy

Marc Lussy — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 09:55:36 +0000

Great post and I could not agree more. I have experienced this various time. I think the hardest part is envolging the senior stakeholders the right way. I think here it is important tha paly the game according their rules. If they are ok with joining the important meetings and take their stake in the “normal” project organisation thats great. Based on their past experience they might jump in circles only hearing words like Steering Commitee, Status reports, workshop etc. You might need to approach in a different way. In my experience stakeholder management is a key success factor in a project and in management in general and its not an easy one. I wrote a blog post about this topic recently and will right more in the future: http://managementleadership-marclussy.blogspot.com/2012/02/management-of-project-stakeholders-iii.html

Comment on The League of Project Superheroes by Joe MacNish

Joe MacNish — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 19:19:53 +0000

Every superhero needs a supervillain. I’d propose the following:

The Scope Creeper: Dedicated to bringing projects off-budget and off-schedule by tinkering with project plans.
The Budget Buster: The Creeper’s malevolent sidekick, a master of inflicting unforeseen and unplanned costs on helpless projects.

Joe MacNish
http://Acentre.typepad.com

Comment on 11 Hints to Improve Your Scrum Meetings by Philippe

Philippe — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 19:18:50 +0000

Great hints…
Thanks a lot for sharing…

Comment on Genius PMO: Five Steps to An Honest Project Team! by Joe MacNish

Joe MacNish — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 19:08:47 +0000

As you pointed out in your article, lies tend to pile up when people aren’t held accountable. There are two aspects to accountability in projects, the first being to have clear assignments of responsibility, and the second to monitor and regularly check-in on those assignees. By making it clear that active attention is being paid to their work, assignees will be much more reluctant to attempt to lie, and more likely to bring potential issues forward for assistance before they become critical problems.

Joe MacNish
http://www.TrackerSuite.Net

Comment on Project Planning Is Unnecessary, Boring, Dangerous… by Grumpy

Grumpy — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 17:28:21 +0000

Not planning is the most agile method of all. We could actually have open source kind of development instead of projects in corporations. Anyone interested could contribute freely from the line organization, IT, R&D, management. We could have quite fancy results if everyone understood the strategic objectives.If not, we should have good plans.

Comment on Project Performance KPIs - PMO Effectiveness by Doug Hurdelbrink

Doug Hurdelbrink — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 15:21:53 +0000

I like the focus and I think metrics should be short and sweet. Accordingly, I suggest compressing Schedule and Delivery On Time into one item, and the same for Functional and Deliverables. The value of the Resources category is not so clear to me, so would appreciate some elaboration on those.

I would also suggest grouping the metrics into Scope, Schedule, Cost, Risks and Quality sections (as I think these are more broadly understood by a non-PM audience), and perhaps add a metric for Change Requests to account particularly for functional, design or scope changes that occur after inception.

I think Carol’s additions are excellent - the most important metrics for projects are their outcomes. The internal management and control metrics during the project execution phase are excellent for management oversight, PM skills development and PM process improvement. But once projects are completed the history of how they were managed vanishes quickly; the legacy of what they achieved is what endures (for good or ill!).

Comment on Balancing Project Management and Project Administration by Victor Hunt

Victor Hunt — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 13:45:48 +0000

Kiron, nice article and tips.

Balacing acts are always risky. That is why the public is so tense when looking at a balancing act in a circus. No difference in project management.

One of the task of every project manager is to manage ALL stake holders. This means managing the sponsor, the customer and the team members. To manage the sponsor you to produce the administrative reports.

Getting administrative reports can be time consuming in some organizations. Getting them to be correct takes even more time.

I have found that having Earned Value Management in place for your projects helps inform the sponsors in a timely and concise manner. I use a one sheet EVM overview that shows the project’s past, present and future. It really made my life as a project manager easier.

Comment on Project Planning Is Unnecessary, Boring, Dangerous… by Prashanth

Prashanth — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 08:42:52 +0000

If planning is boring and time consuming. You can follow Agile Methodology. Which suits for R & D. But Planning is MUST for complex projects. Without knowing your constraints on time, Cost, Quality, RISK..etc and baselining them, you will never know where you are heading with the project. You will be lost and Project will be failure interms of constraints, even you complete the project. So its very much necessary to Plan before hand.

Comment on 5 Essential Building Blocks for Project Managers by MaureenT

MaureenT — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 02:19:28 +0000

Michelle, great article. This is a great list of the building blocks to become a strong project manager. I’d like to take it a step further. How can you turn successful project managers into tomorrow’s executive leaders? They are primed for stepping into executive leadership roles of the future. What are the traits project managers develop and what do they need to get to the next level.
A lot of questions, I know but your post really leads into this topic. I recommend taking a look at the Leadership Development Series of blogs - particularly Turning Project Managers into the Executive Leaders of tomorrow.

Comment on Suggestions For Better Project Planning by Jim Yates

Jim Yates — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 15:19:02 +0000

A very useful contribution. It’s the process, insights and understanding which are important not the plan.

I like to think of planning as a means of mapping the landscape of the project, helping participants to see the way forward and the potential barriers in their way.

If the team members are actively involved in the process, so much the better!

I’ll be publishing a related post on my blog in the next couple of days.

http://pivotalthinking.wordpress.com

Comment on Project Performance KPIs - PMO Effectiveness by Brad Mitchell, PMP

Brad Mitchell, PMP — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 13:46:35 +0000

Yes Carol, I agree … without customer satisfaction the product of the project is not going to bring its potential value to the organization regardless of how well we met our project objectives and metrics. With smaller projects, maybe that’s “OK” … with an enterprise project it most certainly is not. We need to proactively evaluate customer acceptance, before, during and after implementation.

Comment on Six Sigma vs. Total Quality Management by vision raval

vision raval — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 10:57:19 +0000

BPI has many elements like Six sigma and TQM but these both has their own way to enhance the end result. TQM is more consumer feedback base methodology and Six sigma is participating in entire process from Define to Control.

Comment on Project Performance KPIs - PMO Effectiveness by Carol Dekkers

Carol Dekkers — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 05:40:09 +0000

Metrics should always suit the purpose (and too often the purpose waylaid or undefined and metrics are simply collected to appease management without due planning.)

Having said that, the list above is a great start, and I’m surprised that there are no customer focused metrics listed such as:

- use: % functionality actually used by customers… can be in 1st year (this is a measure of how well the customers/sponsor correctly specified the “requirements” rather than wants)
- quality: e.g., defect density (defects per function point), or adherence to quality requirements (portability, maintainability, etc)
- benefit: actual benefits (need to be traced back to the cost/benefit analysis) versus planned benefits (puts onus back on the business since they are often the ones who justified the project)
- customer satisfaction (with both the process and the outcome)

While these are not specifically performance metrics of the project (and team) - these metrics take a look at the results of the project.

Does anyone else agree?

Comment on What IT Managers Can Learn From the Failure of a British IT Project by Fredi VEAS-BRAVO

Fredi VEAS-BRAVO — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 07:19:39 +0000

Hello,
Thanks for the article.
In my opinion poor decisions hampered blightred programme from the start, for instance: importing system from US, the tightness of the contracts, lack of leadership and challenging timing.

Comment on How to Reexamine Your Project Estimates Without Any Major Changes to the Project? by Graham

Graham — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 12:48:17 +0000

Your tips on reducing cost are very useful, but be very careful with the first suggestion. Checking your estimates for accuracy is fine, but trying a different technique simply to get a lower estimate is dangerous. An estimate is all we have to work with and is our best attempt at predicting the future.

When would you and your business rather know that a project would cost 60% more than budgeted for? At the start of a project or part way through? Of course, you want to know at the start, so bending your estimates to fit is denying everyone the ability to make decisions based on the best information available.

Comment on Agile Project Charter by Terry Bunio

Terry Bunio — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 20:52:46 +0000

Hi Kasper, thanks for your comments and insightful questions. One thing I left out is that I recommend this table and any deliverable be created with the team in a session rather than created separately and then presented.

I found that this type of format provided the most benefit to the team members rather than the PM. I also find myself in similar situations trying to bridge the gap between agile principles and some heavier weight deliverables that larger organizations find value in. (which is why they appeared in this list)

Thanks again for your comments and questions. You have also given me new ideas on project kick offs. One other thing I failed to mention is that I like to conduct innovation games during the project kick off sessions to generate/confirm an aligned vision and start to generate the user stories and ultimately the desired feature set. This list does not remove the need for those visioning and solutioning sessions…

Thanks again

Terry

Comment on Agile Project Charter by Kasper Jørgensen

Kasper Jørgensen — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 16:29:07 +0000

I like the idea of bringing the agile principles into the kick-off, definitely a good idea when going agile.
I have also done some work combining the agile principles in organisations who have had a preference for waterfall and predictive approached projects.

The heart of agile says something like “Let people figure out the right thing to do, and then do it” hereby facilitating the creative process which is a prerequisite in an agile environment.
So I guess my question is to whom do the above user stories add value for - you as PM or the team, or the organistion providing you the scope and funding the project?

If you were developing an agile organistion with-in a traditional organistion, then the above would be excellent training to get the specialists to start working, and you are perhaps somewhere in between

I would propose that your kick-off meeting is focused on the product owner and the product vision - hereby getting the customer and customer team to present to your team what they are expecting, then turn that into users stories.

Based on this you also have initiated a common objective for the customer and the vendor, this objective can then be used as inspiration for you to talk and execise the collaboration - spend time doing the daily meeting, make a couple of users stories based on the product vision etc.

You will find your self with some higly motivated specialists and I will actually bet that they will start talking risks and issues with the client - which if facilitated the right way will enable you and your project to deliver expected solutions, rather than what was specified in a URS 6 months earlier.

The above in my mind, is your checklist (as the traditional PM) to ensure that you have your project initiation well prepared :-)

That said I find that larger agile projects lack some of the formal documents - excatly what the charter is for those of us who are familiar with PMI etc, and I have good experience in taking the charter and slidewaring this for both the customer and IT team and referring to it over the months of development.

However, thanks for the table, it has motivated me to adjust some approaches and provided very useful to some current processwork I am doing.

have a great weekend
Kasper

Comment on Moving on Up in Project Management by PM Hut

PM Hut — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 15:08:09 +0000

Hi Julie,

Sorry for the delay in getting back to you. You may want to check the project management process on PM Hut, it is available here: http://www.pmhut.com/project-management-process

Comment on Moving on Up in Project Management by PM Hut

PM Hut — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 15:06:49 +0000

Hi Tahir,

I don’t understand, you have 7 years of PM experience and you’re a PMO AND you want to know how to become a project manager?

Please explain…

Comment on Moving on Up in Project Management by Tahir Shah

Tahir Shah — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 07:13:32 +0000

Hi,

I am currently working as PMO in a MNC.I have around 7 years of experience in Project Management and my experiences are in financial services, telecom and IT project Management sectors. I am curious and would like to know the way to become a project Manager in any of the field.

Please advice

Regards,
Tahir

Comment on 7 Things Recovery Has Taught Me About Project Management by GauravTx

GauravTx — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 00:29:51 +0000

Good points Christoph.

All 7 lessons are quite relevant for a project’s success. However, organisation’s culture can be considered as 8th lesson in the series.

The term culture generally means “The set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterizes an institution, organization, or group”. Culture comes into play on projects in a number of areas and can impacts project’s desired outcome.

Comment on Limitations of Agile Software Development by Sivasubramanian

Sivasubramanian — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 04:57:54 +0000

I have been in an XP team for 1.5 yrs and I agree with most of your points. In a sense, this is the level of understanding that anyone practicing Agile needs to have. You may call it pre-requisites/ expectations / limitations but the necessity is to understand them well.

I feel point #1 (on the kind of people) is very important. That is why you always need a mix of methodologies/practices to manage Agile teams that are composed of differently ‘abled’ individuals. In point #6 (on ownership/accountability) I am not sure if you really need to distinguish/evaluate individual performance during reviews. Will your ‘true’ stars under perform if they aren’t distinguished ? Debatable.

Nice post.

Comment on Deliverable-based Project Schedules: Part 1 by frankyn

frankyn — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 19:07:01 +0000

I am struggling to establish a new product carbon monoxide monitoring unit which has at least 7 deliverables. Will appreciate your assistance!

Comment on The Five Stages of Project Team Development by teresa morrison

teresa morrison — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 18:50:05 +0000

project team development has been awesome to read. I work in a group and we truly lack these qualities. when i start my ground store i will surely have my employees read this and take a brief test upon hire. I feel all employers should use this as a day to day guide for effective team work.

Comment on Proactively Managing Project Expectations by Carol Dekkers

Carol Dekkers — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 18:22:43 +0000

Susan,

This is an excellent article and addresses the “elephant in the room” on many projects (especially the ambiguous IT projects). You hit the nail on the head with your statements:

“…the first step is to uncover the true goals (target accomplishments, not the solution) that each project owner, sponsor, customer and/or client has in mind. This step may be more challenging than it sounds. The documented goals may have been set prior to the project manager’s being assigned to the project. In this situation the goals may actually be solutions, not true goals.”

This is the essence of real communication - bi-directional discussion of what is to be accomplished (goals) before work gets done. It is said that “if you don’t know where you are going, a map won’t help” - or alternatively “any road will do”. This is what happens to too many projects - they start out with a great idea (truly) morph into a project which morphs into a project plan, lots of people get involved and soon the project is underway - but there’s been no real agreement of the minds that what is in the project plan traces back to the original goals or vision.

Thanks for posting - it ties well into #6 (Manage Expectations) in the post I did today about “Childproofing your metrics program” at http://musingsaboutsoftwaredevelopment.wordpress.com/2012/01/25/be-sure-to-childproof-your-metrics-program/

Carol

Comment on The Five Stages of Project Team Development by Sonceri Basden

Sonceri Basden — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 03:24:02 +0000

The work ethics are very much needed when it comes to getting from team to group process.These stages are very much needed to get the effect of information needed on an project.Control and concept is the way to go to get all communication clear and be agreed on.

Comment on The Five Stages of Project Team Development by Mohamed Massaquoi

Mohamed Massaquoi — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 23:18:22 +0000

According to my understanding and exprience the five stages are of vital points to all members and team leaders of all teams and groups.

Comment on The Five Stages of Project Team Development by Mohamed Massaquoi

Mohamed Massaquoi — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 23:07:59 +0000

According to my understanding and experience I now know that it very important to use the five stages when forming any group. This is simply because these stages are there to help all group members and team/group leaders to run any group effectively. As all the members will have common understanding and respect for each other.

Comment on Agile Project Management - Driving Value or Where’s the Beef? by Ed RItter

Ed RItter — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 21:13:00 +0000

I like the ida of having the stakeholder determine priority. Gets them involved and puts their skin in the game. It also helps in the status and communications as they ‘chose’ the sequence! Having the internal teams select value may depend on how much time you have up front also.

Comment on Stop Agilizing Everything by John

John — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 16:47:22 +0000

Agile has been great for us. We have added development practices that were lacking and now that the dev teams can focus on development we have come to the realization that the product teams are struggling. We can now make the product, but the product is ill defined. Where before the development teams were seen as the thing slowing the org down, not it is the lack of good product definition. Of figuring out a road map, of planning…

Without our current implementation of agile methodologies a lot of the troubles would have not come to the surface. Agile forces everyone to communicate and where that communication is bad to FIX IT. Agile is not just a development methodology when the projects get larger and the org grows it is a way of thinking about everything we do and a way to bring problems to the forefront to then solve creatively.

Comment on The Five Stages of Project Team Development by Martha Tapia

Martha Tapia — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 03:01:34 +0000

I liked the way the five stages were presented. I personaly like to work in this way. Working on a project I used the five stages, because it is more succesful. It is very important meeting each other and sharing ideas. I believe that team work is more effective and successful being on the same page.

Comment on PMP Certification: Is It Worth It? by Rmj

Rmj — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 00:34:37 +0000

Bravo Pam. Great article. I hope that people entering the world of project management find it useful. I was just telling someone the other day that the PMBOK can’t tell you how to deal with an angry client or a political environment. Only experience and mentoring can teach that. Project Management is a huge responsibility and putting ones fate so heavily will set you up for heart ache. Use PMBOK as a tool for project organization. But get ready for hard work, tears, mistakes and learned lessons.

Comment on Teach First… Leadership Will Follow by Jim Grinnell

Jim Grinnell — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 01:17:12 +0000

Phil, great question. As much as I believe in the servant leader model, I recognize that there are many leaders who are dispositionally not suited to it. Even if such folks wanted to adopt this leadership approach, it would take considerable time and investment to change. I would never recommend that someone “fake it until they make it” because the first time they hit a significant roadblock they will likely revert to their old ways. Obviously this could have significant negative repercussions with those they lead.

With respect to the situational dimension, there are times when such an approach is just not advisable. For example, during times of crisis or intense dissension, the traditional “command and control” approach will likely be more appropriate.

I hope this addresses your comments. Thanks!

Comment on The Five Stages of Project Team Development by Bennie McGowan

Bennie McGowan — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 00:28:24 +0000

Excellent breakdown of each stage. It is important to highlight the highs and lows that a team can and will have during the process of completing a project. These informative points can be used in your everyday academic and professional situations. From the manmager to the employee, and the instructor to the student, this is applicable to the success of working together to complete tasks.

Comment on PMP Certification: Is It Worth It? by Larry Short

Larry Short — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 17:54:04 +0000

My personal opinion is that certifications represent a minimum bar of acceptance. For example, it’s nice to know that the plumber with 15-years experience has read the book describing local building codes. He may have a lifetime of experience, but if he doesn’t complete the job according to specs, then my new house will not get signed off on by the city inspector. Project Management methods can easily be applied in any career. I am currently in the process of changing professions and feel that studying for the PMP is helping me prepare for the type of job I am seeking.

Comment on Do You Love Your PMO? by Peter Taylor

Peter Taylor — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 14:26:13 +0000

And do you love your PMO Leader?

Gower, in association with The Lazy Project Manager, APM PMOSIG, the National Centre for Project Management and Project Magazine, announce the PMO Leader of the Year Award

The Award will be presented to the PMO Leader, nominated by their PMO team, who shows the most excellent leadership and understanding of what a PMO can deliver to a business. A panel of independent judges will review all submissions to consider how each nominee has led their PMO over at least the last 12 months and how they plan to grow the PMO under their stewardship in the coming months.

The judges will look at the key PMO leadership skills in the areas of:

Flexibility
How effectively does your PMO leader respond to the changing needs of the projects, your PMO and your organization? How does he or she manage the balance between the requirements of project processes and the people delivering those processes?

Resilience
How effective is your PMO leader as a negotiator? How well does he or she negotiate changes to how things are done whilst maintaining the core objectives of the PMO? How well does he or she enable the PMO to respond to unexpected requests for resources or support?

Setting Example
How successful is your PMO leader is an example to everyone within the PMO and the project organization? How well does he or she express or demonstrate the standards of the PMO and champion these in the face of misunderstanding, conflicting interests or politics. How good an example is your PMO leader as an agent of change?

Professionalism
How professional is your PMO leader is his or her approach to their work. How does the PMO leader demonstrate their knowledge, expertise and understanding of, for example, the commercial needs and constraints of the business or the technical aspects of project and programme management? What commitment does the PMO leader demonstrate to developing skills and a capability for themselves, the PMO members and the wider organization?

Support
How well does your PMO leader communicate with everyone within the PMO; to establish and articulate needs; support the team or individuals within at times of pressure or conflict?

Go to http://www.leadingsuccessfulpmos.com for further details of the Award and how to enter your PMO Leader.

Comment on Predicting Project Portfolio Value Using Simulations by Kerry Gardner

Kerry Gardner — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 11:53:20 +0000

Thought I would mention a very interesting online tool that estimates the value delivered by a portfolio as well as the opportunity for improvement. It can be found at http://oakstonepartners.com/online-tools/portfolio-management-value-simulation.html

Comment on The Implementation Phase in Project Management by Phil

Phil — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 15:40:51 +0000

I agree with you in the sense that agile teams have to “implement,” and they implement a very small quantity of required functionality at a time without being handed a requirements document, etc.

But for instance, we start work on a feature. We talk with the business user about the required behavior. We write tests around that behavior, and these tests also design our code. We iteratively write code to satisfy the tests and have constant user involvement for correction, approval, and those, “Oh, I forgot to tell you about this” moments. When all the tests define the required behaviors and they all pass, then that feature is ready for release.

Which part of that is the design phase? Which is the test phase?

So, I don’t really think it’s applicable to think of agile development as really small iterations of Waterfall. There just aren’t distinct phases, not even per feature.

Comment on Teach First… Leadership Will Follow by Phil Anderson

Phil Anderson — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 14:52:46 +0000

Nice article. The nuances of leadership lend themselves to the creation of timely lists, while the philosophy of leadership as service-first is timeless. I am curious, why do you said that this philosophy doesn’t apply to everyone or every situation. I believe that serving others first, as teacher, coach, or leader, ensures that we are leading best. Even in situations that require autocratic decision-making, the intent of the leader sets the tone and the response of the followers.

Comment on The Implementation Phase in Project Management by William Parker

William Parker — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 21:53:37 +0000

I would suggest that agile teams very much do have an implementation phase. The primary distinction is that agile teams transform requirements into functioning software incrementally in short time frames, whereas waterfall teams move requirements through the development lifecycle phasaes in mass. In regards to the four steps noted in this article, I would encourage readers to read the book entitled “How to Sole It” bymathematician George Polya - I beleve his model (define the problem, devise a plan, execute the plan, examine the results) is the core model behind many of models uswd today in engineering and problem solving (eg Demning’s Plan-Do-Act-Check).

Comment on The Implementation Phase in Project Management by Phil

Phil — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 20:43:39 +0000

I’m curious about this part:

“From a software perspective the traditionally agreed upon sub-phases include requirements, design, develop/build, and test. These can be extrapolated in many different ways and approached using different methodologies such as Agile, XP or countless others.”

This article advocates a strong Waterfall approach for software development, so I’m wondering how you would do this in an Agile manner? Agile teams don’t typically have an “implementation phase.”

Comment on Do Project Managers Need In-Depth Business or Industry Knowledge? by James Clements

James Clements — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 23:07:00 +0000

Good article Michelle and a subject I’ve been interested in for a while. I agree with your assertion that solid project management skills can transcend the need to have detailed knowledge of the industry or product.
In my own experience I have moved between industries and found this to be an advantage, at times, particularly when thrown into a troubled project as you are better able to take a wider view and look at actual performance and performance metrics more objectively.
I do feel though that when you move from business to business or industry to industry their does need to be at least some level of relatedness (if that’s a word) in the industries/businesses/products as you don’t need everything to be brand new and sadly employers still look for industry or related experience.
The comment in the second to last para about ensuring you have enough budget, time and people allocated caught my eye, how do we (project managers moving between industries) even know we have enough of these things if we don’t understand the industry and if we’re new to the organization, have enough good will to rely on people to advise on this honestly and accurately? Knowing whether you’re being informed well when you are so reliant on others in this situation is the biggest challenge I think.

Comment on The Role of Decision Dynamics in Project Management Failure by Tony G

Tony G — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 14:15:43 +0000

Project budgets should allocate time for making decisions. If members of the project team take their time over making decisions, much of the “first option adoption” problems could be prevented.

Comment on 20 Questions All Project Managers Should Ask by Joe MacNish

Joe MacNish — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 18:12:27 +0000

A couple other questions to consider are “What are the skills required for this project?” and even more importantly, “What is not considered a deliverable/ not within the scope of this project.”

Joe MacNish
http://www.TrackerSuite.Net

Comment on Kanban - The Next Step in the Agile Evolution? by Roy Maines

Roy Maines — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 16:34:07 +0000

I have been using Scrum for years with great success. I’m new to Kanban. I’m looking forward to trying it out. The thing I have been working on is how Scrum aligns with the Federal Aquisition Regulations. We have developed a Scrum based process that aligns with the JCIDS process. Although it is not how a commercial software development company would choose to implement Scrum, Federal government programs have to comply with a myriad of regulations, we have figured out how to do that using Scrum. Drop me a note if your interested in learning more.

Comment on Most IT Development Projects Succeed! by George

George — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 15:24:42 +0000

Nice article. The CHAOS report of 2011 shows that more and more IT projects are successful. Based on my experience I agree with you that the root cause for failure is bad requirements which lead to underestimation of the effort and thus to failure.

References
Standish Group International (2011). CHAOS Manifesto 2011- Press release. The Standish Group International, Inc Available from: http://www.standishgroup.com/newsroom/chaos_manifesto_2011.php

Comment on Getting Projects Done With or Without a Certified Project Manager by George

George — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 15:12:50 +0000

Nice article, probably we need project managers that can educate project sponsors on project management basic. This takes time.

Comment on The Emerging Servant Leadership Paradigm by Teach First… Leadership Will Follow - PM Hut

Teach First… Leadership Will Follow - PM Hut — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 14:52:53 +0000

[...] profound framework for effective leadership. In fact, the seven qualities resonate closely with the Servant Leadership paradigm discussed in my previous article. To be clear this type of leadership is not for everyone, nor is [...]

Comment on Why Projects Succeed - Stakeholder Communication Best Practices by Why Projects Succeed - Clear Business Objectives - PM Hut

Why Projects Succeed - Clear Business Objectives - PM Hut — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 01:33:32 +0000

[...] This is a series, the previous article can be found here. [...]

Comment on What is Stakeholder Analysis? - Part 2 by Abiye

Abiye — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 21:15:59 +0000

Good explanation but your matrix has a problem.

Your high interest, high power category should be on the right rather than the left.
As you rightly explained, these are the stakeholders that need to be satisfied. I believe it an error from the diagram. Might be confusing for a reader trying to use the matrix to further understand the concept.

Comment on Why Not Velocity as an Agile Metric? by Roy Maines

Roy Maines — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 20:59:02 +0000

Using Velocity as a metric is asking for trouble. As Ester points out - defining the scale used simply skewing the estimated number of points quickly makes this statistic meaningless. This is particularly true if there are numerous development teams which are loosely coupled. The thing I find amuseing is that is is so obvious to see thru the wool they try to pull over your eyes. The thing that rocks the most about Scrum is the visibility - no hiding in Scrum!

Comment on Most IT Development Projects Succeed! by H. Breevoort

H. Breevoort — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 19:19:46 +0000

This is the first time I see things from this perspective. It seems that as IT Project Managers, we’re not failing as much as we thought we are, it’s just the expectations from us are just too high. We are expected by all of our stakeholders (including ourselves) to be perfect, which is never achievable.

Comment on Project Performance KPIs - PMO Effectiveness by Jim Shaffer, PMP

Jim Shaffer, PMP — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 14:57:14 +0000

You make a great point. Ignoring reports is to ignore problems - and sometimes big ones. Metrics are there for a reason and should be analyzed and reported often to ensure everything is going as it should.

For schedule and cost reports, my favorite is the schedule and cost performance indices. They are a great way to see where the projects really are and can provide some insight as to how to fix problems.

Comment on Top 10 Project Management Trends for 2012 by Jim Shaffer, PMP

Jim Shaffer, PMP — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 22:18:31 +0000

Interesting post. I’m already seeing some of these trends (especially HR having a higher assessment roll) in works. It is unfortunate that the PMP seems to be losing some of its luster. While becoming a consistant “requrement” for jobs, it does not have the same weight as it did a few short years ago.

Comment on Why Not Velocity as an Agile Metric? by Enrique

Enrique — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 17:38:29 +0000

I am currently working under SCRUM methodology. But our Business Owner compares our teams using velocity as metric. I would like to know if someone could give me some book reference where explicitly clarify this.

Comment on Why You Can’t Learn Project Management From a Book by Senthil

Senthil — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 14:18:25 +0000

Hi,

Thanks for your great post. Happy New Year.

Regards,
Senthil S

Comment on Agile Project Management - No Upfront Estimates! by Vin D'Amico

Vin D'Amico — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 13:38:09 +0000

Excellent post! I too consider myself to be as good an estimator as you’ll find. And, I too have been wrong many times. This often occurred simply because of organizational delays. Someone didn’t get their part done as planned. It’s impossible to predict those non-events.

I’ve seen schedules with so much padding that they are virtually guaranteed to finish on plan. If that’s acceptable in an organization, go ahead. It feels unethical to me.

Agile approaches eliminate schedule games and focus on getting stuff done. Isn’t that what customers really want?

Comment on Thoughts on Kanban by Vincent Fong

Vincent Fong — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 05:49:05 +0000

I whole-heartedly agree, except I think in the project world the equivalent is “Critical Chain” relay race concept -> work as quickly as possible, handover, get on to the next piece of work (no multi-tasking) - test - accept - release. Of course this is a very simplistic view of the CC but it smacks of Kanban.

Comment on Top Ten Global Project Management Trends for 2011 by Top 10 Project Management Trends for 2012 - PM Hut

Top 10 Project Management Trends for 2012 - PM Hut — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 13:55:54 +0000

[...] At the beginning of each year, ESI International authors an article on the PM trends for that specific year. You can also check the Top 10 Project Management trends for 2011 . [...]

Comment on 7 Basic Principles Of Effective Project Management by Project Management at a Glance - PM Hut

Project Management at a Glance - PM Hut — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 16:58:29 +0000

[...] First of all, we need the criteria. I use to deduce the important criteria from the 3 parent project dimensions (more in the article The 7 Basic Principles Of Effective Project Management) [...]

Comment on PMP Certification: Is It Worth It? by Michael York

Michael York — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 21:15:10 +0000

I have many years of project management experience and finally decided obtaining a PMP was worth the effort within the last year or so. I can say with 100% assurance - I am a much better project manager for having expereinced this process.

I would, however, agree that a PMP by itself does not assure that someone is a good PM. Some people obtain a PMP just for the sake of the credential and make little effort to apply what they’ve learned in practice. Other PMPs may have barely met the requirements (you only need a 61% to pass the test) so they got into the “club” without a true understanding of how to successfully manage projects with PMBOK.

As a hiring manager (I manage a section that owns our PMO), I would not aboslutely require a PMP credential to be hired, but I would require achieving the PMP within 6-12 months as a condition of continued employement. This helps assure me they will - at least - speak the same language since our process assets are based on PMBOK. They will be better for it too.

Along the same lines - this is simlar to whether or not to obtain a college degree. Having a college degree does not guarantee me that you’ll be an expert in your field - but it does demonstrate that you can reach a difficult goal; that you’re organized enough to understand what’s required to earn the degree and apply it; etc. Earning a college degree or a PMP will make you better than without it.

This does not mean its worth the time, effort, and cost for everyone.

Comment on 2 Rules For Being A Better IT Manager/Boss by H. Breevoort

H. Breevoort — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 14:11:05 +0000

Hi Jim,

I did often fall into the buddy trap. The problem is that the closer you are to your team members, the more potential friction you might have with them.

When you’re a buddy instead of a manager, then you cannot ask them to do something without them rolling their eyes, and “keeping you satisfied” will no longer be on their list of “motivators”.

Comment on What Is the ‘Big Nose’ of Your Project? by H. Breevoort

H. Breevoort — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 14:08:04 +0000

The big nose of all of my projects in general is the following: “it won’t bring as much money as expected, and that’s why we don’t care much about it”.

The big nose of some of my projects is: “We will reach a place where it’s impossible to go back, and impossible to move forward”

Comment on Do Program and Project Portfolio Management Add Value over Project Management? by The PM Coach

The PM Coach — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 12:07:01 +0000

Great article. I like the matrix comparing the three. When I am asked the difference between project, program, and portfolio management I usually refer to the definitions provided by PMI: Project—a temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product, service, or request. Program—a group or related projects managed in a coordinated way to obtain benefits and control not available from managing them individually. Portfolio—a collection of projects or programs and other work that are grouped together to facilitate effective management of that work to meet strategic business objectives.

Comment on Why Not Velocity as an Agile Metric? by Achille Carette

Achille Carette — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 13:59:46 +0000

Very interesting. A similar comment about the agility of velocity: Is velocity agile ?.

Comment on What FIFA World Cup 2010 Teaches Us About Project Management? by Rudi Ratlos

Rudi Ratlos — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 11:56:31 +0000

Have you guys actually worked on the project ?
Did not meet you there.

Also your article has zero relevance to the problems
encountered in SA 2010.

Best regards

Rudi