Tue, 17 Aug 2010 07:49:24 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/ Copyright © 1998-2010 by allPM - The Project Manager's HomePage en-us http://www.allpm.com/images/logo.gif http://www.allpm.com/ admin@allpm.com http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2339 You’ve read the PMBOK® Guide several times, taken the certification exam for project managers, passed, and you are now a PMP®. Yet you still persist in making mistakes. Project managers are not infallible. Most project management training courses, even those focusing on the PMBOK® Guide, stress “generally accepted best practices.” What is not taught are discussions on what not to do as a project manager. Tue, 17 Aug 2010 07:49:24 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2338 Often times I have a vivid imagination. When I thought about the focus of this month’s publication and what to write to help project managers who are managing projects for the first time, my attention was turned to the works of Theodor Seuss Geisel, better known by his pen name “Dr. Seuss.” Perhaps you are familiar with Dr. Seuss’ books written for children: “Green Eggs and Ham,” “One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish” and “The Cat in the Hat.” The “Cat in the Hat” is my favorite. I have a copy of the book in my office primarily because The Cat in the Hat, in my vivid imagination, is a picture of what not to do as a project manager. Tue, 17 Aug 2010 07:46:25 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2337 New Project Manager: I was just assigned my first project! Now what? Mentor: Well congratulations you are now a project manager so what do you need to do? Perhaps you need to get yourself organized as a project manager. New Project Manager: Ok, I think I am organized so what do you mean? Tue, 17 Aug 2010 07:42:16 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2336 When project managers accept the responsibility for all aspects of project performance, including the technical quality, costs and schedule performance, they in effect put their careers on the line. If things go well, management knows precisely whom to credit. If things go poorly, management also knows precisely whom to blame. Adapted from Earned Value Project Management (Quentin – Koppelman) pg. 152 Tue, 17 Aug 2010 07:32:02 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2335 There’s nothing like a good book list. We all have our favorites; books we find interesting, helpful, or simply good for reference. I’ve read my fair share of snoozers as well as some that were just “ok.” Whether you are a project manager, a Six Sigma Green or Black Belt, or a supervisor, the following ten book recommendations can help you become a much better, and more effective, project leader. Sure, there are many others that could easily be added to the list. These ten, however, are definitely worth checking out. Tue, 17 Aug 2010 07:28:34 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2334 An internal Six Sigma Black Belt, Will, talks with a seasoned Area Manager, Karen, about changing one of her popular back office measures. An interesting discussion ensues. Tue, 17 Aug 2010 07:23:08 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2333 Several years ago at PMI® Seminars- Symposium (before they were renamed World Congresses) I attended a keynote presentation offered by Bob Ross. He wrote a book entitled “Lead, Laugh, and Profit- Building Productive Workplaces With Humor.(Arrowhead Publishing). It was a particularly enjoyable presentation and was filled with lots of good advice and, of course, tasteful humor. As with many presentations we attend, we sometimes pick up a gem or two of wisdom that stays with us and is never very far from our daily conscious thoughts. Tue, 17 Aug 2010 07:17:05 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2332 *Read this article in English: English *Requires Adobe Acrobat Reader Resumen. El presente trabajo presenta una aplicación de la técnica para medición de desempeño conocida como Earned Value Management en inglés (EVM) y Valor del Trabajo Realizado (VTR) en español para medir el desempeño de programas integrados por un grupo de proyectos que se administran simultáneamente y que tienen un elemento de operación continua como la fabricación de un producto o la explotación de un mineral. Tue, 17 Aug 2010 07:14:34 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2331 Available in multiple Languages!* Read this article in: Chinese French German Farsi Portuguese Spanish Russian *Requires Adobe Acrobat Reader What should a good risk management process cover? Anyone undertaking a risky or important venture should ask themselves eight simple questions: What are we trying to achieve? What might affect us achieving this? Which of those things are most important? What shall we do about them? Have we taken action? Who needs to know? Having taken action, what has changed? What did we learn? Tue, 17 Aug 2010 07:09:18 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2330 Tue, 17 Aug 2010 07:01:23 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2328 Traditional project managers focus on efficiency which means getting the job done successfully balancing the Competing Demands1 : scope, time, costs, resources, quality and risk. But what about the business results for which the project was created? Projects do not look like investments. They are investments! Why? Because someone put some money into the organization to finance its business strategy, which means money was used to fund those projects that support the business strategy. He, she or they, the investors, as a consequence, would like to receive, at certain point, some money back from their investments. This is called Return On Investment or commonly referred to as ROI. Project Management is supposed to help them to achieve the expected organizational strategic objectives. As a consequence, what happens nowadays is that project managers are asked to be active participants during the projects evaluation and selection process in order to undertake the alternative that brings most benefits to the organization. Thu, 01 Jul 2010 10:57:31 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2327 All of project managers love projects that will employ their knowledge, experience and unique competencies and capabilities and hate projects that don’t. Often a project manager (PM) knows when they are assigned to a good project and when they’re not. PMs hate projects that are “bridges to nowhere”, “solutions looking for a problem to solve” or a manager’s ego trip. Ultimately they want projects that will optimize their skills, enhance their knowledge, and make them more valuable and marketable to executive management or their client. The problem is that they rarely participate in project governance and they rarely get the chance but if the opportunity affords itself, the PM must know something about the governance area. It affords them an opportunity to contribute positively and perhaps influence the choice of projects assigned.  Thu, 01 Jul 2010 10:52:56 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2326 So, you get a call from your PMO manager and she wants you to be managing a project that has already started. You are told that the last project manager was moved to another project.  You jump right in and start catching up and following up.  But wait, how do you know you are on the right project and what can you do about it? Thu, 01 Jul 2010 10:40:45 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2325 With many pitfalls that lead to project failure, I believe that a good project manager and project team need to manage successfully the relationship and expectation of their stakeholders. Over the last few months I have posted a series of articles regarding Stakeholder Management and this is the final installment. To write this article I chose to use the framework for stakeholder management developed by Dr. Harold Kerzner. These articles highlight the entire stakeholder management process. Here is what was covered in the first three articles: Thu, 01 Jul 2010 10:38:18 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2324 You know what one of the biggest obstacles is to improved performance? Not getting to the root cause. Many times, in our efforts to improve results we treat the symptom, not the root cause, so inevitably we have to revisit the problem. Obviously, this results in costly rework, delays, and inefficiency in the utilization of resources. It is also demoralizing when employees and team members have to constantly work on the same problem over and over again. Thu, 01 Jul 2010 10:35:48 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2323 An enthusiastic and passionate Six Sigma Black Belt, Will, attempted to apply a few Six Sigma techniques in the home environment with his wife of nineteen years, Jenn, with mixed results. Thu, 01 Jul 2010 10:33:24 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2322 The project manager, upon receipt of an assignment, is immediately placed in a leadership position. Regardless of the size and complexity of the project, a team is waiting to be led. A few years ago the Wall Street Journal included the following quote in within one of its editions; “The news media doesn’t talk about world managers, it talks about world leaders.” People don’t want to be managed, they want to led. The project manager is expected to understand the leadership needs of the team as well as the expectations from management about results. This requires the project manager to develop a plan, or more appropriately, a strategy, that will establish and sustain a well connected, trained and effective project team that produces the desired results. Thu, 01 Jul 2010 10:25:08 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2321 As a Project Manager, you need to manage people, money, suppliers, equipment – the list is never ending. The trick is to be focused. Set yourself five personal goals to achieve. If you can meet these simple goals for each project, then you will achieve total success. These goals are generic to all industries and all types of projects. Regardless of your level of experience in project management, set these goals for every project you manage. Thu, 01 Jul 2010 10:19:44 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2320 Projects are risky undertakings. This is because they are usually unique and complex, based on assumptions and constraints, with a range of stakeholders, and dependent on the performance of people. Given these tough challenges, it is not surprising that some projects fail. How are we doing? Thu, 01 Jul 2010 10:12:40 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2319 Thu, 01 Jul 2010 10:06:57 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2317 Imagine this, you work at a company that does not “believe” in project management; however, they do project management every day without realizing it. What should you do to help convince them the value of formalizing this process? Actually this is the situation I was in many years ago when I worked at an architecture engineering firm that did project after project and had over 30 people using the title “project manager” even though not a single person had the Project Management Institute’s PMP® credential. During this time, I was heavily involved in my local PMI chapter assisting the board and I worked in the Administrative group as an IT person. Obviously I had no formal training in engineering or architecture so trying to convince anyone that PMI and their principles had value was virtually impossible and YES, people even laughed at me. During this time in my career, I really didn’t know what I should specialize in and if you take a look at Microsoft’s website, I am sure you realize the enormous number of software packages and credentials that exist out there. Also, I was not really sure I wanted to specialize in server administration even though that was already 25% of my job. Due to some thoughts from my manager at the time (thanks Ken if you are reading this), he suggested I go for PMI’s PMP credential. He really thought that this would help the IT department internally to better manage projects. What a great idea! Fri, 28 May 2010 05:35:28 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2316 The larger an organization gets, the number of projects that need to be executed at one time increases. This makes it difficult to bring about organizational consistency in execution and delivery of projects on time and within cost. As the first step in solving this problem some home grown initiatives are tried which usually do not deliver the expected results. This is typically followed up with a decision to set up a project management office (PMO) as it is a well proven fact that establishing a PMO is the first step to improving project management practices within an organization. Fri, 28 May 2010 05:33:38 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2315 Background: Congratulations on your assignment. At this stage you are possibly overwhelmed after the initial adrenalin rush. There is so much to consider and this paper provides a few prompts to ensure that you start on the right track and get some traction! Fri, 28 May 2010 05:30:56 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2314 Project management is a unique profession and is commonly viewed as being comprised of three branches: project management, program management and project portfolio management. This article will address the key elements and benefits of what is commonly referred to as the strategic component of an enterprise project management platform – project portfolio management. The first branch, project management, is solely tactical and focuses on the fundamental tools and techniques of the profession, to produce a major deliverable on time, within scope and budget, and with an acceptable level of quality. Program management, the second branch, is both tactical and strategically based because programs are comprised of interrelated projects and programs’ focused on the timely delivery of benefits that meet organizational goals and objectives. Fri, 28 May 2010 05:15:07 -0600 http://www.allpm.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2313 “I’ll take a Bud Light, with a lime” he told the bartender, Patty. “Large?” she asked. She, of course, already knew the answer; he and his wife were regulars at the local Chili’s burger restaurant. He just smiled. It had been a long week. He and a few buddies from the office decided to have a cold one after work and watch the game. The argument was sure to come up; it always did. This time he came prepared. His friend, Mike, came through just like he thought he would. “I’m telling you, the guy is on the juice! You can tell; just look at him.” Brian, perhaps just to sustain the argument, quickly countered. “No way; he’s clean. You just can’t accept the fact that he is a freak of nature; he totally dominates and because he’s not very friendly with the fans or the media, everyone trashes him.” It was a circular argument; each side making their case with lots of emotion; the beers only making the argument more colorful. “What’s your take Will; is he on the juice or not? I mean, it’s obvious, isn’t it?” Mike asked Will, who was busy adding a second lime to his Bud Light. “I have the final and definitive answer” declared Will, “but it will cost you the next round; deal?” It was the opening Will had been looking for; he pulled out a folder with some charts and data just as Patty delivered the next round. Mike and Brian rolled their eyes, yet seemed quite interested in the “analysis” Will brought to the table. Fri, 28 May 2010 05:11:03 -0600