Update on Blogs as PM Tools – Tales from the Front Lines

We seem to be going through a second wave of focus (hype?) in the popular technology press, on the idea of using blogs as an important project management tool. The topic made the cover of CIO Magazine this week - Lynch made a number of interesting observations - interesting because I don't necessarily see the same things in practice: The Reputation Hurdle: While I agree that blogs aren't fully understood by everyone, the folks that need to use them pick…

Three Business-Case Arguments for Agile, & The Moose On The Table

15 January, 2008
PMO
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Another conversation at the start of the new year - this time in our PMO, concerning project prioritization and resource assignments. Many organizations follow a "parallel" model, launching multiple projects at any one time and working concurrently to move things forward. To be fair, this often occurs because we start work on one or two things, only to have additional worthy business requirements pop-up as time goes by. Unfortunately, we don't stop the first project or delay the second; most…

Innovation That Matters – Substance Over Style

When talking about "innovation" in a non-digital firm, don't force-fit the trendy stuff - focus on the innovative stuff you've done with your traditional environment, like ERP and Data Analytics. Tie this to what creates value for the enterprise, and you have something meaningful.

Five Simple Rules for Project Names, plus Four Sample Lists

8 January, 2008
Project Management, PMO
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A recent post by Jeff Atwood about project names brought back memories of a previous employer, and the project naming convention we set up in our PMO. At this company, the IT group spawned maybe 30 to 50 chunks of work we would call "projects" - at least two calendar weeks in duration (anything smaller than that was just a programming request, and given a control number). Like any good PMO, we generated charters, mission statements, requirements, process maps, status…

Tactics for Controlling Project Scope

5 January, 2008
Project Management
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I wrote about ways to "cheat" at project prioritization [aka trying to figure out what to work on next, when there is more demand (projects) than supply (people to work on them)]. One significant tool you have at your disposal is controlling scope - can you do 20% of the work to get 80% of the benefits? Easier said than done, sometimes you need tactics, that help identify an opportune place to stop, a run-on project, or a design that…

SQL Hack for Reporting Project Phase and Status

20 December, 2007
PMO, Hands-On
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It's been a while since I've posted some code, but I did a nice little SQL hack today that I've been puzzling over for a while. I freely admit that I may have made this more difficult with the original data model, but the die has been cast. Consider a single SQL table that captures project updates as comments note that this table also allows me to change the "phase" (ex. Design, Development, Test, Production) and/or Status (ex. Proposed, Red,…

How to Win at the PMO Prioritization Game

19 December, 2007
PMO, Communication
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Last time I talked about "cheating" at the PMO prioritization game. Ok, it wasn't cheating, more like a trick to keep your projects small, fast - and easy to fit into a crowded schedule. Totally above board, but some might call it manipulative. Remember the old management hack ... how do eat an elephant? If that's too cliche for you, let's talk about ways to consistently win at the prioritization game. How can you make sure your projects are legitimately…

How to Cheat at the PMO Prioritization Game

15 December, 2007
PMO
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Many will say their Project Management Office (PMO) has been established to promote "Best Practices for Project Management" - better work product, alignment with business strategic direction, etc. That may be partially true, but let's inject a little reality here ... many PMOs were created to help solve what I call the Dirt Bag problem - you can't fit 10 lbs of "dirt" in a 5 lb bag. I'm talking about the project prioritization process; I have 100 different project…

PMO Prioritization – Project Descriptions should be Effective, Relevant … and Short!

9 December, 2007
PMO, Project Management
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Next year, our PMO will be taking a run at improving "transparency" for project prioritization - a clearer process for getting projects approved and scheduled. Here's a key building block - what is the most effective way to describe a project? There is a certain amount of art and style in getting this right; most PMOs feature some sort of central database listing candidate projects; typically, the various screens, views, reports, etc. are designed for "short and sweet" descriptions. Note…

PM Anti-Patterns That Increase IT Project Cycle Time

Lots of conversation at work these days about PMO, resource prioritization, and reducing cycle time for IT projects. I feel a series of posts coming on ... IAPL, we launched a project to bring test discipline to our technology efforts. The team was writing standards and guidelines for test scripts, implementing integrated testing tools supplied by the ERP vendor, and adding steps to our project methodology requiring test scripts for all system changes. As the project dragged into a fourth…