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Project Management
“Lean” meets “Demand Management” in IT – Managing the Constraints
It has been a few months since I’ve posted, but I haven’t been idle – two significant projects (aside from working very hard at the full-time job), only one of which I can talk a bit about at this time. Tomorrow (Thursday, 16 Feb 2012) , I am presenting at a conference on IT Portfolio [...]
Help for the Newly Minted Project Manager
Congratulations! Due to the recent [acquisition / divestiture, market expansion / contraction, organizational realignments, other] you have been identified as a Critical Resource for this particular bit of business process change. And, to help us implement these changes, you have been named the Project Manager for this effort. So now you are a Project Manager [...]
Idle Time is a Good Thing for IT
Lots of good conversations recently about managing IT, Finance, and other constrained resources for projects. We have implemented tools to model available time; when trying to understand what new work can get added to the pile, it helps immeasurably when you understand how much time you have available, plus what else has been committed. This [...]
Estimating Bird-Dogging Time for Project Tasks
New year, new projects, and new adventures in getting folks to think in project management terms. I’ve written before about Calendar time vs. Effort time, but this past week we came up with a new distinction that is worthwhile to call out. When working with the business and getting folks to estimate how much time [...]
The Magic In the Middle
I don’t know where I first heard that phrase, or what it originally meant, but I have been using it a lot in the last few weeks … Consider the entire user population for any web site or application. You can generalize all user populations into three Pareto-inspired groups … Top 20% – The folks [...]
Defining Business Benefits: Hard and Soft
All projects should have a clear objective, a practical plan, and an understanding of the costs and benefits to get the thing done. Easy to say, but a lot of project teams struggle to crisply and clearly define specific business benefits. One way to move the process forward would be to have a clear understanding [...]
The Delicate Art of Pushing Back
Commiserating a week or so ago with an old friend, struggling mightily with some external consulting firm providing technology talent, developing customer management systems for Big Sales Company. There were some critical dependencies on the server side, and the (internal) project team needed some on-site assistance working through the issues. Ad hoc phone support was [...]
Over / Under Communication for Project Managers
It is often said that you can’t over-communicate, but I’m willing to bet most folks – and especially your project sponsors – underestimate the cost and effort of this critical component of project management. Consider this fair warning – and a good checklist for folks wanting to get into IT, project, or functional management. Media [...]
Low Tech SharePoint Hack: Project Status Indicator
I’m doing a little hacking in SharePoint that is pulling together a few ideas from the past: Keeping my tech skills sharp Knowing when to search for the answer (vs. stubbornly sticking with DIY) Communicating status tersely but effectively Apparently, I’m also trying to answer a question that is meaningful to many others, as it [...]
Dueling Collaboration Portals
I noticed an interesting phenomenon this afternoon; we are experimenting with SharePoint as our internal project management / collaboration portal. A nice platform to choose, because it’s popularity is growing, and there are a wide selection of add-on products and development partners ready, willing, and able to help us spend our money to make it [...]
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