Scope crêpe

Looking past "The End of the Beginning"

2009-12-02T07:04:00.000-08:00

As project managers we think (and often dream) about the end of our projects. And what is that end?

It's the successful turn up of a computer network. Or, it's the availability of a new service. Or, perhaps it's the readiness of a new bridge, a new building, a new drug, a new electric toothbrush.

Do you note a pattern here?

When we're done, something else, usually something bigger, is starting.

We often limit our thinking as project managers to the lifecycle of our project and don't think enough about the lifecycle of the product of our projects. For those of you who weren't paying attention, that's the "bigger thing" that is enabled by your project.

This concept reminded me (or perhaps it's the other way around) of a book and movie which I've always enjoyed. Both the book and movie share the title, "The Discovery of Heaven". Do yourself a favor and rent this film or read the book. It's by famed Dutch author Harry Mulisch, and it's not known so well in the USA but is throughout Europe. Here's the trailer.

From wikipedia, here is the synopsis of the book:

The Discovery of Heaven tells the story of an angel-like being, who is ordered to return to Heaven the stone tablets containing the ten commandments, given to Moses by God, which symbolise in the book the link between Heaven and Earth. The divine being, however, cannot himself travel to Earth, and on several occasions in the book resorts to influencing events. He affects the personal lives of three people (two men and one woman) in order that a child will be conceived. This child would then have an innate desire to seek out and return the Tablets.

The book consists of four parts (dubbed "The Beginning of the Beginning", "The End of the Beginning", "The Beginning of the End", and "The End of the End"). In between these four parts, the angel-like being discusses "The Plan" with his superior, who is supposedly an archangel.

The inspiration for the posting comes not from the religious theme of the book, but rather the way the book is organized:

The Beginning of the Beginning
The End of the Beginning
The Beginning of the End
The End of the End

Now back to project management and our way of thinking. We don't realize it when we plan our projects but we only work on the first two parts: The Beginning of the Beginning, where we Initiate and Plan the project, and The End of the Beginning, in which we execute, monitor and control, and close the project. We don't look ahead - often enough - to what happens in the "life and death" of the bridge, the building, the drug, the computer system - even the electric toothbrush.

And that brings me to Life Cycle Analysis, something my partner and I at EarthPM are asserting that we'd better start looking at as PMs - and not just for the very valid environmental reasons, but because it helps us understand the project, its product, and its products' customers more effectively.

I won't detail this here because it's something we'll be covering in our upcoming book, but I would like to reference you to the EPA (US Environmental Protection Agency) site that covers this. They provide an excellent set of PDF training on the subject.

Here's a link to the basic training page of the EPA. There's more, much more to be learned on this subject and we will be covering it in our upcoming book, but I wanted to share this with you here first. Learn more on EarthPM.com.

And go rent that movie!

Oh, chute!

2009-11-17T20:30:00.000-08:00

I'd like to share an analogy I use in my Project Management courses to explain the often misunderstood difference between secondary and residual risk.

Secondary risks are those which are caused by the treatment or response to the risk.

Residual risk is the risk which remains even after you have treated or responded to the risk.

So here goes the analogy.

You are jumping from a plane. Yep. That's a situation which clearly has some threat to it. It also has opportunity (in this case a thrill). But let's focus on the threat. How do we respond to the threat of severe injury or death that we will encounter if we simply fall to the ground from several thousand meters (or feet, it really doesn't matter)?

Well the answer is that we mitigate the risk with a parachute. That's our risk response. So let's go through two scenarios in which the parachute doesn't work exactly like it was designed.

Scenario 1: We pull the cord, and the parachute deploys but due to air currents, the force of the "tug" when it deploys causes you to sprain your shoulder. Oh, CHUTE! Ow! That hurts. That is an example of secondary risk. The risk response (the chute) caused a new risk.

Scenario 2: We pull the cord, the parachute deploys smoothly, and we cruise to the ground but for whatever reason it does not provide us a slow enough descent and, Oh CHUTE! Ow! we sprain an ankle when we land. That's an example of residual risk - a threat that remains even after we have responded to the risk.

I hope that helps clear up the difference.

Whether or not this cleared things up for you, at least get a laugh out of this posting. Have a look at this humorous video from Dutch insurance carrier Centraal Beheer, involving... you guessed it, a secondary risk from a parachute. Click here for the video.

Happy landings!

"The danger of the single story"- Chimamanda Adichie

2009-10-25T17:13:00.000-07:00

You know that I've blogged before about the danger of PMs taking a single-point estimate. I want to draw your attention to a nice talk given by Chimamanda Adichie (shown on the left) called, "The Danger of the Single Story".

I'd like to acknowledge Pervez Mohammed of VISIONS non-profit group for making me aware of this video.

It takes the idea of a single-point estimate to a whole new level.

Listen to her. The video is about 20 minutes and is located HERE.

Then think. Or maybe reflect is a better word here. Think about using this as you identify risks, as you build your teams, as you take inputs from contributors. Don't rely on one source. As a PM you need to be unbiased and open to wider sources of information and willing to listen to alternate versions.

This talk may help you with that.

Enjoy.

Bored --> Board --> Exciting

2009-10-19T11:39:00.001-07:00

Today, I'm very happy to announce that I've become a Distributor for a tremendous product that brings fun, intrigue, and yes, even thrills to the world of learning about project management. Thus the image above.

Project management learning should be a little more like that, don't you think? Well, it can be, with a board game that takes project managers on a bit of a roller-coaster ride through a project and teaches them about risk and much more.

The board game, which was carefully developed over a nine year period by Kay Wais at Successful Projects can now be obtained via my company, Exclaim!PM.

See the press release HERE.

This game and supporting materials - although focused on project risk management - really uses the "churning is learning" philosophy that Kay and I agree is so basically important to the way adults learn about project management in general.

I plan to use adopt it in my series of courses that make up a Master's Certificate in PM, and if you are an educator or student of PM and would like to do the same, please contact me for information and availability of the materials.

Here's a picture of the game:

There's a video of the game here.

For more about the game, contact me directly at exclaim@verizon.net

Thanks!

Free WBS tool for download

2009-10-01T20:37:00.000-07:00

Here's a very small program with a very specialized task: make quick work out of genrating a WBS.

It's free, fairly intuitive, and does its task well.

Check it out here:

http://www.wbs-tool.net/

Get SMARTER

2009-09-10T22:49:00.001-07:00

Some of the "more seasoned" of us may recall the old TV series, Get Smart, and the more youthful readers will certainly know the Get Smart movie that came out a few years (based on that original TV show). The title, and most of the writing, was very clever, and 'played with words'. Smart was the name of the agent, and the bad guys were always trying to 'get' (as in capture) Smart. But it was of course also a reference to getting smarter - as in 'gaining intelligence or wisdom'.

To remind you of the show, click here to see the opening music and credits which were a thing of beauty in and of themselves.

And most of us in the wonderful world of management will recognize the acronym SMART for dealing with goals and objectives. Remember?

S - specific, significant, stretching

M - measurable, meaningful, motivational

A - agreed upon, attainable, achievable, acceptable, action-oriented

R - realistic, relevant, reasonable, rewarding, results-oriented

T - time-based, tangible, trackable

Well, we here at ScopeCrepe, and also at EarthPM, our related endeavor, would like to say that the time for getting SMART has passed. It's gone. It's fizzled. It's deceased. Would you believe that it was at least getting old?

Instead of just getting SMART these days, we think we need to be SMARTER. How, you ask, can we be SMARTER?

Glad you asked.

We can be SMARTER by adding two more letters to SMART. Of course, those two letters are E and R.

E - Environmentally

R - Responsible

In other words, it's not just enough to set our project goals and objectives as we said above, we also have to consider the effectiveness of the processes of the project itself, and its own waste and inefficiencies, we also should consider the end-product and its disposal or re-use.

If this intrigues you at all, or even if it annoys you, you should find out more about what we're saying and how you can add those two little - but important- letters, by visiting EarthPM - http://earthpm.com .

And while you're at it, Get SMARTER!

Don't miss it, even by that much.

Take a guess. No googling allowed, though.

2009-08-17T09:13:00.000-07:00

Okay, here's a quick question for you. Without going online or doing any research, just off the top of your head, how many computers do you think are disposed of daily? To answer, fill out the POLL on the left top side of the blog. I will have the answer - as well as your guesses - on an updated version of this posting within 2 weeks.

In the meantime, if you're interested in project management (and you ARE, by virtue of your being here) and the environment (which you should be, as a resident of this particular planet), have a look at a website devoted to the intersection of those two things - EarthPM. Visit http://earthpm.com .

5 seconds of your time...please?

2009-07-28T05:26:00.001-07:00

Please follow the link below to answer a 1-question poll about how your organization deals with... with... well, you have to go to the poll to find out.

This is the link below that I was talking about above:
OK, I will give you 5 seconds!

Choices...choices...

2009-07-12T08:27:00.001-07:00

As a project manager - even if you ended up in the career, as many of us did, as an accident - you will be making lots and lots of choices. Add more resources to this task? Use the Jones company or the Smith company as your subcontractor? Have an on-site project kickoff meeting or a virtual one?

I just listened to an excellent podcast on the subject of choice. It was on NPR's Radiolab, one of my favorite podcasts and one I would highly recommend you subscribe to.

It's brain food. Eat well.

In the podcast was something interesting about the way our mind works. A psychological study was referenced in which people were given numbers to memorize - numbers which were short, like "23" or numbers which were long, like 034789328. The people went into a room, were given the number and were told to memorize it and move to another nearby room down the hall and repeat the number there. That was their only task.

On their way, they were interrupted by a woman with a pushcart who said something like, "excuse me, as part of your participation in the study, you get a snack; would you like a slice of chocolate cake, or a fruit cup?".

Here is the interesting part.

Participants who were given the longer numbers (like 034789328) were much, much, much more likely to choose the chocolate cake, and those given short numbers (like 23) were much more likely to pick fruit.

So what?

Well, it turns out (according to the continued research) the rational part of the brain that needs to process the analysis/memorization of the number is the same part which would make the rational decision that the fruit was the healthy, better choice. However, while occupied with the number, it was distracted, and the more emotional part of the brain, the one that says, "mmmm, gooey, yummy chocolate", takes over and makes the decision.

The connection to PM? When you need to make choices like the ones I mentioned at the opening of this posting, you may want to be sure that the rational part of your brain is free -- or you may be making a "chocolate cake" decision.

If this tickles your interest, see an article from Stanford University here.

And please - add RadioLab to your list of podcasts!

Greenality

2009-07-12T08:05:00.000-07:00

Greenality. You probably never heard that word before. But we want to change that. We want you - project managers - to take the lead in making projects more green.

If we want to measure how green a project is, we need a word. If you want to check how original an idea is, we look into its originality. So if we want to check how green a project is, we've decided to coin the term greenality.

You can actually help. My colleague Dave Shirley, PMP, and I have placed the word greenality in Urban Dictionary and in Wikipedia. All we'd like you to do is go to THIS LINK and vote thumbs up on the word. Also if you have comments about expanding and illustrating greenality on wikipidea, just look it up first by clicking HERE and comment to this blog posting with your ideas.

Thanks for your help!

A "Car Talk" puzzler becomes a lesson in Risk ID

2009-07-05T21:16:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite radio shows is "Car Talk" on NPR (National Public Radio in the US). You don't have to be in the US to receive it, by the way. You can get their podcasts free of charge at http://www.cartalk.com .

Car Talk is a show which is incredibly entertaining even though it is made up mainly of people calling up the two hosts seeking help with car troubles. The hosts, Tom and Ray Magliozzi, also often have a "puzzler" or brain teaser, usually related to auto maintenance or something to do with cars. This most recent one, however, reminded me that we can learn a thing or two about project management wherever we are, even if it is listening to a podcast while sitting at a beach on Cape Cod Bay.

I suggest you read the transcript below and do two things:

1. See if you can solve the Puzzler

2. See if you can catch the connection to Risk Identification (answers below - DON'T CHEAT!)

------------------

RAY: Hi, we're back. You're listening to Car Talk with us, Click and Clack, the Tappet brothers, and we're here to talk about cars, car repair, and of course, the answer to last week's puzzler.

TOM: Yes, the dimly lit Quonset hut.

RAY: Anyway, this was sent to us by someone named Tom Clemala from cyberspace, I guess, and I'll set the scene. You ready?

TOM: Yeah.

RAY: It's just as he did.

TOM: As he did. Go ahead.

RAY: Don't get too excited. The answer's not that good.

TOM: I love it. But the question is great.

RAY: An RAF airfield north of London, a dimly lit Quonset hut, filled with air crews just returned from bombing runs over Germany.

TOM: Dimly lit Quonset Hut.

RAY: All right, shut up will you? The meeting opens with the chaplain leading the men in prayer for their lost comrades. He's followed by the flight operations exec., who begins the debriefing by asking the airmen, "From what direction were you attacked by the German fighter planes?" Without hesitation or dissent, the reply was, "From above and behind." The flight operations exec hastily scribbles the information on the back of a top secret map, hands it to a junior officer and says, "Get this information to the departing air crews; it may save their lives."

TOM: Here comes the good part. This is the good part.

RAY: As the junior officer turns to leave the dimly lit Quonset hut, from the inky shadows, a hand grasps his arm.

TOM: Can you just see it, man? Was it Humphrey Bogart?

RAY: This was a nice, brief little puzzler, before you started repeating all the lines. Anyway, as the messenger turns to leave, from the inky shadows, a hand grasps his arm and he hears these words, hold that order. Or, hold the pickles, hold the lettuce, special orders don't. Hold that order, the information you're about to give may lose lives, rather than save them. What did the guy from the inky shadows know that the flight exec didn't?

TOM: That's not the right question.

RAY: It isn't?

TOM: Well, I bet, I don't think. I mean doesn't the flight exec know the same information that this guy in the inky shadows knows?

RAY: Well, he should.

TOM: He should.

RAY: What mistake did the flight exec?

TOM: Yeah, that's better.

RAY: What mistake did the flight exec?

TOM: Exactly, and did he lose his job over it?

RAY: No. He should have.

TOM: He should have, huh?

RAY: Yeah, well.

TOM: You don't know the answer, by the way.

RAY: Basically, it was a case of poor sampling. You see the only information that the flight exec had in the dimly lit Quonset hut.

TOM: Stop it, stop it.

RAY: Was from the guys who survived, from the guys who came back. The guys who came back were all attacked from above and behind, but it may be that those weren't the fatal attacks. The fatal attacks were from some other direction, and those people, those airmen, had no advice to offer, because they didn't come back.

TOM: Exactly.

RAY: So that's why --

TOM: So, we don't even know what he wrote on the back on the map.

RAY: I'm assuming he wrote hold the pickles, hold the lettuce, the attacks are coming from above and behind.

TOM: Back and to the left.

RAY: When, in fact, that information --

TOM: What he wanted to know was the information from the guys who weren't at the meeting.

Did you guess the answer?

And did you see the connection to Project Management? Here, at least, is what I saw.

We need to identify a full contingent of people to interview when discovering (identifying) risk on our projects. Hopefully we don't face the same issue here, in which the identified risks are missed because of fatal incidents. The point is that we need to look for the identification of risk to come from a full spectrum of sources or we end up with Risk Identification bias.

In your projects, make this analogy. Think of where you may be getting information that's simply too optimistic (or pessimistic) because the folks who might have that information simply are not present and accounted for.

And for goodness sake, listen to at least one episode of Car Talk!

Is the world ready for earthpm.com ?

2009-06-30T19:55:00.000-07:00

Are you ready?

Are you - and your project - green?

Today, my colleague Dave Shirley, PMP, and I are proud to launch a new website, EarthPM, which is focused on all things you might find at the intersection of all things 'green' and all things Project Management.

We're just getting started, but the site already has some interesting articles and is about to be supplemented with interviews and other resources related to how your project can be more earth-friendly.

You may just be curious. You may just be an expert. Either way, we would like your feedback and opinions and input. It's your earth. It's your project. Here's where they come together.

Relax, have a seat in your comfy chair, and enjoy 'The Lazy Project Manager'

2009-06-28T13:17:00.000-07:00

Now, here is a book that is in harmony with the postings on this page and also written in a style that accommodates my sense of humor and philosophy of project management.

The Lazy Project Manager, a brand-new book by Peter Taylor, is, by his own admission, not a methodology nor a replacement for a PM book, nor a preparation for the PMP Exam. It is, however, written by a gentleman who is a PMP and who has a great deal of real-world PM experience. So you should pay attention regardless of what the book isn't.

What the book is, instead, is a collection of wisdom and coaching about how to manage projects in such a way that you are active and assertive as a PM when you need to be and only when you need to be. The author, a fan (like me) of Monty Python (see the Comfy Chair sketch by clicking here), and silliness in general, adapts one of Python's gimmicks as the common thread throughout the book: "a project is thick at one end, much, much thinner in the middle and then thick again at the far end". This is the opposite of a dinosaur, as theorized by Anne Elk (brackets, Miss, brackets) who stated, in her very own theory, which was hers, "all brontosauruses are thin at one end, much, much thicker in the middle, and then thin again at the far end".

Brontosauruses aside, the concept is that projects have the most need for attention and assertiveness by the PM at the starting and ending stages and in the middle need communication and management, yes, but in a much 'lazier', more monitoring and controlling fashion.

In his coaching and advice, the author tackles the usual suspects, feature and scope creep, the evils of email, reporting not being the same as communicating, dealing with a wide variety of project sponsors, and all cleverly illustrated not only with illustrations (the author is fond of two-by-two grids) but also illustrated with stories from his own experience and with jokes or brain teasers thrown in here and there.

Taylor does something that I have done on my blog and in my own writing - he gives you a chance to cheat. By cheating, I mean that he levels with you, the reader, the busy reader, the lazy reader, and says something like, "look, if you want to get to the bottom line, skip over to the last chapter now. You will miss some stuff but ... you'll get the idea". In fact, he even uses this principle of cheating itself to help explain the Pareto principle - a tactic I thought was particularly ingenious.

Another interesting thing about this book is the author's use of footnotes. Where many authors rely on footnotes only to reference their sources, Taylor instead takes the opportunity to provide a variety of other things in the footnotes. Don't skip them - or you will find yourself missing a recipe for a virgin bloody Mary.

So don't be lazy - get a hold of this book and read it, perhaps on a lazy summer afternoon.

Poignantly perpetuate your project's purpose

2009-06-12T07:18:00.000-07:00

This is a not a book review.

I tend to review PM books, but also read some general management books and note their applicability to project management. That's the case with Nikos Mourkogiannis' Purpose. I heard about the book on several podcasts and decided it would be a good read - and it was.

What I would like to do in this brief post is to share a couple of takeaways from the book for project managers.

The book is about how organizations can "purpose" themselves for success, and one of my assertions about project management has always been that it is a microcosm for organizations in the larger sense. But, as we all know, there are also differences - significant ones - between projects and operations. So one must look carefully for the gems in books like this that can be adopted and molded a bit to fit into the context of a project.

One such gem is Mourkogiannis' determination of the sources of energy for the company - or in our case, sources of energy for the project.

The four purposes which I think you can apply to a project (just as the author applies to great organizations) are:
Discovery, Excellence, Altruism, and Heroism

Mourkogiannis' point is that although no two companies are alike, successful ones have excelled by drawing on one of these philosophies and "applying it with integrity". There is an undercurrent in the book about morality, one which makes even more sense in light of the recent embarrassing and shameful stories from financial and "insurance" companies such as AIG and the Madoff schemes*. This seems to make the book and its ideas even more relevant now. But I digress, I want to tie this to PM.

Below is what is in effect the heart and soul of the book. I still recommend that you read it but this captures the main idea.

I suggest that PMs could do best by focusing on the chapter, "The Real Value of Purpose", in which the author gives examples of how each of these moral purposes were "put to work" to build the culture for success at the companies he uses as examples. I think that PMs could model some of these purposes to infuse their projects with the same kind of culture and focus, paying attention to which one suits their project most aptly.

Check it out for yourself by going to the author's web-based purpose profiler.

And you can order the book from that same page. On purpose.

*AIG (as are other companies who were mired in greed and a lack of Purpose) is so embarrassed, in fact, that they are removing their own name from their own employees' badges and corporate buildings. I'm not kidding: see this article from today's news:
AIG Said to Remove Logo From Employees Badges.

Go Banana Slugs!

2009-06-04T11:29:00.001-07:00

I never would have believed it unless I looked it up. And I did.

The official mascot for the University of California Santa Cruz is the ... Banana Slug. You can see one in action here.

What does this possibly have to do with project management? Not too much, but a little. I was asked to guest blog on the UCSC Silicon Valley Extension project management page, and I happily accepted. And this is before I knew about the Banana Slug logo.

So if you want to have a look at some posts - they may look familiar because some of them were re-treaded versions of ScopeCrepe postings, then you should slither over immediately (or whenever your sluggish activity gets you there) to:

http://svprojectmanagement.com

...and have a look at my three postings. But don't stop there, you will also find (or perhaps instead find) excellent material from other PM personalities. Give it a shot, ya big slug!

Let's Go Banana Slugs!!!

Getting better all the time?

2009-05-17T13:37:00.000-07:00

So....

You see the smiling, optimistic, fresh faces of the Beatles in the previous post? I want to believe, really, really want to believe, the numbers from PMI's survey. And I do, to some extent.

However, I wouldn't be "fair and balanced" if I didn't provide some recent news which seems to contradict, or at least contrast strongly against the PMI survey.

I'm referring to CHAOS. Not the top-secret bad-guy organization that Maxwell Smart (Agent 86, see recently-declassified photo on left) is always fighting along with his colleagues from CONTROL, but rather the reports issued periodically by the Standish Group of West Yarmouth, Massachusetts.

The latest report - in quite some contrast to the PMI report - shows a sustained upward trend in failed projects. The report organizes 'finished' projects into 3 categories, Successful (on time, under or at budget), Challenged (missed either the time or budget constraint, or both) and Failed (canceled and/or did not provide the scope they promised).

A press release about this from the Standish Group is here: http://www.standishgroup.com/newsroom/chaos_2009.php . What you see above is my representation using their published data. You'll note that the percentage of failed projects not only increases, but kicks up in slope in this last measurement - which is, as my Ducth friends would say, niet goed!

This begs the question: why the disconnect? I really don't have the answer, although I have some very strong beliefs (which I will share later) about the reason for this uptick in project failures, beginning around the year 2002.

It also begs another question, one on which one of my blog viewers has already commented: can one be very "mature" in PM and still have a high failure rate? And, if so, what does that tell us about the value of PM Maturity?

I know I raise more questions than answers here, but I would like to challenge folks to reconcile the different views of PM that these sets of data represent?

Thoughts?

Getting better all the time...

2009-05-06T17:31:00.000-07:00

"I used to get mad at my scope, my PMO just didn't cope. Holding me down, turning me 'round, right at the end of my rope.

Now I admit, it's getting better, it's getting better all the time..."

...apologies to The Beatles, from their song "Getting Better All the Time". To see (and hear) the real version, go here.

Why the flashback to the Sixties? Just got my latest edition of PMI Today. The feature story is about the latest survey on project performance, and there is the reason for the flashback - it's getting better all the time. What is? Project performance. A little better. Projects finishing on time moved up from 53% to 55% and projects finishing within budget edged up from 55% to 58%. The glass, however, is still just barely over half-full. These numbers are not great. Some other numbers were more impresive - 65% of respondents reported an increase over 2006 in projects meeting goals and business intent.

How about scope creep, the namesake of this blog? Well, unfortunately, that little slug is doing just fine, and is quite healthy, thank you very much. 51% of projects experience it, say the respondents. So....more work needed there.

What's nice about the survey is the positive correlation identified between PM maturity or project management culture (centered around a PMO) and project success rates. For example, One chart shows that if an organization has high PM maturity, on-time-ness and on-budget-ness go from 43% to 75% and 48% to 73%, respectively. And strikingly, scope creep affects 36% of projects for organizations that have achieved higher maturity levels but over 59% for those that have lower levels of PM maturity.

And how about this one - the frosting on the cake and a good justification in and of itself - for efforts in PM maturity: the increase in percentage of projects that met their goals (in other words, the whole reason for doing the project in the first place). It goes from 51% for low-maturity organizations to a whopping 80%, for those organizations with high PM maturity levels. Speaking of "being mad at your school", that's like going from an F to a B. Okay, a B-minus, but hey - it's still a B!

I'm trying to find a direct link to the survey, but in the meantime, you can go here to read the article. If you're pushing for increased PM maturity at your organization, this is good backup data for you.

So hopefully, for you as well, it's getting better all the time...

Hubba Hubba

2009-04-05T19:48:00.000-07:00

The hub. That's Boston's nickname. Its origin is interesting but basically it's because we think (and you can hate us for it or love us for it) that we are the center of everything.

Find out more about this colorful nickname at this link.

You can actually see it illustrated right there (on the right) in the logo of the Boston Bruins, our NHL (ice hockey) team. In fact, this is a year of resurgence for the Bruins, they are headed to the playoffs with a top seed, and lots of momentum.

So what does this have to do with project management, you ask, somewhat impatiently?

Hold on...I'm getting there.

There's a source for science and business information to which I would like to direct you called Bright Hub. Okay...there's the connection you were craving...

Bright Hub describes itself this way:

Bright Hub’s goal is simple: share knowledge about how the simplest scientific idea evolves into tomorrow’s technology.

With an expert writer network and an active community of life-long enthusiasts Bright Hub provides a level of technology transparency rarely seen in high tech. The team of writers and managing editors utilize deep domain expertise to focus on creating valuable information for both novice and advanced consumers. With a content inventory of thousands of science and technology articles, software and hardware reviews, buyer’s guides, blog entries and forum discussions, Bright Hub is able to provide readers with a dependable resource to make informative technology decisions.

I signed up to write some articles for Bright Hub and have now just published my sixth one. I'd like to ask that you visit the articles and also poke around (given the "hub" analogy, I suppose I could ask you to "spoke" around) for the rich information that is there.

Bright Hub's categories are here:

Computing & Hardware

Education

Engineering Technology

Environment

Health & Wellness

Internet

Mobile

Money & Finance

Multimedia

Office Productivity

Science Technology

Video Games

And you can find my articles here:

My latest one, "Watch your language" is here.

If you want to bookmark a place to always find all of my articles, go here.

Enjoy.

And....GO BRUINS!

Are your project teams - inspired?

2009-04-03T14:06:00.001-07:00

Perhaps your project teams are in the doldrums. Pehaps they are good folks, but are acting, shall we say, lethargic.

How do you get them more active, more motivated, more... inspired?

We know from our experts in psychology that it can't be achieved just by cash, and we know that people don't always respond to threats of punishment or consequences. So what is a project manager to do?

Well one thing a PM can do is to make themselves a more informed - and inspiring - leader by visiting Michael Greer's blog and podcast, to be found at http://www.inspiredprojectteams.com/ .

Michael has recently added the podcast feature and I've reviewed a few of them. I found them easy to listen to, full of good information, and very well-referenced, so that if the posting leaves you hungry for more, there will inevitably be a book or link which will feed that hunger.

Direct from the website, here are the objectives of the podcasts:

Each audio will contain the same content as the printed posts, namely:

Quotations that might inspire project managers or project team members.
Reflections to think about… as project manager or project leader.
Team Challenges – Questions and suggestions to challenge your teams to stretch and grow.
Project Manager Challenges – Specific actions for project managers or team leaders.

Check these out. I think you'll like them.

Then go get your team inspired!

evorpmI ruoY Xobni

2009-03-27T21:23:00.000-07:00

That's Improve Your Inbox, backwards.

Xobni is Inbox - spelled backwards.

As a project manager, communications makes up a huge portion of your work, and nowadays, email is often, like it or not, the bulk of that communications.

So wouldn't it be nice if someone came along with a program which improves your Outlook inbox, makes it fun to use, adds instant new angles to how you view people, including instantaneously extracting phone numbers, pictures, even histograms of when they are more responsive to emails?

And wouldn't it be cool if the program were eerf? Um, I mean free?

Well, that's the case with Xobni. Xobni is an email add-in for Outlook and although I have only been using it for a short time, I see it as a very nice addition for project managers in particular.

Below is a link to an introductory video on Xobni. It describes it much better than I can.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amRkMds177A

If you want to check it out for yourself, go to the Xobni website, http://www.xobni.com .

The download is fast and the installation is simple.

If you don't trust my opinion, here is a review of Xobni from PC World Magazine: http://www.pcworld.com/reviews/product/31773/review/xobni.html

Your comments about Xobni would be detaicerppa. I mean, appreciated.

Since I only just started using Xobni a few days ago, and since it's such a new add-in, I'd like your comments and feedback.

Do you like it in general?

Do you find it particularly useful for PM applications or PM reasons?

Thanks in advance for your comments here.

Form a line for this book!

2009-03-23T19:42:00.000-07:00

Wow, so my last posting had a bowtie and what appeared to be an invitation to a wedding (or other formal event), and now I move from "formal" to "forms".

Cyndi Stackpole, who was the project lead for the 4th Edition PMBOK(R) Guide - on which I was also proud to work - has written a companion book which, for people like me, who are visual and practical, brings the PMBOK Guide to life with a set of forms and the instructions for completing them.

Yeah, I know.... A book of forms is exciting to me. How telling is that? But wait, there's more!

One of the things I always had expected of the PMI was a little more assertiveness when it comes to guidelines, forms, and methods. I know the PMBOK Guide is not a methodology. Still, there seems to be (my opinion) too much vagueness in the PMBOK Guide, where I think there is an opportunity at least to show examples, and get folks moving in similar directions...

This book is extremely straightforward in its approach. After literally only one page of introduction, in which she discusses the intent, the audience, and the organization of the book, Cyndi gets right to it.

As she says, the audience is for PMs, with new PMs being able to use the book as a guide for how to collect and organize information, while experienced PMs being able to use the forms as a template to save them from rebuilding new forms every time a new project starts up. She also addresses the PMOs so that they can share the forms across an organization to yield some standardization and a more "repeatable approach".

The advantage of this book over similar books or packages is that it is very tightly connected to the PMBOK Guide's latest edition. The forms are organized by Process Groups and in the case of the forms from the Planning process, there is description of inputs and outputs for the form, so that you can put it in the context of the project.

For example, the Probability and Impact Matrix (pictured below) takes input from the Risk Register and the Probability and Impact Assessment, and gives information to the Risk Register. In fact, this is a good example of what I meant before when I said that I always hope for a little more from the PMBOK Guide. Her Probability and Impact Assessment form, which suggests specific scales for Scope, Quality, Schedule, and Cost impacts, and a definitive 5-point scale for Probability: Very Low, Low, Medium, High, and Very High (for example, Low is 21% to 40%). This will perhaps bring some standardization across industries and give some common ground for folks involved (like myself) in developing PM training courseware. Instead of "making stuff up", we can all go to these scales, at least for starters.

The book comes with a CD that contains completely editable versions of all of the blank forms, in MS-Office format.

You can find this really fine book at PMI's bookstore site, as well as Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

If you are curious, here are the forms included:

2. Initiating Forms.

2.1 Initiating Process Group.

2.2 Project Charter.

2.3 Stakeholder Register.

2.4 Stakeholder Analysis Matrix.

2.5 Stakeholder Management Strategy.

3. Planning Forms.

3.1 Planning Process Group.

3.2 Requirements documentation.

3.3 Requirements management plan.

3.4 Requirements traceability matrix.

3.5 Project Scope Statement.

3.6 Assumption and constraint log.

3.7 Work breakdown structure (WBS).

3.8 WBS Dictionary.

3.9 Activity list.

3.10 Activity attributes.

3.11 Milestone list.

3.12 Network diagram.

3.13 Activity Resource Requirements.

3.14 Resource breakdown structure.

3.15 Activity duration estimates.

3.16 Duration estimating worksheet.

3.17 Project Schedule.

3.18 Activity Cost Estimates.

3.19 Cost estimating worksheet.

3.20 Cost performance baseline.

3.21 Quality management plan.

3.22 Quality metrics.

3.23 Process improvement plan.

3.24 Responsibility Assignment Matrix.

3.25 Roles and Responsibilities.

3.26 Human Resource Plan.

3.27 Communications Management Plan.

3.28 Risk Management Plan.

3.29 Risk register.

3.30 Probability and Impact Risk Rating.

3.31 Risk data sheet.

3.32 Procurement management plan.

3.33 Project management plan.

3.34 Configuration management plan.

3.35 Change Management Plan.

4. Executing Forms.

4.1 Executing Process Group.

4.2 Team member Status Report.

4.3 Change request.

4.4 Change Log.

4.5 Decision log.

4.6Quality Audit.

4.7 Team Directory.

4.8 Team operating agreement.

4.9 Team performance assessment.

4.10 Team member performance assessment.

4.11 Issue Log.

4.12 Procurement Criteria Evaluation.

5. Monitoring and Control Forms.

5.1 Monitoring and Controlling Process Group.

5.2 Project Performance Report.

5.3 Variance Analysis.

5.4 Earned Value Status Report.

5.5 Risk Audit.

5.6 Contractor Status Report.

5.7 Product acceptance Form.

6. Closing.

6.1 Closing Process Group.

6.2 Procurement Audit.

6.3 Contract Close Out.

6.4 Project Close Out.

6.5 Lessons learned.

Enjoy.

The line forms on the left (or in the British-influenced countries, on the right, and I suppose it would be a queue, not a line).

Nice guys...Cranky Managers...Weasels....Jerks

2009-02-19T20:57:00.000-08:00

Here's an ecclectic and short posting mainly meant to get you to take advantage of what appears to be an interesting book and what I have come to find as a wildly entertaining and interesting podcast.

The book is Nice Guys Can Get the Corner Office - Eight Strategies for Winning in Business Without Being a Jerk by Edelman, Hiltabiddle and Manz, and it was the subject of Mr. Wayne Turmel's Cranky Middle Manager podcast. This podcast, although about general business stuff, is appropriate listening for project managers. And this episode is of particular interest because PMs - as managers - need to know how to get things done, if possible, without being a jerk.

I told you this would be short, so I will, without further blabbing, just send you there. Go there. Here's the link. Listen to this particular episode, but also bookmark and subscribe to the podcast. It will unweaselify (new word of the year, so far) your iPod or other MP3 player. Guaranteed.

Enjoy!

And as Wayne says, "Don't let the weasels get you down".

Survey SAYS!

2009-02-09T19:56:00.000-08:00

I got to meet Terry Doerscher at the PMI Summit in Coconut Grove, Florida, at which he presented some preliminary results from the PMO Survey 2.o. That's not Terry on the right there - that's a guy I recognize from Hogan's Heroes or Family Feud - Richard Dawson. And he was famous for saying, "Survey Says?!" at that point in the show when the contestants' guess for some question was matched with the response of a survey to see if they aligned. If you're an international reader or a US reader who has lived inside a tree stump for the past 20 years, you can learn about this show here.

Terry has a really nice blog also, called the Enterprise Navigator. Visit that right here.

Back to the survey.

What do PMOs do?
What industries are they in?
How old are they?
Where do they fit in the organization?
What size are they?
Are they growing?
What kind of success are they having?
What celebrities are they dating?

Almost all of these questions can be answered if you look at the survey results.

The full version of the presentation is now available in presentation format.

If you're involved in your company's Project/Program Management office, you may find this interesting. If not, just watch an old episode of Family Feud.

Click here to register for the survey presentation.

Here's the detailed full link:

https://event.on24.com/eventRegistration/EventLobbyServlet?target=registration.jsp&eventid=130306&sessionid=1&key=B56DB34EEDE4C55688E616BF392795B8&sourcepage=register

Enjoy!

Identify your Stakeholders: by Heineken

2009-01-24T17:43:00.001-08:00

The new PMBOK(R) Guide has a new process called, Identify Stakeholders.

I am going to write much more about that but for now, I just really have to share with you an example of Stakeholder Identification that ought to make you laugh.

It's a Dutch commercial, so there is no English in it at all. Still, I would be amazed, truly amazed, if even my English-speaking audience cannot get a chuckle out of this one.

The link to project management? Well, I advise that you watch the video first and then come back here.

Watch the video before reading the rest of the po st!
Just click on the link above or the can below.

Make sure you have your sound turned up.

OK. See the video?

Whoever built the house had to first identify the needs of key stakeholders, in this case "she" and "he", and had to listen carefully to their needs. Although my guess is that the "resources" aspect of this project was least constrained, it appears - and especially sounds - like the project was a success.

----

Update 2 March 2009: Bavaria has spoofed the Heineken commercial quite nicely.

See: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcm9oGBrNKA

Moody Blues = PDUs ???

2009-01-21T12:43:00.000-08:00

You choose: Is this news? Moody Blues = PDUs.

Just don't snooze...

________________________________

What can an early 1960's rock-and-roll band tell us about Project Risk Management?

Turns out: quite a bit indeed.

I'll be leading a seminar entitled, "Managing Risk - A Question of Balance" on March 24 and 26, 2009.

Here's the teaser:

Some contend that a project manager’s core work is as the risk manager of the project. Even if you don’t believe that, it’s clear that as a PM you constantly deal with risk. Using the concept and theme of balance throughout, this course takes the participant through the processes of risk management – risk planning, risk identification, risk analysis, risk response, and monitoring and control of risk – never losing sight of the project context. Peppered with class discussions to get the most from the attendees’ varied backgrounds (and to provide more balance!) it is also enhanced with interactions that engage all participants. This journey through the world of uncertainty will reinforce basic risk courseware you may have had and will leave you with some thought-provoking concepts but also with down-to-earth tools to use on real projects.At the end of this course, class participants should be able to:

1. Gain a deeper, more integrated understanding of how risk affects a project

2. Translate this into how this affects the planning of their projects

3. Collect, understand, and use advice and tools for risk identification

4. Improve their capabilities in risk analysis

5. Expand their capabilities of developing effective risk responses

6. Reaffirm the importance of continuing, ongoing risk management.

To register for this session, follow this link:

http://www.enterprisepmsolutions.com/

or in particular...

http://www.enterprisepmsolutions.com/training.html#19

After suffering through this, er...I mean, after enjoying this great course, it you will have earned 5 PDUs, for only $89.00!

Hurry, obviously you risk missing this if you don't take action soon. In some days, the future will have passed (an inside joke for fans of the Moody Blues).