I’ve written at different times in this column about the impact of the web on enterprise project management systems. Until now, most of that talk has been about how the availability of a web interface would attract additional users through an easier and more accessible interface. There is an emerging movement in this regard however, which is starting to revolutionize how we think of project management data and project systems usage. It has come about…
I’ve had a few wonderful opportunities lately to talk to high-tech CIOs about what costs them the most time. I had thought I’d hear about project management and resource management issues. ‘We need a better scheduling algorithm’ or ‘We need a better resource-leveling engine,’ I figured I’d hear. Not so. The CIOs I’ve met this month in my rather non-scientific survey talked about the simple things. “I’d just like to know if my people are…
More and more these days as I visit project management offices across the country, I end up talking about scorecarding and balanced scorecarding. These terms are part of a popular trend in management at the moment which is based on the simplest of management principles. Scorecarding refers to simply setting goals for certain results in the business and then tracking those results on a regular basis. (See? I told you it was simple). The notion…
An amazing 40 million people use Excel for project management. That makes Excel the 2nd most popular tool for project management (after the pencil). When we think of enterprise project management tools should we be forgetting about this one? Read more in this article.
The hottest buzz in the project management industry over the last 10 years has to be the Project Management Maturity Model. This concept is an offshoot of the thinking at Carnegie Mellon on the Capability Maturity Model which has a huge following in the manufacturing sector. Increasing one’s assessment along the PMM model encourages organizations to be more formalized, more integrated and to create project management as a core process. That sounds great but is it great for every organization? This article discusses the concept.
How do you get management, the project management office and the line-project managers to take seriously how much effort it will take to implement enterprise project management? We’re often asked for “easy enteprise project management” which, I think, is an oxymoron. Project management concepts are challenging and all the moreso when they’re organizational in nature. Perhaps the “E” in EPM should stand for “Effort required” instead of “Enterprise”.
It’s easy to want enteprise project management, it’s a little harder to get it. We talk to so many organizations that initially call for a project solution to their organizational problems but, when they find out what will be required of them to get it become less enthusiastic in a hurry. It makes us ask our prospective clients: Are you sure you want the cure for what ails you?
When you look at Olympic athletes, you can see how dedication and doing the work required can produce remarkable results. The same is true for those who take on creating an enterprise project management environment. Those who hope that results will just arrive at their door mostly miss out on the remarkable achievement that is possible when you accept the work that has to be done. Here’s a short article on acknowledging the work required in creating a project management environment.
It’s one of the hottest topics in the project management industry today. We spend so much time thinking about how to do projects that we sometimes forget about whether we should do the projectds in the first place. Here’s a short article on Project Portfolio Management.
One of the biggest and earliest challenges in implementing enterprise project management is defining the benefits to management. Talking about epm system features or the intricacies of your project management process is of little interest to management unless you can tie it to how this will impact the organization overall. This article looks at how to define the business benefits of epm.