Project Management News
Performing a Project Premortem
Projects fail at a spectacular rate. One reason is that too many people are reluctant to speak up about their reservations during the all-important planning phase. By making it safe for dissenters who are knowledgeable about the undertaking and worried about its...
Three Imperatives for Good Project Managers
We all have good ideas. The hard part is making them happen. HR departments love handing out worksheets on how to plan your time. Management gurus have written hundreds of pages of advice on how to better manage your week, your day, and your hour. But what happens...
6 big Project Management predictions for 2016…
It was predicted that the Agile methodology would grow in the IT field. In a VersionOne study published earlier this year, 2013-2014 saw an 84% jump in new Agile adopters. That number likely continued to grow (we’re going to have to wait for their newest study to...
Rules of Project Management
It takes one woman nine months to have a baby. It cannot be done in one month by nine women. Nothing is impossible for the person who doesn't have to do it. You can con a sucker into committing to an impossible deadline, but you cannot con him into meeting it. At the...
A Review of 3 Project Management Horror Stories & Lessons Learned
Success in project management requires a continuous stream of successfully managed projects. But even the best companies, with the most mature project management processes can stumble. So read the following horror stories and learn a few useful...
Cats in neck-ties: PMO Killers!
This is a discussion is about how the PMO is really just the custodian of a portfolio. The only reason a project portfolio exists is to deliver on business goals, and so the portfolio really belongs to "the business". But in most organizations there is little...
Six Things All Project Managers Should Do
1. Learn to Communicate at All Levels. Communication is key to a successful project completion, and learning how to communicate comfortably with executives, team members, and shareholders is considered the top-needed skill for project managers. PMs need to be able to...
7 Habits of Highly Funny Project Managers
Why are there people who are funnier than the rest of us? What makes them different? Oh sure, some people are just born funny. Some just have a natural way of saying things that’s funny. Some may look funny while others talk funny. After twenty plus years of teaching...
THE LIGHTER SIDE OF PROJECT MANAGEMENT
Top 10 Signs You're a Project Manager 10. Becoming tired of having a social life beyond work. 9. Spending hours planning and re-planning a Friday night out. 8. Thinking Rommel would have been more effective if he'd used a Gantt chart. 7. Using so much jargon...
Is your leadership team a team of leaders or a group of managers?
This sounds like a dumb question but when I look back on the number of executive and leadership teams we’ve worked with in organisations it’s clear to me that in many instances the members of those teams were technically competent, and nice people, but not great...
The Best 6 Project Management Secrets You Need to Know
While there have been many and many books written on the subject of project management, there is no sure-fire procedure or equation to get it right. Of course, that also explains why there are so many books on it. Well, we’ll cut to the chase and lay out six project...
70% of Executives not engaged; a PMO wake-up call
My brain just melted. Or exploded. Or both. According to recent PMI research, 70% of the time, senior executives are not engaged in the project prioritization process. Now this just blows my little brain to pieces and here’s why. Why this statistic blows my mind...