pmStudent

It’s said there are no new project management sins, just old ones repeated. It’s also said that we don’t learn the lessons from past projects and this must be true, otherwise why would we keep making the same old mistakes? Read more »

Project management as a whole has paralleled somewhat the changes we have witnessed in photography. Project management also has been a skill for the few, with the barrier to entry being quite high. However, the barriers are being reduced and the chance for abandoning “point and shoot” project management is here! Read more »

Projects are naturally networks of commitments. Learn how to bring reliability to your projects by paying attention to promising conversations. Read more »

In an article at Projects@Work, Tom Mochal discusses how enhancement work not directly related to a project should be added to the managed portfolio… Read more »

Anita Wotiz is the guest blogger this week over at the UCSC Extension in Silicon Valley Project Management blog. She published great post titled “An unrepeatable success?” Read it here.
It was great to hear about the project, specifically the lessons learned and trying to relate them to my own experience.
I wouldn’t write the first set [...] Read more »

Kimberly Wiefling had an article today on Projects@Work (www.projectsatwork.com) giving us a taste of some hard-learned lessons when dealing with project sponsors.
I’ve always loved Kimberly’s sense of humor and highly recommend just about anything she’s written. This is a great example of education a la entertainment. Check out her book too, you can [...] Read more »

Cutting’s Edge is one of my favorite project management blogs. Thomas recently posted on the cost of project success. I enjoyed the examples of the construction of several wonders of the world as projects and their often overlooked consequences on the project teams that built them.
Thomas draws out a parallel to contemporary projects, and [...] Read more »

Dave Garrett recently wrote on the concepts expressed by Aaron Shanhar in his book, Reinventing Project Management. The gist is that the common triple-constraint model of managing cost, schedule, and scope is not enough. As I like to put it and in Goldratt’s words, necessary but not sufficient.
I have not yet read Shanhar’s [...] Read more »

Lately I have been working on thinking about the best way to go about project planning, especially in terms of objectives and deliverables. Based on my experience at several companies and some independent research, here are my current thoughts on the subject.
Hierarchy
I’m fairly convinced that in most cases, this is an effective hierarchy to [...] Read more »

Matt Miller is a final year student at Loughborogh University in the UK. He is working on his dissertation on IT Project Failures, and would like your help!

There are 2 surveys below, one for ProjectManagers to complete with details of their most recent 3 projects since January 2005 and another questionnaire for anyone involved in [...] Read more »

I recently read a new book by Curt Finch, CEO of Journyx, Inc. titled “All Your Money Won’t Another Minute Buy - Valuing Time as a Business Resource.” I have always been a student of time management, so I was delighted with the opportunity to interview Curt about the book. Please enjoy the interview. Read more »

Today I was trying to think of ways to integrate some of the methods and benefits of Critical Chain project management into the traditional PM methodology most companies use. I wanted to pick out one element of CC that would potentially yield the most benefit without much, if any, additional overhead to the project [...] Read more »

I finally got a chance to read this month’s PM Network magazine. There is an article on keeping project team motivated that caught my attention starting on page 38, written by Simon Kent.
The article reminded me of a previous post I wrote back in February, 2007 titled Motivational Theory in Project Management where I [...] Read more »

Earlier I announced a contest for a free subscription to The Project Management PrepCast™. We have a winner!
There were only 2 comments where I could identify an email address, the rest of the comments left during the contest were anonymous. I flipped a coin, and Craig Brown is the lucky winner! Incidentally, [...] Read more »

This point speaks to the need for
(1) commitment from top management and
(2) commitment from everyone else in the organization.
Quality is everyone’s job, and if any implementation is not total, it will not fulfill its full potential.
In project management, I see this point alluding to executive formation and support of a company-wide Project Management Office. That [...] Read more »