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Started Jun. 20, 2008
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Project "Post Mortems" ... What are your experiences?
Project "Post Mortems" (sometimes called "Lessons Learned" discussions) are a great way to improve your own or your organization's project management (PM) skills and results. The idea is that at the end of a project you get everyone together and look back on what happened... the good, the bad, things needing improving, and so on. Typically, this is a structured session (sometimes facilitated by someone outside the project team) that is based on a set of questions that project team members take t… Continue
Posted on June 20, 2008 at 1:25am —
The "Accidental Project Manager" ... Are You One?
I interact with lots of newcomers to project management (PM) either as attendees in my workshops and as visitors to my website (www.michaelgreer.com). Unfortunately, I find a lot of them are feeling pressure to become certified, mostly as a PMP (project mgt. professional) from the Project Mgt. Institute (PMI) and sometimes from the European PRINCE2 certification. Frankly, I sometimes feel sorry for these folks and a little irritated on their behalf that they can't simply enjoy their new PM respo… Continue
Posted on June 20, 2008 at 1:00am — 2 Comments
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I have been an engineering manager for 20 plus years and have recently started my MBA program at Kent State. I am currently working at GE. I have a 30 page report to complete in the next the week on the subject of Project Portfolio Management (PPM) with emphasis on IT. First I want ask your permission to reference your work (with full credits) in my report. Second on the subject, I had a few questions. Project manage is not a stranger to me but the formal twist of project portfolio management is somewhat new. In engineering are project management programs are always tied to the company’s strategic metrics. What I am learning and would have to agree on is that has not been the case for IT. IT seems to have developed a vocabulary regarding project management. I am trying to understand the term “IT governance” and how it relates to PPM. Other areas of interest are the time required to implement PPM, the training requirements and benefits and risk associated with PPM. Anything you can offer will be deeply appreciated. I plan to share your web site with the other 24 students in my class. Again, thank you for all your hard work there people in this flat world who care and listens.
David
I see you live in LA. Cool. I lived in North County San Diego for a year (starving artist), and it was awesome. I lived two blocks from the water, and I miss that.
Have a great week, and thanks again!
Your suggestion about vision is great. Nice and simple. Our company's purpose is very easy to believe in (helping kids learn) but sometimes profit-making and time spent feverishly pumping out deliverables ex nihilo tends to eclipse our view of why we do what we do. So, a brainstorming session about company vision would probably do us a lot of good.
A few months ago I was tasked with learning Microsoft Project and putting our "projects" (which at that time were really just a jumbled bucketful of tasks) into it. I did that, and found that our resources were too few and the projects too many. So I said "can we put these in order of importance?" and I was told that "they are all equally important." Ha ha, very funny. What do you suggest as a remedy for this? Is it a mindset issue or a workflow issue or what? Also, we have a project lifecycle in place which is pretty good - but I'm confused as to the difference between that and a "white paper."
One more thing: how do you deal with your team all talking at the same time during meetings? This is epidemic in our business culture.
Please take your time responding to all my many many questions, I know you must be busy. Thanks again!