How Project Managers Can Use “Because” Justification
The skill of persuasion is a key tool in a project manager’s tool belt. Learn a counterintuitive trick – uncomfortable to put into practice and yet proven and very powerful!
Dealing with the Downside of Choices in Project Management
Having choices is both good and bad – and therein we find the challenge for a PM to differentiate between the two sides of choice and guide things forward accordingly. So how is it that a PM can manage the plethora of choices on a project and deal with the paradox of choice?
The Concept of Reversion to Mean in Project Management
People rely on project managers to fix problems and keep things on track. As a result, they are action oriented, anticipating problems and acting proactively. This is admirable, responsible and accountable behavior, but there is a risk.
The Downside of Respecting Authority in Project Management
There is a flipside to respecting authority. If ignored, it can provide a perilous blind spot in our thinking and lead to potentially harmful decisions. We need to temper the goodness of respecting authority with the perils of putting our projects at risk by overreliance on authority.
How to Motivate Project Team Members
Many things motivate people, but we often think of financial motivators first. However, the opportunity to do something that matters, to help people and to grow as a person motivates people. Indeed, there is a whole spectrum of motivators for every situation.
Experience Bias in Project Management
Experience bias involves overextending the lessons learned from our experiences.This article focuses on how to most effectively apply and how to avoid misapplying our experience-based knowledge.
Countering Social Loafing as a Project Manager
Working in teams has become part of the daily fabric of work in professional environments today. Does the effect of social loafing mean that we are doomed to decreasing efficiency, or is there a better way to manage teams with due respect to the social loafing effect?
Overcoming Availability Bias in Project Management
In a world awash with information, it is a challenge to distinguish between the useful and useless, the relevant and irrelevant, the complete picture and the incomplete picture. Learn how to best avoid negative effects and make sure you have good data to make a sound decision.
How Project Performance Measurement and Evaluation Help You Succeed
The perceived success of anything is in large part determined by how it is measured. In addition, there is the matter of tracking where you are on the way to where you are going. Learn more about the value of metrics in any project.
Successfully Resourcing a Project
Having a properly resourced project can absolutely make the difference between project success and ultimate project failure. Indeed, inadequate resources can bring down even the most promising undertakings. Learn more about the importance of having adequate resources.
What Is Success in Project Management?
Why is it that some projects are more likely to succeed than others are? Does one have a good process and the other not? Is one just a good project…and the other not? Let’s explore how your vision of what project success is up front is critical.
Defining the Scope of a Project for Project Management Success
Although several factors determine a project’s success (or failure), having a clearly defined scope is the first essential step and perhaps the most important. Learn more about why defining the project is so significant to a winning outcome.
Budget Constraints of Government Project Management
Government projects must often include pay based on time spent and typically not on performance. The project manager must ensure that there is no favoritism in the expenditure of funds.
Legacy Requirements in Government Project Management
Maintaining systems that support legacy processes remains important for a much longer period than in private industry. This drastically increases the complexity of government projects, and pushes efficiency down the list of priorities.
Process and Compliance Constraints in Government Project Management
This article examines process and compliance constraints, which are typically a hurdle in any large enterprise, but even more so in the public sector. These constraints have a very important purpose: to control fraud, waste, abuse and mismanagement.
Constraint Challenges When Working in Government Project Management
On government projects, scope is constrained because it is not as open-ended at the beginning as in the private sector. This article looks at how a constrained scope is a unique and challenging aspect of project management in the government sector.
What is the Project Portfolio Management Process (PPM)?
This article dives into on the practice of portfolio management applied to a portfolio of projects. It examines whether a well-managed portfolio of projects is more valuable than the sum of the value of each project.
Managing a Portfolio of Businesses
This article investigates the application of portfolio management to a grouping of businesses, driving home what the elements of Portfolio Management are, examining whether a well-managed portfolio of businesses is more valuable than the sum of the value of each business.
Defining Product Portfolio Management
This article investigates the application of portfolio management to a grouping of products, driving home the elements of portfolio management .The product strategy is the initial driver and portfolio management is the practice of executing that strategy for the specific grouping of products.
How Does Portfolio Management Apply to Managing Investments?
Portfolio Management is managing a coordinated grouping according to a well-defined strategy. As such, managing a portfolio of investments is much like managing a portfolio of projects. This article investigates the application of portfolio management to investments.
