New PM Articles for the Week of September 8 – 14

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Balloon Over the WallNew project management articles published on the web during the week of September 8 – 14. We give you a high-level view so you can read what interests you. Recommended:

PM Best Practices

  • Glen Alleman summarizes the Government Accounting Office’s findings on the root cause of the HealthCare.gov website problems. “Ineffective planning and oversight …”
  • Bruce Benson also reviews the problems identified by the GAO and comes to a different conclusion: they need brutal honesty in order to establish realistic expectations.
  • Russell Whitworth says the key to successful projects is to identify success criteria, and then monitor and manage to them.
  • Michel Dion articulates three keys to project management: identify the intended results, be decisive, and take action.
  • Harry Hall helps us get past the terminology gap, between what we know about project management and what our sponsors and stakeholders don’t
  • Johanna Rothman explores the relationship between cost, value, and investment for portfolio management in a new series.
  • Henny Portman shares an article on building a project portfolio prioritization model, to be part of his upcoming book.
  • Mike Griffiths has a few suggestions for managing the Millenials, in the modern world of frequent job changes and unrealistic expectations.
  • Kerry Wills touts the virtues of planning a schedule from left to right; in other words, calculating the end date, rather than having one imposed as a constraint.
  • Elizabeth Harrin reviews Glip, a project collaboration site with instant messaging and some interesting integrations with other commonly used tools.

Agile Methods

  • Shim Marom shares the slide deck from his Australia PMI conference presentation, “Transform Yourself From Traditional to Agile Project Manager.”
  • Dave Prior constructs a self-assessment tool for “recovering PM’s” who are embracing Agile, and want to measure their progress. “Recovering?” Egad …
  • Mike Cohn explains that the primary benefits of story points is a standardized measure of effort, independent of the skill level of the programmer.
  • Meghana Niranjan presents Poka-Yoke 101, or for us non-Japanese speakers, an introduction to mistake proofing. The examples are more than enough reason to read this.
  • Aby League clarifies how the Pomodoro Technique works, and how such a personal time management approach can fit in with Agile teams.
  • John Goodpasture assigns ownership of delivering the value described in the business case to the product manager.

Following the Trends

  • Janet Wagner provides a current-state view of cognitive computing and identifies several companies producing cognitive apps.
  • Zach Watson sees opportunity for project management in the Internet of Things.
  • Peter Saddington reports on research linking social collaboration and the evolution of brain size.
  • Bertrand Duperrin interviews Manuel Diaz on the intersection of the customer experience and digital models.
  • Kailash Awati interviews organization psychologist Dr. Neil Preston on exchanging the hero myth for an ethical approach to organizational change management.

Podcasts and Videos

  • Venkatesh Krishnamurthy shares a video from Masaaki Imai, founder of the Kaizen Institute, on continuous improvement across the organization. Just 5 minutes, safe for work.
  • Cesar Abeid interviews Shawn Dickerson of AtTask on the future of project management, and re-connects with Farnoosh Brock. Just 35 minutes, safe for work.
  • Cornelius Fichtner interviews Joan Vincent on how the Wideman Education Foundation develops project management skills in young people. Just 25 minutes, safe for work.
  • Margaret Meloni expands on her last post, on strategic reserve time, to show how to avoid starting off behind schedule. Just 7 minutes, safe for work.

Enjoy!