Tag Archives: PMO

New PM Articles for the Week of July 3 – 9

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New project management articles published on the web during the week of July 3 – 9. And this week’s video: Scott Wadsworth and Cy Swan revive the old American tradition of shooting an anvil into the air on Independence Day. Just three minutes, safe for work.

Must read!

  • Joanna Plucinska reports that the G20 will collaborate with the private sector to fight terrorism online.
  • Anshu Sharma describes Amazon as “the company with 100 CEOs” and explains why that model lets them do anything. Anything.
  • Deepali Uppal explores coming trends in organizational structure. It’s not just Holocracy.

Established Methods

  • John Goodpasture explains the concept of “the most valuable milestone” and why we should protect it.
  • Leigh Espy provides a decision guide for choosing between Agile methods and detailed planning methods, based on characteristics of the project and the team. Sorry, I can’t bring myself to use the epithet “waterfall.”
  • Stuart Easton contemplates the most common complaint from PMOs: “We have too many projects!”
  • Kerry Wills describes that annual corporate game of gambling and bluffing: Budget Poker.
  • Lynda Bourne uses the Sydney Opera House as an example of a project that may or may not have been successful, depending on what success criteria you use.
  • Harry Hall details three of his favorite techniques for identifying risks.

Agile Methods

  • Stefan Wolpers curates his weekly Agile content list, from hiring Scrum Masters, to applying the Theory of Constraints to Agile, to a list of 113 mental models.
  • Mike Cohn share a few recommendations for your summer reading list (and leaves the door open for commenters to add their recommendations).
  • Puja Nigam describes the current state of the quality manager role in an Agile world.
  • Ryan Ripley shares an audio recording of his Advanced Scrum presentation at the Path to Agility conference in Ohio. About an hour and twenty minutes, safe for work.

Applied Leadership

  • Jesse Lynn Stoner makes the case against team alignment.
  • Elise Stevens interviews Mike Clayton on the importance of building resilience in advance of running into challenges. Just 19 minutes, safe for work.
  • Suzanne Lucas tells how to manage people you don’t like.
  • Richard Lannon explains why coaching skills should be part of your professional development plan.

Technology, Techniques, and Human Behavior

  • Elle Mirman summarizes the top five trends found in Crayon’s analysis of the top 1,000 landing pages.
  • David Pierce updates us on why and how we need to protect our phones from exploits.
  • Adam Shostack points out the potential commercial impact of the Presidential Advisory Commission’s commitment to release voter data (including the last four of SSN) to the public.
  • Shannon Kempe reveals the most popular posts published by Dataversity in the first half of 2017.

Working and the Workplace

  • Elizabeth Harrin recaps the “four sins of meetings” described by Gerry Lewis in his book, “Shine.”
  • Lisette Sutherland interviews Lily Snyder, COO at Doghead Simulations, on their new virtual reality collaboration software for remote teams. Just 37 minutes, safe for work.
  • Art Petty explains why (and how) we should remove the negative influences from our life and career.

Enjoy!

New PM Articles for the Week of April 17 – 23

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New project management articles published on the web during the week of April 17 – 23. And this week’s video: Carl T. Bergstrom and Jevin West introduce their new 1 credit hour course at the University of Washington on Calling Bullshit. Eight minutes, and I could say it was safe for work, but I’d be full of shit.

Must read!

  • Joseph Kelly makes the case that the role of the Entrepreneur is to create new Truths. And along the way, some of these Truths may not be absolute. It’s about creation, not morality. Read this with an open mind and be prepared to come back to it later.
  • Will Knight points out a problem with Deep Learning artificial intelligence applications: since they learned by observing human behavior, we can’t explain how they make decisions.
  • Michael O’Brochta explains how sunk costs, groupthink, escalation of commitment, and conflicts of interest make failing projects so hard to kill.

Established Methods

  • Robert Wysocki elaborates on the co-manager model for complex projects, where a product manager and a process manager collaborate to lead a combined team.
  • Harry Hall catalogs some actions we can take to recognize and reward our project teams.
  • Elise Stevens interviews Hans Arnbjerg on how the PMO can help project managers engage with their stakeholders.
  • Mike Clayton a list of 22 excellent project management podcasts—“[some] extinct, some dormant, and some highly active.”
  • Alex Puscasu looks at the potential upside of integrating Scrum into Prince2.
  • Lew Sauder uses the Fitbit as an introduction to measures of project health: one metric does not tell a meaningful story.

Agile Methods

  • Stefan Wolpers curates his weekly round-up of Agile content, from the C-suite’s fondness for Big Bangs to what we can learn from the customer service debacle at United Airlines, to the Museum of Failure.
  • Jordan Koschel explains how to deal with design debt. Like technical debt, only more visible to your user community.
  • Anurag Prakash takes a critical look at the way burn-downs are used in practice. Let project structure drive your choice of metrics.
  • The Clever PM interviews one of his mentors, Rich Mironov. Based on this interview, I’m now following Rich’s blog.
  • Jesse Fewell addresses the question: where is the project manager role in Agile methods? Just 7 minutes, safe for work.
  • Ryan Ripley interviews Lisa Crispin and Amitai Schleier on the fine art of co-presenting at conferences, co-writing books, and Agile testing. Just 44 minutes, safe for work.

Applied Leadership

  • Glen Alleman identifies seven key behaviors that can be found in a weak leader.
  • Coert Visser examines the difference between (benign) admiration and (malicious) envy and how each motivates us.
  • Jayath Jayarathna guides us through managing subject matter experts.
  • Elizabeth Harrin interviews Karen Chovan, project manager and advocate for clean, lean, and green solutions.

Technology, Techniques, and Human Behavior

  • Naomi Caietti explains the six emotional intelligence behaviors and skill sets necessary for project and program managers.
  • John Goodpasture shares his FAQ on systems engineering.
  • Brendan Toner lists his ten most useful iPad apps. I have five of them on my iPad and similar apps for four of the others. And we both drink Bushmills, so there’s that.

Working and the Workplace

  • Ron Rosenhead notes a survey of workers in various professions that found only the legal profession is more boring that project management. Statisticians and journalists didn’t make the list, which makes it somewhat suspect …
  • Andy Kaufman interviews author Amy Blankson on the strategies we can use to stay productive and happy when surrounded by interactive tech. Just 49 minutes, safe for work.
  • Lisette Sutherland interviews Jerry Koch-Gonzales on the practice of Sociocracy in group meetings. Just 38 minutes, safe for work.

Enjoy!

New PM Articles for the Week of February 20 – 26

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New project management articles published on the web during the week of February 20 – 26. And this week’s video: Jason Fried lays out his theory of why the office isn’t a good place to get work done, and some suggestions that address the cause of that conundrum.

Must read!

  • Bryan Menegus reports on the latest massive leak of passwords and personally identifiable information. Change all of your passwords and then read the details.
  • Mark Rice and Timothy Korson explain how to apply Malcolm Gladwell’s “thin slice” expert opinion approach and Planning Poker to estimate timeline and budget.
  • Michael Lopp tells how to win the “Successfully deliver hard news” merit badge.

Established Methods

  • Johanna Rothman suggests several scenarios that let you report defects based on the risks that arise from them.
  • Matthew Heminger illustrates the consulting power of Why with a story about a hole in the ground.
  • Rob England explains that #NoProjects doesn’t mean there won’t be any projects, just that it won’t be the primary mode of operation in IT.
  • Harry Hall links quality of requirements to quality of the outcome with a simple anecdote.
  • Dmitriy Nizhebetskiy provides a short textbook and video on creating a robust work breakdown structure. Even the full online course is free.
  • Mike Clayton tutors us on the project business case. Even if you’re not using Prince2, this is a great explanation of an important business practice.
  • Eamonn McGuinness just published the second edition of The Collaborative Project Management Handbook.
  • Karthik Subburaman lists eight excellent books on project management and related skills.
  • The nice folks at Smartsheet posted The Complete Glossary of Project Management Terminology.

Agile Methods

  • Stefan Wolpers curates his weekly links to Agile content, including the brilliant jerks who make Agility impossible, slicing user stories, prototyping, and more.
  • Ryan Ripley interviews Tom Cagley on the role and impact that certifications have had on the Agile movement.
  • Paul Culmsee reports from Creative Melbourne, where he was one of the inaugural speakers. Sounds like an interesting group of smart people being fascinating.
  • Max Ogle interviews Irene Au, design partner at Khosla Ventures and former head of design at Google and Yahoo, on the need to base designs on what people actually do.

Applied Leadership

  • Magi Graziano defines three tenets of leadership IQ: self-awareness, executive brain function, and response agility.
  • Seth Godin explains why we do what’s urgent, rather than what’s important.
  • The Clever PM contemplates the human factors that make people resist behavioral change.
  • Leigh Espy interviews Kane Hadley, who says that his foundational experience in project management came from playing Dungeons and Dragons.

Technology and Techniques

  • Kailash Awati tutors us on the basics of machine learning. Yes, there’s more to it than regression analysis.
  • Conner Forrest summarizes a recent report on the technical hurdles facing artificial intelligence based on machine learning.
  • Paramita Ghosh reports on one of Hitachi’s machine learning initiatives: the Robot Boss. Hitachi claims an 8% productivity increase in enterprise IT functions. No word on how much of that was attributable to fewer meetings.
  • Hussain Bandukwala begins a short series for the first-time PMO leader on setting up the PMO.
  • Elizabeth Harrin reviews a new on-line training course created by Philip R. Diab, a former Chair of PMI, called RapidStart PMO.

Enjoy!