Basics: The SoftPMO Project Management Toolkit

Both the Toolkit’s Guidebook and its customizable Process Templates are based on the SoftPMO™ Project Management Model.

Achieve IT Governance by Adopting Good Practices

credit: Karbondiary

Good IT Governance Practice Enables:

• Leadership to ask the right questions and interpret the answers
• An appropriate IT governance framework to be adopted
• Critical success factors to be addressed by leadership

Focus Areas—Ask Questions—Get Answers

SoftPMO Project Execution Guide: Enterprise Edition

A Step-by-Step Guide to Executing Projects that Deliver Business Benefit

  by Michael Kaplan, PMP

Great ideas are often derailed from greatness as a result of a poor execution plan. This book on project management is organized in a well thought-out and easy to reference guideline. Users can increase their percentage for success by utilizing these proven methodologies and templates. This is a must read for those who want to move great ideas into successful outcomes!

  ~ Mitchel Laskey, CEO Brijot Imaging System

Measure IT Governance Performance

credit: Chong FeiGiap

Apply effective governance of IT and assess performance and identify precisely where and how improvements can be made—not just to the IT governance process itself but also to all processes that need to be managed within and around IT.

Define IT Governance Objectives and Measure Results

IT Governance: a Continuous Program of Improvement

A Primer on IT Governance

IT governance is "Specifying the decision rights and accountability framework to encourage desirable behavior in the use of IT.” 

~ Weill and Ross

IT Governance Delivers Value

Fundamentally, IT governance is concerned with IT’s delivery of value to the business and the mitigation of IT risks. Both are enabled by strategic alignment of IT with the business, and the availability of adequate resources. Management measures performance to monitor progress toward desired goals.

Development Plan for Internal IT Controls

Information Technology (IT) Governance

Monitor the internal control for IT related activities and identify improvement actions.

Hanged Man

Objectives

• Continuously monitor, benchmark, and improve the IT control environment and control framework to meet organizational objectives. 
• Monitor and evaluate the efficiency and effectiveness of internal IT managerial review controls. 
• Evaluate the completeness and effectiveness of management’s control over IT processes, policies and contracts through a continuing program of self-assessment. 

Industry Practice for Portfolio Prioritization

What is Project Portfolio Management?

Terror Zero

Project Portfolio Management is a way of evaluating an organization’s projects. It can be compared to an individual’s portfolio of investments. The organization identifies its business goals and objectives, and then selects project “investments” that will best enable it to achieve those goals. The organization “invests” in projects by allocating scarce resources to those projects. It can “sell” its investment by removing resources and ending the project. It realizes returns on its portfolio by achieving its strategic objectives through the successful completion of projects, according to time, budget and scope estimates. The project portfolio is a dynamic entity – projects are continually being proposed and completed, and resources are continually being allocated to and re-distributed among projects. Like a stock market “ticker,” project data must be current to enable managers to make timely and effective decisions.

~ Michael Kaplan, Doug DeCarlo, Kathryn Mathias - May 1999

Mobilization and Planning of Programs

Made Quarterly

An actionable approach for planning the work needed to mobilize and initiate a large program.

Executed in a linear path, with later activities leveraging outcomes produced by earlier work efforts.

Work includes implementing a governance structure, support office with the acquisition and build-out of facilities, tools, infrastructure, and technical environment. Also includes program and project planning, and establishment of financial controls and guidelines.

Get Commitment Prior to Mobilizing the Program

Program Definition and Commitment

Filibusteras by Carlos Buendia

Most of the work effort to begin a program is associated with the activities related to mobilization, which includes documenting program governance, understanding the scope and boundaries, defining resource plans, and creating an outline to manage financials.

All of this planning requires strategic inputs to get started, which are the outputs of the business strategy process.

As the program is defined, and the scope of work is agreed to, the programs constituent parts are analyzed and verified against the businesses strategy. A justification process assesses proposed work to ensure it is necessary and will contribute to overall success of the business. Finally, programs and their projects are identified, and scoped and authorization is given to start the mobilization work.

Use this Technique to Implement and Manage a Program

Credit: Jason Greenberg

Purpose of Program Management

To provide a smart approach to enable a business’s strategy to be planned and executed through the effective execution and implementation of the changes in business operations.

Program management is the organized and coordinated management of projects designed to achieve a business goals and objectives.

Program Management Practice and Framework

Enable a business’s strategy to be delivered through the proper and effective implementation of the changes in business operations.

Program management is the organized and coordinated management of more than one project to achieve a set of business objectives. It involves maintaining the program of projects, related to the portfolio, by determining, ascertaining, assessing, ordering, choosing, initiating, managing and controlling projects.

Accelerating Project Start-up

The definitive workshop for ensuring that your project gets off to the right start

  

Forest by Jeff Langevin

Getting a project set-up, staff engaged and running is challenging. Why is it challenging? New people are joining the team, they need to figure-out how to work together; space, facilities and services have to be arranged. How does SoftPMO help? We get you focused early in the project on documenting ‘how the project gets managed’, and then engage the team to use the new processes.

At the completion of the Accelerating Project Start-up workshop, participants know how to start-up projects and have access to tools for getting the job done.

How to Set-up the Project Office

The most comprehensive course for starting-up the Project Office

Jules Julien

This workshop, customized to fit the requirements of individual projects, helps project managers to set-up a project support office to oversee one project, or multiple projects. It is intended for organizations that need to rapidly deliver projects to meet business objectives. It is also intended for project managers who have experience managing their own projects and who now must oversee a group of projects.

The output of this workshop is a project management system for the project office, with active project files, customized to meet the unique needs of the project. Participation in this workshop also provides 1 year online access to the SoftPMO Project Management Toolkit.

Using SharePoint for a Project Work Site

The Project Work Site, aka the virtual Project Management Office (PMO), is used by the project team and key project stakeholders to manage the project--it holds the project management system and contains the project management processes, guides, templates and artifacts.

Glossary of Terms

What is Project Portfolio Management?

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The term "portfolio" is derived from the mutual fund industry. Owning mutual fund shares is fairly common, so most readers should be able to understand this idea easily.

Morgan Stanley's Dictionary of Financial Terms, describes a "portfolio" as:

Portfolio

If you own more than one security, you have an investment portfolio. You build the portfolio by buying additional stocks, bonds, mutual funds, or other investments. Your goal is to increase the portfolio's value by selecting investments that you believe will go up in price.

Manage customer expectations

And We Shall Be Luminous Again

Get it in writing to avoid misunderstanding project objectives and requirements.

Good practice is to understand and document the project scope. Do your best to confirm customer expectations and needs are aligned. It’s in everyones best interest to ensure the project definition is approved in writing.

Always provide stakeholder's with a written statement of the work which defines the scope and benefits for the project. Make sure there is a common understanding so there is minimal room for differences later on down the road.

Get approval and sign-off on each deliverable

Tristram Lansdowne.

Keep project and organization goals aligned

Approve and communicate the start of each new project phase. Make the start of new work contingent upon acceptance and approval of the previous phase.

Validate priorities before project execution

Ensure the sponsor agrees to approval points for overlapping phases.

Implement a Project Management Framework

Credit: Money confetti collage

Increase project success. 

Reduce work effort to implement project activities. Improve communications, work and progress reporting. Provide a standardized approach for managing projects.

Establish a project management framework that defines the scope and boundaries of managing projects and the method to use for each project undertaken.

Get Inspired!

QuotesEverlasting.com

I get inspiration from just about anywhere I look. From enjoying the beach, to reading, here is some information about Albert Einstein who gives me very much inspiration.

Albert Einstein

"Albert Einstein ( /ˈælbərt ˈaɪnstaɪn/; German: [ˈalbɐt ˈaɪnʃtaɪn] ( listen); 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German theoretical physicist who developed the theory of general relativity, effecting a revolution in physics. For this achievement, Einstein is often regarded as the father of modern physics. Einstein is generally considered the most influential physicist of the 20th century.

Mentoring Can Improve Project Success

http://www.resourcesystemsconsulting.com

GOOD MENTORING can improve project success

A mentor is a "wise and trusted counselor or teacher." ~ reference.com

According to Wikipedia, "In Greek mythology, Mentor (Greek: Μέντωρ / Méntōr; gen.: Μέντορος) was the son of Alcimus or Anchialus or Heracles and Asopis. In his old age Mentor was a friend of Odysseus who placed Mentor and Odysseus' foster-brother Eumaeus in charge of his son Telemachus, and of Odysseus' palace, when Odysseus left for the Trojan War.

Motivation Skills for Leaders

Master these skills to motivate people and lead great teams that perform.

"Teams should be able to act with the same unity of purpose and focus as a well motivated individual."

  ~ Bill Gates

Project Managers everywhere want effective teams that are focused, and committed to the project objectives. A great team like this will perform and deliver results!

People Don't Like Change

"Managing change means managing people's fear. Change is natural and good, but people's reaction to change is unpredictable and irrational. It can be managed if done right."

 ~ F. John Reh

"For all those who hate change, especially when it comes to Google+ or any social network, +Lamarr Wilson has your back. I love how he asks Google to let him have some blackspace, just, well, you have to watch to see why. " ~ Robert Scoble

What if Project Managers had Mandatory Counseling?

"Good morning, Bruce. Have a seat. I understand you are a project manager and you may be experiencing some job-related stress."

"Yeah, I guess so."

"Tell me about your job. What does a project manager do?"

Why Project Management Training is Important

"The key to organizational success is performance excellence. Making sure that every department and every person in your organization is working in the most effective and efficient manner."

 ~  Business Improvement Architects

Think Like a Pro and Act like One

If you want to pretend you're a Pro, then starting acting like one

 ~ by Glenn B. Alleman

"On our roads we come across all sorts of riders. The pros and the development teams, young guns working on getting picked for the development teams, tri-athelets on their tr-bikes, weekend riders, casual riders."

Leadership Style Makes a Difference

"The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint to keep from meddling with them while they do it."

Tell a Story with Your Dashboard

Portfolio Snapshot: Monthly Metrics in PowerPoint

When dealing with many projects, developing metrics for storytelling is important; especially the right metrics.

Using dashboards really helps. Creating dashboards can be challenging. This dashboard provides focus on trends occurring in areas such as risk, cost, and resources.

Project Management Performance Metrics

Project management charts help stakeholders visualize trends.

The charts in this post are generated in real-time (a feature of SkyDrive), and developed using Microsoft Excel. To download the file used to create the charts for this post, click on the Excel icon (chart footer), or get it here!

Issue Tracking System for Project Management

Issue list and form

An issue is a matter of concern on a project and the Issue document describes the issue.

The issue list is the log of issues that have occurred during the life of the project and that required recording. The issue log is needed to assess the status of issues.

The examples shown below use files hosted on Microsoft SkyDrive and Google Drive.

SkyDrive and Google Docs Public Files

The SkyDrive files located here, are used in the following posts:

 - Implement Issue Tracking System

 - Visualize Requirements in Real-time

 - Use a Dashboard to Tell a Story

Get the Google Drive files here

Introduction to the Project Management Toolkit

What does the Toolkit do?

Based on the SoftPMO Project Management Process Model, the SoftPMO Project Management Toolkit helps both first-time and experienced project managers accelerate and improve their project planning, project management, and team collaboration efforts.

To learn about the Model and how it drives the Toolkit, go here.

Eclipse Process Authoring Tool

The Eclipse Process Framework (EPF) supports developing and producing customizable process and comes with exemplary tools. It’s a complete solution, open source and free.

The EPF solution includes a tool for authoring and comes with a small library of methods targeted at agile software development needs. Methods can be tailored to suit site specific needs then published to a website. The tool suite can be used to author new methods too.

Using DITA XML to Produce Technical Publications

A challenge faced by many organizations is their inability to reuse common content to produce multiple output formats.

We create, assemble and distribute content to a large audience of users— this information might be technical methods, service materials, user guides, proposals, policies, books, CDs or Web pages.

We have systems in place for authoring, producing and delivering our critical information. But there’s room for improvement in our content life-cycle—we can cut costs, clean up processes, produce quality deliverables, and reduce the resource load on IT.