The SAP/Oracle Choice re: Integration

With the release of SAP Business Suite 7, the debate about the SAP and Oracle integration strategies has heated up.  Loraine Lawson at IT Business Edge (here) uses two posts by Ray Wang (here) and Dan Woods (here), to contrast the two approaches. Of course, I agree with Lawson and Woods that the SAP approach is [...]

PM Quote of the Day — Arnold Palmer

The most rewarding things you do in life are often the ones that look like they cannot be done. 

Deming and Project Management

I liked this post (here) by Bob Tarne on how Deming’s 14 points align with project management (especially agile).  Our studies of  Deming, Crosby, and Goldratt were among the most valuable parts of business school. While we’re on Deming, I also believe that it is particularly important for initiative leaders to get their arms around his concept of [...]

PM Quote of the Day — Akio Morita

If you go through life convinced that your way is always best, all the new ideas in the world will pass you by. 

Manager-Leader Gap in IT Strategy

An illustration of the manager/leader gap discussed earlier (here) is drawn in this back-and-forth among Glenn Whitfield (here), Andrew Meyer (here), and others.  All good stuff, though the last two comments on Glenn’s post — from Long Huynh at CIO Assistant and Glenn himself — get closest to my perpsective. The idea that a CIO can perform [...]

PM Quote of the Day — Frank Capra

A hunch is creativity trying to tell you something. 

Isn’t a “disbenefit” really just a cost?

In a comment, Craig Brown at Better Projects asked me if disbenefits weren’t simply costs.   That was my first take as well, and disbenefits do indeed have costs (additional resources or forgone revenue).  After further thought, the “disbenefits” concept should be clearly differentiated from the concept of costs, which after all come along with every project. Disbenefit [...]

PM Quote of the Day — Chinese Proverb

He who asks a question is a fool for five minutes; he who does not ask a question remains a fool forever. 

How do you judge character?

I got an out of left field perspective during the Dalai Lama’s visit to MIT this past week.  He was asked about model leaders and [h]e singled out President George W. Bush for his straightforwardness, but stopped short on complimenting him for much else.  “I love him”, said the Dalai Lama of President Bush, “but [...]

Benefits vs. Disbenefits

As we build the value management components of the next generation of SAP methodologies, I’ve dug in to the program management standards of PMI and OGC.  One of our first principles is to ensure alignment with industry standards; however, for programs and value management we’ll need to mix and match. One example of a concept not [...]