Value Management and PMOs

I’ve been working on an initiative called “Value Delivery,” which will incorporate value management into our various PMO methods, tools, etc.  These activities are often listed as typical PMO functions, but this really only honored in the breach.  Value management never seems to take off given a PMO’s traditional emphasis on implementing project management methods, [...]

PM Quote of the Day — Harold Geneen

It is much more difficult to measure nonperformance than performance. 
Hat tip: Jonathan Becher at Manage By Walking Around.

WSJ Interview on “The Experience Trap”

FYI, a Wall Street Journal article (“Dangers of Clinging to Solutions of the Past”) based in part on interviews w/ yours truly came out today (link here, page B4 in the paper).  Thanks to Kishore Sengupta of INSEAD for pointing the WSJ my way and to Phred Dvorak of the WSJ for conveying the perils of [...]

Bridging the PM/Management Gap

I like the title of Sanjay Saini’s post on the lack of communication between project managers and senior management — “Make the Effort.” One can quibble with his specific suggestions, but his exhortation to communication more regularly, frequently,and transparently is right on:
Reviewing progress and profitability should not be something that waits until year’s end. [...]

What to do with MBOs?

After a round of performance reviews with my team, I’m so with Jonathan Becher about the pitfalls of management by objectives (here).  It is easy to fall into the vicious cycle he describes, where
MBOs that measure outputs, rather than impact, [which then] cause outputs to decrease. Which encourages more bad management by bad objectives.
Poor MBO [...]

Accountability for “soft stuff” deliverables

Per an earlier post (here), I have a bee in my bonnet about ”supporting” deliverables and how to measure their success.  The excellent comments from Glen and Stephen (here) pointed to the answer.  From Glen:
We are looking for cost savings, efficiencies, and other process improvements. This is the typical work flow process improvement approach. Extend that [...]

PM Quote of the Day — Florence Nightingale

Apprehension, uncertainty, waiting, expectation, fear of surprise, do a patient more harm than any exertion.
This quote resonates during these uncertain and surprising times.  Florence Nightingale was one of the first medical professionals to recognize that the mind and body work, or don’t work, together.  Her insight was not merely derived from anecdote.  She pioneered the use of statistics [...]

Not forgetting the talent that comes with an acquistion

Another post inspired by Mary Adams at the IC Knowledge Center, this time on value from M&A.  Her post (here) links to a roundtable discussion of intellectual capital issues from Mergers and Acquistions magazine (here).   Very interesting stuff…
However, I was quickly drawn to the article on page 60 about ensuring you get the most out of [...]

PMBOK 4th Edition — People Skills Appendix

I’m curious about what the updated PMBOK Guide will have to say in the new People Skills Appendix.  What it includes will set the baseline for the topic (BTW, I’m not expecting any earth-shaking inclusions or exclusions).  It is good that the PMBOK Guide to will start to address such an important topic in a greater degree [...]

Tom Peters: 80% good, 20% overboard

Tom Peters has a list on how to lead during what he calls “weird” times (post here, also read the comments here).  As always, he’s thought-provoking.  My biggest concern is that folks like to cherry-pick from Tom without understanding that the points in his “lists” often build on or reinforce each other. 
With that caveat, here is Tom’s list.  [...]