Herding Cats

What Activities Take Place During the Management of a Project?

When we speak about Project Management, Managing Projects or other combinations of those words - what is really going on? By going on, I mean the activities outside the writing of code, pouring of concrete, welding steel, assembling molecules into... Read more →

"Magic Beans" or credible alternatives

Please Note is this a Theory Discussion, sparked by a recent post about the soon to be revealed possession of "magic beans" of project management. There's a notion going around these days that the processes and practices of project management... Read more →

Avoiding Professional Amatuers

The notion the project management has a variety of definitions, approaches, and "theories" is popular these days. While those suggesting this are likely trained in their respective field along with the supporting practices in those fields if training - counseling... Read more →

Agile and PMI

Mike Cottmeyer's Blog has much to say about managing agile projects in the presence of more traditional project management methods. His post Power Shift presents ideas about simplicity. One item that struck me was Being agile means you accept input... Read more →

The Role of Project Management

In the morning paper (Longmont Times Call, a true home town paper), had a story about the US Census Office and their quest for an electronic census taking process. The initial budget was $11B - that billion with a B.... Read more →

Measuring Makes You Accountable

When I hear words like "measuring is too much work, we can't pay back the effort," the first thought is "the person really doesn't want to be held accountable. Measuring your performance in any way, connects the outcome with the... Read more →

Change Control? We Don't Need No Stinkin Change Control

The notion that change and managing this change is part or is not part of project management has many different faces. Change happens, so its a waste to plan - this is the popular "extremist" approach. Those who think having... Read more →

If it wasn't for "the last minute" nothing would get done

A common approach to "getting things done," in the project world is to do the work at the last minute. This is happening all the time on nearly all our projects. David Allen's Getting Things Done is a "must read"... Read more →

Set It and Forget It?

Hal MaComber and others make reference to a paper titled "Is the Theory of Project Management Obsolete?" ignoring for the moment that the paper itself may be obsolete, since it refers to the 1996 version of PMBOK, long before agile,... Read more →

Project Management is Systems Engineering

A recent opinion post on an electronic project management journal,conjectures that PMI centric project management processes are the primary source of project failure. This conjecture starts with the unsubstantiated hypothesis that Project Management Methods are Obsolete. Ignoring for the moment... Read more →

What does a Project Manager Do?

There's lots of discussion of late about the role of a Project Manager. Whether a Project Manager is needed in the agile world. Whether a Project Manager and Project Management is really a "directorial" role or a "coaching, personal guide?"... Read more →

The Never Ending Story - Part Two

Can someone be informed about the issues of project management in the absence of project management experience? What kind of project management experience you might ask? Oh how about project management where it's like the project that PMBOK talks about.... Read more →

The Never Ending Story

The Never Ending Story of "what value is a PMP" is being replayed on Projects@Work. While there are some real issues with the issuance of a certificate stating competency in any profession, the notion that somehow the Project Management Institutes... Read more →

Software Program Managers Network

I had the occasion to revisit the Software Program Managers Network site this week, looking for the software copies of the "Little Black, Yellow, Red and Brown," books. These are small (4x6) handbook on topics critically important to project managers,... Read more →

Some More Irreducable Truths of Project Management

In a recent site visit a discussion of "what are the absolute minimum" processes for managing projects came up again. Here's a list. There may be other lists, but this one is a good start for any "professional" approach to... Read more →