Herding Cats

The Biggest Project Management Job in the World

There are several jobs titled "The Biggest Project/Program Management Job in the World" Admiral Craig Steidle - Associate Administrator, Exploration Systems Mission Directorate. Joint Strike Fighter Program Manager. The Exploration Mission Directorate Program Management Handbook is a "bible" for large... Read more →

More Silly Season

"As democracy is perfected, the office of president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last and the... Read more →

Agile Thinkers?

I was flatered and a bit taken aback when Clarke Ching asked if I'd like to be interviewed for his Agile Thinkers blog. The subtitle for that Blog is "great thinkers in the Agile community." Well that's news to me.... Read more →

Agile does Project Management for Real

Check out Joel's article on scheduling. We got: 100% completion criteria, just like IMP/IMS and Deliverable Based Planning, Measures of Physical Percent Complete, just ANS-748B Earned Value Decomposition of the work, just like MIL-STD 881A Tracking of effort versus value,... Read more →

Three Core Processes of Project Management

In a recent response, Lalit suggested the notion of "resource management," somehow demeans the human aspects of project management. That possibly PM should go to a Human behavior class before the PMP study class. While the "human element" is a... Read more →

Useful Project Management Quotes

Many times I'm sitting in a meeting or driving along thinking about projects I'm working on, or even better riding my bike far away from home and a thought comes to me about how to wrap up a complex concept... Read more →

A Little Book of f-Laws

Cleaning up my desktop tonight, I came across the "13 Common Sins of Management," by Russell Ackoff and Herbert Addison in a PDF file I received from somewhere unknown. The lower the rank of managers, the more they know about... Read more →

More Thoughts on Risk Management

I'm preparing a paper for the 2009 NASA PM Challenge conference. Walter Majerowicz is a constant contributor to the professional of project and program management. I finally met Walt at the PMI College of Scheduling conference this year. In a... Read more →

It's the Silly Season - Again

Unlike the British, we drag out the national elections until everyone (mostly) is simply worn out. The result seems to be that we become susceptible to professional messaging. Advertising works, otherwise they wouldn't spend money on it. Along the way... Read more →

Risk Management is How Adults Manage Projects

If your project management method does not start and end with Risk Management, you're whistling in the dark, hoping things will work out. Hope is not a strategy - hoping to get things done on time, on budget, on specification... Read more →