Herding Cats

Compendium of Works to Increase Probability of Project Success

This collection of presentations, briefings, journal and conference papers, essays, and book content has been used to increase the Probability of Project Success (PoPS) written and applied over my career in the software-intensive system of systems and other business and... Read more →

PMP or Not To PMP

Shim has asked a question - a recurring question - about having a PMP. Since everyone is selling all the time - it's part of being human. There are those in the community that encourage a PMP. There are those... Read more →

What's Missing from Project Management in IT

The management of IT projects is usually based on PMBOK or a similar framework. The projects start with "requirements" and add all the common processes and their outcomes. There may be a business cases, but requirements are the first step... Read more →

We Have Found The Enemy and He is Us

In working a project to produce a Balanced Scorecard for a public agency built around ITIL V3 I've come to an understanding I did not possess before. In executing this project, we apply our Deliverables Based Planning® project management method.... Read more →

Project Management Day

I try NOT to read blogs that use bad PM practices as their starting point. But I just could not control myself this time. I was responding a comments and made a new post on "Black Swans."This types of post... Read more →

PMI Virtual Communities

PMI has moved to Virtual Communities, away for the standalone organizations of the past. What ever their reasoning, it doesn't matter. I voted against the VC move for College of Performance Management, but we went there anyway. Now that VC's... Read more →

Fort Worth PMI Chapter and Symposium

I had the pleasure of speaking at the Fort Worth Texas PMI Chapter meeting and two sessions of the PMI Symposium this June. Here's the material Fort Worth Chapter Meeting PMI chapter meeting (v4) Symposium: Immutable Principles of Project Management... Read more →

PMBOK, Agile, and Some Tips

Mike Griffith's has got me thinking about PMBOK®, the Agile software development processes and a general notion of "what to do." Alec Satin has a nice "electronic book" of 72 tips for project managers. Please subscribe for some useful information.... Read more →

Connecting the Dots to PMBOK

Rarely, if ever, is the conversation around agile and its relation with project management processes set in a domain and a context in that domain. It's time to reset the conversation with the just those items. To establish the "rules... Read more →

PM Network Article versus Reality

An article is the current PM Network, A Closer Look: Excel Energy, Boulder, Colorado, USA, describes the smart grid revolution and its deployment in Boulder. While there are many interesting aspects of the project. At $100 million, the project ambitious... Read more →

Putting PMBOK To Work

The discussion around PMBOK and Agile has been discussed here in the past. A Simple Way to Put PMBOK to Work speaks to how each Knowledge Area can be applied to general purpose projects management paradigms. The answers to each... Read more →

PMBOK is NOT a Method - Part Deux

After some conversations around what PMBOK is or is not, let's have a quick review starting with PMBOK's words. On Page 4 of PMBOK Version 4. As a foundational reference, this standard is neither complete nor all-inclusive. This standard is... Read more →

PMBOK is NOT a Methodology

The conversation around agile Software Development and PMBOK come back again. Bas de Baar and others have echoed some posts with this idea that PMBOK should be compared with software development processes, specifically Agile Software Development methods. Please, everyone, please... Read more →

PMI-CPM Spring Conference

Headed home from PMI's College of Performance Management (CPM) Spring conference in Naples Florida. I gave three papers, one solo, one with another persopn, and one with three of us doing a "role playing" skit of a Program Manager, Government... Read more →

OK, Now I'm Annoyed

PMI just announced a new publication Project Management Circa 2025. What a great idea. Something to read and contemplate when mired in the details of getting a "bad" project back on baseline in the middle of the night. But wait,... Read more →