Facilitated Change

Category: Project Management

  • Curriculum for a Consulting Project Manager 101 Class

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    Lisa
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    The Project Management Institute (PMI) has many different Special Interest Groups (SIGs) in order to meet the needs of its 250,000 members. PMI has asked the question: What should be the curriculum if we had a Consulting Project Manager 101 Class? Here are my thoughts: The book “Flawless Consulting” by Peter Block should be a…

  • Are team building exercises bad for introverts?

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    Lisa
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    Here’s an interesting discussion from Tech Republic about the value of team building exercises. http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/career/?p=119 Several self-described nerds wrote in to say that they find the team building exercises that have been designed by extroverts to be truly horrific for introverts. One contributer, who calls herself Server Queen, said I find that kind of thing…

  • Meetings are not Deliverables

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    Lisa
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    When I ask my project management students to develop their first work breakdown structure, there are inevitably a few meetings listed as deliverables. I feel strongly that a meeting itself should never be considered a deliverable. Meetings are held in order to achieve an objective. Therefore, we can list the desired outcome of the meeting…

  • Writing the Work Breakdown Structure

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    Lisa
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    The WBS is a mythic document in Project Management. Every text reminds us that the WBS is the foundation of the project plan. But what the heck is it? Perhaps appropriately, I’ve found a lot of mythology on this topic. So let’s talk about what it is and how to build it. I should begin…

  • Involve Your Customers

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    Lisa
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    First and foremost, this means listening to your customers. Early on in the project, your team must spend time with customers and end users. Make sure the project team understands the requirements from the users’ point of view. As you move from planning into project development, try to create prototypes of the end product. If…

  • Project Risk and Task Estimation

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    Lisa
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    It’s common knowledge that I love Liquid Planner. In my opinion, it allows me to to do magic and foresee the future. ::geek mode on:: Liquid Planner allows you to use probabalistic modeling for any or every task in your schedule. This means that instead of saying that a task will take 5 days, you…

  • Having a Vision

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    Lisa
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    Your team has a good project, one you believe in and which will help your organization to achieve its goals. The next step is to write a good vision statement. You may think that everyone understands where the project is going, but folks are probably more confused than you think. Here’s Scott Berkun on the…

  • On Being a Change Agent

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    Lisa
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    When I introduce project management to my students, I always tell them that my goal in the course is not just to teach them how to do project management. My goal is to change their lives. In part, this is because learning project management is about becoming empowered. No longer will you feel that you…