By Alicia Trelles-Duckett on February 22, 2014
In this ever shrinking business world, it is not uncommon to deploy a project with colleagues from different countries, with cultures different from our own. We can even implement a project in our own country and easily have stakeholders, say, from India, China, Mexico, Canada. Each one will bring different points of view, dependent on […]
By Alicia Trelles-Duckett on September 20, 2011
When I started my working life, at IBM, years went by before I had any sub-contractors as part of my project team. We could handle just about every request with in-house skills. Alas, almost 20 years later those days are gone, and the opposite has become the norm. It is nigh on impossible to deploy […]
By Alicia Trelles-Duckett on June 25, 2011
As a general rule, project teams will agree with the idea that Risk Analysis makes for a better project. It gives the team visibility of worrisome items, a forum to prioritize them, and some time to react before the risk materializes. So why don’t more project managers incorporate Risk Analysis regularly in their project’s governance? […]
By Alicia Trelles-Duckett on April 14, 2011
Your next project involves implementations here as well as in other countries. Are congratulations in order? Or are condolences more appropriate? No doubt installations in other geographies come with their own inherent set of challenges. Currency fluctuations; centralized versus local procurement; languages; time zones. And those are even before considering difficulties due to the particular […]
By Carter McNamara on April 6, 2011
Guest post from Claudia Vandermilt: As a project manager, your teams rely on your leadership skills to guide and encourage productivity and project success. When provided with quality leadership, team members often respond positively; they build stronger relationships and rise to project challenges brought forth by their leader. Arm yourself with these five critical leadership […]
By Kevin Lonergan on March 17, 2011
there was a debate for years around whether Project Management is an art or a science. The truth is that neither are correct on their own – it is both. Successful project managers (with a track record of more than one project) typically employ the science stuff (core PM concepts), sometimes religiously. They also harbor […]
By Patrick d'Astous on March 3, 2011
I wrote recently about the difference between senior and junior project managers in terms of decision making. More specifically, I argued that while senior managers focused on potential project difficulties, junior managers were more easily swayed by their project’s plan and its deficiencies. Spotting problem with your plan and being able to foresee difficulties are […]
By Kevin Lonergan on February 10, 2011
Well here’s my view. If project management (or delivering projects successfully, on a more often than not basis) were purely common sense, then the evidence to do with project delivery performance would tell a completely different story. For example, a UK report by the Royal Society of Engineering a few years ago quoted some frightening […]
By Patrick d'Astous on February 2, 2011
In project management, we imply the existence of a strong relationship between experience and good decision making. The question is: What kind of experience? Domain experience or project management experience?
By Carter McNamara on January 27, 2011
A guest post from Patrick d’Astous , chief scientist at Smartbox Software. A project manager puts, by trade, or by choice, his credibility on the line every day. Another way to say this is “a project manager is as good as his/her last project’s perceived success”. Compared to traditional management and its long term objectives, […]