PMcrunch

In the hassle and buzzle of day to day work life, of course mixed with a busy personal life, we need to remember that our team members also have their own personal goals, aspirations and challenges. There are many things we can do related to this but the first step is always awareness. Here are [...]

[Read more →]

We need to consider how clear the objective of the project scope is when we build our project teams.  For an extremely well defined project of relatively short duration, and well-defined deliverables, this could be fairly easy.  However, for a project that is less defined, which may involve some significant shifts of some sort over the [...]

[Read more →]

Human resources is an important function in all organizations and that includes the project organization. In these difficult economic times, the human resources’ function is being tested in organizations worldwide. How does that testing in this environment translate into the project team environment?

[Read more →]

In these challenging times, so many of our projects and programs are more challenging than usual. We are called upon to make tough decisions to solve difficult problems and to squeeze more out of every resource we have. How we face these challenges has more to do with our approach and attitude than anything else.

[Read more →]

Most of us are familiar with the old story of the tortoise and the hare. They raced each other one day and the hare raced off to a rapid start, took a nap, and continued the race in a cycle of rapid sprints and long naps. By contrast, the tortoise plodded along slowly but steadily to the end of the race, albeit at a very slow pace throughout. In the end, the tortoise actually won. While slow and steady may win the race, the best teams make the most out of both the tortoise and the hare. Here are my thoughts.

[Read more →]

Loyalty has always been a big topic in organizations of all types. Back in the middle ages, kings spoke of their loyal subjects and gave severe penalties to those who were not loyal. For many years, in the post-World War II era, people were rewarded for loyal service with lifetime employment. However, in today’s fast-paced world the question in my mind is “What are the limits of loyalty?”

[Read more →]

We are living in an age of “standardization”. It seems that everything is standardized, from processes and procedures to management practices across the board. While we, as managers, try to standardize much ourselves in order to reduce error, create efficiencies, build a common vocabulary, and enhance communication, what happens when things just don’t seem to be working the way we like?

[Read more →]

As leaders and professionals, we are called upon to be at our best all of the time! Not only to we need to maintain and improve personal performance, but we as project managers and program managers are frequently responsible for the performance of others. One challenge is how we manage the plethora of positive and negative feelings that inevitably come our way in the course of our professional endeavors. I have been thinking about how we can be more aware of what happens inside of us emotionally that needs to be managed in order to achieve top performance consistently.

[Read more →]

A moderately lighthearted approach to project management and leadership can be very beneficial. To get the most out of ourselves, we need to strike a balance between hard work and fun. As leaders, we need to be assured that we are facilitating the right balance work and fun for individuals on our team and for the team as a whole. On project teams, where project leaders expect the absolute best from their people, fun on the job isn’t a frivolity, but rather a necessity.

[Read more →]

There has been a tremendous amount of buzz more recently about PMOs, otherwise known as Project Management Offices. Here is what a select group of experts are saying about PMOs today.

[Read more →]