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Author: Brad Egeland

Brad Egeland is a Business Solution Designer and IT/PM consultant and author with over 25 years of software development, management, and project management experience leading initiatives in Manufacturing, Government Contracting, Creative Design, Gaming and Hospitality, Retail Operations, Aviation and Airline, Pharmaceutical, Start-ups, Healthcare, Higher Education, Non-profit, High-Tech, Engineering and general IT. He has been named the “#1 Provider of Project Management Content in the World” with over 7,000 published articles, eBooks, white papers and videos. Brad is married, a father of 11, and living in sunny Las Vegas, NV. Visit Brad's site at http://www.bradegeland.com/.

5 Reasons Why Xebrio Can Uniquely Take Your Project from Requirements to Deployment

Written by Brad Egeland on . Posted in Articles.

My next instalment in my “5 Reasons Why…” series will look at Xebrio’s project management too. This offering is a software tool that will help you fulfil your story from Requirements to Deployment. Xebrio is an ecosystem for tracking projects starting from requirements to releases, all under one roof. Xebrio helps teams achieve maximum productivity by enabling precise and comprehensive requirement analysis and tracking, milestone tracking, hassle-free collaboration and task assignment, issue tracking, and much more, ensuring that your team never misses a deadline and works efficiently. It offers you the flexibility that your team needs without making following up on tasks harder than the tasks themselves. Here are my 5 Reasons Why you should check out Xebrio…

Manage Requirements with Stakeholder involvement

Xebrio’s requirements management suite differentiates it from other project management tools. Xebrio’s makers have understood that it is vital to start a project correctly with careful and efficient requirements management to be able to end it successfully. Xebrio helps teams leverage stakeholder collaboration and input for productive and efficient requirements management. So, it allows external stakeholder collaboration & review and connects requirements to all the ever-important primary functions of project management.

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Link Test Cases to Requirements 

The second-best thing (after the requirements management suite) in Xebrio has to be its test case management tool. This is one of the rare tools that offer support for requirements management as well as test case management. Xebrio is jam-packed with features that make test engineering a breeze. It has a lucid QA dashboard that enables a holistic view of all test engineering activities, which allows teams to gain in-depth data-driven insights into the project’s testing efforts.

Customizable Task Management

Xebrio’s task management suite is a virtual, improved to-do list and makes completing tasks a pleasure. Xebrio helps teams to record tasks and sub-tasks extensively. You can easily delegate tasks to individuals and teams and invite teammates to collaborate or review & share feedback on tasks in real-time. You can make tasks visible to external stakeholders or work on certain tasks together with just the flick of a button. Xebrio also allows the sharing of files and resources. No more attachments getting bungled or lost in emails!

Efficient Milestone Tracking

Xebrio allows milestone-oriented delivery — the delivery of the project in chunks of tasks. Milestones can act as check posts for project’s progress, such as the project kickoff dates, the submission of an important deliverable, or the completion of a bunch of similar small tasks grouped together that make up a bigger phase of a project. You can schedule and track milestones and keep an eye on project progress. You can analyze your project’s progress with Xebrio’s milestone tracking suite in one glance since milestone stats and data-driven insights are represented visually. Reporting against milestones is very straightforward and helps to check how much of a project is completed, and what is outstanding. You can then relay this progress to your stakeholders and clients more effectively.

Effortless Team Communication and Collaboration

Understanding the significance of proper communication and seamless collaboration between geographically dispersed teams, Xebrio offers a variety of features for excellent real-time communication. With their ‘Discussions’ feature, you can access a virtual idea board where brainstorming sessions can take place as organically as they would in person, but with the added benefit of structure, a detailed record of every conversation, and the ability to work on ideas derived from the discussions immediately and within the same tool.

Summary – call to action

In addition to being meticulously designed to streamline and ease project functions, Xebrio makes the users’ experience more comfortable with good user-care practices and reasonable pricing points. Are you ready to try it? Either contact Xebrio for a personal tour or signup now to try it. You won’t be sorry.

5 reasons why Runn is the best resource management tool for IT teams

Written by Brad Egeland on . Posted in Articles.

In this installment of “5 reasons Why…” I’m presenting one of the newest tools in the resource management space – Runn. Since 2018, Runn has made a name for itself, now being used by software teams around the globe. Here’s my 5 reasons why you should try out Runn for your professional services team…

1. High-level resource and capacity planning

Runn takes a high-level approach to planning – don’t spend more time planning than executing! Runn is a beautifully dynamic tool that showcases the workload for your projects and people at a glance.

Get a bird’s eye view of your project and resourcing plans and easily spot who is over and underutilized. See the impact of changes at a business level, and drill into specific roles, teams, and groups of people–right from the planning interface. You can also see how workload is looking in the short and long term, and whether you have the capacity to deliver potential, tentative projects.

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2. Quick and easy resource scheduling and project planning

Planning in Runn is simple and intuitive. Simply drag-and-drop time allocations and phases to create them, and right-click to edit. Choose from a monthly, quarterly and half-yearly view to create and view your plans in advance. You can even keep your project budget in mind when planning with the live budget tracker. This lets you see how much an allocation of time is going to cost to your project as you draw them in the planner.

Runn has a unique workflow for placeholder allocations – the work that isn’t yet assigned to someone. Fully plan your projects even if you don’t yet have someone with the right skills at the right time. You can transfer the work to an actual person later down the line.

3. Compare your plans with reality

Runn’s built-in timesheets are some of the simplest ones out there. Only manually enter time if what you worked differs from what was scheduled. Or go one step further and autofill your timesheets with Runn’s Time Tracker Chrome extension as your team fills them in.

Pull valuable insights including the variance of scheduled versus actual time worked and staff productivity, so that you can build better plans for future projects.

If you prefer to use your own timesheet or time tracker tool, Runn has native integrations with Clockify, WorkflowMax and Harvest. You can also build your own integration with your preferred tool using Runn’s API.

4. Track, measure, and adjust your plans

Runn is built with project managers in mind. With a variety of project tracking and forecasting insights, know how your projects are progressing against the budget and plan. Each project has a dashboard with key performance metrics depending on the project type (time and materials, fixed price or internal project are all supported).

See cost, revenue, and profitability forecasts for an in-depth look at the health of your projects and to be aware of potential challenges before they come issues.

5. Powerful business intelligence and reporting

Runn provides visibility over the financial health of the business. Filter the reports and charts by a number of fields including role, team, tag and client to view important data and KPIs for each group. Adjust the date range of your reports and view the data by week, month or quarter. See how tentative projects will impact your numbers, and determine whether you should pursue them.

You can also export all reports to CSV files to use in your own reporting.

Ready to try it?

Get more information about Runn and its features, and then try it out with a 14-day free trial.

 

5 Reasons to Consider pmxboard Full Agile Management Board Set for your professional and private life!

Written by Brad Egeland on . Posted in Articles.

1.The first and the only full Agile and Lean Management Set! The most comprehensive Agile Management Set in the world

Everything you would need in order to build your complete Agile process is in one package. There is no other product on the market that you would get and build your entire Agile Board without needing to purchase additional items. The set comes with pre designed but also customizable full magnetic board, which weights just above 6 lbs, and comes with 84 pieces of magnetic cards set in order to build your Kanban, Scrum, or any other type of Lean Board. Moreover, the set comes with accessories such as tripod to locate your board, special magnetic card markers, board markers as well as cleaning sets.

2. Pre designed Full Magnetic Lean Board comes with the set

The special board comes with a beautiful design, it is fully magnetic, high quality and increadibly light! You can snap your magnetic cards anywhere on the board, you can also use it as a white board and write on it. The columns are already created for you however, you can also customize the headlines via using the extra empty headline cards that come with the set, so you do not need to use the pre-defined column headlines if you do not want to.

3. Full Magnetic Agile Management Card Set comes with the set!

The magnetic card set that comes with ore-designed magnetic board has everything in it. The magnetic set consists of below items;

  • 60 Task Cards in three colors to help with grouping (Gray, Green, Yellow). 20 cards of each colors. The Task Cards have designated spaces to write the headline of the task, a bigger space to write down details and also quick recognizable circle on the right bottom either to write task owner’s initials, or due date of the task, ow both.

  • 10 Blocker Cards. Which Lean Board would not need blocker cards? But, pmxboard blocker cards are not only visually distinguisable easily, also you can drop quick notes on it. They spap directly on the board, or even on other magnetic cards. So, it gives great flexibility to identify risky items on the overall board easily.
  • 10 Details Cards. Whenever and wherever you need to capture more details and you need more space, detail cards come in handy. They can be easily paired or stacked with task cards, or can receive blocker cards on themselves.
  • 4 Empty Headline Cards. These headline cards provide great flexibility to customize your board if you need to change the pre-designed headlines on the board. You can easily snap them on the existing headlines on the board, and change the column headline to your specific need.

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4. Gives three options to locate your board and your board can be mobile!

One of the things I like most with this set is that the board is not like any standard board on the market which most of them are bulky, difficult to handle, and you have to find a permanent place on a wall to put your board. Unlike these standard boards, because the materials they used on this board (high density EVA) provides great weight advantage, just over 6 lb, it basically gives you the freedom to move your board around easily and make it mobile if you do not want to hang it on a wall, which hanging on a wall is is also an option if you like to. The set comes with a tripod, so you can literally put your board on this tripod and move it around easily, even with one hand because of its leight weight. The magnetic power between the board and the magnetic cards on it are strong enough and they stay intact during normal maneveours.

5. You can use this set over and over for many projects!

All the pieces in this set have gone through realibility tests in order to make sure that they are reusable, and the quality does not downgrade easily over time. You can wash the magnetic cards, clear off completely, same with the board, and they will stay as if they are new. They used eco-friendly UV printing on the products, and it provides the highest quality and durability for this kind of products.

Click here to purchase this product on Amazon US
Clich here to purchase this product on pmxbaord. They deliver worldwide!

5 Reasons KeyedIn is the PPM Software of Choice for Strategic PMOs

Written by Brad Egeland on . Posted in Articles.

KeyedIn is an established PPM software provider that is designed to help PMOs get to the next level of PPM maturity. They do this through software products combined with services offerings that configure to user needs. Rich in functionality in all the critical PPM components – portfolio management, resource planning, project management, dashboards and analytics, and financial management – KeyedIn provides a number of other value-adds that give their customers an edge.

  • Powerful but affordable – KeyedIn is not beholden to a private equity firm that demands growth at the expense of service and sensible pricing. KeyedIn offers the power of a high-priced PPM tool without the high price tag.
  • Software that actually gets adopted – KeyedIn features an easy-to-use interface that drives adoption. Customers like Walgreens-Boots – currently with more than 2,000 users – have consistently cited the solution’s ease of use as a significant benefit.
  • Professional services and customer support that creates a lasting partnership – The KeyedIn services and support team is among the best in the industry. Even industry analyst Gartner, in a recent PPM Magic Quadrant report, acknowledged that “customers give [KeyedIn] high marks for its high levels of personalized customer service and support.”
  • Our vision for Agile Portfolio Management – With the rate of change in business only increasing, KeyedIn pioneered the concept of Agile Portfolio Management, which takes the Agile principles that have improved project execution and applies them to the top-down assessment of portfolio investments.
  • Integrations – As a best-of-breed vendor, KeyedIn understands the need to play nicely with the software and services an organization already has in place – from Agile development tools like Jira to ITSM systems such as Cherwell.

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Some product screenshots examples:

  1. Dashboards

Highly configurable, interactive dashboards to answer the questions most relevant to the user.

2. Resource Plan

Analyze resource allocation, availability, utilization, and capacity by department, team, role, project, skill, and availability. Assign resources to work with simple drag-and-drop.

3.      Plan and Manage Projects

Central repository for all project, program, and portfolio information. Fully configurable layout. Content can be personalized to each persona/role and individual.

4. Task Planning, Kanban

Configurable Task Kanban Board allows users to visualize and manage tasks within an agile environment. Drag-and-drop tasks between board columns. Support for agile elements including Tasks, Stories, Features, etc.

5. Risk and Issue Management

Ready to try KeyedIn?

Are you ready to check out KeyedIn for yourself? Download your free trial today!

5 Reasons Why the Top Teams Choose Float for Their Resource Management

Written by Brad Egeland on . Posted in Articles.

For my next “5 Reasons Why…” installment, I am presenting to you Float – the #1 rated tool for resource management on G2. With Float, you can directly integrate with your project management tools like Jira, Asana, WorkflowMax, Trello, QuickBooks, and more. Let’s consider my 5 reasons why…

1.It’s easy-to-use with powerful scheduling capabilities

Scheduling in Float is fast and intuitive. Click anywhere on your schedule to start creating and assigning tasks in seconds. Add repeating tasks and assign them to multiple people in just a few clicks. Make changes fast with a right-click menu and keyboard shortcuts. Integrate with your existing project management tools like Asana, Jira, Teamwork, and more to sync your projects between both.

 2. Get a high-level and accurate view of your team’s capacity

Float makes capacity planning a breeze. Set custom work hours at a team and individual level, import and assign public holidays, schedule time off, and set a status to let your team know where you’re working from (e.g., the beach house or the living room!). Float also, integrates Google and Outlook Calendar, so you can sync events directly to your resource schedule, and/or send Float tasks back to your calendar tool.

3. Create project phases and plan project timelines

Float’s project planning features help you set up your team for success. Plan with precision by breaking down bigger projects into smaller parts with phases. Set a budget for the total project or a phase, and monitor spend in real-time. Add project milestones to keep your team on track, and link tasks together to visualize dependencies and shift timelines quickly.

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4. Track your team’s time and compare your project estimates to actuals

Time tracking in Float is simple and easy with pre-filled timesheets based on your work schedule. See the actual time it takes your team to complete tasks and monitor your budgets and project progress in real-time. Powerful reporting lets you compare your project estimates with actuals to accurately forecast your capacity for future projects.

5. Sync directly with your project management and calendar tools and schedule on the go with the Float mobile app

Float’s direct integrations save you time by streamlining your project workflows. Integrate directly with project management tools like Asana, Jira, Trello, Teamwork, WorkflowMax, and QuickBooks. Sync your schedule with Google and Outlook Calendar. Automate reminders and send updates to your team with the Slack Notifications App. Take your schedule on the go with a mobile app for iOS and Android.

Ready to try it?

Are you convinced and ready to give Float a try? Check out all of Float’s integrations and resource management features on their website, and try a free 30-day trial here.