Skip to main content

Author: Curt Finch

Tangoing Your Way Through the Executive/PMO Relationship

Written by Curt Finch on . Posted in Articles. 7 Comments on Tangoing Your Way Through the Executive/PMO Relationship

“It takes two to tango.” This idiomatic expression, which originated in a 1952 song by Pearl Bailey and was later popularized in 1982 when President Ronald Reagan quipped about Russian-American relations, is an accurate description of the relationship between a project management office (PMO) and an executive. At the end of the day, success for either of them is dependent on the other. Executives depend on the work accomplished by project management offices for their own success, just as project management offices depend on executives for their success.
In a provocative 1999 article in Fortune magazine that addresses why executives fail, the authors get directly to the point and state that the number one reason for executive failure is “bad execution…as simple as that…not getting things done…not delivering on commitments.” The article also states that executives who do not deliver are three times more likely to get fired than their counterparts who are delivering. Think about it. What is the dominant purpose of a project? Getting things done! Projects deliver products and services, and they do so according to a schedule. Projects deliver on commitments. Executives need projects so they can deliver on commitments, thus avoiding the number one reason for executive failure.

The opposite is equally true. Projects need executives. The scope of projects and the judgments made about their success have expanded over recent years to the point where project success is almost always beyond the sole control of those running the project. Project success is highly dependent on the availability of resources typically not under the direct control of the project manager. Similarly, the project manager does not have direct control over the networks and systems that their project must fit into. Really, the project manager doesn’t have direct control over much of anything upon which the project’s success depends. The days of the small, relatively simple, stand-alone project are mostly over. These dependencies, which are essential for the success of the project, are less often in the domain of the project manager and more often in the domain of the executive. The project manager must establish a PMO that is run with a direct two-way supportive relationship with the executive.

A Real Story
To illustrate just how pronounced the dependence between executives and project management offices is, and needs to be, let’s consider the following story. This story illustrates just how effective a strong co-dependent relationship can be. Prior to the creation of the PMO with a co-dependent executive relationship, trouble was the norm. After the creation of the PMO with a co-dependent relationship, the situation improved. The story is associated with responsibilities that the co-author of this article, Michael O’Brochta, had when he worked as an employee of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). He spent decades there managing hundreds of projects, managing project managers, and leading efforts to advance project management within the organization. The story begins with a strategic need within the organization and an executive who recognized this need and made a commitment to take action. Note that this is not a unique story. In a 2009 book by Brian Hobbs, PhD, PMP, titled “The Project Management Office (PMO): A Quest for Understanding,” he highlights a global study of project management offices and describes the PMO best practice of tailoring the PMO function to match the needs of the executive, just as happens in this CIA story.

“I don’t understand it; I have staffed my new organization with hundreds of highly-skilled project managers, yet even after our first year in business, we can’t seem to deliver enough projects on time or to the satisfaction of our customers.”

These were the words that O’Brochta first heard when the director of the organization asked for help. He went on to describe the gap between his vision for his organization and the current reality: “I’m confident that running this organization as project-based is the way to go, but I never thought it would be this hard,” said the director. “I periodically review project schedules, and find them to be ever changing. No one is happy about a moving target — not me, and least of all, not the customer. Quite frankly, I do not see why anyone would come to my organization if they had a decent alternative.”

The project-based organization described here was formed to advance the mission of the CIA. The best engineers, the best information technology professionals, and the best project managers were combined into a single organization focused on delivering new and better intelligence analysis systems and capabilities. One of those systems, named Fluent, was described a decade ago in a Reuters article titled “CIA Using Data Mining Technology to Find Nuggets.” This was cutting-edge technology focused on critical CIA mission needs at the time.

Finally, the director got to the point of the conversation: “Will you come and help?”

During the following year, O’Brochta built and ran a strategic-level Project Management Office. Although the published knowledge associated with successful project management offices was rather limited at the time, enough was known for him to select a couple of starting points. O’Brochta started with one initiative focused on the project managers and one initiative focused on the executives. For the project managers, he led the building of a standardized project life-cycle methodology complete with milestones and documentation tailored specifically for the nature of their work. For the executives, he led the building of a standardized governance system complete with reviews, decision-making criteria, and change management strategies tailored specifically for their work.

Previously, the role and actions of the executives and the project managers were out of sync. Project managers were doing their best to draw upon their extensive backgrounds to create and follow project plans, but no two were the same. Likewise, executives were doing their best to support the project managers with resources and decisions, but inconsistency and unpredictability were common.

O’Brochta routinely met with executives and others in the management chain to ensure that decisions about the PMO’s focus matched its needs; he did the same with project managers and the various PMOs. Both the executives and project managers learned that each group performed equally important, but different, roles. The executive’s role included supplying a standardized project life-cycle methodology for the project managers to use and holding them accountable for using it. The project managers’ role included tailoring the provided life cycle methodology and putting it into practice. The executives established and followed a routine for project reviews and associated decisions. The project managers prepared for each of the project reviews with the information needed to support the scheduled decision-making. Predictability and consistency became the norm. Effort that had been directed toward “figuring out what to do” was now directed toward more productive activities associated with running the projects and meeting mission needs.

Initial Reaction
Because of the success of the initatives, the value of the project management office was established. Other initiatives followed, all targeted at the co-dependent relationship between the executives and the project management offices. These initiatives included training for both the project managers and the executives. They reflected the maturing of project management within the organization and the value of strengthening the co-dependent relationship between executives and project management offices. It was learned that this relationship is, in and of itself, a project that can be planned and managed within a PMO for the strategic long-term benefit of the organization.

What’s Next?
As satisfying as it might be to establish a successful PMO, the question arises about how to keep them going. This is a serious question. It appears that keeping a PMO going is not so common. A 2007 PMI-sponsored report titled “The Multi-Project PMO:  A Global Analysis of the Current State of Practice” states that PMOs are frequently closed or restructured with only about half of them surviving for two years. That’s a grim statistic. Executives need projects, project management, and PMOs. Yet, the PMO often struggles to survive. Why? According to the same study, the successful PMOs were the ones that responded to and adapted to the ever-changing needs of the organization. In other words, the successful PMO’s performance was matched to the needs of the organization. Key performance indicators were established and achieved. And not just any key performance indicators were achieved, but ones that were relevant and meaningful to the executives with whom the PMO had a co-dependent relationship.

Coming up in Part 2: Specific key performance indicators that a newly-established PMO can use to measure itself to ensure alignment with the needs of the organization.

Don’t forget to leave your comments below.

Michael O’Brochta,PMP, has been a project manager for over thirty years. He is an experienced line manager, author, lecturer, trainer, and consultant. He holds a master’s degree in project management, a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering, and is certified as a PMP®. As Zozer Inc. President, he is helping organizations raise their level of project management performance. As senior project manager in the CIA, he lead the maturing of the project management practices agency-wide. Since his recent climb of another of the world’s seven summits, he has been exploring the relationship between project management and mountain climbing. Mr. O’Brochta’s papers and presentations at PMI national, international, and regional conferences have consistently been popular and well received; his last three PMI Global Congress presentations have drawn the largest audiences at those events.

Curt Finch is the CEO of Journyx. Founded in 1996, Journyx automates payroll, billing and cost accounting while easing management of employee time and expenses, and provides confidence that all resources are utilized correctly and completely. Curt earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science from Virginia Tech.  As a software programmer fixing bugs for IBM in the early ‘90’s, Curt found that tracking the time it took to fix each bug revealed the per-bug profitability. Curt knew that this concept of using time-tracking data to determine project profitability was a winning idea and something that companies were not doing – yet… Curt created the world’s first web-based timesheet application and the foundation for the current Journyx product offerings in 1997.

Unlocking PMO Profitability

Written by Curt Finch on . Posted in Articles. 3 Comments on Unlocking PMO Profitability

Aug24thFEATURE

The potential benefits of a project management office (PMO) are numerous and well documented. However, many of the benefits never materialize. Take a look at PMOs over the years and you will see that many have restructured, dissolved, or constantly had to justify their existence during both economic downturns as well as high-growth periods. This is evidence enough that PMOs are not yielding demonstrable positive financial results. This churn often causes years of frustration for both the PMOs and the projects and departments they serve. Changing the way in which the PMO is chartered, works, and is perceived within an organization can ensure that it offers plentiful advantages for the entire organization.

Two Problem Scenarios…And Strategies to Solve Them

One: The PMO is spawned by an executive with a big problem

Let’s consider this example: a client forms a PMO to salvage a huge contract with a customer. A very large project lags, causing late deliveries and missed expectations all around. Department staff is not completely honest with the customer, hoping they will somehow be able to ‘catch up.’ They fall farther behind and an executive is forced to intervene. Experienced senior project managers are brought in to assist with the problem, turn around customer expectations, and evolve communication and estimation processes within three months. In another four months, the project managers turn the projects back over to a grateful department.

The senior project managers who saved the day wonder, “Now what? We had unrestricted executive access, some of the best people across the organization loaned or transferred to our projects and spent tens of thousands of dollars on training, equipment, and process improvement. Results were great. Now we can’t get a phone call returned from a director outside the PMO or any attention to the best practices we just proved are necessary to keep projects out of the red zone.” Three of the four project managers are let go or quit within the next six months along with half of the PMO staff of 20.

This example is not just for illustration — it is happening in organizations across the country every day. If the PMO is helpful in solving the big problem, then PMO staff members must assume other roles to continue to justify their existence. When PMOs define their own course, the high-percentage outcome is stagnated by over-regulation and process. It does not take long for your PMO to lose power and possibly be disbanded.

Strategies to remain financially viable:

  • Always take on the big problems. Put the PMO on each issue as a fix-it or turnaround weapon.
  • Key deliverable leave-behinds should include significant process improvements that equip your internal customers with tools they didn’t previously have that make them more successful going forward.
  • Processes used should include mentoring and training key people in the problem domain so that the fixes the PMO put in place ‘stick.’
  • Help the involved departments win their battles, shore up their defenses and then move on to the next big problem.

Two: The PMO is spawned by one or more executives who want more visibility or compliance via governance efforts but don’t really want lasting change

Let’s look at another example: a large organization takes a hit in their most recent audit for compliance in regards to Sarbanes-Oxley and internal policy governance requirements, which affects the organization’s financials. The projects in violation include IT projects, among others. Several direct reports of the COO band together to ‘review the situation’ that a now out-of-favor peer has gotten their department into.

They recommend many process changes at a high level that go something like this: “They should have done this, this, this, and that.” No one considers or estimates the amount of effort (person hours), training or persuasive change management required to move the entire staff to a phase-gate approval process. (A phase-gate approval process requires that at the end of every phase, the project manager prepares a project status report and submits it to senior management to get approval to move on to the next phase of the project.) A project is chartered, training is authorized, tools are purchased and installed (not implemented, just installed), and a set of directives comes down to the PMO, not the departments, to get cracking.

At this point, department heads and their direct reports begin a campaign to undermine PMO authority, which is quickly degrading. Eventually, the PMO is disbanded and the PMO director is fired for “not being able to work with his peers.” The organization’s compliance is upgraded from a complete failure to spotty (at best), which requires a good deal of convincing.

Financially, a PMO tasked with making other departments comply with vague or second-hand demands is destined to fail. PMOs in this position can be misused as merely lip-service providers for governance coverage required by Sarbanes-Oxley, FDA, and other regulatory, investor, and customer requirements.

Strategies to remain financially viable:

  • Show that complying with executive mandates is faster and cheaper with the PMO than without.
  • The PMO should be the leverage point and path of least resistance to complying with executive directives, not the source of those directives.
  • PMO staff effort should not be billed back to the department. This will ensure that PMO resources are welcomed and not shunned.

Showing PMO Value

The difficulty in demonstrating real value from the PMO is twofold. First, traditional financial measurements of PMO success do not usually provide immediate, tangible benefits. Many simple metrics can be used to show the number of projects being completed on time and within budget. However, this data can be misleading. A possibly misconstrued metric would be, “we have never brought a id=”mce_marker”0-million-dollar project in on time or within budget.” On the surface, that may sound irresponsible. In reality, it is due to an unrealistic plan and lack of deeper collaboration with project sponsors, executives, and teams on all of the project’s dimensions, which are more than just time and money.

Second, the assigned role of the PMO in a given organization might not be appropriate, and can ultimately serve as an impediment to the execution of projects if not employed correctly. As seen in the second problem scenario above, PMOs that act as a regulatory force without clear directives and sponsorship from senior executives only make the project manager’s job more difficult.

How can you use your PMO in a way that maximizes its potential and improves your organization’s ROI?

Making It Work

The groundwork for a successful PMO actually begins at the top. A PMO requires sponsorship from upper-level management (read: C-suite level executives) in order to build and maintain a presence across the organization with the flexibility required to address various important project-management issues. Allowing the PMO to do its job with executive backing will empower the PMO to address widespread issues quickly and effectively.

There is no set-in-stone way to implement a PMO. Rather, it should be organized and supported in ways that address the organization’s specific issues. When considering where to go with a PMO, an organization should ask the simple question, “What problems prompted the creation of the PMO in the first place?” Assign the PMO to those tasks, and extend its reach as necessary to enable smooth operations.

Three metrics are commonly used to determine the effectiveness of a PMO at any given time. These are:

  • Accuracy of cost estimates: How close is the final cost of the project to the initial budget?
  • Accuracy of schedule estimates: How long did the project take to complete in comparison to its original schedule?
  • Stakeholder satisfaction: Overall, how happy were the stakeholders with the final project and their relationship with its developers? [i]

Improvement in each of these three categories is a good indicator that the PMO is working smoothly and to the best financial interest of the organization.

As more and more projects are supported by the PMO, specific patterns in project execution will emerge and its predictive accuracy will increase. In this way, the PMO is constantly self-improving and will eventually become a cost-saving nexus of efficiency within your organization.

Don’t forget to leave your comments below.

Darrel Raynor is a senior technology executive, consultant and turnaround specialist with over 20 years’ leadership experience streamlining operations, systems, people, and projects. He increases margin and profit, and decreases organization friction internally and externally with customers, vendors and partners. He is author of the forthcoming book, “Agile & Integrate Project Management” and writes The Management Advisor column to help raise readers’ effectiveness. He holds the Project Manager Professional (PMP) certification and an MBA in Information Systems, Managing Advanced Technologies from Golden Gate University in San Francisco.

Curt Finch is the CEO of Journyx. Since 1996, Journyx has remained committed to helping customers intelligently invest their time and resources to achieve per-person, per-project profitability. Curt earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science from Virginia Tech in 1987. As a software programmer fixing bugs for IBM in the early ‘90s, Curt Finch found that tracking the time it took to fix each bug revealed the per-bug profitability. Curt knew that this concept of using time-tracking data to determine project profitability was a winning idea and something that companies were not doing — yet… Curt created the world’s first Web-based timesheet application and the foundation for the current Journyx product offerings in 1997. Curt is an avid speaker and writer. 

A Surefire Plan for Improved Project Results and Increased Maturity

Written by Curt Finch on . Posted in Articles. 5 Comments on A Surefire Plan for Improved Project Results and Increased Maturity

Many of the clients we work with are a “PMO of one.” Usually this person has been brought in to establish common processes and procedures around planning, managing and executing projects. Most often, there is a broad spectrum of project work being performed by varied project teams within the organization, including a range of maturity levels spanning from no established, repeatable processes to very formalized and documented processes.

According to the Project Management Institute, “Companies with greater maturity should expect to see tangible benefits that include better-performing project portfolios, efficiencies that come with better resource allocation, and increased process stability and repeatability.” [i] On the other hand, companies that are less mature tend to be reactionary, trying to dodge problems as they come rather than strategically planning and executing projects. Often, these companies have various groups working in their own silos, so there is no centralized view of resource availability or up-to-date project status. Project managers are consequently unable to prioritize projects or schedule them with accuracy. This can lead to lost opportunities and failed projects time and again. A new study on organizational maturity has confirmed the need for defined repeatable processes, finding that companies that use them have a much higher project success rate than those who do not. [ii]

So how can the “PMO of one” bring teams and processes together to get everyone on the same page, speaking the same language and doing things in similar ways? Here are some things to think about for establishing common project processes that can be adopted throughout the organization, providing better performance and tangible results.

Focus on the Critical Business Issue

There are a number of reasons why an organization would decide to unify its project management processes. It could be a response to client pressure, a desire for an additional competitive advantage, or part of the general evolution of the company. Other times, the lack of organizational maturity is leading to lost opportunities. Understanding the reason behind the shift will not only give you direction as to how you should approach it, but can also help project managers to find creative ways to address the issue.

Don’t just establish processes for the sake of establishing processes. Rather, let the fundamental issues you’re trying to address or avoid drive your direction. You might find, for example, that re-engineering your processes isn’t what you need at all. Perhaps providing increased transparency, visibility and collaboration around all of the projects across the organization better addresses the critical business issue.

Transparency, Visibility and Collaboration

Adding transparency, visibility and collaboration to your projects is integral to achieving better organizational performance. In a recent article, Gina Abudi recommends a central system or “portal” as a means to implement best practices and improve project results. [iii] This does not, however, have to be an overwhelming PPM solution. A simple, easy-to-use system to interface between time tracking, resource management and project scheduling allows businesses to retain processes that are currently in use while still benefiting from increased visibility to crucial data.

Software alone will not solve your critical business issue, but it can serve as a hub that provides one “pane of glass view” for all processes throughout the company. Keep in mind that it is necessary to choose the right system for your organization. A few key requirements are as follows:

  • Improved visibility of resource allocation, including project work, non-project work, vacation, etc.
  • Real-time status information across all projects with warning indicators and alerts
  • Integration between work requests, schedules, resource management, project roadmap and prioritization

A system that provides these benefits will enable project managers to focus scarce resources on the project that are most profitable. Project managers will also be able to keep track of which projects are on time and which ones are not, helping them to take immediate action as needed. Finally, they will no longer run the risk of scheduling a project under the assumption that certain resources will work on it, only to find out later that the resources are already allocated or will be out of the office.

Leverage What You Already Have

Just because you are trying to improve your organization does not mean that you should blow everything up and start over. Chances are you have processes currently in place that are working, and you should leverage these to get you to the next level. For example, you might find that despite the varied maturity levels, experience and background within your organization, most people are using Microsoft Project™ and Microsoft Excel™. A “rip and replace” approach where you force everyone to stop using these tools and start using a different system could have very adverse effects. Instead, you might look at how you can enhance and extend the tools, allowing people to keep the processes they are comfortable with while maximizing benefits and value.

Abudi agrees that you need to learn about what is currently being done throughout the organization before you try to make a change. Only then can you “discuss how standards may be developed organization-wide using a composition of processes already developed and being successfully implemented and filling in the gaps with new processes where needed.” In other words, rather than taking a standard like PMBOK® or PRINCE2® and forcing everyone to change their processes in order to uphold it, you can be a little more creative, retaining the things that work and improving or replacing the things that don’t.

Communication is also important because many employees will be resistant to change. They might be suspicious of your efforts to improve processes when they feel that the status quo is “good enough.” (Remember what Jim Collins wrote in his book, Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap and Other Don’t: “Good is the enemy of great.”) It is important to instill trust in these people so they understand that you are not looking to replace their current processes, but to improve and enhance them. Buy-in from your team is necessary in order to achieve success because they are the ones who will be helping you to reach your goals.

Better Project Results

Whatever you introduce is going to represent change, so it is important to understand how much change the organization and team can take and be mindful of that. There is no silver bullet, and something that worked for one company may not be a good fit for another. Only you will know what your needs are, what will and will not be adopted by the organization and how much time, money and energy the organization is willing to spend in comparison to the potential return.

Don’t rely solely on software either. Remember to integrate your processes and people, and manage them well. Your software solution will need to empower team members and facilitate their work.

By evaluating existing processes, organizations can replace the weaker ones and maintain the stronger ones for optimal success. Integrating these processes in such a way that everyone involved in a project is on the same page provides a way to learn from your failures as opposed to repeating them.

Don’t forget to leave your comments below.

Curt Finch is the CEO of Journyx. Since 1996, Journyx has remained committed to helping customers intelligently invest their time and resources to achieve per-person, per-project profitability. Curt earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science from Virginia Tech in 1987. As a software programmer fixing bugs for IBM in the early ‘90s, Curt Finch found that tracking the time it took to fix each bug revealed the per-bug profitability. Curt knew that this concept of using time-tracking data to determine project profitability was a winning idea and something that companies were not doing — yet…Curt created the world’s first Web-based timesheet application and the foundation for the current Journyx product offerings in 1997. Curt is an avid speaker and writer.

Authority Earned, Not Given

Written by Curt Finch on . Posted in Articles. 2 Comments on Authority Earned, Not Given

For project managers, the support of their team is critical for completing projects successfully. Yet, a team’s respect cannot simply be assigned like a task. Acquiring and executing project authority with the support of a full project team demands careful and skilled execution.

Project leadership requires a humble yet assertive persona, capable of taking charge when needed and delegating authority wherever possible. A project manager must develop their own skills and lead with principles. Doing so will certainly encourage team loyalty. If a project manager simply presumes authority, they will never earn the backing of their team.   

This is an ongoing practice that should drive the way a project manager carries himself and shapes how he interacts with others.

Strengthening the Circle of Influence

Project managers operate under a circle of influence; though they have a degree of influence over their team members, PMs rarely have direct control over anyone in particular. While a boss or senior executive may be able to issue decrees and make demands, the project manager does not have quite the same powers of command. Many fail to understand this aspect and walk into project management assuming the role of infallible leader, often inspiring heavy resistance and strained accomplishments.

Team members are not the employees of the project manager, but are rather members of a collaborative, symbiotic team. It is crucial for project managers to think of all team members in this fashion.

To exert influence, then, a good project manager should do the following to inspire team loyalty:

Delegate Work

Understanding when to delegate authority is an important aspect of leading. A project manager must know their team’s strengths and weaknesses. This knowledge allows the PM to assign tasks and make decisions for team members, improving overall efficiency. Doling out responsibility saves time and empowers team members.

When delegating, it’s important to understand exactly when and to whom power can be entrusted. Not everyone is cut out for a management role, and some are much happier with strict oversight than free reign.

It could turn out that someone who is excellent at sales, for instance, does not have any interest in managing others. Conversely, the newest and perhaps least senior team member could prove himself capable of taking on more tasks and responsibility. It’s important for a project manager to keep their finger on the pulse of their team and monitor changing roles and abilities.

To learn the capabilities of the team, a project manager should assign small tasks at first. The team member can develop a plan for the assignment, then do the actual work, and finally, receive a performance evaluation. As the team member improves, the task load and/or the complexity of assignment can be increased.

Delegating work will ease the overall burden and encourage team members to work toward a valued end goal, putting their trust in the project manager. A project manager who does everything himself will end up with team members feeling resentful and distrustful.

Maintain Morals

At the end of the day, all we have is our honor; a project manager should never let a feeling of entitlement be corruptive. To be a great leader, it’s important that a project manager acknowledge him/her principles and stick by them. Team members will respect the project manager for honoring him/her convictions and the PM will be able to feel pleased with him/her accomplishments. Project managers have to be able to believe in themselves, believe in others, and believe in their own actions. Even if mistakes are made, there is the knowledge that they were made with the right intentions.

Communicate Effectively

Communication will always top the list of vital qualities for effective project management. Developing relationships with team members is critical, and project managers should work to exhibit their true personalities and gain the trust of all coworkers. Effective communication can never be achieved through short emails, incessant demands, or brief interactions; relationships are slowly developed through consistent interaction and honest behavior.

When communicating, a project manager shouldn’t do all the talking. It is absolutely critical to listen to team members’ suggestions and ideas. Letting team members know that their input is valued and giving credit where it is due will help alleviate any resentment and facilitate collaboration among the group.

Don’t Neglect Personal Development

Being a project manager is not a static role. It is an ever-evolving career that requires constant learning and staying on top of the game. This can mean everything from furthering project management education to focusing on health. If team members view the PM as ill-informed, they will be less likely to trust their judgment.

There are incredible resources for furthering project management skills, such as webinars, continuing education classes, or PMI chapter meetings. These resources will not only make a PM’s job easier, but will demonstrate competence to team members.

Health and well-being can also play an enormous role in job performance and work experience. Project managers should not neglect exercise, healthy eating or sleep. With just a slight lifestyle change, a project manager can realize huge energy gains, achieve better focus, and attain a more positive outlook.

Lead by Example

A project manager can’t just “talk the talk” but has to also “walk the walk”. If not, he/she will lose all credibility. In order for a project manager to earn their team’s respect, they must wholeheartedly support their own decisions and back them up with actions.        

The most effective way to earn authority is to be a project leader that others want to follow. Be on time. Be kind and considerate. Be efficient with your tasks. Be organized. Be fair with others. Set an example for others to follow.

The project manager is a tricky position to navigate, yet just a few simple practices can enhance a project manager’s powers of persuasion and increase their influence enough to achieve tremendous things. A project manager should always remain cognizant of the fact that they aren’t the boss; they are a leader of a team that will be inspired to follow or struggle at every step along the way. The process will be made much easier by being kind, respectful, and benevolent in decision-making.

These techniques should help the project manager complete projects within the time, quality, and scope parameters laid out during the early phases. Or, at the very least, the project manager can go home happy and content that they’ve done their very best.

Don’t forget to leave your comments below.

Dan Vickers, PMP, is a project leader at CS STARS and has worked with a wide variety of clients in multiple industries: Banking, Insurance, Staffing, and Manufacturing.  He began in project management in 1996, was certified as a PMP in 2003, and has led hundreds of projects from start to finish.  He works in a fast-moving, multi-client, multi-team environment delivering risk management software solutions to clients across the country at CS STARS.  He currently performs program management for numerous projects in an effort to efficiently impact the organization’s bottom line.  In addition, he leads project management webinars to other project managers from around the world.  Managing multiple projects simultaneously and effectively is his way of life.

 

Curt Finch is the CEO of Journyx. Since 1996, Journyx has remained committed to helping customers intelligently invest their time and resources to achieve per-person, per-project profitability. Curt earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science from Virginia Tech in 1987.  As a software programmer fixing bugs for IBM in the early ‘90’s, Curt Finch found that tracking the time it took to fix each bug revealed the per-bug profitability. Curt knew that this concept of using time-tracking data to determine project profitability was a winning idea and something that companies were not doing – yet… Curt created the world’s first web-based timesheet application and the foundation for the current Journyx product offerings in 1997. Curt is an avid speaker and writer.

Saving Time and Money: Investing Your Two Most Critical Assets in Project Management

Written by Curt Finch on . Posted in Articles. 2 Comments on Saving Time and Money: Investing Your Two Most Critical Assets in Project Management

The phrase “time is fleeting” has never had more relevance than it does in the 21st century as today’s “C-Suite” executives and their employees confront overwhelming demands on their time.

Time is as critical as money. Yet, many companies are not accustomed to allocating and investing it with the same level of care as they would with more traditional assets. Few executives “get it” that time must be managed, accounted for and invested in ways that maximize return. This is often easier said than done as companies seldom possess the right processes and infrastructure to make the most of time resources.

They often confuse the core business process of time-resource allocation with simple “timesheets” or “time management calendars.” This is as dangerous as confusing a simple check register with a company’s capital investment strategy.

To allocate and manage any resource, it must first be seen clearly and then tracked carefully. Time tracking should be a fundamental part of any business. Almost every business tracks time at some level — even if only for payroll. At the most basic level, some companies employ a simplistic, homegrown system that is based on spreadsheets.

Even companies that have fully automated time-tracking systems may fail to leverage those systems to drive profits up and/or costs down. Leveraging such systems is neither as easy nor as obvious as it seems. Some companies may understand the potential gains associated with managing time as an asset, but lack the right knowledge or tools. Many others succumb to a misinformed and needless distrust of time tracking. Still, others mistakenly believe that time tracking systems are simple, and develop or buy inadequate systems that fail to deliver real value to the entire enterprise.

An expertly developed and finely-tuned time management system can become a window into the real-time costs of any organization, especially if it provides —

  • Access and a thorough understanding of costs at every level of the business — at a team level, a task level, a project level, a business unit level and a company level.
  • Complete visibility into these costs for everyone in the organization who can impact them.
  • Power to redeploy and shift time resource investments to optimize processes, reduce risk, thwart competition, drive revenue, and increase profits.

The benefits of such a system will make the relationship of time and money crystal clear. While identifying costs is nothing new for most companies, many experts agree that traditional cost accounting methods may not yield the right information for some of the most vital initiatives that companies undertake, such as competitive strategy formulation and execution or project portfolio management.

New ways of understanding costs, such as activity-based costing, have emerged to help companies redefine and realign their strategies. Yet these new methods are only as good as the data that feeds them—and time data is a critical input.

Identify Core Processes

To understand time tracking as a core business process, first consider that time data feeds four fundamental business functions:

  • Payroll
  • Billing
  • Project management
  • Business strategy development

It’s important to find a solution provider that addresses all of these functions. Some providers might only manage hourly time with the aim at lowering the cost of payroll by punch rounding, security lockouts, and other techniques. These packages are so well suited for managing payroll, that they are unsuitable for project management or billing automation.

Some providers focus on billing software and are great at automating billing for small companies, but they don’t do payroll or project management. And others focus on great project management but can’t do payroll or billing automation.

The ideal solution should offer the ability to automate time tracking for project management, billing, professional (i.e., salary) payroll, and increasingly, for hourly payroll. This will enable a qualitatively new function: time tracking for strategic analysis.

This will help companies better understand which of their projects generate profits. An important first step is to know whether projects are on schedule or within budget. However, this step alone is not enough. Despite project managers’ keen abilities to remain within schedule and budget constraints, all too often they find themselves out of a job when their projects, product lines or research portfolios are deemed unprofitable or excessively risky. Budgets and schedules alone won’t make a company successful. Only projects that create profits will drive success. All projects, whether internal or external, must somehow drive the company to greater profitability. If they do not, they will be cancelled.

It is critical to constantly monitor projects throughout their lifecycle in order to continue or terminate them. Two questions to ask: “How much of my project’s budgeted time has been spent?” and “How close are we to completion?” will offer some valuable information to make a decision. If you have used thirty percent of the allotted time and you are only ten percent done, that is a red flag. However, it’s better to have that red flag raised when you have spent thirty percent of your money rather than eighty percent.

The companies that manage their portfolios of internal and external projects skillfully — ensuring that all projects help the company make money — will be the companies who survive and succeed in both good times and bad. The hard truth is that no company can afford to mismanage its project portfolio. Whether that portfolio contains two or two-hundred projects, the goal remains the same: profit.

To reach this goal, companies need to be smarter about how they collect and use critical time data to evaluate project cost and performance; allocate labor and other resources; and estimate future project schedules and costs. They can reduce risk of failure by understanding the true costs of their project in real time, and by taking necessary action sooner when the chances of success are greater.

The right time data, accessible in real-time, is critical to solving project management problems.

Don’t forget to leave your comments below.

Curt Finch is the CEO of Journyx. Since 1996, Journyx has remained committed to helping customers intelligently invest their time and resources to achieve per-person, per-project profitability. Curt earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science from Virginia Tech in 1987.  As a software programmer fixing bugs for IBM in the early ‘90’s, Curt Finch found that tracking the time it took to fix each bug revealed the per-bug profitability. Curt knew that this concept of using time-tracking data to determine project profitability was a winning idea and something that companies were not doing – yet… Curt created the world’s first web-based timesheet application and the foundation for the current Journyx product offerings in 1997. Curt is an avid speaker and writer. Learn more about Curt at http://journyx.com/company/curtfinch.html.