Tag: Skills

Why You Should Align Your Project and Company Goals

Written by Effie Sismanis on November 2, 2011. Posted in Articles. 4 Comments on Why You Should Align Your Project and Company Goals

Each year, as project managers we take courses and read articles and books on how to improve our project management skills: how to track the critical path, influence without authority, tackle bigger scope and bigger budgets, work with remote teams, flush out the ‘right’ requirements, engage the teams we’ll need for success and many other topics. Often, these are great courses and articles with great tips and advice that we use every day to deliver projects assigned to us. One area where PMs aren’t always included—or do not involve themselves in—is the project selection process, that pre-initiation stage where the project is still a concept, someone’s brainstorm or someone’s personal pet project.
Many projects come from the must-do category—legal, compliance, regulatory, contractual (this last one is a big area and for the purposes of this discussion it will be left in the must-do category). But what about the rest of the project requests that are raised? There are infrastructure projects, which some companies define as must-do based on end-of-life criteria, while other companies include them as part of a discretionary project, such as a new product or new functionality. There are software projects—new options, features, products, functionalities—that will improve market share, increase customer experience, provide more features that customers can buy, improve turnaround time for transactions, allow customers to have more self-serve options, cut headcount, improve security, etc. How does a company select which projects will go ahead given the available project hours in a year or term?

Many project managers become involved or are assigned after a project is approved and only focus on the project they’ve been handed; they do not question whether it is the ‘right’ project to be done. However, as a responsible project manager, it is your place—and your responsibility—to at least raise the question of how the project fits in with the company’s goals and strategic direction.

Projects that do not align with the company’s goals—projects done because someone has a personal interest or is focusing only on their own area/department—do not necessarily further company interests. Such projects will not get the proper management support they need to be really successful, they will have over-inflated benefits that look attractive but are not based on realistic data (without these good-looking benefits, they wouldn’t have made it past the selection stage) and they will ultimately fail even if they are successfully installed.

In order to ensure that the project actually benefits the company, PMs should get to know the company short- and long-term goals. Most of these are easily available in the company’s intranet, and some companies want to ensure employees are aware of the goals so they print posters that are posted in company hallways or lunch rooms. If they’re not easily available, ask your manager/director, or the person who assigns you your work. If they don’t know, then the project may not be aligned to the company’s goals.

Go through the goals one by one and work with the sponsor and key stakeholders to identify the ways in which the project does and does not align with each stated goal. If there are aspects that do not align to the goals, spell these out in the Charter. Taking the time to write this out in plan form may save you from issues being raised later in the project. Be as specific as possible; if the company goal is to improve the customer or client experience, state specifically how this project does or does not contribute to this goal. If the company goal is to be a luxury brand or to have a reputation for world-class service, list the ways that this project will help or hurt this perception; again, documenting the negatives as well as the positives may get the sponsor/key stakeholders to reconsider their approach before the project is too far down an odious road. Once you are sure that the project is aligned to the company’s goals, ensure that this is spelled out in the Charter and is signed off by major stakeholders.

Once the information is documented and approved, ensure that the project team understands how this project fits those goals. Use this information throughout the life of the project to help guide decisions, including change requests. It is by no means the only information to be considered, but should be included with other information to make sure that the project doesn’t sway from the intended goal.

Perhaps the company already does this before the project gets the approval to proceed. In this case, the exercise should be very simple to complete and most of the information will already be in the business case. In this situation, once the information is in the Charter, it will be signed off and you can proceed to the next phase of your project.

You may be surprised to find that in projects where this alignment is not considered up front, once you complete the exercise and document the findings, the project may stall as people discuss and possibly reconsider the decision to proceed. Do not view this as a time-waster or think that you are being a troublemaker—a boss or sponsor who interprets this as such probably has other reasons for wanting this project to proceed, reasons that will likely come to light through the exercise. Remember that your goal as a project manager is to deliver the project—not just any project, but the project that will benefit the company.

When you do the right project, there is engagement at all levels, there is support, and there is also increased attention and monitoring. There is also likely more pressure as this is a strategically important project. Welcome this attention as it will help you to deal with risks more effectively and prevent some risks from becoming issues.

A project that doesn’t align to the company’s goals will not contribute to the company direction—it is a project that will not meet expectations, that will attract only a handful of customers, that will actually pay back in multiple years rather than months, and that doesn’t get the attention of the senior management team when issues arise. It is the type of project we’ve all installed after arduous hours and many challenges that everyone forgets about as soon as the installation is over. This is not the project we enjoy installing—it’s the project we’re all glad is over. And this is not the project we should be doing.

Ultimately, the decision to proceed comes from the business and leadership team. If they accept that the project does not support or contribute to the company’s goals, then at least it is documented and approved, and can be referred to in later stages if the question “why are we doing this project” is raised. If that happens, you are prepared to hear this question and can prepare for the inevitability that the project will not get the attention to help it proceed smoothly.

Don’t forget to leave your comments below.

Effie Sismanis is a Project Management consultant working in Toronto, Canada. Effie has spent the last 17 years delivering IT projects for the Financial Services & Telecom industries in Canada and internationally. PMP-certified since 2004, Effie started out working in a call center, and appreciates that business knowledge is a key to delivering successful projects.

Could Your Project be the Reason for a Data Breach?

Written by Eben Berry on November 2, 2011. Posted in Articles. 8 Comments on Could Your Project be the Reason for a Data Breach?

Part II: The Solution and Its Value

Viewing Cyber Security as a Business Solution

As a continuation of Part I, although advancements in technology have enabled organizational strategies they came with a price to pay given the rise in cyber breaches. Cyber security continues to be a moving target with no final technological solution insight. Considering the rate of progress in new technologies and their social prevalence, solutions are now more dependent on a person’s mindset, critical thinking abilities, and an increase in individual responsibility. These facts lead us to believe that the most effective resistance against cyber threats must now be built on shifting an individual’s mindset, adjusting human behavior and evolving legacy methodologies. Cyber security has elevated to become a required attribute for successful organizations and career professionals going forward. Cyber safe practices require a proactive approach in addressing a new generation of cyber breach challenges associated with strategic asset delivery and survivability. The first step project managers should take is to make cyber security a priority and position cyber safe practices as part of the solution in the upfront initiation and planning processes. Project managers and delivery team professionals such as business analysts should also incorporate cyber security practices into the remaining project phases to ensure traceability of established cyber security requirements.
A Gartner research study conducted in 2010 found that reactive versus proactive investment in cyber security could have up to a 70 to 1 price tag. Many of the cyber security challenges that organizations face today have less to do with a technology problem and more to do with the human element and process approach representing the weakest security link within organizations’ cyber infrastructures. An older but still relevant report on the leading causes of data loss noted that 1 in 2 events had been caused by human error and 1 in 4 were related to policy violations (Source: IT Policy Compliance Group 2007). This highlights the need for greater awareness, education and a refined business approach to delivering cyber safe strategic assets.

Protecting business assets from the evolving dangers of the Internet and mobility infrastructure requires a unified approach across business, IT and security in maintaining business resistance to cyber threats and attacks. For example, a window in your house protects you from weather damage, heating and cooling costs, and unwanted intruders. For the window to function properly, it requires a set of combined controls that involve human process and technologies. These controls include security controls (i.e., requiring a particular lock be part of the design), IT controls (i.e., incorporating the lock into the window design), and the business controls (i.e., ensuring that a daily routine has been established to shut and lock the windows). Without a unified business approach and controls in place that cover all three areas, organizations are at an increased risk of water damage, higher heating and cooling bills, and intruders with easy access.

A Mindset Shift, Behavior Modification and Methodology Change

To truly challenge the advantage cyber attackers have today, managers and individuals require a shift in their mindset towards cyber safety. Although many see cyber security as a technological problem, data breaches show society that this is more of a human behavior problem. Many organizations continue to rely on their employees as their last line of defense but most non-technical roles in the organization do not have the required awareness and education that is necessary to fully minimize an organization’s exposure to cyber threats and attacks.

Proper cyber safety requires a new business awareness, delivery and operational approach to expand an organization’s capabilities and competencies for both non-technical and technical career professionals such as project managers. A new set of data handling and safeguard skills for all employees and third party vendors for handling sensitive data in cyber space has become a fundamental organizational requirement. Business units, business projects and entire organizations must improve preparation by investing in new cyber safe practices starting with awareness training, education and certification programs. This mindset shift, behavioral modification and methodology changes should be followed up with actionable techniques incorporated into the organizational culture and functional processes.

Creating a New Delivery Model Through Cyber Security

Organizations need to take a proactive approach to cyber security and enhance their existing business delivery models tailored to their industry and organization. This new baseline model places an emphasis on planning, designing, building and delivering secure business solutions rather than reacting to data breaches and exposures that your organization could have avoided.

Cyber security must become part of every career professional’s mindset in further shifting an organization to a security-minded culture. In order to level the playing field and begin building resistance against cyber attacks, asset protection demands a multi-dimensional model that includes individuals, organizations and society. In order to gain significant advantage quickly, a new set of baseline standards must be created for organizations to better evaluate the technology and vendor selection processes to ensure a particular vendor or technology solution does not become the reason for a data breach. This becomes even more critical to organizations that have shifted or are making the shift to mobility platforms to enable new business model innovations. Establishing cyber safe planning and delivery performance metrics, empowering your project teams by making security a priority and incorporating cyber safe practices into your business process designs will put your organization in a more defensible position.

Cyber Security and Project Management: The Perfect Partnership

Three of the main project management functions are managing resources, managing project risk and managing project quality assurance. Given this, let’s review the potential business risks of cyber threats and attacks during the project delivery life cycle.

Project Management Functions	Cyber Threat & Attack Impacts	Cyber Safe Practice Examples
Managing Resources	Data loss exposure Identities and intellectual property stolen	Incorporate essential practices for project data Cyber safe data assurance management plan
Managing Project Risk	Erosion of customer trust Damage to brand image Stakeholder dissatisfaction	Establish cyber security priorities Establish cyber safe performance metrics
Managing Project Quality Assurance	Low-quality projects: open windows Low-quality deliverables: easy targets Inadequate testing of threats	Incorporate scenario-based threat testing Develop cyber deliverables checklist Develop business incident response plan

Table 1.0: PM Functions, Cyber Threat and Attack Impacts, and Cyber Safe Practice Examples

Cyber security must be part of your solution going forward to remain competitive, to retain your constituents’ trust and to attract the top talent necessary to compete in the Internet market. Do not wait until your project or organization’s assets have been compromised by cyber attackers to begin making an essential business practice shift—start establishing and incorporating your delivery process with cyber safe practices today. Minimize your chances of being an easy target and establish cyber safety as a new benchmark for project management success. Organizations and career professionals, including executives, must make cyber security a priority by investing upfront in the strategic planning and delivery process to integrate cyber security as a competitive advantage in the products and services they offer. Project managers armed with cyber security knowledge and techniques will deliver higher quality projects, increase their marketability and help PMOs achieve greater project success.

Don’t forget to leave your comments below.

The information presented in this article is intended as general advice. Specific advice would require a qualified organization to become familiar with the facts of you or your organization’s particular situation.

Eben Berry is President and Founder of Cyber Inspectors LLC. Mr. Berry formed a new venture enabling companies to have greater preparedness in responding to growing concerns with cyber-attacks. As a former CISO, his twenty three years of experience across Military, Fortune 1000 and non-profit organizations centered on business, technology and information security. He received his MBA from Northeastern University.

Ehsan Sabaghian is Sr. Director of Business Development at Cyber Inspectors LLC. After receiving his 2^nd master’s degree in information technology management from Clark University, MA, Mr. Sabaghian joined Cyber Inspectors LLC. An information systems expert with extensive background in business management, he emerged as a strong change agent SME on many large IT projects.

About Cyber Inspectors™ LLC. Founded in 2011 and based in Burlington, MA, Cyber Inspectors is focused on cyber security and enabling companies to achieve greater organizational preparedness in responding to cyber threats and attacks. Cyber Inspectors has developed a new Business Delivery Assurance Model™ focused on cyber safe essential practices, response capabilities and strategic investment of security.

Scheduling 101: Remember the Basics

Written by George Pitagorsky on October 26, 2011. Posted in Articles. 4 Comments on Scheduling 101: Remember the Basics

Unquestionably scheduling is a challenge in just about any project. It becomes an even greater challenge when requirements change and resources are shared amongst multiple projects and between projects and operational activities.

My first project management job was on the Polaris project. A huge program but one in which most of the resources were dedicated full time and priorities and scope were stable. The hardest part of scheduling in that project was effort estimating and accounting for risk.

Since then I have found myself involved with projects in which resources are shared, there is little or no multi-project resource management and in which clients and users are up to their necks with day to day work so getting them to take part in requirements definition, decision making, testing and roll-out activities involves prayer, threats and the like.
So how do we schedule under those adverse conditions?

Well, one choice is to not schedule at all. Just do the work and finish when you’re finished. In this mode, frustration and escalation as well as diligence and commitment are the drivers for getting the job done. Sometimes projects never get done at all, staying on the back burner forever.

This is not my first choice. Like many who find themselves managing projects I want a bit more control. Clients and executives want to know when the results will be ready.

I have pretty much given up on certainty (uncertainty and impermanence are the only certainties). No amount of the best scheduling is going to provide a guaranteed end date. But, some reasonably accurate sense of “when” is needed and possible. That’s the message we need to get across to stakeholders and ourselves.

The key is realism. Begin with a solid sense of scope and a sense of how stable its definition is. Then create an estimate of how much effort is required. You’ll know this based on having done the work before and by breaking the work down into manageable chunks and estimating the chunks. If the project is unique, chances are many of the tasks are not that unique. Breaking the work down will enable you to identify the uncertainties and do a better job of estimating. If the project is like many others you’ve done before, life is easy. Do a top down analogous estimate. For tasks that have long lead times or are being done by people who are not effectively accountable (for example outside auditors, permit grantors, etc.) Build in a cushion.

As we know from basic training in PM the next step is sequencing to identify which tasks can be done in parallel and which must be done serially.

Next comes the hard part, resource allocation. If you are in an environment that maintains an accurate picture of how resources are allocated then this part is relatively easy. You can see who’s available when and schedule accordingly.

If on the other hand you are among the many without such an advantage you must be careful to estimate resource availability. Don’t fall into the trap of creating a schedule based on wishful thinking (or non-thinking). If you and other resources are bouncing from project to project to operational activities and back, build or if resources like clients, senior managers and end users (yes, these are project human resources) are hard to pin down for meetings and their task durations, then build contingency into your schedule. If you can, minimize interruptions and schedule projects or tasks so that they can be done without unnecessary starts and stops. Don’t be afraid to expand the schedule to accommodate multi-tasking, if you cannot get dedicated resources.

Manage risk. Keep in mind the difference between what is most likely to happen as opposed to what you would most like to have happen.

To account for uncertainty, use buffers or contingency funds rather than elongating individual tasks. At the task level, it is best to pin performers down to a specified target date. On the project level, it is realistic to expect completion within a range. Use contingency funds to manage task slippage and expectations.

Remember, scheduling is a means for managing expectations and performance. Make the initial schedule realistic and aggressive.

Be courageous. Don’t cave in to demands to set a target date that you know is a pipe dream. Adjust the schedule as actual performance and current perspectives dictate.

In the end, scheduling, and planning in general, does not determine the project outcome. The plan sets a direction and approach. They provide the map we use to determine if we are on course. If we are not on course we adjust. If the map is inaccurate we change it.

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How do you Implement Lean for Project Management

Written by Lisa Anderson on October 19, 2011. Posted in Articles. 8 Comments on How do you Implement Lean for Project Management

FeatureOct19 There’s no doubt that there is a vast amount of interest in lean principles. I’ve had multiple client requests – both ones who are interested in doing the latest and greatest program that they think might be the answer to “all their issues” and those who are interested in implementing culture change. I find that those clients who view lean as a culture change and are focused on long term fundamentals leapfrog the rest with bottom line results.

In today’s new normal business environment, sales are lackluster and resources are scarce yet customers expect more for less. Thus, the traditional avenues to success will no longer yield the same results. Instead, we must try new approaches and “think smart” to thrive in the new normal business environment. As project results can be a significant contributor to the bottom line, there is no better time to think about how to succeed in new ways. Why not incorporate the lean concepts that make sense to project management?
In my experience as a business consultant, a not-for-profit leader and a former VP of Operations, I’ve found that there are several lean principles which align with project management success. The top three include the following: 1) Focus on the customer. 2) Eliminate waste. 3) It’s all about the people.

Focus on the customer: Similar to implementing lean in manufacturing environments, first take a step back and think about the customer. Who is the customer of your project? Or, said another way: who will benefit from the project?

For example, one of my client projects is focused on reducing the past due metric. In this case, the customer connection is obvious – the fewer customer orders which are past due, the better service the customer will receive. Yet, even in this case, truly understanding what the customers’ value is important. Would the customers prefer a delivery date that is achievable and reliable or would they prefer a shorter lead time with less reliability? I’ve yet to work with a client who didn’t have customers who value different aspects of service higher than other customers. Find out and optimize based upon what each customer values.

In another example, another client project is to implement an inventory management system. Who is the customer? There could be several: The end customer will likely receive better service with improved inventory accuracy. The CEO will likely improve profitability as the inventory management processes are optimized. The CFO will be much better equipped for a financial audit. And the list goes on. Although it is helpful to brainstorm all the benefits, it is vital to understand which is of value to your customer.

Eliminate waste: There is a plethora of waste in project management. First, look for waste. Taking a step back, since it’s unlikely we’ll be looking for machine waste in project management, we should think about the best definition. I like the following – waste is that which doesn’t add value to the customer (and that which the customer is willing to pay for).

It is interesting how often we become used to waste and don’t see it anymore. Thus, you need to put on a new pair of glasses to see the waste all around you. Can you accomplish the project in a fewer number of steps? Are you following up on every task or focusing attention on the critical path? What will provide a return on investment? Are you asking the project team for input and ideas to eliminate waste?

It’s all about the people: Last but not least, those who succeed with lean initiatives understand that it’s all about the people. In essence, it is not an event; it is a culture change. Do you engage your people in the project? Do you ask for their input? Do you explain the project scope and its value to the organization? Do you do what you say you’ll do? I find this is much harder to do than it sounds yet it is a secret to unleashing your project talent. In my experience, an exceptional project team with a so-so project will beat a so-so project team with an excellent project every time!

Implementing lean for project management doesn’t require cash, capital or extra resources yet it can ensure that your project is delivered on time, on budget and with dramatic results. Although it is a good idea anytime, it is a must in today’s new normal business environment.

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Five Uses for a “Dead” Issue Log

Written by Kiron Bondale on October 19, 2011. Posted in Articles. 4 Comments on Five Uses for a “Dead” Issue Log

I couldn’t surpass Simon Bond’s volume of suggestions, but Issue Logs can add value beyond a project’s completion! Although you may be more likely to consider schedules, financial plans or even risk registers as useful post-project artefacts, here are a few reasons to consider doing more than just archiving those issue logs.

Improving operations: A good practice in project closeout is to transfer all open or on hold issues to the team that will be responsible for supporting the project deliverables in their operational state. However, even the data related to closed project issues can help with resolving operational challenges – troubleshooting methods, workarounds that might have been used during the project for expediency purposes or key contacts are a few examples of such useful information.
As I wrote in the article, Quantifying Risk Management Benefits, by reviewing issue logs immediately after a project has completed, you can glean candidate threats to future projects. You can also harvest quantitative impact data and gain insights into how effective specific issue management strategies were.

Helping to develop a Risk Breakdown Structure (RBS): An RBS can be a valuable input into risk identification activities, but to develop one that reflects the relative severity of different threat categories, past project issue logs can provide empirical evidence on issue frequency and impacts.

Proactive identification of portfolio-wide threats: Analogous to the rationale used by security agencies use for sifting through and analyzing terrorist chatter to avert impending attacks, analyzing issues across projects can help to identify significant systemic threats.

Resource evaluation and development: While the normal artefacts in a project can provide data to help resource managers understand how their staff perform under normal conditions and expectations, issue logs can provide insights and supporting evidence into how the same resources deal with unexpected situations. This information can help during performance evaluation time but can also be useful to identify which staff may be better suited to troubleshooting tasks.

Harvesting and distilling operational process assets requires effort, and such post-project activities may necessitate the services of a PMO or PM community of practice (as the project team will likely have moved on to their next project), however, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to fulfill it”.

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