Tag: Strategic & Business Management

5 Reasons why you should use Portfoleon to manage your project portfolio

Written by Brad Egeland on December 1, 2021. Posted in Articles.

In my next installment of this “5 Reasons Why…” series on project management related software and services, I want to consider 5 reasons why you should consider Portfoleon to manage your projects and portfolio of projects. I personally had not heard of Portfoleon before, but was delightfully overwhelmed with the power and visibility this tool gives to the project leaders when presenting projects for planning and alignment with organizational goals. The key to getting buy-in from senior management is to demonstrate feasibility, efficiency, and relevance of your plans with these projects and how they align to the strategic company goals. Portfoleon does just that. Let’s consider…

Get a bird’s eye view of the project portfolio

In managing your project portfolio Portfoleon puts emphasis on visualization. Make every conversation you have with your stakeholders productive by instantly pulling the right data from a single source of truth and visualizing it in a way that enables your team to make decisions.

With Portfoleon’s powerful visualization capabilities you can make kanban boards, strategic timelines, spreadsheets, pivot tables, and charts to highlight different aspects and interact with your portfolio. Planning resource demand and supply in broad strokes will enable you to quickly find and address resource gaps.

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Collaborate and involve

You will get better results and improve buy-in when your stakeholders are actively involved in the portfolio management process. Gone are the days when a manager would work on the project plans on their own.

With Portfoleon you can involve others into the process, test assumptions, prepare plan changes, and finally roll the updated plans out to the whole organization.

With a draft-publish-rollback system, your team members will be able to confidently perform experiments and make changes knowing that they will not interfere with the work of others.

Customize to your specific needs

Define your own corporate terminology and data structure with custom item types, fields, forms, and automation rules.

All the custom items and fields are available everywhere – in the spreadsheets, kanban and timeline cards, pivot tables, integration API, and more.

Integrate into your IT landscape

Portfoleon is made to integrate into your IT landscape – securely and efficiently. Use the single sign-on integration to authenticate your users, use the native integration with Jira, or integrate with anything using the integration API or a no-code Zapier connector.

Get quick wins even with the most difficult portfolio

There are many great software systems out there that provide complex portfolio management capabilities, but ask you to go through a long preparation process before you can get started. Often the maintenance effort or barriers to entry become too high and the teams choose to proceed with the old ways.

Portfoleon is designed to help you to start small. With as little as a just list of projects names and two key dates Portfoleon can already provide you with a lot of value. Add more data points gradually to improve your portfolio management system. With every small step involve more stakeholders, have more productive conversations, and get a better outcome.

Start now

Make your project portfolio planning simple, visual, and lightweight in Portfoleon. Get started now with their free plan.

OKR and Project Management

Written by Giovanny Guillen on November 30, 2021. Posted in Articles.

What are OKRs?

OKR stands for Objectives and Key Results. This allows to clearly define the course in a project must be set to achieve the expected result, for this OKRs are established in objectives that can be measured. The OKR method consists, first in establishing qualitative objectives, and second define the strategy to quantify the outcomes and the achievement of these objectives. In addition, it is essential that once the results of the process have been quantified, a retrospective is made to discuss the results obtained (Something that can be associated with the development of agile methodologies).

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One of the main characteristics that enhance the positive impact of OKRs is that they vary between two types of objectives:

Very difficult objectives to achieve. The purpose of these objectives is to motivate the team and exploit their skills to the fullest.
Achievable objectives, which can be developed smoothly by the team.

These two types of objectives must vary and coexist to achieve good outcomes.

What are the differences between OKRs and KPIs?

The main difference between KPIs and OKRs is that KPIs are performance indicators associated with the team and the process with which the results are obtained. OKR is associated with increments to deliver value in an iteration or the final result of an iteration, having a more global reach of the organization.

OKR in Agility

In agility the purpose of each iteration is to add value to the product that is being developed, OKRs can play an important role since they provide support in the efficiency of processes and allow to enhance their value based on organizational goals. In an agile organization, the team needs to define, by themselves, OKRs. This is because there will be no one better at setting the key results than the same team that plans to develop them.

KRs

It is essential to be focused on the KR or key results and this must be differentiated from the tasks.

A key outcome must be geared towards what needs to be achieved.
One task will be how development is proposed.

For this reason, KRs should be prevented from being sorted as a task list.

In order to measure these results, it is necessary to establish a scoring scale:

Between 0 and 1 using decimals
Between 0 and 10 with integers

One of the indicators that must be borne in mind is that the score must be staggered, that is, if we have scores for results that only indicate 0 and 1 or 0 and 10 should be analyzed since they possibly resemble a list of tasks (a situation that has already been described and should be avoided).

The key results for them to be scored should be as least subjective as possible. An example of this can be, for example, if a company has fixed a KR to increase monthly sales considerably, instead of, to fix a KR to increase monthly sales by 10%, the latter will be easier to measure.

A fairly common mistake in the results is that they don’t know how to measure KRs, which could completely divert the development of the activities of a team.

OKRs must always be established at the team level and the work to consolidate them must always be collaborative, it is common that between 4 and 8 KR are established by objectives and that those are evaluated in a period.

The O

The objectives are what guide the development of the KR and are fundamental to know the direction of the project or product that you want to develop. Its fundamental characteristics are:

They must be challenging and inspiring objectives since in this way the team will be motivated to achieve them.
The objective should qualitatively describe what you want to achieve with the result or/and the product.
They must be limited to a period in which they will be developed.

The objectives, unlike the results, can spare with the metrics to be reflected, that is, they do not need a numerical parameter that limits since they are qualitative propositions.

In the objectives there are two key errors that can damage the methodology:

Set impossible objectives; since the people who will develop the activities will be unmotivated under the knowledge that they will not be able to consolidate it. Usually, this happens if the goal is set by a person who doesn´t develop the activities (The principle of self-organized teams is not followed).
Set easy objectives; like the previous one demotivation is generated, in this case, objectives don´t invite to work for them.

OKRs Methodology and Cycle

To implement OKR in your organization or even in your personal life, you have to follow the next steps:

Review or define your annual vision and mission. In the current environment with the changes in the market, laws, economy, and customers preference, it is important to review and validate if these statements are true yet.
Define the strategy to face changes and uncertainty and accomplish with the vision and mission.
Define key objectives that must be aligned to the vision, mission, and strategies. This is a 3- or 4-months cycle. To establish it, follow the next steps:
1. Define objectives with your team. Each objective must be clear, time achievable, and measurable.
2. Specify the actions for each objective that can help to achieve it. Each action could represent a project initiative.
3. Each week, review your progress based on the metrics from every project and analyze if you are in the correct direction.
4. If you detect deviation improve your OKRs making the changes needed to correct it.
5. After 3 or 4 months, repeat the cycle with the aim to make changes and improve OKRs again.

Figure 1. OKR Methodology and Cycle

OKRs and Project Management

While OKR is the way to define objectives for a short period, and establish the desirable results, project management, especially agile methodologies, is the way to become those objectives and results into a reality. OKRs allow business and project managers to face uncertain, evaluate risk, and changes in the market to set the direction and to make decisions about what changes are needed in current projects or which projects initiate or cancel.

Figure 2. OKRs and Project Management

The objectives execution through project management allows to gather the information and get the metrics needed to determine if objectives are achieved in a short period, with the aim to execute the OKR cycle again. From objectives, product owners, business analysts, and project managers can organize and plan releases, iterations, and sprints to develop the product.

Figure 3. OKRs and Project Management Alignment

Final Considerations

To develop OKRs one of the keys is consistency in them since it will be useless to start based on them and then never feedback or evaluate them.
It is always good to reference the methodology in already proven models, however, to achieve the maximum potential and understand the development of a specific case it is convenient to study and adapt the OKRs.
OKRs are a very powerful tool, however, it is difficult to strategically guide an organization based on them because:

They don’t necessarily have a long-term vision but are set for more limited periods.
Lack of management in the evolution of different scenarios and the detection of changes.
They only contemplate the results.
The processes to achieve results are based on project management.

OKRs can be defined as a tool of the great potential that will allow articulating with other procedures to obtain what would be an organizational strategy.

Five Foolproof Ways Social Media Can Benefit Project Management

Written by Nandini Sharma on October 26, 2021. Posted in Articles.

Using social media for project management might not have seemed effective to both project managers and organizations a few years ago but things have changed and how!

Gone are the days when social media was no more than just a medium for users to forge new connections.

It’s amazing how social media has opened up an array of possibilities for businesses of all sizes and types to enhance communication and collaboration, which are two of the most crucial drivers in project management.

Project managers and organizations have realized that the far-reaching influence of social media can be utilized in more ways than one when it comes to project management.

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Social Media, Communication And Project Management

Communication is the core of project management; it should flow quickly to the right people at the right time.

Increasing number of team members, clients, and stakeholders are working from different geographical locations and different time zones. Therefore, project managers have to look for ways to maintain seamless communication among all those who are involved in a project.

In this context, social media can prove to be a great binding force that enables people to share ideas, information, feedback, videos, personal messages, etc. All social media platforms provide a quick and reliable platform for users to be on the same page and collaborate to achieve set targets.

Social media should not only be looked at as wide-scale networking platforms but also as technology that facilitates prompt and information-rich communication among users.

Before we go on to discuss some undeniable benefits of social media in the field of project management, it would be worth taking a pause and reflect on the 6 C’s that drive and underpin social media usage in the business world.

6 Vital C’s Of Social Media In Contemporary Times

1. Collaboration

Collaboration and social media are synonymous with each other. Sharing of messages, files and documents, images, audio and video files among users is common on various social media channels. Since project management involves sharing and collaboration of more or less the same elements, social media can prove to be a useful addition.

2. Community

Social media revolves around creating and building communities with people/ groups with similar interests and ideas. That’s the primary purpose for users to use social media – to share and exchange information in virtual communities.

3. Conversation

Social media thrives on the regular flow of communication; people coming together to discuss trending topics and areas of common interest. Even a single message can reach millions of people across different platforms and they can reply within seconds. Another aspect where social media can be of a great addition to project management.

4. Content

We’ve all heard that content is king, and this saying holds true for social media. Engaging, original, and relevant content has the potential to engage social media users by providing them with valuable information on a range of topics. Content is rightly termed as the center of social media engagement.

5. Curation

Curation refers to classifying, organizing, and maintaining content by social media participants. Curation is a collaborative effort where individuals circulate valuable content within their communities and explain how it adds value and what they’ve learned from it.

6. Culture

Social media revolves around group culture, which thrives on collaboration and communication. It’s amazing how a single click can enable people to express their views within seconds!

All these C’s are interconnected. For example, curated content can lead to conversations, which are the foundation stones of your community and culture.

Undeniable Benefits Of Social Media For Project Management

We have read how social media is a strong platform for people from different backgrounds to connect seamlessly with each other. Social media has brought the world closer together through its range of features that can help to simplify complex project management.

Let’s take a look at how social media can benefit project management in more ways than one.

1. Communication Management

Popular social media platforms such as YouTube, LinkedIn, Quora, and even WhatsApp are today widely accessed by professionals and common man alike. These platforms are easy to use and 24×7 available, which enables users to communicate without any time restrictions.

A project manager and his or her staff can leverage one or more social media platforms to support such a high level of communication. Social media apps have inbuilt features like audio calling, video calling, and text-based secure messaging. These communication modes can be used by team members for sharing and updating project-related information.

2. Project Updates

Social media has a huge and diverse user base and its agility of information can play a determining role in the management of project updates. Large and complex projects, especially, call for updating the right people at the right time, which is not a straightforward task.

Social media platforms can empower project managers and their teams to add efficiency to their updates management. These updates can be about tasks and project progress, issues faced, potential resolutions, team building activities, milestones, decision-making meetings, etc.

3. Training And Learning Management

One of the key areas where social media could be of great use in the project management field is the management of training and learning given to team members during the project. Lessons learned during the project can often get buried under heaps of paperwork, and most people do not take much interest in retrieving them.

Social media enables project managers and organizations to collect and store this vital piece of information through the active involvement of all participants. This information can be easily accessed, shared, and used by people for improving the quality of next projects by reducing risks.

4. Issues Management

Issues management often involves several team members and speedy actions. Therefore, involving the right people in time becomes crucial to mitigate the negative effects of issues arising within the project. Social media is an ideal tool to distribute information to selected people that are involved in a particular issue(s) management.

The information distribution could be for many purposes, which depends on the level of involvement, like:

For keeping informed and involved considering seniority and managerial position
People who are responsible for troubleshooting the issue
Experts whose inputs are sought on managing the arising issues
For capturing the learned lessons as a result of emerging issues
For updating the risk management and project plans.

5. Financial Savings

For SMEs, financial savings are of paramount importance. Social media can help small and medium-sized businesses in saving money by minimizing the costs of traveling, communication (phone bills), and even accommodation.

Video conferencing systems allow team members working from different locations to be on a common platform and exchange information and ideas without having to travel to attend group meetings.

Epilogue

Social media has evolved from merely being a social interaction tool to a comprehensive and collaborative platform. It’s amazing how various social media platforms can help project management teams to be on the same page through swift and efficient communication, file sharing, collaboration, and much more.

There are enough strong reasons for you to merge social media with project management and reap dividends. If you are still not using social media in your project management efforts, it’s high time for you to start thinking about it.

Good luck!

Evolving PMO: How the pandemic is shaping future PMOs

Written by Bill Allars on October 12, 2021. Posted in Articles.

The pandemic has taught everyone that anything can happen, and change is always just around the corner. While every industry has been reeling from its impacts, the pandemic has given us the opportunity to make our project management offices more resilient and sustainable. To stay relevant and fulfil its role as a strategic command centre, the Project Management Office must evolve.

5 key changes of an evolving PMO

Here is a quick summary of the top 5 changes the pandemic will bring to the Project Management Office (PMO):

Shift towards more Agile methodologies
Increasing demand for effective communication and collaboration tools
Acceleration of digital transformation through technological advancement
The necessity for remote leadership skills
PMOs becoming pivotal for crisis management

Let’s do a deep dive of each major change.

1. Shift to more Agile methodologies

Agile has been the ongoing buzzword of project management for years, though previously limited to software and ICT development spheres. The pandemic has shown us that the global market is not only extremely competitive and fast-paced, but also filled with uncertainties that could strike at any moment.

With its high value orientation, emphasis on self-organisations, quicker reaction times, more efficient management of digital programs and customer experience focus, adopting Agile methodologies allows organisations, not just software companies, to tap into the flexibility they need in times of crisis and change.

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If organisations need to be more Agile, their PMOs will need to spearhead the change. Becoming an Agile PMO is more than just changing practices and tools, but also involves changing mindsets and cultures. PMOs will need to transition from their traditional policing role rooted in rigid processes, old bureaucracy and traditional tools to make room for flexible processes, lean management and Agile-centric tools.

Though organisations may want to become more Agile, there is no one-size-fits-all approach to solve all your problems. In fact, many other methodologies have emerged and built off Agile philosophies to suit specific contexts. The PMO will be tasked with identifying, adapting and implementing the approach that suits their organisations needs best.

2. Increasing demand for effective communication and collaboration tools

The pandemic has brought about massive workplace changes, specifically in regard to remote working, and it is change that is likely to stay. A 2020 Gitlab research on white collar professionals discovered that only 1% of respondents wanted to return to the office with the vast majority preferring remote working. Additionally, 59% of the respondents indicated that remote working improved their output.

To accommodate this trend, the PMO will need to invest in improved cloud-based technology adoption to enable seamless communication and cross-team collaboration of geographically dispersed teams. Though many software and PPM systems have online collaborative capabilities, not all PPM software is equal. Collaboration platforms like Asana and Monday have become increasingly popular, but many such services lack integrative capabilities that allow all your project related activities to be collated in a single hub.

3. Acceleration of digital transformation through technological advancement

Digital transformation is nothing new, but the pandemic has greatly accelerated the pace of digital transformations. KPMG global survey shows that the pandemic has accelerated digital transformation strategy in 67% of respondents, with 63% increasing their digital transformation budget. McKinsey research shows that companies were adapting to digital changes at much faster rates than what was imagined pre-pandemic, particularly in regards to remote working, online customer services and the adoption of advanced technologies into operations.

As companies begin to better grasp the value of digital transformation and understand the speed it can be implemented, it will become a forefront agenda for PMOs of the future. PMOs will play a critical role in not only introducing practices, tools and processes catered to digital workflows, but also building the right cultures to minimize the resistance to change.

Additionally, as digital integration becomes more advanced, PMOs will much sooner than later be faced with the challenge of adopting and integrating artificial intelligence into their operations. It may seem like a daunting task, but AI is set to bring extensive changes to the project management field and effective PMOs cannot afford to be left behind.

4. The necessity of remote leadership skills

Relationship building and clear leadership are critical ingredients for a successful PMO. But relationship building is one of the hardest challenges of remote working. How does the PMO maintain their position as the strategic hub of an organisation if they are not able to build the relationships to lead effectively?

The pandemic has clearly shown how unequipped teams have been for remote working. A Terminal survey shows that 77% of respondents had no prior experience of leading remote teams and 30% of organisations had no long-term strategy for remote working post-pandemic. With trends showing that remote working is not going anywhere any time soon, PMOs have to adapt quickly and effectively to keep teams organized, focused, and motivated.

While remote working has been said to improve productivity, there are still many challenges such as teams feeling disconnected, employees experiencing higher rates of burnout and lack of morale. PMOs will have to work on building up their digital communication and leadership skills to compensate for the lack of opportunities to build informal relationships with team members.

5. PMOs becoming pivotal for crisis management

“In my view the PMO, in times of uncertainty, holds the whole project management ‘enterprise’ together, via process, communication and guidance. Companies that don’t have a PMO will see a lot of chaos and fumbling around in their projects” – Bob Patrino, Principal IS Project Manager

In times of crisis, employees will turn to the PMO to be their guiding light and have the proper processes and tools in place to support them. Crises like the pandemic are only going to increase in frequency and if PMOs limit themselves to their traditional policing role, they will quickly lose their relevance. PMOs have the opportunity to become a critical asset in an organisation’s crisis management strategy and have the capacity to lead teams strategically, align stakeholders, prioritise tasks effectively and ensure resources are allocated to the most critical projects.

PMOs are changing permanently. Are you ready?

Like the rest of the world, it is tempting to wish we can all ‘go back to how it used to be’. It is becoming more apparent than ever that going back may not be an option and a ‘new normal is here to stay. However, the PMO may be changing for the better and it is only those who prepare for the future who will reap its benefits.

About the author

Bill is a PMO consultant with 20+ of experience in Project and Portfolio Management, Project Administration, Risk Management and Process Redevelopment. He is currently working as PMO consultant with pmo365 and providing his expertise to the leading business.

Why do businesses need digital dexterity now more than ever?

Written by Mahendra Gupta on August 25, 2021. Posted in Articles.

User adaptation is one of the major hurdles faced by the digital workplace today. As the work and the workplace continue to adopt and adapt new technologies available, employee usability lags. Sure, some organizations adapt faster than others, but for the long haul, digital dexterity helps organizations to acclimatize faster amid disruption and digital transformation.

According to Gartner, employees with a high level of digital dexterity are 3.3 times more likely to use digital initiatives to improve how they work. Coined by Gartner, digital dexterity is a terminology that goes beyond specific hard skills and technical abilities. To succeed and keep up with the world that’s going digital, inculcating digital dexterity should be a priority for every organization.

What is Digital Dexterity?

According to Gartner, “Digital dexterity is the ability and desire to exploit existing and emerging technologies for better business outcomes.” It is all about fostering a culture conducive to drive a successful digital transformation. Simply put, it is the willingness to engage, adapt, and learn to use new technology and include it in the way of work so that it fits the mission of the organization.

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CIO’s role in digital dexterity:

The onus is on the Chief Information Officer to create a digitally dexterous company. The CIO is responsible for supporting and encouraging desired behavior prerequisites to change management. However, transforming an entire organization from one that resists, or at the very least accepts new technology, can be very challenging. CIOs have an arduous road ahead, but not one that is impossible to conquer. Following these steps, CIO’s can mold digital dexterity into the workforce.

1) Begin with figuring out what failed to work in the past and how it can be corrected. Use surveys and focus groups to identify factors that trigger an aversion to change in employees.

2) Create a benchmark that evaluates employees’ outlook toward new technology at the workplace. This data will help you identify the areas that need a higher focus, like a particular department or a process.

3) Envision the future of your workplace and share it with your employees. Doing so will enhance the willingness of your workforce to accept new technology as a stepping stone to a digitally transformed future

4) Train users on the new technology extensively, and explain the benefits of increased collaboration, efficient data collection, and improve business efficiency. So that they are less resistant to adopt the change.

Prerequisites to digital dexterity:

1) Digital-First Mindset: The first and foremost step to create a digitally dexterous culture is seeking, exploring, and prioritizing digital solutions. In short, a digital mindset should be in place.

A digital mindset is an outlook that tends to reach out to technology to have a competitive advantage, and systematically approach enterprise data. When managers and employees instinctively resort to digital tools and data to improvise processes or create new products, they reap the benefits of agility and enhanced collaboration more often. To create a digital mindset, CIO’s must ensure these 3 steps:

i) To engage key stakeholders, communicating the benefits and importance of digital transformation is crucial.

ii) Practice what you preach. When executive management is engaged, employees are automatically engaged.

iii) Align rewards to digital transformation be it tangible or intangible will drive employee motivation and transformation goals.

2) Digitized Practices: The key practices that boost digital dexterity are digitizing operations, data-driven decisions, and encouraging collaborative ways of working and learning. Digital organizations display more advanced data capability levels than their peers. In a study, it came to light that less than 18% of organizations displayed digital dexterity. This also explains why 70% of digital transformations fall through the cracks. The following steps can ensure digitized practices at your workplace:

i) Start by hitting refresh on your current operational practices and restart practices by implementing digital solutions at the vanguard. This encourages collating and analyzing data systematically to drive better decision-making.

ii) Focusing on adoption instead of deployment of digitized practices leads to increased collaboration among actively engaged users, intelligent decision-making, and, over time, incessant behavioral change. Role model, rewards, gamification, etc, can have a significant impact on employee behaviors.

iii) Ensuring new work practices are set to default and accordingly, adapting the management, people, and processes to institutionalize the updated process. Doing this CIOs advocate transparency, core process standardization, and operations efficiency that digital technologies provide.

3) Empowered Talent: To create a culture conducive to digital dexterity, leveraging the digital IQ of the organization, developing key skills, and increasing engagement is important. In a McKinsey Global Institute survey, it was predicted that by 2030, nearly one-fourth workforce shall be retrained or replaced by AI and automation. Intel provided a Digital IQ training program for all employees to increase collaboration, communication, and innovation. In just a matter of two years, more than 20,000 employees completed the training. When this level of commitment to learning exists, it helps organizations retain their key talent and build an appreciation for digital initiatives.

4) Data Access & Collaboration Tools: Once talent, competence, and engagement are established, data access and collaboration tools can complement performance-related outcomes to drive innovation and share intelligence across the enterprise.

Data access is pivotal to digital transformation. Precise and timely data not only aids in improving business operations but also helps in proactively catering to customer demands. When employees realize the importance of data-driven outcomes, they continue to deploy data-driven approaches consistently.

Also, access to effective collaboration and coordination tools facilitates the key practices of employee engagement.

Advantages of digital dexterity:

1) More flexibility: Digitally dexterous employees are more willing to try new roles and don new hats to support the company’s adaptation to a digital workplace.

2) Higher autonomy: Employees are more willing to work on projects with initiatives and requirements that are susceptible to change or are unclear. They are also able to harness AI and other disruptive technologies at the right time.

3) Enhanced efficiency: As digital opportunities surface, employees can take advantage of and adapt themselves to improve their team or department’s efficiency.

4) Remote workability: The remote workforce is adept to work from anywhere as long as the right technologies are deployed. Collaborating with diverse perspectives and experience in remote work encourages digital dexterity.

5) Willing to take risks: Employees with high digital dexterity understand the positive impact of digitalization on the enterprise-wide level and are thus willing to take risks to pursue this result.

Takeaway: Creating a culture that fosters digital dexterity is a daunting task, especially for firms where employees are averse to trying new technologies. But with the right mindset, practices, talent, and tools, organizations can successfully establish digital dexterity. This is possible with a human-centric approach that will navigate the digital transformation. To facilitate this, businesses must ensure that their digital initiatives include training to existing and new employees on board. Also, CIO’s and senior management need to communicate long-term strategies and take accountability to ensure digital initiatives from start to finish.