Many businesses make the decision to get started with PMO processes, (or risk management, or project management approaches) and then add the tech in later. This is a perfectly acceptable approach, but it does have drawbacks. There’s no escaping that paper-based (“electronic” paper!), highly manual processes are cheap to start off. And if you’ve got […]
How to Create Buy In for the PMO
More often than not, when we are engaged to help an organization set up a PMO, executive managers have already committed to the idea of a Project Management Office. They understand the benefits and services that a PMO will provide. They see the strategic value inherent in the work the PMO does. They know that […]
Microsoft Project Lag Filter
Recently one of our readers asked whether it is possible to create a filter in Microsoft Project to capture all tasks that have lag. Lag is waiting time between a predecessor task and a successor task. Tasks in Microsoft Project may have either a positive lag or negative lag (lead). In our scenario a stakeholder […]
Making Open Ended Activities Critical in Primavera P6
How do you include a deadline date marker on your schedule Gantt chart and not lose your critical path? The answer is to make open ended activities critical. Let’s take a look. Projects come with deadlines. It is the hard truth of managing any project. And displaying the deadline on the Gantt chart is most […]
Different Types of Risk Reporting
The project managers in your organization should be tracking project risk on a regular basis. This allows them to log and respond to situations as they arise, to avoid issues before they happen. Preparing action plans that allow risks to be addressed, and then working through those plans is the core of project risk management. […]
The Challenges of PMO Maturity
When we look at Project Management Office maturity levels, we often see that PMO leaders face a number of challenges in starting the journey. They want to move to a more mature PMO, offering a more services and providing more value to the business. But getting there isn’t as easy as you might think. Here […]
Organizational Change Management For Program Managers
When we work with Program Managers, we help them conceptualize, assess, plan and implement changes brought about by project results. While no client is the same, starting from different points, different levels of maturity, unique situations, etc. some common themes do appear. Are you struggling with some of these problems with managing the changes brought […]
Microsoft Project Resource Delay
What can you do when you have multiple resources working on a task, but some of these resources have a delayed start? Well, Microsoft Project supports an assignment delay for resources in these situations. In your scheduling scenario you have several resources working on a task, and some of these resources have a staggered start. […]
Administrative Time Gaps
Administrative time gaps are rarely, if ever, accounted for in scheduling, but some consider them to be the root cause of most schedule delays. Administrative time gaps are therefore, worth discussion. Schedules can be defined and divided into Productive Work Segments (PWS) and Time Gaps (TG). A PWS refers to the division of an activity’s […]
Quality Cost Forecasting for Project Controls
Cost forecasting is almost never 100% accurate. If it were, the field of cost control would be significantly less difficult. There are elements however, that do contribute to a quality cost forecast. In this article I offer some high-level details about these elements. Forecasting is the critical focus of cost control. Work package forecast evaluation […]