While there are various types of Project Management Office, no two PMOs are exactly alike. They all serve their businesses in different, unique ways. That’s why it’s helpful to document what your PMO is going to do and what purpose it serves. In this article we’ll dive more into the purpose and benefits of having […]
How To Use Technology To Improve PMO Capability
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 […]
Using Stored Period Performance in Primavera P6
I’ve recently been working at a client where they implemented Stored Period Performance using Primavera P6 Professional. It has not gone as smoothly as we would have liked, but there are some valuable insights from the experience should prove useful to others. Stored Period Performance forms part of the project update each financial period. It […]
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. […]
Primavera P6 – MSSQL Database Not Configured for Background Jobs
Problem Description During a new setup of Primavera P6 Professional, the following error was encountered upon first logging in to the new MSSQL Server Database with the P6 Professional client: Error: The Database has not been configured to run background jobs. Reason This happens on MSSQL Server database instances because there is a stored procedure […]
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 […]
Deltek Cobra 8.2 – Interface Goodies You May Have Missed
I’ve been uncovering a few interface “nice to have’s” in Deltek Cobra that you may not be aware of. While these are not mission critical, and have not necessarily been featured in the release notes, they are, nevertheless, pretty neat and I wanted to share a couple of my favorites with you in this article. […]