AceProject Blog | Tag Archive

Go Ahead, Manage is over one year old. I know, it’s young compared to most of the blogs out there. I’ve been writing the majority of Go Ahead, Manage’s content. After a year, I find that the greatest challenge is to have something to say.

This blog is not about my personal life, but about the life of the whole team here, the life of our product, AceProject, and the life of our field, project management.

When we began this blog, I had a lot of things to say, I even had a backlog! As time passed, I got through that backlog and now I find my inspiration a few minutes before I start typing the new post away. Read the Complete Post

One thing most bloggers won’t admit to is how they often find inspiration for their posts: in other blogs and tweets. Anywho, I found my inspiration for today’s post from this Tweet: “Why do so many professionals say they are project managing, when what
they are actually doing is fire fighting? – Colin Bentley” from Greg Cimmarrusti, PMP

Firefighting is a management style not only used by project managers. When someone spends all their time putting out fires, they look very busy, and they have a great sense of purpose.

Why so much fire fighting?

It’s a vicious circle. It’s difficult to think long-term when fighting fires.

Read the Complete Post

Virtual teams are a fact of today’s projects. With outsourcing and increased mobility for the workforce, there is a higher proportion of people who either work in satellite locations, or simply work from home.

The project team becomes virtual. How can we keep up with everyone when we can’t see them?

A huge part of project management is getting a feel of how the team is doing

How can we do that without seeing the people we work with? After all, the biggest part of a person’s message is not conveyed with words. It’s transmitted via pitch and intonation of voice, the way she sits or stands, her facial expressions and hand gestures. Read the Complete Post

With the Vancouver Olympics project getting a lot of attention worldwide, the Canadian chapters of the PMI have organized a Project Management Week. This is a great time for all Canadian project managers to inform and train their teams about project management today.

The Globe and Mail and the French paper Les Affaires will be running a special insert next week, and your local Canadian PMI chapter has events lined up for you to attend!

To get involved virtually: join the LinkedIn group for the Canadian Project Management Week. Read the Complete Post

A project should not be composed a leader on top and everybody else below. Actually, that's a very good way to fail. Your team is there for the project, and so are you. Why not work together?

You need to work together.

Be with your team. Spend time with them. Take the time to explain what's going on in the project. Listen.

When problems arise (they always arise), your team's unique perspective may be the key to solving it. Budget problems? Maybe one of your developers knows a less-expensive tool that does the job just as well. Schedule problem? Read the Complete Post

While working on a project, I realized the project team was not clear on the roles and responsibilities of the project sponsor VS the project manager.

Who’s the sponsor anyway?

The project sponsor is the person who pays for the project. Because he or she is paying for the project, they get to decide on the project scope, schedule and budget. They’re the ones really taking the big decisions.

Don’t confuse sponsor and client, however. The person who buys the product is not necessarily the one investing in its development. For example, we develop AceProject and then sell it to our clients. Read the Complete Post

Neal Shen wrote a very interesting post on the PMI blog, titled: The First 100 Days…

Neal argues that when being assigned on an existing project, it can be a challenge to get up to speed and build good relationships with your project team. I completely agree with the 3 Ls of communications management: Listen, Learn, Lead.

There’s a reason why Lead is last

You can’t lead effectively if you’re ignorant. Ignorant of your project, ignorant of your team. Once you’ve built a good understanding of the project and the people, then you can choose a leadership style that fits the situation. Read the Complete Post

I’ve been reading on HR management for my upcoming PMP exam. According to the PMI, HR management is about getting the right team for the right project, and developing that team so that the product of the project is delivered on time and on budget.

As the project manager, what do you bring to the table?

It’s is easy to know what the software developer brings to the project. It’s harder to know what the PM brings to the project. We’re usually the cat herders: we do our best to keep the project on track, the team happy, the stakeholders under control and the deliverables…delivered! Read the Complete Post

It’s easy to get swallowed by project management tools. It’s easy to feel that we can get all the information we need from a piece of software.

But it’s not true.

If you want to know how well a project is going, take your team to lunch. They will tell you more about the project than any statistic. While you’re sitting at the table with your team, take a look at their non-verbal behavior. Are they happy to be together? Are they talking to each other? Are they just sitting there, waiting for lunch to end?

How your team interacts together will show if they are getting along and where there might be personality clashes. Read the Complete Post

Do you have a plan in case something goes wrong in your project?

Let’s say a key team member accepts a position at another company. Are you prepared to reallocate her tasks to someone else? Is there someone else who could take over?

Or, let’s say the 5 more people that human resources were to hire for your team take longer than expected. Will your project still be on time without them? What are you going to do: overwork the people that are there, negotiate a new deadline?

It’s not about being pessimistic, but about being prepared. About knowing where the project could be endangered and thinking about how you’re going to deal with that. Read the Complete Post

Tag Archives: Project Manager

The discipline of producing new, fresh content

Project management and firefighting

Virtual teams make everything more difficult

Canadian Project Management Week

Project managers are not alone

You need to work together.

Project roles: sponsor VS manager

Suggested reading: the first 100 days

Human resources management: what do you bring to the table?

Project management and communications

What’s your plan B?