No-Drama Project Management (eBook)

Bart Gerardi is a program manager for an e-commerce company. He has been a consultant, manager, and leader for 15 years. Bart s love of bringing projects to market has spanned several companies, positions, and waves of Internet fads. Always on the lookout for new projects to run, he also manages the delivery of several teams bringing the next generation of e-commerce to the industry.

Title page 2
Copyright page 3
Table of contents 5
About the Author 6
Acknowledgments 7
Preface 9
CHAPTER 1 The No-Drama Project Manager 10
Why We Run Projects 11
Why Roles Are Necessary 12
Role of the Project Manager 14
Role of the Project Team 16
Role of the Program Manager 17
Role of the PMO 19
Role of the Project Sponsor and/or Client 21
Summary 22
CHAPTER 2 Project Management Success 24
How to Irritate Your Program Manager 26
Failing at the Obvious 26
Being a Headache 27
Expected Problems in Client Management 28
Requirements 29
Prioritization 30
Change 30
Alignment 31
Assumptions 32
Identifying Stakeholders 32
Expected Problems in Team Management 33
Communication 33
Planning 34
Preparing 34
Establishing Metrics 35
Project Roles 36
Not All Problems Are Expected 37
No-Drama Project Management 37
CHAPTER 3 Identify Requirements 38
Customer Identification 40
Top-Down Thinking vs. Bottom-Up Thinking 42
Outside-In Requirements Gathering 44
The Value of Focus 46
Communication Strategy 47
Sign-off 49
Formal Sign-off 49
Informal Sign-off 50
Following up 51
Summary 52
CHAPTER 4 Prioritize 54
The Importance of Prioritization 56
The True Critical Path 58
Prioritization Games 59
Pairwise Prioritization 60
The Value of Deprioritization 63
How to Deprioritize 64
Summary 66
CHAPTER 5 Manage Change 67
The Importance of Change Management 69
Drivers of Change 70
The Business or Client Organization Has Changed 71
New Advances Make Your Project Obsolete 72
Changing Priorities of Your Client orOrganization 73
New Sales Channels 74
New Legislation 75
The Impact of Other Projects 76
Failure in Execution 77
Be Aware of the Situation 77
Be Aware of the People 79
Be Aware of the Project 80
Keeping Aligned 81
Summary 81
CHAPTER 6 Align with the Client 83
Why Alignment Is Important 84
Aligning with the Client 85
Aligning with the Team 88
Communicating Alignment 90
Understanding Differences 92
Amount of Aggressiveness 94
Remaining Aligned 95
Summary 95
CHAPTER 7 Testing Assumptions 97
What Is an Assumption? 98
The Importance of Assumptions 100
How to Identify Assumptions 102
Pre-Project Assumptions 102
Assumptions Made by the Project Team 104
Level of Confidence 105
Avoiding Standard or Implicit Assumptions 106
Assumptions vs. Risk 107
Continually Testing and Tracking Assumptions and Risks 109
What to Do When an Assumption Is Wrong 110
Summary 111
CHAPTER 8 Identify DecisionMakers 113
Who Is Paying the Bill? 115
Who Is the Customer? 120
Who Has Signature Authority? 122
Any Other Influencers? 124
Does Anyone Want This to Fail? 125
How to Manage Stakeholders 126
Summary 129
CHAPTER 9 Communicate Effectively 130
The Importance of Communication 132
Differentiating Communication for Different Audiences 133
Communicating with the Internal Team 133
Communicating with the Extended Team 135
Communicating with Other Departments and Functions 136
Communicating with Executives and Clients 137
Challenges of Different Audiences 140
Treat Communication as a Project Deliverable 141
Communication Channels 143
Broadcast Communications 143
Individual Communications 144
Closed-Circuit Communication 144
Determining Whether You’re Being Effective 145
Other Benefits of Effective Communication 146
Summary 148
CHAPTER 10 Develop a Plan 149
Acting Intentionally 151
Scheduling and Traditional Planning 152
Overplanning Project Managers 152
False Information in Plans 153
Inflexible Plans 154
Making Other Plans 155
Staffing Plans 155
Risk-Management Plans 156
Communication Plan 158
Sticking with the Plan 159
Summary 160
CHAPTER 11 Prepare for Problems 161
Expecting the Expected 161
Unclear Project Ownership 163
Slow Turnaround 164
Lack of Fundamental High-Level Agreement 166
Skill Gaps 168
Breaking the Process 169
Underestimating Complexity 171
Risk Introduced by Schedule “Make Up” 173
Summary 174
CHAPTER 12 Establish Metrics 176
Top-Level Metrics 177
What Are KPIs? 178
Align with the Goals of the Organization 178
Drive the Right Behavior 180
Be Based on Valid Data That Can Be Proven 181
Some Example Project-Management Metrics 183
Resource Utilization 184
Earned Value 186
The Two KPIs Your Program Manager Cares About 188
Client Satisfaction 188
Team Satisfaction 189
Summary 190
CHAPTER 13 Know the Roles 192
What Makes a Project Team? 193
Things Team Members Must Know and Do 194
Understanding the Needs and Objectives of the Project 194
Executing on Project Tasks 194
Expressing Status 195
The Three Levels of Team Members 196
Leaders 196
Team Members 197
Team Contributors 197
The Importance of Role Definition 199
Project Team Member Roles 200
Functional Manager 200
Analyst 201
Developer 204
Tester/Reviewer 205
Client Interface 206
Policing Roles 207
Summary 208
CHAPTER 14 Handling the Truly Unexpected 210
No-Drama Preparation 212
Was Your Problem Unexpected? 213
Strategies for the Unexpected 215
Restart 216
Revise 218
Rescope 221
Managing Fallout 222
Managing the Team 224
Summary 225
CHAPTER 15 The End of Drama 227
No-Drama Project Management 228
Preparation 228
Being Open and Honest 229
Treating Communication Like a Deliverable 231
Making Intentional Decisions 232
Expecting the Expected 233
Problems in Team Management 234
Communication 235
Planning 236
Preparing 236
Establishing Metrics 237
Project Roles 238
Problems in Client Management 238
Requirements 239
Prioritization 240
Alignment 241
Assumptions 241
Stakeholder Identification 242
Managing the Unexpected 242
Index 244