PMcrunch

On our projects, and in our programs and project portfolios, we often struggle with how to make changes.  From my own personal experience, the most challenging part of change management has always been the area of making incremental changes versus making wholesale major changes.  Let’s take a look. 

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“Managing an IT project is like juggling chunks of Jell-O: It’s neither easy nor pretty.” So it says in an excellent article on IT Project Management is CIO magazine. The article goes on to say, very accurately I think, that “Information technology is especially slippery because it’s always moving, changing, adapting and challenging business as we know it.”

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Project cutbacks are a common theme. In many cases, teams are simply reduced in size. In addition, project scopes are decreased while agile methods are a key way organizations develop software more efficiently. The term agility goes far beyond that.

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The word ‘agile’ has become popular in software development and project management circles, as the agile method produces quality product speedily in a very flexible and organic way. Agility, however, describes much more than a method for software development and speaks right to the core of project team formation and development. The individuals, project team, and team building process itself all need to be agile in today’s demanding environment.

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The Student Syndrome is something that we all have experienced one way or another. It is evident that most of us tend to do at least to some degree of cramming for exams, completing papers, completing projects, doing problem sets and more. The student syndrome is based on our human tendency. For example, the student syndrome is demonstrated where, if we have 25 days to do an assignment, we put off most of the work until the final days or hours before it is due!

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Agile and Scrum are gaining in momentum and popularity. Here is a list of Agile and Scrum Project Management resources.

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The Agile Method is touted for its free flow of ideas and lack of impedence by an overstructured environment. We have provided other posts about project blogs, and this is an ongoing discussion. It also is an ongoing developement out there in the project management world, as blogging is used as part of project management communication.

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Formal Software Configuration Management is very much a part of the Agile Development process. While agile development implies more free-flowing work, the need for structure, especially in the area of configuration management, is still very much there. The key is that supportuing project management tools provide a ore flexible structure for managing project information.

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Making mistakes is not only human; it is an immutable law of nature. No matter what anybody does or says, mistakes will happen along the way – by you, me, and others. It is how we accept this fact and handle them that provides us the opportunity to show our character and skill as leaders.

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Since 2000, we have seen a bit of a smoldering of the red hot ambers from pre-2000 IT, and only gradually are things coming to a new order. But there are some emerging themes. They revolve around the idea that Business Process Improvement is hotter than ever, and is alive WITHIN information technology in addition to applying info tech to other parts of the organization.

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