PMcrunch

Project teams, project oriented organizations, and project management offices have an unusually strong opportunity today for building highly motivated project teams. The reason for that is projects sit at the center of a new evolving organizational structure.

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Talent management is a huge challenge for corporations and organizations of all types and sizes. I many cases, success at talent management within the organization can be the key differentiating factor between success and failure for the organization. Likewise, success at project management, program management, and portfolio management also largely hinges on strong talent management. Part of this challenge lies at the relationship between the organization’s talent management capabilities and those of the projects and programs.

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How does the emergence of Web 2.0 collaborative capabilities and networks effect the organizational landscape, and how does that effect project and program managers? I think the key to answering this question is to look at what is happening to interpersonal relationships, power centers, and influence within organizations to see how this is changing as a result of this emerging development. I find that we can gain insights into this by observing from the following point of view: a. Organization charts are the way the organization is “supposed” to be, and b. Web 2.0 collaboration reveals relationships, and hence organization structure, as it really is. Let’s explore…

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Leaders know that great insights often come from the people doing the actual work. Faced with “higher level challenges,” leaders and leadership teams tend to lose touch with those doing the work. Whichever end you find yourself in this dilemma, whether you are on project team, lead a project team, or lead a program, take some time to refresh your thinking and “dismiss the hierarchy’, if only temporarily. It will help to keep motivation alive in yourself, your team, and your organization.

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Enterprise Architecture ( EA ), Organizational Strategy, and Project Portfolio Management (PPM) are closely related.  The question is, “How are they related on a very practical level?”  Let’s take a look.

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I was recently at an off site meeting for an office of about 25 people. There were many interesting things about the experience, and I would like to document a few. The upshot is that the people around you are tremendous resources, and you can tap that, it is like mining gold!

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I recently read a forum entry where someone was looking for advice on PM tools and PM software used across the globe for IT needs. The person mentioned that their company had some general tools like Critical Path, PERT etc., and various models for Estimation. The question was “What would be best software to support all these tools + models and standards like CMMI or ITIL, then support for SEI – indicator template for measurement analysis, Risk Management alerting + Alerting on Change management etc. Also requested were opinions on using lines of code as a metric.

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I think the idea of building enterprise architectures is a great ideal. It relates very closely to the idea of project portfolio management – where multiple projects are coordinated as a hole for the benefit of the enterprise. Here are some of the ideas based on experience at the US Army. This topic is sure to be revisited!

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