 Reforming Project Management |
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Saturday, April 12, 2003
Meet Claude Emond
Who is Claude Emond? Among other things he's made the most comments to Reforming Project Management. I just had to talk with him. I did and this is what I learned. Claude is a A few years back Claude started speaking of this time we're in as The Project Age. Companies' competitiveness will be determined by their responsiveness, innovativeness, and their ability to make adjustments to their practices. Claude says, Companies will change and evolve thru projects. It's the management framework of the modern company.Read more of his views in The Project Age Value Model. Claude went on to caution us on the value of Project Management Offices (PMOs). Companies in all industries are setting up PMOs with an intent to bring some order to the projects they pursue. Unfortunately, PMOs have become hierarchical, centralized, and political. Claude commented, PMOs are a fad responding to a collection of project failures. PMOs don't work for the same reason organizations don't work. Companies centralize when they don't trust. (It's time) to stop telling people what to do and start listening.Alternatively, Claude encourages people to set-up a project support office. Provide tools, methodologies, and training at the pull of people on your projects. Help when asked to help. Impose nothing. I asked Claude what he sees working in on projects and in companies today. Here's his list of eight best practices he observes:
I hope you enjoyed meeting Claude. Here are three of his recent comments: [1 Project Portfolio Management], [2 Lean Projects], [3 Listening]. Enjoy! Friday, April 11, 2003
Theory of Constraints Perspective for Projects
Blogging, Blogging and Blogging on Theory of Constraints
I am embarking on a series of postings next week on the Theory of Constraints created by Dr. Eliyahu Goldratt. I've made minor postings before. This series will be geared for people who find themselves making choices on projects. I am aiming for something practical, concise, and in a form you will want to share with others. I've decided not to do this alone. I started this weblog with the intention for me to learn about project management and how to speak about project management. In that spirit I will write each day to continue my learning. While I've been a proponent and student of the TOC for many years there are others who can speak more authoritatively about the subject than I. I've invited Frank Patrick to post along side of me, but to do so in his own weblog Frank Patrick's Focused Performance Business Blog. Frank is an expert on conducting projects on a TOC basis. He maintains a good website with a special section on projects. I am sharing the postings with him ahead of time so he can post at the same time I do. We will link to each other to make it easy on readers. To make this a even more interesting, my friend Joe Ely, who writes the weblog Learning About Lean, will be joining in by posting alongside us on his weblog. His postings are often based on real experience pursuing a lean approach in a project-based fabrication setting. Joe has been using the TOC to provide focus to improving activities at his firm. If you aren't subscribing to my weblog via Bloglet, then now's the time to do so. (See the subscription box in the left column.) This way you won't miss a posting. You will receive an email each day with the previous day's posting. For all of you who are subscribing, Frank's and Joe's weblog postings are available the same way. If you subscribe to their weblogs you'll get all postings in the same email message. All three postings neatly grouped together. (You can always unsubscribe at the end.) We plan on having some fun with this. I hope you enjoy it. Thursday, April 10, 2003
Take Note
There's a new archive that has an alphabetic listing of some of the more popular postings based on the reader responses.
I apologize to all the Bloglet subscribers. There's been a problem with the service. Postings during the last week have not been delivered. The folks at Bloglet are working on it. Stop by the weblog to see what you've missed. Some of you might have noticed a delay opening the weblog. This is caused by the heavy load on the commenting system Monday, April 07, 2003
Got Some Project Software to Sell? Pay Attention...
Ready for a little entertainment today? I'll try to be unconditionally constructive. Please forgive me if I fail to pull it off. Let's look at the white paper Refining the Project Planning Process by Bernard Ertl.
This "white paper" was delivered via an email newsletter. Even I'm awake enough to recognize a wolf in sheep's clothing. The white paper is just a marketing piece for eTaskMaker™. Maybe even a well-written marketing piece. I've identified by inference these suppositions in the paper and "supporting quotes" (You might want to read the paper to draw your own inferences.):
Projects are human endeavors. They might also be engineering endeavors, construction endeavors, or events. But first, projects are about people working together to fulfill some shared intention or promise. Planning is effective when conducted as a conversation among interested people who will carry out the plan. Since we cannot know the future, the planning conversation is a kind of dress-rehearsal for project participants to orient themselves to the future. Assigning planning to specialist non-performers misses the opportunity of walking through the project as a performer. The walk-thru in conversation also provides the opportunity to (re)shape the plan. The group learns as it plans. Planning conversations continue through execution as participants continue to learn, adjust, and discover. I know that the author didn't say the tools couldn't be used the way I describe. And, I'm sure there's a legitimate benefit to using templates...even dynamic ones. If you want to sell to me, then keep the emphasis on: supporting the planning conversation, scenario (what if) planning, planning in the midst of execution, and learning from one group to another. Please...no more talk of efficiency. Sunday, April 06, 2003
The Best 19 Pages on Lean Thinking
Earth Day, Natural Capitalism, and Lean Thinking
Earth Day is April 22. (Let's stay out of the controversy on whether the real Earth Day is March or April.) I am reminded of a fascinating book Natural Capitalism, Creating the Next Industrial Revolution, by Paul Hawken, Amory Lovins, and L. Hunter Lovins. The authors argue our world view is the limitation to living in a world economy that doesn't deplete the ecosystem by accounting for resource productivity -- doing (much) more with less. In chapter seven, "Muda (waste), Service, and Flow", the authors paraphrase Jim Womack's and Dan Jones' book Lean Thinking. These are some of the best 19 pages on lean thinking that you will find. If you don't buy the book, at least read the chapter over a cup of latte at Barnes and Noble. Visit the Archives for more postings |
 Reference Papers
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