Best PM Movie Quote

Inspired by an newsletter (email) that I received from Gantthead.com. With their message of Holiday Cheer, the team at Gantthead.com raised my awareness about their new Project Management T-shirts. Each of the designs present a twist on semi-famous movie quotes. Given that "...the attendees at the PMI show in Atlanta and the Microsoft Office Project Conference in Seattle loved [their] gantthead t-shirts... " - it made me think of what would be my favourite PM Movie quote.

Well — definitely no contest.

Pulp Fiction (1994).
Scene: Winston Wolfe (played by Harvey Keitel) interacting with Jules and Vincent who have a bloody car to clean up.

If I'm curt with you, it's because time is a factor. I think fast, I talk fast, and I need you guys to act fast if you want to get out of this. So pretty please, with sugar on top, clean the f&#!-ing car.

If you want to check out Gantthead's T-shirts, head on over to their store.

Leggo my Resource!

How often has this happened to you? You've planned out your timeline, assigned resources and managed your costs to ensure a successful delivery of your interactive project. Only to have the "rug pulled out from under you".

Your team member announces to you that there is a conflict of priorization between your deliverables and other projects assigned.

In larger organizations, the element of priorization is a very real risk on every project. Typically, there are well over 30+ projects underway. Each of these project are assigned a Project Manager, who is responsible for managing their resources and ensure that they have an understanding of what tasks require their attention over any given week. However, each Project Manager may encounter impacts to their project as a result of delays from another project running parallel. The impacts may include their resource attending to other tasks outside of your project deliverables. And now we have a conflict of prioritization

At such times, I would give anything for an application that would provide Project Managers with a notification system that would resolve such conflicts. This web-based application would have the ability to capture all the current tasks for all resources on any given week - identify the hours assigned and determine conflicts based on hours assigned. Then once the conflicts were identified, the application would communicate to the affected Project Managers with the affected tasks and affected resources.

My team and I currently resolve such conflicts between resources and their tasks through prioritization meetings / negotiations. We escalate any unresolved issues to the management team for resolution. While this process DOES resolve the issue, it does have its draw-back;

• It is a very manual process
• It increases the number of meetings through the course of a week
• Resolutions take time away from productivity and delay projects

I am on the hunt for a better resolution to this issue - and will provide a follow up to this posting when I find any further solutions.

Continue to extend your project's success

With the deployment of the client's new website to the production server, or the click of "send" and the fifty-thousand emails are sent out – the interactive project team breaths a sign of relief. The project is completed. The team worked hard, there were some long nights, and challenges to overcome. But all that has diminished now into memory, as the round of "congratulations" and "great job" circulate amongst the team members and with senior management.

Still — there is no better feeling than when a project is launched.

And as the team members begin focusing, almost immediately, on other projects -- the project manager begins the process of closing out the project. From my experiences in the past, this task is by far the most difficult to remain focused on. With the project launching, the drive and motivation of the team relinquishes - as the pressure to complete the job dissipates. However, closing out the project accurately and effectively may be the most important task a project manager can contribute to their organization.

A proper close out process will extend the memory of the organization by providing the ability for any future project manager to quickly research and acquire the details of every interactive project completed since the groups inception. And as we all know, many interactive projects are replications of previous projects - usually with slight modification to the deliverables.

Through a detailed close-out process, a project manager can identify and archive the following information which will enable the next PM to provide the client continuity with their next interactive request:

• Artwork
  
• Copy
  
• Developer Code (e.g. XML, Flash, Javascript, HTML etc.)
  
• Resource names and hours recorded
  
• Define the Project's final deliverables
• including any change orders
  
• List of specific Assumptions, Risks and Mitigations identified
  
• Costs and write-offs
  
• Brief description of any learnings that resulted from the project
  
• Brief description of any successes that resulted from the project
  
• Acquire Feedback from team members on their impression of the project and its processes
  

In the world of interactive projects, a key ability expected of the entire team is to respond to the client's request with speed and accuracy. The project manager can greatly assist with this expectation by extending the breadth of legacy knowledge through a proper close-out process.

A further article on Project Close Out processes can be found at Gantthead.com.

(Note: In order to access Gantthead articles you'll have to complete the free sign-up form.)

I'd like to hear about what your thoughts are on Project Close Out processes - and what different ways your group completes and archives projects.

Write back and let me know.
Be productive.

30 Second posting: Links to online productivity apps

From time to time I come across good links. I discover some of them in other blogs, some are sent to me from other project managers, and some spotted in a posting to Digg.com.

By the way, check out digg.com if you haven't yet - there is always an "ah-ha" article there. And if not there, then definitely at lifehacker.com.

Here is a quick list of 5 productivity online apps/sites that may help you in your project management activities:

1. Remember the milk: http://www.rememberthemilk.com/
Stay organized and distribute task to yourself and other with this online application.

2. BaseCamp: http://www.basecamphq.com/
Basecamp provides tools tailored to improve communication between team members collaborating on a project.

3. Copperproject: http://www.copperproject.com/
Copper is an online collaboration tool used by creative teams to better manage clients, projects, tasks, files, billing and events [Mashable:]

4. Taskbin: http://www.taskbin.com/
Collaboration webapp Taskbin shares and manages to-do lists among groups. [Lifehacker:]

5. Simply Get things done: http://www.simplegtd.com/
Webapp Simple GTD manages your task, project and contexts lists in a user-friendly, dynamic interface. [Lifehacker:]

Be productive.

Book Review: The Art of Project Management

The Art of Project Management
By Scott Berkun
.....................................
Publisher: O'Reilly
Pub Date: April 2005
ISBN: 0-596-00786-8
Pages: 392

Synopsis
I have countlessly revisited the information and council that Mr. Berkun has organized within this book. As a former Microsoft team leader, Mr. Berkun provides the reader insight into the day-to-day challenges facing both software and interactive project managers. As noted in the review of the book's features found on Mr. Berkun's website, this key reference book boasts 16 chapters on the critical and common challenges of leading projects and managing teams.

My expectation of the book initially was not high. Often times, these books tend to be overly complicated with formal project management discourse and inpractical examples. I was very surprised with the content's of this book. The book is filled with practical management idems, leadership skills, negotiation tips and more – in a well-written and structured form. “ …it feels like a nice long talk with someone who is being completely honest about the way things work …”, (Chris Campbell, bitdepth.org, June 2005).

“The Art of Project Management” is separated into four distinct sections; how to ensure a project has proper focus and clear priorities (Planning); how to get the most out of meetings (communication); successully accomplishing feature-level design (Design); and what to expect as a project moves from inception to finish (Build and Close-out). Within these sections, Mr. Berkun reveals his thoughts regarding soft-skills. These are the skills exuded by successful Project Managers and are often described elusive and difficult to explain. Mr. Berkun identifies these soft skills, provides contexts where they can be applied, and provides practical day-to-day examples on conflict resolution, leadership, mitigation, and how to close a project successfully.

This book is an excellent reference for most new and even experienced project managers alike. It is must have for your reference library.

Days versus Hours

A discussion happened this week that I think you may be familiar with. It started with the all-to familiar question: "... so, when can you have that finished?"

Often time it is a difficult question to answer. Our brains try to calculate all the possible sub-tasks, possible conflicting priorities, and what else have I got to do this week.

It is however, a question that project managers, our resources, and stakeholders grapple with constantly; and it is a struggle to help balance everyone's needs.

Each of our needs are different:

• Clients want it done immediately;
• Resources needs to understand the priority of the task and determine how best to complete it given all the other tasks at hand; and
• We are trying to ensure that the future is predictable.

As the discussion progressed – when can you have that finished? – the discussion turned to how long will it take to have that task finished.

And we entered the real critical question at hand — how long.

I've discovered that there is a difference between hours and days. And it came as a revelation. I say revelation, because, the tool that I use to plot out the projects tasks, milestones and delivery dates did not do this automatically. Microsoft® Project assumes there are 8 hours in a day.This is its default setting. I recall once in a discussion with a resource - he asked me: "Really, you think that I sit for 8 hours straight doing nothing but your task?" ... um, good point.

The difference between hours and days is the difference between effort and duration. How long a task is going to take requires the direct understanding of how much effort will the task require to complete the job.

If you were tasked with painting the outside of a cottage - how quickly could you get it done? It would depend on how big the cottage was, how many coats of paint were required, how fast you could get a side done, did you have another painter to help you, etc.

Within the interactive world, similar questions are required. And your resource, or possibly their manager can help in determining the amount of effort to complete the task - including if there are any advantages of engaging more than one resource to complete the task. Once an understanding of how much effort the task will require and possibly resource levels, can we now look to see what will be the duration.

I wandered around my office, and observed the manner that most people work, and its interesting. My resource was right. Not many people sit 'chained' to their desks for a complete day without moving. There are the obligatory bathroom breaks, getting lunch, mid-day coffee, stretching of the legs, getting clarification from another collegue, scheduled meetings, and likely a few smoke breaks too. I soon realized that the most that I could hope for from a day's productivity would likely be 5 hours a day.

Not the "8" that Project assumes.

The good news is that Project doesn't leave you hanging. While it is hidden when you first launch the program, you can add in a new column that will help you fine-tune your timelines. And the column is called WORK. To access it, right-click at the top over Duration and select add a column from the drop down menu that appears. A dialogue box will appear, and select Work from the Field Name drop-down. Now you have control over the hours for each of the tasks.

Note: If you find that when you change the hours - the days change to match and it begins to cause your timeline to extend in duration, be sure that each of your tasks are Fixed Work. You can find this by Right-clicking on the task row; select Task Information; go to the Advance Tab; and change the Task type to Fixed Work

As I adjusted my hours to match the amount of effort that was provided to me, and accounting for the assumption of 5 hours of purposeful work in a day, I was able to see that my initial calculation of how many days the task would take was short. I adjusted the duration to a more appropriate time, and confirmed the target with my team. The overall concensus was that the timeline was more realistic and the level of confidence to complete the work was strong.

Hours versus Days has enabled me to create a more accurate timeline and empowered the team to reach for an achievable goal and be productive.