Perspectives on Project Management from Learning Tree International

PRINCE2 Professional Qualification: What Gets Assessed?

Published January 29, 2012 PRINCE2 , project management Leave a Comment
Tags: PRINCE2, PRINCE2 certification, PRINCE2 Practitioner, PRINCE2 Profesional Qualification, project management, project manager competencies

The PRINCE2 Professional qualification assesses your capability to manage a non-complex PRINCE2 project across all aspects of the project life cycle. If you decide to take this next step after achieving practitioner certification, you will discover that this particular assessment takes place at an assessment center over two days. Throughout the two days you and your fellow candidates are provided with opportunities to demonstrate evidence of your competence in managing a project using PRINCE2. You are also asked to provide evidence of your broader competencies as a working Project Manager.

Evaluators at the two day session collect evidence of a your competence through observation of group activities and exercises as they watch you discuss and solve problems relating to a project case study. You are also interviewed individually by the Evaluators at some point during the event.

The capabilities required of the candidate in applying their knowledge and experience to a non-complex project across its life cycle, include 19 different areas of performance criteria. These criteria are:

Preparing the Project Product Description
Preparing an outline Business Case for the project
Designing the project management team structure for the project
Tailoring corporate strategies to fit the project
Performing Product-Based Planning
Applying the risk management procedures for the project
Applying the communication management procedures for the project
Planning the project
Refining the project’s Business Case
Preparing the project’s Benefits Review Plan
Preparing an End Stage Report for a management stage in the project
Capturing lessons learned
Preparing a Work Package
Applying the issue and change control procedures
Planning and conducting the Closing a Project process
Preparing an End Project Report that includes the Lessons Report
Using interpersonal skills
Managing project team performance
Manage your own performance

Sounds like a fun and busy two days, doesn’t it? It will be interesting to apply my PRINCE2 knowledge and experience when I attend this event in February and stay on to become approved as an Evaluator as well. Stay tuned for details…

Susan Weese

The Learning Tree offers a range of PRINCE2 certification courses in the UK and the US for those who are interested.

Motivation Challenges at Work

Published January 27, 2012 motivation Leave a Comment
Tags: management motivation performance management

If you have challenges motivating staff at work, then you have to watch this video by Dan Pink:

If you need more help on these ideas, then you should check out Learning Tree’s Management Skills course.

Larry T. Barnard, PMP, PMI-RMP, IISPM-Practitioner
CEO & Principal Architect
IISPM, International Institute of Sustainability Project Management
larry@iispm.com

Sustainability Products for Project Leaders

Published January 25, 2012 Uncategorized Leave a Comment
Tags: green, iispm, ink cartridge, Oracle software, paper recycling, project leadership, project management, recycling, sustainability

There are countless ways that project leaders and the companies with which they work can be more sustainable. An organization that helps project leaders make sustainability a part of their projects is www.iispm.org. The goal of www.iispm.org is to “make project management sustainable . . . one project at a time.”

The electronic devices that make our lives easier also produce some unwanted side effects on the environment. Fortunately, many consumer electronics manufacturers are working to create products that keep us productive while reducing energy demands to lessen our impact on the environment.

Here are three of the newest environmentally-friendly, sustainable technologies reviewed at www.pctoday.com (from the December 2011 issue) that we can use to embrace sustainability for the good of people, the planet, and profits.

1. Rewritable Paper

The Taiwan- based Industrial Research Institute ( www.itri.org.tw), has pioneered a rewritable epaper that only requires heat to store and transmit images onto the screen. When you want to change the on-screen content, you place the epaper into a thermal writing device that would remove anything you wrote. The rewritable epaper would consume no electricity, and the thermal writing device would use a minimal amount of energy. The screen provides a crisp 300dpi resolution and is made of a flexible material that should be easy to mass produce. ITRI suggest that the technology could be used for digital books, electronic bulletin boards, pictorials, and situational wallpaper.

2. Canon Ink Cartridge Recycling

Canon (www.usa.canon.com) is working with FedEx Office (www.fedex.com to collect and recycle empty PIXMA inkjet cartridges. The collaborative recycling effort also involves Sims Recycling (us.simsrecycling.com) and Close the Loop (www.closetheloop.com), a company that recovers the plastic from inkjet cartridges for felt-tip pens and markers. Return a Canon PIXMA inkjet cartridge to one of the 1,600 FedEx Office locations and FedEx will send it to Sims Recycling for processing, after which Close the Loop will handle the cartridge to recycle the plastic and ink. The recycling effort is part of Canon’s Generation Green environmental initiative that brings a people-and earth-friendly approach to product design and life cycle for Canon’s printers, copiers, scanners and calculators.

3. Oracle Sustainability Reporting Starter Kit

Oracle (www.oracle.com) has introduced a new sustainability reporting add-on for its Oracle Hyperion Financial Management software. The Sustainability Reporting Starter Kit for Oracle Hyperion Financial Management is a prebuilt application that enables a repeatable, accurate, and auditable approach for consolidating environmental social and economic metrics for corporate sustainability reporting. The application includes content from the GRI (Global Reporting Initiative) Sustainability Reporting Guidelines. The content is verified by GRI, a network-based organization that produces a comprehensive sustainability-reporting framework that is widely used around the world. The free starter kit is available to customers and partners using Oracle Hyperion Financial Management.

For more information about sustainability in project management have a look at this new book from www.iispm.org: Making Sense of Sustainability Project Management.

James L. Haner

Three Steps to Managing Project Scope

Published January 23, 2012 PRINCE2 , project management , Training and Development Leave a Comment
Tags: PRoject Management Scope Management, project scope

Project management has many challenges. One of the most challenging things is the management of scope. There are many challenges to scope. Within the life cycle of a project, I would like to focus on the initial development of scope. When do you develop scope, and how do you develop scope?

Scope is developed in three main stages. The first stage of development takes place when you create the project charter during project initiation. This is the first key document created by the project. It’s used to outline the purpose of the project and get approval to start the project.

Once approved, full blown planning is needed. During planning, the project manager often employs the help of a project team and some subject matter experts (SMEs). Together they will comprehensively describe the objectives and deliverables of the project in a project scope statement. This is the second key document in the development of project scope.

The next step required is the complete decomposition of the list of deliverables into work packages. This is done through the creation of a work breakdown structure (WBS). By starting with the list of deliverables, each deliverable is further broken down until the project manager has work packages that can be delegated to individuals or teams and effectively managed. Typically these work packages each constitute one or two weeks of work. The aggregate of work packages constitutes the entire scope of the project. The WBS is the third essential document in the development of project scope.

The last and final step is the decomposition of work packages into activities for estimating purposes. This is the final step that enables the project manager to create an estimated schedule and estimated budget.

Sounds easy enough, right? But there are a few variables to consider. First of all, project philosophy suggests that planning is good, and that you should do the planning as early on as possible.

In real life, projects often neglect to plan early, and/or neglect to involve all the necessary stakeholders. Real life is always messier than virtual reality. In addition, people have to deal with politics, time constraints and many other complications.

To help project managers with the practical challenges of scope development, Learning Tree has some key courses that combine a blended style of learning between lecture, and hands-on project work. Check out Learning Tree’s wide spectrum of Project Management courses.

Larry T. Barnard, PMP, PMI-RMP, IISPM Practitioner
CEO and Principal Architect
IISPM, International Institute of Sustainability Project Management
larry@iispm.com

Eliciting Project Requirements

Published January 21, 2012 Business Analysis , project management 1 Comment
Tags: BABOK, business analysis, business analysis techniques, business analyst competencies, CCBA, project management, requirements, requirements development

Requirements elicitation targets gathering the right information to develop the project requirements. The requirements for your project are the foundation for a solution that will be designed and deployed by the project and its efforts.

According to the BABOK® Guide, the tasks in the Elicitation knowledge area begin early in the project life cycle and typically peak during the more detailed requirements development phase of the project. Actually, I have found that requirements can be elicited at any point in the project life cycle, either for the first time or as the result of changes or things that have been missed or erroneously stated.

There are a number of ways to elicit requirements on your projects. The most common elicitation technique is a face-to-face meeting with one or more of your project stakeholders to gather information regarding their needs. However, elicited information doesn’t have to come directly from people. It can also come to you indirectly based upon your research and review of existing documents and other data.

The business analyst is responsible for adequate requirements elicitation preparation. On large projects, this responsibility often falls to the collective members of the business analysis team, who will be simultaneously eliciting requirements information from different stakeholders. Be sure to coordinate who is doing what when, and make sure you plan for sitting down and accumulating what everyone has learned. It is important to remember that any project stakeholder can be involved in requirements elicitation.

Interestingly enough, I noticed that the BABOK® Guide has three types of elicitation techniques: events, performed work, and collected work. CBAP and CCBA exam preparers, make sure that you can recognize each individual elicitation technique and that you remember which type of technique it is! This seems like a good topic for a certification exam question.

Elicitation events take place using one of six techniques: brainstorming, focus groups, interviews, observation, prototyping, and requirements workshops.
Performed elicitation work is done by the business analyst using the document analysis or interface analysis technique.
Collected elicitation work is distributed and collected using surveys/questionnaires that are sent out to the stakeholders.

Business analysts are increasingly becoming the critical liaisons between business and solution development (oftentimes IT), so they must communicate and relate with equal effectiveness throughout all levels of an organization. Download this free White Paper to learn how to address common business analysis mistakes.

Happy requirements elicitation!

Susan Weese

If you are considering sitting the CBAP or CCBA certification exams for business analysts, check out our new study guide that can help you prepare to pass the test, the CBAP / CCBA: Certified Business Analysis Study Guide by Susan Weese and Terri Wagner! It’s a great place to learn more about business requirements and everything else you need to know to successfully pass the certification exam

Perspectives on Project Management from Learning Tree International

PRINCE2 Professional Qualification: What Gets Assessed?

Motivation Challenges at Work

Sustainability Products for Project Leaders

Three Steps to Managing Project Scope

Eliciting Project Requirements

Project Management Training

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