Like many others, I sometimes walk the stairs instead of riding the elevator. This morning I did, and I as I was walking the stairs I noticed a couple of used napkins lying in the staircase: I was first thinking, someone really needs to keep the staircase better maintained! Shortly after another thought starting dominating … Continue reading What Are You Doing to Improve Quality Today?
Category: Project Management
Is Your Project Controls Organization Data-Driven?
DJ Patil, U.S. Chief Data Scientist, defines a data-driven government as a “connected organization that responsibly gathers, processes, leverages, and releases data in a timely fashion to enable transparency, create efficiencies, ensure security, and foster innovation to benefit the nation.” Since data is at the core of every project controls organization, can we apply elements … Continue reading Is Your Project Controls Organization Data-Driven?
Keep It Small
The classic IT Enterprise Systems implementation includes a team of in-house personnel from the functional side as well as IT, a software vendor who provides the software product, and a “systems integrator” who is bringing the expertise to implement the chosen software. As many of you already know — this is a model I don’t particularly care … Continue reading Keep It Small
Influence Curve — or Inverted Complacency Curve?
Most colleagues in the project management profession are familiar with what is often referred to as the Cost Influence Curve. Put briefly it documents the decreasing level of control to influence project costs as the project evolves in time. The best description of this concept was written by the late Stanford professor Boyd C. Paulson, … Continue reading Influence Curve — or Inverted Complacency Curve?
Be Quick to Decide — But Don’t Make the Decision Too Early
“Be Quick to Decide” is a recommendation many people give, most recently Bob Parsons, the billionaire founder of GoDaddy.com. However without due thought into what this actually means, you may quickly end up making pre-mature, poor decisions. Being Quick to Decide does not mean making decisions in a short period of time — nor can you use … Continue reading Be Quick to Decide — But Don’t Make the Decision Too Early
The Case for a Real Project Management System
Abstract This white paper is designed to give project management practitioners, major project decision makers and stakeholders an overview of the challenges in managing major projects and the high-level mechanisms needed to be best possible equipped to handle them. It does not address all features needed by a project management system, but rather focuses on … Continue reading The Case for a Real Project Management System
Work Breakdown Structure and Functional Elements
It is widely recognized in various literature that the Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) should focus on the “What” of the project and be deliverable-oriented. However, in my experience every WBS for a major construction project will contain functional elements on higher levels, but get deliverable-oriented as you get into lower levels. I have also had … Continue reading Work Breakdown Structure and Functional Elements
The Compounding Effect of Project Management
Project Managers and Project Controls Professionals sometimes have an unappreciated job. Battling inefficiencies, lack of transparency and sometimes near-anarchy conditions, we burn the midnight oil establishing processes to increase transparency, accountability and predictability — all to make sure that our organizations have the necessary information to make informed decisions. As with politics where some say “a trillion … Continue reading The Compounding Effect of Project Management
How Will You Measure Project Progress?
- How many project controls engineers does it take to determine the progress of a work activity? - Nine. One to determine the number, and eight to talk about how much better they would have done it…. Measuring progress is one of the challenging areas of Project Management and since it is challenging it is … Continue reading How Will You Measure Project Progress?
Vik Bulletin 