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Are Project Managers Born Leaders?

While it may be assumed that when you accept the role of project manager, you also indirectly accept the role of a leader; that is not the case. Essentially, leadership and project management are two different aspects to look at. A successful project manager may not translate to being an exceptional leader. To be precise, project managers are to control the three major factors (namely scope, budget and time) that influence the quality of service delivered. Project managers implement new tools and techniques to deliver impeccable results. Successful project management can be achieved by having adequate knowledge of project framework and being aware of newer methodologies.

However, in the ever-evolving world of business, every organization needs their project managers to develop exemplary leadership skills. In today’s time, project management calls for individuals who can offer a wide range of expertise and capabilities. Therefore, it is no longer feasible for a project manager to just manage. Project managers must also act as leaders, i.e. motivate and inspire, be team builders, develop communication with every member and lastly maintain integrity coupled with being a confident problem solver. If the question in the topic of the blog is altered, i.e. can project managers become leaders? The answer will be a definite yes.

Effective communication is a great start to being a project leader. You must know your team members and convey to them about what and how it needs to be done. As long as the leader is not articulate enough and cannot get a point across, the team fails to achieve a satisfying outcome. The key to reach a level of excellent communication is having the ability to deliver feedback that is both positive and constructive and also be a patient listener towards members’ suggestions and input.

To ensure a productive work environment, a project leader must possess enthusiasm towards a project. Project management is not just about knowing your goal, it also about managing your team members because that is a leader’s primary job. In times when failure seems inevitable or there is a huge burden to handle, it is the project manager’s attitude that changes inevitable failure into an astonishing success. The project manager must have a positive approach towards work and be a source of motivation for the team. His words should be encouraging so as to maintain productivity and not let the team members give up.

Team building might seem easy but it surely is not. It is a task that requires immense patience and impartiality from the project manager’s side. When a team works together, issues and conflicts are inevitable. However, a project manager must deal with the conflicts from an early stage and not let it grow. His job is to maintain a friendly work environment and keep the team focused on a common goal eradicating any selfish motive. Team building also consists of being aware of each team member’s personality and treating each one of them equally and in a manner to achieve the desired results.

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What makes money and time so important to project management?

The success of a project depends on factors like integration, scope, quality etc. Modern day project management is constantly evolving but time and budget are still the solid foundation of project management. However, we will leave the rest of the factors to some other blog and discuss how the two equally crucial yet demanding factors, time and money, affect the outcome. Time and money are not only inter-connected but also very important in what is termed as the “planning” stage of project management.

Time and budget constraints have a positive impact on project management because the restrictions of both increase productivity and thus a higher success rate. Restrictions of both keep the wheel rotating and do not let complacent attitude become a part of the work and employees. The major task for the project team is to work efficiently while also meeting the time and budget constraints.

A project manager must first understand the time and budget constraints and see how it applies to a project. The project is then planned and managed accordingly. While the cost allocated can be adjusted, fluctuations in time are rarely possible unless the due date is moved ahead.

Cost:

The budget is not just the amount of money needed; it is a reflection of the work of the project and the resources required. A comprehensive budget takes into account how funds will be utilized throughout the course of the project. Generally, a project’s expenditures show an increase when resources utilized are increased.

The monetary commitment of a project is dependent on various factors. The factors include the cost of labour, services and materials used in the process, and other overhead costs. The budget allocated might show an increase as each stage of execution is elaborated.

Every project essentially has costs that might be fixed or varying or both. The project manager must know how to control costs throughout the course as per the requirements and quality of the work. The budget is estimated by evaluating historic data, average vendor and resource costs.

Time:

Time constraint for a project is basically the time allocated to the project from beginning to end, i.e. till the work is delivered. Time can be assigned only after being thoroughly aware of the work that project requires. To be more precise, the project is first broken down into components and then into sub-components to estimate the time that would be needed for the completion of the project.

Time management is vital and can be achieved by devising a timeline that mentions the duration that each component of the project should take. The schedule must be properly planned and constantly compared to the on-going project so as to clearly judge the progress of the project. However, it is also important to remember that time management is required at an individual level as well. Team work and support enhances both creativity and productivity by keeping the spark of motivation and dedication alive.

Constraints of time and money are vital to project management because both these factors determine the quality of the work produced and delivered. A project manager must devise a budget and schedule that all the employees agree on.

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Organizational Performance Management

Performance management design concept. Typographic poster. Performance management concepts for web banner and printed materials.
Performance management design concept. Typographic poster. Performance management concepts for web banner and printed materials.

A very crucial question that need to be pondered over is how does organizational performance management fit in. when talking about small startups, OPM main seem quite a big deal. But what if the organization is somewhere in between. On one hand you no more do all the logistics yourself on the other hand, there is still time when you will be cutting checks for a large number of employees.

For understanding how organizational performance management fit in, you first need to understand that OPM is a good thing. Relating strategy with implementation, making a strong link between strategies, how it is planned and then implemented in order to deliver on portfolio grounds. Also realize how important its value is.

Thing to keep in mind is OPM at scale is even better. If you don’t scale OPM to where your organization is OPM may seem quite complex to you, even in try of attempting it. If you think OPM is a good thing don’t waste a single moment trying it. It has been witnessed that the organizations that doesn’t seem to care enough about OPM, witness a downfall in their businesses. At times teams get frustrated and at times the progress get halted. And the same answers are given by the leadership- work harder.

Performance management is a lot more than the appraisals given at the end of the year. It’s about translating goals into outcomes, or results that are effective and has a huge progressive impact on the organization. It includes individual employees, teams, processes and the organization as a whole.

Effective PM will help you in nurturing individual performance, foster ongoing employees hence increasing overall organizational effectiveness.

OPM and strategic planning is closely related, here we will discuss how strategic planning has influenced private and public sector organizations. Indeed strategic planning is a crucial step in the management of any organization, regardless of at what level they reside. Public agencies have a greater challenge in evaluating their results. Whereas, private organizations have clear goals and results as the outcomes are closely related to the financial goals. Rapidly changing and increasing demands for programs, products and services and greater demands for accountability are the adequate reasons the public sector organizations have tend to opt strategic planning which leads to good organizational performance management as well as good results in overall progressive growth of the organization.Organizational PM helps in improving different levels.

How OPM can help?

  1. Assessment of your existing performance appraisal system.
  2. Development of performance plans in accordance with organization’s missions and goals.
  3. Writing elements and standards that involve measure of performance.
  4. Pay for performance systems
  5. Reward systems linked to your performance appraisal systems.

OPM mainly involves identifying the gaps in performance against the objectives of business, further recognizing where the gaps lie and deploying the improvements to close the gaps. Some of the key features are

Establish objectives, analyze process performance data, identify and implement improvement, implementation of improvements

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When the Benefits of Your Recent Project Fades Away

benifitsThis is a thing which is not being paid due attention, for instance, let’s understand it with an example the project you were working on is complete you are busy taking your time out, enjoy success, celebrating with your stakeholders and other teammates. You are not following your recently completed project but somebody else surely is.

You even engage in some new assignment. But then the unexpected happen. Ad what it is?

The project you completed is not delivering results. At some point like the first six months or so of your project, you might even overhear what your project has been creating, a mess for others or let’s just say , not adding the right kind of value or expected value to the business of your customer or the organization you are working for. But once you find out the results are not as expected, next thing on your mind is how you need to carry out the amendments but firstly you get to know, what went wrong?

You start looking for clues and let us see, what can be the answers,

Your findings reveal that the related processes which are supporting your product are not aligned thus in return producing the loss. Which results in erosion of benefits or you can say with this the benefits of the product fade away.

Some of the factors are discussed below, which can be of great help for project managers, these factors will help you fill the loopholes when you work on your next project, so here you go.

  • Overtime
  • Regulatory fines
  • Overlooked tax deductions union disputes.

Discussing these in detail is important.

But first, understand is what your next step would be, focus on the assignment you are currently working on and ignore what’s been lacking behind or work on the solution involving your stakeholders, other project managers, and team in the process. The answer may differ according to the situation you are in, but one thing you need know, updating the project with lessons learned is important. And crucial to your success as a project manager, whether you are in the leadership role or not.

Regulatory fine:

The project processes do not provide the project report on time, regulatory reports to be precise. There is a lack of compliance, data requested by federal or local authorities is missing. This results in creating a lot of mess.

Overtime:

Lack of clarity about changes brought by your project and the changed processes caused the operational areas to work as usual. Producing the undesired results and the operational areas worked as usual, and the work had to be done again.

Union disputes:

The implementation of the new processes and project caused a change in union worker’s duties, which were caused due to not thinking about the minor aspects at hand, in the current contract, the new contract if done, would be on a larger scale with contemplating, each and every aspect.

Benefits Gain Profit Earning Income Hands Volunteer Concept
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Cost Controls Redefined

Balancing the AccountsManage all types of projects with detailed cost control using separate cost control processes to track every dimension of project financials. View graphical cash flows.The Cost Sheet Dashboard provides rolled-up information from all project financials with drill-down into details.View and manage multi-year forecasts at the CSI division level or any other multi-level cost structure.Manage all contracts and change orders in detail. Ensure payment integrity.Leverage Transaction Visual Analysis to see all related cost transactions at a glance.Manage Project Schedule and Resources effectively and efficiently.

Advanced project cost management in primavera P6

Oracle’s Primavera P6 Enterprise Project Portfolio Management is the most powerful, robust and easy-to-use solution for globally prioritizing, planning, managing and executing projects, programs, and portfolios. Primavera P6 Enterprise Project Portfolio Management is an integrated project portfolio management (PPM) solution comprising role-specific functionality to satisfy each team member’s needs, responsibilities, and skills. It provides a single solution for managing projects of any size and adapts to various levels of complexity within a project. In addition, it intelligently scales to meet the needs of various roles, functions or skill levels in an organization and on a project team. This course builds on the student’s current knowledge, skills and application of project cost management using Primavera P6.

Learning Outcomes

  •     Ability to implement global change – modify projects using advanced functionality.
  •     Manage project cost effectively
  •     Apply advanced scheduling techniques.
  •     Implement earned value analysis.
  •     Use top-down budgeting.
  •     Assign codes.

Benefits

Assist project managers, cost control managers and cot controllers to use Primavera for integrating the cost with the project schedule.

  •     Apply the cost control techniques using Primavera including EVM.
  •     Calculate percent complete. Importing and exporting project data.
  •     Understand effective top-down/bottoms-up budgeting calculations.

Topics

Import and export data.

  •     Update baselines.
  •     Use Claim Digger.
  •     Apply duration types.
  •     Calculate percent complete.
  •     Use earned value analysis.
  •     Use top-down budgeting.
  •     Apply tracking layouts.

Auto computes layouts.

  •     Use top-down estimating.
  •     View reflection projects.
  •     Manage issues and risks.
  •     Create a project with Project Architect.
  •     Assign codes.
  •     Use global change.

Advanced scheduling.

Prerequisites

Participants should be working in a project management environment and understand how projects are planned and controlled, including knowledge of the following subjects:

P102 Project Management in Primavera using P6 V8.3.

Project management processes.

Experience in the use of PCs and an understanding of the operating system.

Audience

This course is targeted at those who are seeking to develop their skills and knowledge in the project budget and cost management.

  •     Project manager (generic)
  •     Project manager (industry specific)
  •     Cost Control Managers
  •     Project planners and schedulers
  •     Project control managers
  •     Project control engineers
  •     Project team members
  •     Project team leaders
  •     Cost Control Engineers
  •     Project coordinators
  •     Planning and scheduling engineers
  •     Quantity surveyors

Format

  • Face-to-face delivery of theory.
  • Facilitated discussions.
  • Facilitator demonstrates the functions of the software using different mediums, such as PowerPoint slides, live software module-by-module view on a screen.
  • Individual activities.
  • Structured Workshops

Our program design and delivery is based on adult learning principles and experiential learning techniques:

  • Individual and group activities
  • Short lecture sessions
  • Using templates
  • Practical and experiential
  • Written activities
  • Presentations
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Project management – What Should be Kept in Mind?

project-managementThe first step for an organization is to see whether the project manager has the necessary skills.

Skills required managing the project or in any adverse circumstances moving them to a place where they do less damage to the organization. And when we speak about the organization:

Certain things should be kept in mind. Considering the needs of the organization itself is a very important step. Business needs today includes the business to be agile, it should change quickly and as per the need. Adapting rapidly to the changing environment is a key factor. These factors make your business project driven.  Which means the business should have a project focus. This means embedding project management into business strategy and making sure the organization understands it.

This includes doing projects right. And that begins with making your team with the cream people who do the things with their best skills, putting your best people. For a couple of years as part of the practice the role of good managers may be stretched and blossom to some additional roles which may take their project to new heights of prosperity. Not just their projects but their skills, knowledge and expertise. Which help them as an individual as well as whole of the organization?

Two of the most important things which should be kept in mind is only those projects that are most critical to the organization takes place and secondly are measured as per actual benefits delivered to the business at the end of the project.

Decisions like these are made by the high level managers, (business executives).

According to some experienced project managers they work on a three year focus with a quarterly review of the portfolio and the strictest rule that nothing is bullet-proof. Business critical projects should always be prioritized and rests of the projects are delayed as per the need of the business. This is the most important way of getting top management support. Worldwide very few organizations have implemented portfolio management support. And among them mostly are suffering from “project amnesia” this term refers to “approve and forget” by some people. Explaining it may include:

“The (executives or top management) approve a project and then seem to forget all about it”.

Reviewing what we discussed in this article, step one was the skills of the project manager, step two were the needs of the organization, step three includes considering the projects that are critical to the organization. But we can’t just stop there even if we take the important of the projects, things might still go wrong. Which can be eliminated using the review technique, which the fourth and most crucial part.

It includes putting processes into place considering all projects are reviewed at set times during the project life cycle.

What is needed is the some kind of a peer review process where a team or an individual carries out a review against a standard check list of the project at hand.

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How things are catered using Primavera P6?

Primavera P6The thing which is of key importance are project planning and management skills using Primavera P6. While dealing with projects of lengthy time span and activities that are larger and are further divided in sub activities.

The key features to this are:

  • Planning
  • Monitoring
  • Budgeting
  • Accomplishing.

The foremost thing in carrying out of these features is scheduling. Whether it is used in planning long term plans or tasks at hand. Scheduling includes services that tell at what time, what task would be carried out. Scheduling has been discussed in a number of previous articles but would be differentiated with project management and planning in this article.

Differentiating project management, planning and scheduling:

It can be easily understood as:

Project management is a system’s approach to planning, scheduling and controlling.

Project management of primavera p6 is a recognized standard for high performance. The projects are high scaled, sophisticated and multifaceted. Projects with unlimited resources are recognized and organized. The number of target plans are large, which in return makes it a vital part in catering projects under primavera P6.

A project managers work include,

  • Balance resource capacity
  • Plan, schedule and control projects
  • Track progress
  • Allocate best resources
  • Monitor, visualize and assess project performance versus plan.
  • Risk analysis
  • Conduct what-if scenarios.
  • Plan alternatives in case of anything went wrong.

Executives will be facing increasingly complex challenges during the next decade these would be the result of escalating salaries, raw materials and competencies between different giant organizations. Which increased union demand, pressure from stake holders, and the possibility of long term high inflation accompanied by mild recession.

All the executives today agree on the point, that the solution to majority of the problems is better control and use of existing corporate resources.

Project management can mean different to different people. It is designed to use the existing resources in a better way.

Let us understand it with an example:

It’s around 5 in the evening and the project needs a design change as well as a front end implementation, within a couple of hours for a persistent client, handling this kind of tasks comes under planning your project where there should be a spot for sudden changes, you check to see who is available, this is done through already scheduled tasks and duties. Well, you have a UX designer but not a single developer who can implement the changes. You have teams in multiple time zones, a model, intended for flexibility and sudden turnarounds like this, so you should have someone available for the tasks.

Figuring out when a developer might be free for some additional work load or sudden task is just one of the many things that you ought to manage.

This takes a good project manager to handle this chaos, good project managers need to be multi-tasking super heroes. Figuring out what need to be planned when and what should be scheduled how, differs all three terms we were discussing in this article.

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What should be known while scheduling?

During project management a very important and basic step is program or task scheduling. Project managers give a very significant importance to this. This article proves to be of great help for project managers who focus on the importance of scheduling.

While scheduling there are a number of terms that should be known.

Few of them are listed below.

ACTIVITY:

While working towards a larger goal, a task or process to be accomplished in a set period of time is called activity.

Actual cost:

The actual or real amount paid for labors or materials.

Activity relationship:

An ordered link between two activities representing the order of execution.

Approved change request:

A prove that can be a document which approves changes made to the contract.

Approved and reviewed by all stakeholders

Backward pass (backward plan):

Also known as critical path calculation, calculates earliest dates for activities on the network. It works backwards to find the finish dates and latest starts.

Bar chart:

A chart on which bars are used to represent activities. Lined up on an X axis time scale, length of the bar represents time duration.

Base line:

A set of dates and cost frozen at the start of the project and is used in evaluating the performance.

Change estimate:

An estimate of a potential change that can be made to a project, which helps in determining the overall cost of the project. Main focus is in cost, resources and scheduling.

Change impact:

The effect of a change on the whole project

Committed cost

A payment that is not yet made but is committed by the stakeholders, it can b in the form of a purchase order or a contract which is not recoverable.

Cost break down structure:

Breaking down in to cost elements for cost control planning.

Critical activity

An activity being carried out on the critical path of the project

Critical path:

A sequence of network activities, which adds up to the longest over all duration. Which determines the shortest time to complete the project

Critical path analysis:

Analysis using the longest path of a project. This aims to identify whether the project can be completed on time and tasks are a barrier between the project and its timely completion. The mile stones are identified and eliminated.

Date constraint:

Mainly used in scheduling software tell us the starting and ending date of tasks and sub tasks in a project. Often used to delay activities or imposed date deadlines in a schedule.

Direct labor:

A labor which can be directly allocated to the output of a productive account. It can either be allocated to a cost Centre. Usually not directly related to output.

Double resource estimated duration:

If the assigned levels of resources have doubled, it successfully measures the length of the activity duration

These all tasks are a very important and essential part of scheduling. These primary key factors helps the project managers in scheduling the tasks for getting maximum progressive output from the project.

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How to Get More E-mail Subscribers

A very important task faced by a person running some website is attracting maximum number of email subscribers. In this article we will tell you a very tricky and successful secret of attracting maximum email subscribers. The percentage can be around 60 to 70 percent.How-to-Grow-Email-Subscribers

Now, let us focus on getting subscribers.

The main problem faced is getting subscribers for same traffic. Here is a faster way of growing your E-mail, and that is by using POP-UP domination. Use of pop up domination is easy to use, high converting, mobile responsive and your subscriber list will explode with request in a matter of minutes.

There are two further things to be kept in mind. Pricing and Pop-up designs.

There are different websites in market that deliver services related to maximizing your email subscription via pop-up generation.

Services that are provides are enhancing. There are a number of ways of increasing the number of subscriptions. Savvy online marketers will tell you “the money’s in the list!” but that’s not entirely true. What they should be saying is that the money’s in the quality of the list, rather than the quantity of subscribers. Lists with a few hundred dedicated customers can outperform lists of 10,000 or more generic “freebie seekers” when you focus on building relationships instead of counting sales.

So how do you attract the right kind of people? How do you get interested visitors to become eager subscribers? Keep reading for 10 outstanding list building tips you can’t afford to miss.

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Scheduling Process in Primavera P6

While using primavera p6, the scheduling process is divided into four main parts or steps:

Plan, update, review/ analyze and communicate.

In the first part we would focus on how to plan. It is very important to understand the contract and requirements given by the customer. It is very important for the scheduler as it may help in scheduling the updates. The documents should be well versed and capable of outlining the frequency which may refer to updates versus revisions, earned value requirements, cost and resource status requirements. it may also refer to change management procedures. These documents require specific software to be used.Primavera P6 Scheduling

Policies of the company, budgeting constraints for the project at hand and usage of application are the few important factors responsible for schedule update occurrence. When you maintain your record more frequently, get data of the built programs or data which is based on required periodic performance updates helps to figure out things more accurately and the people working on projects can work more effectively. It establishes greater accuracy, promotes timely issues/resolutions.

The starting point to which it can get back when some error or exception occurs during the update process.

In which the usage of layouts and reporting tools as well as predefined filters helps you enhance the functionality. These filters are based on standard rolling date as well as the scheduling data dates. Regular updates should be taken, in order to effectively record project progress consideration. Internal policies of the company, budgeting constraints for the project at hand and usage of application are the few important factors responsible for schedule update occurrence.

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Scheduling Process in Primavera P6

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