06/27/2017 by Brad Egeland Tags: Gantt chart, project requirements, sow
Requirements are the lifeblood of projects. That’s one of my mottos anyway. If you don’t have a list of what needs to be completed, how do you know what to accomplish, or even when the project is actually finished? This is why requirements are critical to a project’s successful outcome. A project that is started […]
04/14/2017 by Brad Egeland Tags: rework, smart project management, why plan
Project Managers are organized in everything they do, right? Well, I can say that I’m not. And when I was attempting to change a tire on our full-sized 12 passenger van… I learned that I’m even less organized than I thought. My little kids were helping… so at least that aspect was fun. The worst […]
03/23/2017 by Brad Egeland Tags: pmo, trust, worklife
This may seem like a simple question, but the answer is bigger than we think it is. We’ve all grown somewhat immune to the mocking of those in charge – you see the President of the United States and other world leaders mocked on TV and other media all the time. But really, what about […]
03/09/2017 by Brad Egeland Tags: identify, opportunity, problems, project manager, true need
Sometimes what you’re really trying to solve is a bit hidden. The customer may not see it and you might not at first glance either. But it is your responsibility to make sure you always go that extra mile to make sure you are addressing the real issue and not just a symptom that the […]
02/23/2017 by Brad Egeland Tags: alternative solutions, budget constraints, project feasibility, project justification, project requirements
In Part 1 of this two-part series on figuring out whether or not what we have viable project … we looked at what brings us to the go / no-go decision point and how we review a project from both a justification standpoint and a feasibility standpoint. Now, in Part 2, we’ll consider how to: […]
02/16/2017 by Brad Egeland Tags: continue or terminate, project feasibility, project justification
In one of my past lives in corporate America, I worked at a very large, Fortune 500 engineering and aviation firm that featured a central Project Management Office (PMO). There existed a requirement for all project managers to go through the following exercise on the larger projects (not all of the smaller projects required a […]
02/02/2017 by Brad Egeland Tags: blame game, failure, PM, project, Relationships
A reader of one of my articles recently commented about people blaming others for failures on projects and workplace tasks. We all know he’s right … some of us may have been guilty of it ourselves once or twice … or had the finger pointed at us in the ugly blame game. But that isn’t […]
01/26/2017 by Brad Egeland Tags: Customer, management, Onboarding, project kickoff, project oversight, Resources, Schedule
One key aspect of the responsibilities of the Project Manager (PM), of course, is his or her management of the project delivery team. This is where the real work happens, where the rubber meets the road and how the project moves productively forward. It is a lot of responsibility and takes some obvious skills and […]
01/19/2017 by Brad Egeland Tags: BRD, Change Order, fdd, Negotiation, PM, Scope, TDD
Are you a skilled negotiator? Does negotiating make your hair stand up on end or does it drive something in you? In Part 1 of this series, I discussed negotiations for Budget and Timeline impacts on your project. I identified that issues requiring negotiations on projects usually fall into one of three main categories: Budget, […]
01/12/2017 by Brad Egeland Tags: Budget, Funcationality, Negotiation, PM, PMO Director, project, Restructure, Timeline
Negotiation is a four letter word to some people, and a passionate love for others. Is negotiation part of the Project Manager’s role? It certainly is. In fact, without realizing it, the act of negotiating things on a project probably infiltrates just about every role occupied on a project … but it’s certainly most prevalent […]