We have just returned from the outstanding-as-usual 2012 Resource Planning Summit, organized by the irrepressible Dick Rutledge, dean of the PM-related conference providers. Only a few others operate at the same level of excellence. One of the key differentiators of Rutledge’s events is his ruthless demands of his speakers for audience take-aways and truly new ideas, as opposed to retreads of tired themes. And this time, we experienced those demands first-hand, as we were a presenter–our first opportunity in the four events we have supported.

Our presentation, Tip of the Iceberg: Managing the Entire ‘berg Improves PM Performance, was developed for this audience of key managers and enterprise leaders. The presentation looked at project and program decision-making from the perspective of top Executives–the tip of the iceberg, as it were. And we identified key practices that Managers in the Middle follow when they add clear value for their executives, their project teams and their organizations.

We asserted, as we did in our 2005 article, Project Levers and Gauges, that the most-effective project and program managers don’t just provide lagging data, they also provide leading information. And, we have carried the theme further, pointing out that this leading information is a well-kept secret of the most effective managers of project managers.

But, let’s start with the background. Many are familiar with the old misconceptions of project management, illustrated by the Triple Constraint, the Iron or Golden Triangle, or some other name. It often includes Time, Cost and Scope. Sometimes Quality is there instead of Scope. Sometimes Performance is the third parameter, which might include Quality and Scope. So far, so good; but why do we call this a misconception in project management?

Because, while those often-named factors are important, one differentiator of competent, performing project managers is which you manage and which you monitor. Less-effective PMs try to control the easy to measure, but lagging factors. We understood this weakness in the early 1980s when we published the Project Vital Signs, shown at right. Yes, there are more than three of them, and our assertion then and through today is that one must manage all of them.

Some of these factors may look familiar to you, because they are similar to the knowledge areas in Max Wideman’s 1986 PMBOK® and Duncan’s 2006 PMBOK Guide (we originally called #6 Resources). But this is just background on the most-discussed part of our Resource Planning Summit presentation.

Planning Leading and Lagging Factors
In 1991 we began helping our customers to track measures or indicators for each of these “vital signs.”Note that the measures varied with the organization, because some had no reliable measurements in a few of the areas. When a project’s Baseline was established, we captured that baseline across all factors as 100%, as shown at left.

Today, when we show this diagram, the first question of most savvy managers is “how do we measure or indicate the Talent, Scope and Risk?” As mentioned above, these vary with the organization, and with their ability to measure these harder-to-quantify factors. But even the Time and Cost factors must be evaluated against true baselines, rather than arbitrary deadlines and budgets, mandated before the requirements were understood.

Tracking the Factors
Next, we see (at right) the first approved variance from the plan. This could occur weeks or months after Baseline approval, but more-often happens at a major milestone, or stage ending review. We will make several observations about the status, based on the diagram at the right.

Note that this update is a study in cause and effect. Clearly, as pointed out by the arrows, things have changed. But which is/are the causes, and which are the effect? Our assertion (and frequent experience) is that Talent changed. For example, perhaps a commitment to place the top engineer on the project was broken, or a priority change caused that person to be removed and replaced with a less-qualified person.

In other words, Talent goes down by a measurable amount. The outcome: Cost, Time and Quality move a measurable amount in the wrong directions. Note that, in this example at least, the Leading Factor is Talent; the impact might be immediately obvious to the team. But the Lagging Factors may not show up in project reports about Time and Cost for weeks or months—if the team fails to alert leadership about the consequences of lost Talent.

Taking Action
Effective teams do not just stand aside when challenged; first they escalate the problem, and its impact, to their leadership. Then, either with their support, or without it in cases when they receive no response, they act.

Study the chart on the left, which shows the impact of project team actions taken. What was the action, and what was the impact? Aided by the arrows, we can see that we selectively reduced Scope, which brought Cost and Time back down. It appears that Quality has also recovered a bit.

But now, Risk has soared! The good news: Risk has never hurt a project. It is Risk Realized that does so, and that manifests itself in Time, Cost and Quality; perhaps it also manifests in failure to meet the business need.

Intuitively Obvious Insights
Each time we discuss this sequence of charts, we see aha’s from project managers and their managers. The same thing happened at the Resource Management Summit, a highly receptive audience for this take-away. The aha’s are intuitively obvious, but not commonly practiced. In our work, we find few project and program managers who intentionally manage their initiatives with this insight. We find more who quickly grasp it, and begin to apply it.

Managers who add value in their organization immediately understand this leading and lagging factors approach, but then they wonder why they seldom receive this type of information from their project managers. Whether these are first-level managers, or somewhere in the layers in the middle, there are several clear take-aways:

1. You can see, from this chart sequence, that the factors above the horizontal line are Lagging Factors, and the ones below the line are the Leading Factors. As a project manager, which do you baseline, measure, manage and communicate? As a manager, which do you hear, act upon and communicate?

2. It is important to convey to managers the potential impact on Lagging factors, as part of communicating the status of Leading factors. For example, if we lost that Engineer, we might be able to get her back if we can identify the imminent consequences in Time and Cost. If we instead only use this information as an excuse after-the-fact, we are not doing our job in managing decision-making information.

3. It is easier to manage the leading factors than to try to control the Lagging factors. Yet the latter is what too many project managers (not-yet-competent ones) try to do. It does a manager no good to be informed that we drove off the road last Thursday. You’d rather hear: “Turn Left Now” while there is time to correct.

4. Managers who act on Leading Factor information when they can, and communicate upward, across and outward when the occasion merits, add value to everything they touch. Those who don’t, don’t.

Changing Behavior
If Skinner is correct, and we can change behavior, then you have potential Lessons Earned from this posting. For example, in our workshops, for years we have asked the question, “Which of the three Vital Signs do you hear the greatest emphasis upon during the project?” We usually hear Time and Cost, with either Quality or Scope as the third. This evokes and perpetuates the obsolete Triple Constraint.

And when we then ask, “A year after the project is complete, which ones are most important then?” Usually the reply includes the right Scope, at the right level of Quality, with either Risk or Talent as the third. Ironic, that the criteria for success during the project changes when it is too late to do anything about the lasting results.

While we called these leading and lagging factors Levers and Gauges in our 2005 article, the secret remains the same: Manage the levers, and monitor the gauges.

For those who prefer a more readable version of the small chart used above, click this link.

Your Comments?

PMBOK is a registered trademark of Project Management Institute in the USA and other countries.

First, we have experience in Program and Project Management (PPM) in the Nuclear industry, and we continue to follow it. Second, although the article is a financial analysis, it demonstrates great insights, in estimating, in research, and analysis, in a complex subject. Third, Mr. Williams demonstrates the type of professional PPM competence that every Executive should be able to depend upon for advice in strategic decisions. Thank you Glenn, for being such a great example!

And Now, the Article
With license in hand, Southern (SO) is ready to build the [USA] nation’s first generation-III nuclear power plant. While this does not signal any nuclear renaissance, it does provide the nation with badly needed generation. The challenge will be for Southern to build Plant Vogtle’s additions on time and on schedule.

The reality is that cost and schedule will be difficult to achieve. In fact, the probability that Southern’s two 1,154-megawatt units will be operating by 2016/2017 and will have a final cost of $14 billion is about zero. Of course, the best available estimate is being used to forecast the project’s outcome. History has taught us 110 times before, however, that utility estimates for nuclear power plants include dozens of assumptions.

If one of those assumptions is wrong, the estimate is wrong. Remember, the Vogtle project is an attempt to build a first-of-its-kind nuclear power plant.

The question is how far off are Southern’s estimates? The answer is nobody knows. And, if anyone claims they know, they’re lying to you.

I built cost and schedule estimates for several nuclear projects. Each estimate took months and a team of approximately 100 planning engineers, schedulers, estimators, cost engineers and project accountants to build an integrated cost estimate for a single-unit nuclear plant.

Based on this experience, there are two important lessons investors should consider. The first lesson is that Southern should be viewed as Plant Vogtle’s construction managers. Yes, of course The Shaw Group (SHAW) has the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract to build these units for Southern. But one of the biggest lessons learned during the last build was that the owners had fiduciary responsibilities to manage the construction process and not rely solely on their EPC contractors. After all, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) issued the construction permit to Southern, not Shaw. It’s Southern’s shareholders who are making the investment, and Southern’s management better have its hands firmly on the project’s controls.

This is a lesson that the industry learned during the last build. So, if Southern signals that the company subordinated its management responsibilities to Shaw, that would be the signal for investors to sell their shares.

The second lesson is that the owner should have a full staff of quality-control engineers reporting directly to Southern’s CEO. There are several reasons why Southern needs to manage quality control. First, rework is one of the most expensive activities that project planners consistently underestimate (who plans for failure?). The nuclear construction industry has been plagued by rework issues. Look no further than Europe. Olkiluoto 3 and Flamanville 3 are Europe’s new generation-III nuclear plants. The construction work at these plants is years ahead of Vogtle. In some of the more difficult areas, they experienced rework rates exceeding 25%.

Rework costs owners 3x more than the original estimate: The cost to build it, the cost to tear it down and the cost to build it again. If the rework is on the project’s critical path, the overall schedule must slip.

Southern needs to manage quality control because the NRC’s relationship to the project is through the licensee, not the contractor. The NRC has the authority to issue costly stop-work orders to the licensee. If the project is shut down by the NRC, and it frequently happened during the last build, it will cost owners approximately $2 million a day for each day construction is delayed. A proactive relationship with the NRC is cost-effective and good management.

It’s not just the NRC. Southern and its partners will have to live with the plant long after their EPC contractor leaves. Operators want to be assured that there were no short cuts or defects, because they will have to fix them.

Progress Energy (PGN) is learning this lesson with its Crystal River 3 nuclear plant. Progress and its insurers are incurring huge costs to fix a problem originating from the plant’s construction. Having Southern’s team work closely with the EPC contractor will help avoid Crystal River-type problems.

If history is any guide, investors should expect smooth sailing in the first half of the construction process — everything should look hunky-dory because this is the easiest part — the second half is when the challenges emerge. Work packages will become progressively more difficult, and tasks will require higher skills to complete. Progress will slow down.

Investors should anticipate the challenges and be patient. Most importantly, expect a cost overrun. This is a first-of-a-kind, and a small cost overrun will not be fatal.

About the Author
Glenn Williams is an experienced strategist in renewable and conventional energy. He has over 30 years of relevant experience in creating and developing effective organizations and entrepreneurial products within the energy industry. He developed technical competence in the financial, strategic, and risk management aspects of the green energy, deregulated energy markets and nuclear power. Mr. Williams directly managed professional staffs of over 100 members and provided leadership to organizations composed of more than 1,000 employees. He also was the CEO of an energy company that went from $0 to $120 million in 20 months with every quarter posting positive earnings.

Specialties
Business development, strategic management and project planning for green energy, nuclear power, and independent power sectors.

Postscript
We liked the insights in this article so much that we connected with author Glenn Williams on LinkedIn. Thank you Glenn! And, our thanks to the Editors of TheStreet.com for your permission to reprint this stellar example of PPM Competence in action!

Last month we wrote about The Importance of Writing Well. This month, we gently approach the topic of Effective Speaking. This is not to be confused with dialogue between persons–that is yet another topic. Instead, this topic involves speaking in front of groups. Actually, that really makes this multiple topics, because different audience sizes require very different skills. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves.

Effective Speaking has received a lot of recent attention. In part, this is because our USA President is perceived by some to be an excellent orator. In addition to political settings, we have observed many other situations where the ability to speak in a clear and compelling way is an asset to the initiative, whether that initiative is a project, a program, or any other Change Agent venue.

Great Writer = Great Speaker?
You’d think that great writers would find it easy to also be great speakers. After all, being able to clearly explain complex topics in a way that everyone understands, is a gift–one that should easily transfer to speaking. But ‘taint necessarily so. I recall the excitement, when it first came out, around the book, In Search of Excellence. Author Tom Peters (together with Robert Waterman, Jr.) wrote such a compelling book that everyone wanted him to speak to their group or company. As I recall, at that time, his speaking skills did not match his research and writing skills. Some people were disappointed.

But, Tom Peters understood: He worked on his Effective Speaking skills. Soon, he was such a great speaker that he had no need to write another book; his speaking, advisory services, and overall message were all so popular. But the question remains: Great Writer = Great Speaker? A web search turns up many interesting discussions, and the results are mixed. Some say “yes!” Some say, “not necessarily so.” 

Impact of Group Sizes
In Facilitator training workshops, most say that everyone can be an effective Facilitator. Your only limit is the size of the group you can facilitate. Some are good at facilitating a group of one; then the group size scales upwards; 5-7; up to 12-15; up to 25 (a limit for most); up to 50; and beyond. The same is true of Effective Speaking. It is a completely different experience to speak to 50 people than to speak to 5. And imagine speaking to 500; or 5000. Imagine trying to get eye contact with 500 people!

First Large Audience: The first time I spoke to an audience of 400+ was at large-scale Computer User Group conference in the early 1980s. Before my presentation, and while others were speaking, I went into the auditorium, and sat at the very back—more than 180 feet from the lectern. From that distance the speakers looked very small. Subtle arm gestures were barely visible, if at all. Some speakers appeared to hide behind the overpowering lectern. It was clear from audience reactions that those speakers had diminished effectiveness. Based on those observations, when I presented, I abandoned the lectern, used the entire stage, and focused eye-contact in all parts of the room, including that back row (at least I appeared to do so). As a result of this preparation, my presentation was extremely successful.

Note that the same demeanor would be overwhelming when speaking to a group of five. But from this simple example, we can see some of the different skills that come into play as group size scales.

Speaking Is More Than Presenting
Some think that Effective Speaking is just standing up and talking with a clear voice. For most of us, it also involves preparation, listening, observing, managing timing, establishing voice control (modulation, volume), all while juggling the microphone, slide clicker and laser pointer. And, appearing to be relaxed and enjoying yourself. Each of these skills requires practice and experience. And then we learn the don’ts. Don’t look just at the front row; don’t block the slide with your body. Don’t speak too quietly, too fast, or too slow. Don’t get off your schedule, but don’t ignore the questions.

Speaking is special from another standpoint: Your content is important–that is why the audience is there; but your style has more impact than the words you choose. We’ve seen speakers who frown as they think their way through their presentation; they would be better off just voicing over a slide show. Of course, we have all heard the diatribes against slideshows; but the most effective speakers (at least those who use them) use them to expand and enhance the message, not to drive it.

Different Time-Space Than Writing
Another way that speaking differs from writing is that speaking is live. This is a completely different time-space for new speakers. It is completely different and disconcerting for writers-turned speakers. We can all write a first draft of an article, set it aside for a day or two, then come back to it and improve it. Speaking involves just a single opportunity to get the message–and all the delivery dynamics–right, the first time. Of course, your writing skill comes into play here, too: Outlining, capturing your key points, here is a place where those who are talented writers have an advantage in preparing a stellar speech.

Does being an effective writer help your (or my) speaking? Absolutely yes, in my point of view. Having a concept is one thing. Conveying it to others in such a way that they grasp it is a gift–whether you do so in speech or in writing. Both are key communication skills for project and program managers. I suggest that you work on both! Of course, then we still must cover meaningful dialogue, and the most precious skill of all, listening.

————–

In doing a bit of research for this article, we found the following links; as usual, they led to more links, all interesting, and it took days to get back to completing this article!

• tompeters! Get to (Serious!!) Work… On Your Presentation Skills
• Carol Brown: 23 Public Speaking Secrets from the Greats
• Ellen Egan: Dealing with the recession – Improve your public speaking skills
• Overnight Sensation: Public Speaking Success: Why Writers Make Great Speakers

We’re Listening! What are Your Comments?

In September of 2006, Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoelick used the word “stakeholder” when speaking about US/China relations.  The Chinese language does not have a corollary word for “stakeholder” and the use of the word led to quite a fuss. The State Department suggested a Chinese phrase meaning “participants with related interests”.

The term stakeholder had come into common useage by the end of the last century, but where did the word come from?  One possible source is the person who holds the money or stakes in a bet. Another possibility is in mining prospecting where you drive stakes into the fours corners of the property you want to claim.

Stakeholders are people inside and outside an organization who have a vested interest in a problem and its solution.  They can be both positive and negative in their interests.  Wikipedia, the free online encyclopedia, has a good section on the term. In all current project planning a stakeholder analysis is a vital step. But where did the common modern useage of people in “interest groups” come from?

Mason and Mitroff in their 1981 book, Challenging Strategic Planning Assumptions posited the following source: “The stakeholder concept seems to have emerged initially in the systems analysis work on organizations conducted by researchers at the Tavistock Institute in London. See Rhieman, Eric, Industrial Democracy and Industrial Man (London: Tavistock Institute, 1968) and Fox, Alan, A Sociology of Work in Industry (London: Coller  MacMillan Limited, 1971). Pp. 57-68 of the latter book contains a good discussion of the idea and its application to management.”

There are many ways to classify or categorize stakeholders. One way is by evaluating their Interest, their Attitude, and their Power. Study the following “stakeholder cube” diagram from Lucid Consulting in the UK. It is an excellent categorization of various types of stakeholders.

About Robert Youker

Robert (Bob) Youker is an independent trainer and consultant in Project Management with more than forty years of experience in the field. He is retired from the World Bank where he developed and presented six-week project management training courses for the managers of major projects in many different countries. He served as the technical author for the bank on the Instructors Resource Kit on CD ROM for a five week training course on Managing the Implementation of Development Projects.

Bob has written and presented papers at many Project Management Institute and International Project Management Association (IPMA) conferences over the years, many of which have been reprinted in both organizations’ publications.

Mr. Youker is a graduate of Colgate University and the Harvard Business School, and studied for a doctorate in behavioral science at George Washington University. His project management experience includes new product development at Xerox Corporation and project management consulting for many companies as President of Planalog Management Systems from 1968 to 1975.

For years I’ve used an introductory dialogue for classroom Communication topics. It involves a tee-up, “Based on research done by the US Navy years ago, different people have different preferences in the way they receive information.” And then I write on a flipchart the following, while saying most of these words:

• 45% Readers
• 45% Listeners
• 5% Both
• 5% Fool

The key is this: While I’d write Fool, I’d say Neither. Typical of American humor.

In a room of 20-25 people, around half would laugh, the others would wonder why they are laughing. It is because some were listening, and others were reading.

Improving Communication Effectiveness
But this little vignette brings up a very important point: Statistically, about half of all people prefer to listen to get their information, and about half prefer to read it. Which are you? While the cited statistics say that about 5% do both equally well, the majority of all participants usually think they are part of that 5%. And the majority think their husband/wife/manager/co-worker/customer (pick one) is the last on the list above.

Great communicators seem to intuitively understand the preferences of their audiences. Meanwhile, I resort to using simple models and observation to approximate a similar result. At least, I do when I focus on Conscious Communication, rather than just using my own preferences, and expect that everyone else understands perfectly. Is this Reader/Listener preference why many of us only communicate effectively with half our audiences? And then we wonder what’s wrong with them? Perhaps we can all benefit from a bit more Conscious Communication.

Some readers have already figured out that this might be a two-part article, about Writing and Speaking effectively. Perhaps, and as I recall, it was Epictetus, who said, “We have two ears and one mouth so that we can listen twice as much as we speak.” He understood the importance of listening well in the first Century AD. This series may have more than two parts, if we take the hint and also discuss the lost art of Listening.

The Importance of Writing
Is writing one of your greatest skills? It should be. Many others think that writing is diminishing in importance as we become more technologically connected. I think today’s technology increases the need for effective writing. People have less time than ever to wade through lengthy emails (yes, I am an offender), dense prose (ditto), and unedited papers. Well, at least Rose has cured me of most of that, except when she lets one slip through.

Project Documentation is a good example of important writing. This is the trail you leave (you do, don’t you?), that other people follow, so they can evaluate your results, figure out why you chose a particular solution, or adapt and tune your results for changing business needs. Documentation of your role as a competent and performing Project Manager is essential in any advanced PM certification. And you document your competence not in just one aspect of the project, but in 46-50 different Competence Elements. Clearly, documentation is important.

Why Do We Write?
We write to inform; to persuade; to evoke responses, so we can change from one voice to a team in dialogue. In a project, we write:

• To get more funding, or obtain the right Talent.
• To avoid or prevent a Risk, by successfully recommending a preventative action.
• To transfer understood work efforts from self to others: Writing is key to effective delegation.
• To clearly define the terms of a contract or other type of agreement.
• To resolve an open issue, that must be acted upon within a window of opportunity.
• To explain the consequences of a project delay or budget overage.
• To inform organization stakeholders and leaders of a project’s status.
• To give praise to key team members or stakeholders.

And, for many more reasons–and that is just in the project setting. But if only half of your audience “gets it” when you write, how will you accompany your writing, so the entire message is received? Verification and observation help, but effective project managers also follow up verbally.

Duty Writing Versus Inspired Writing
I know people who write very well. Several are leaders of asapm. For me, it can take weeks to get inspired about an article. Sometimes, just as with some of my favorite people, leaving something to the last minute inspires me a little bit, as the looming deadline juices my adrenalin. But the inspiration is essential. No one wants to read an article that was written just because it is a duty. This article, for example, was started in early November, as a duty. Needed it for a November newsletter. Now, here it is January 6, and I had an Epiphany: the tee-up that this article begins with.

Are your project reports Duty Writing or Inspired Writing? Fear is not quite the same as Inspiration, although there is a slight resemblance. In failing projects, a few hours of reading project communications easily shows the problems, the attempts to CYA (a clever approach to avoiding blame, spelled out, it means Cover Your Anatomy); the early signs of a looming disaster. This is panicked Duty Writing, and over my consulting career, I’ve seen too many examples.

For me, Inspired Writing usually begins with a middle-of-the-night insight. Then I’m off and writing. Inspired Writing is more enjoyable for the writer, and usually more enjoyable to read.

Writing Well
In earlier generations, we all went through the writing classes in grade school, maybe multiple times: Outlining; sentence structure (remember diagramming?); declensions, person, nominative and dative; all the science of writing. But there is a difference between a well-structured sentence, and a compelling one, isn’t there? And how do we learn to write compelling phrases? Look at that list under Why Do We Write; can you afford to be ineffective in any of those communications? This is a Darwinian-style theme: survival of the fittest writer.

You are successful, in part, because of your writing skills! Such learned techniques as placing the “Why” in the first five words of a report that needs Executive action; of Engineers and IT Talent using more adjectives and adverbs when writing for non-technical stakeholders; and many other techniques. Perhaps we should start a wiki of writing tips for project managers. Such sharing could help all of us in writing well.

Back to our introductory dialogue: Effective writers prepare for their audiences to be some combination of reader and listener. They ask for preferences: “Would you rather review my proposal first, or have me explain the key points, and answer your questions?” That is one of the ways effective writers also become effective communicators.

So yes, in some future posting we will also opine about The Importance of Speaking Well; and probably of Listening, too. Perhaps not immediately; there are a lot of interesting things to write about, early in 2012. May your 2012 be prosperous and successful!

Your Comments?

Typically, and especially in the USA, November is a slow month—the calm before the storm of December, with its end-of-year project deadlines, and fiscal close-out for non-governmental organizations. It is a bit of a relief from the intensity of September and October. This effect is accentuated in the USA by the Thanksgiving week late in the month, that disrupts any schedule for a two week period.

But not this year.

I traveled more this month (on behalf of professional organizations) than any period since May-June, with:

• A keynote for a major University, with a discussion about establishing a truly relevant PM curriculum;
• Participating in an excellent PMO Symposium in Orlando; and (finally) meeting Cornelius Fitchner;
• Speaking of which, contributing to The PM Podcast’s celebratory event, celebrating Cornelius’ 200th offering;
• Participating in an IPMA Executive Board meeting in Sarajevo with a very informative Government/Business Roundtable for the Bosnia-Herzegovina IPMA Member Association;
• A keynote at the incredibly successful 2nd Annual Symposium for AMIP, Asociacion Mexicana de Ingenieria de Proyectos, IPMA-Mexico, in Saltillo, Mexico.

Whew! Wore me out just reading it!

The Newvember Theme
The month is named for the ninth month in the pre-Julian calendar, popular long before the Caesars renamed the  Summer months for themselves. When I learned Latin at a very young age, I wondered why the month names of Sept., Oct., Nov. and Dec. failed to match the numbers 7, 8, 9 and 10; later I learned why. Wikipedia cites January and February as the ones that were added to expand the calendar; July and August were originally named Quintilis and Sextilis, but were changed by Augustus. Regardless, project managers should be happy, because as a result, we have two extra months to get things done each year, right?

Well, not quite. As I recall, the year still contains the same number of days; the months are just of shorter duration. I knew there was a reason why all those things due at the end of the month are still missing! Before the calendar change, the early Romans really had it right; they used the last 12 or so days of the year the celebrate the year, rather than desperately trying to finish all their incomplete projects.

But all this background should inspire a new look at Newvember. I recall that for years as a consultant, I’ve booked most of November in Europe, Canada, or South America. Why? Because, aside from the first week, it was pretty much a wasted month in the USA, as billable time goes. Our great friend William Duncan applies the same approach still today. So, a few of us have understood the Newvember theme for a long time.

Newvember is the month when:

• You have a hope of figuring out how to deliver this year’s promises (the theme of our asapm March Symposium)
• You can sign all the contracts that assure a more prosperous 2012, and plan for filling them;
• You can begin to plan for the ways you will continue to differentiate from the masses in the new year;
• You can review your recertification status, whether for a basic certification or one of asapm’s advanced certifications;
• You can begin planning to attend the October 28-30 IPMA World Congress, in Crete. Airfares are often least expensive when they first become available, 10.5-11 months before the travel date.

So why am I traveling all around the World in November, instead of doing all the above?

Because part of the excitement of this Newvember was the exposure to different expertise, different cultures, different challenges, and different solutions. We are in an era where the classic answers are no longer the best answers. Each situation requires a considered response. Of course, that last factor has always been true. But today, there is a much wider range of responses available, requiring much deeper understanding of the situation. Otherwise, we will flaw by giving easy answers to difficult questions, rather than useful ones.

I rather like Newvember, because has always been a very intense learning experience for me. Even after coaching or consulting on thousands of major projects, ranging from IT systems that transformed the company, to improving the effectiveness of a pharma organization, to identifying the cost tracking inconsistencies in the Stealth Bomber project; serving as a Change Agent, under the auspices of asapm and IPMA, is tiresome, but inspirational.

Of course, we were so busy making news during Newvember, that we were not around to record and report the news. And that, dear friends, is why this is a combined November+December newsletter.

Enjoy, and I hope to see you at the asapm Symposium in Washington, DC March 5, 2012!

Your Comments?

This posting is inspired by the theme of IPMA’s 25th World Congress, Brisbane, Australia, October 10-12 2011. We originally developed the content for The PM Podcast’s 200th celebratory podcast, then adapted it for IPMA President Roberto Mori’s Welcome and Introduction speech at the Congress. Finally, thanks to the insight and graciousness of the Australians, we are again using the theme one more time at the asapm Congress scheduled for 5 March, 2012, in Washington DC. Nothing like taking a good idea and re-using it multiple times!

First, thank you to IPMA Member Association AIPM (Australian Institute of Project Management) for a great 2011 IPMA World Congress, and for the inspired theme of the Congress: Project Management—Delivering the Promise.

The promise of project and program management is efficient, effective and beneficial change. We as a profession make that promise to four types of audiences:

• Individual PM Practitioners;
• Project Teams and Stakeholders;
• Enterprise Managers and Executives; and to
• Nations and Society.

Each of these audiences has different needs and different expectations. Let’s explore them.

Our First Audience, Individual PM Practitioners,
expects to improve their project performance, while increasing their job satisfaction and career progression opportunities. To accomplish that, we must move beyond classroom knowledge and testing that brings only short-term results. Why is this important? Based on recent research the half-life of knowledge acquired but not applied is only two weeks. We must follow classroom training with on-the-job application of that knowledge, with four goals: Develop needed skills, improve behavioral competences, gain end-to-end project experience, and achieve measurable project performance results.

Individuals who are Delivering the Promise add interpersonal skills and contextual competence elements to build on their technical knowledge areas. The IPMA Competence Baseline uniquely emphasizes this wide range of competences needed for individual performance. This competence approach is proving to be very popular, as other associations are now adding some Behavioral content to their certifications. We applaud that move, because we have known for years that project success depends more on interpersonal skills than on all technical knowledge put together. Perhaps all practitioners, regardless of which PM associations they identify with, will soon begin Delivering the Promise.

Our Second Audience, Project Teams and Stakeholders,
deserves, from their project efforts, recognition, a sense of gratification, and measurable business results. And yet, too often we see barriers to meeting those expectations. Too many organizations fail to commit the right talent, the right amount of time, to their initiatives. The consequence? Unacceptable project failure rates. To Deliver the Promise, We must move Beyond Certification of project managers, to also encourage the PM competence development of team members, sponsors, resource managers and executive decision-makers.

In Delivering the Promise to Project Teams and Stakeholders, it’s clear that you must assess—and correct—the PM competence of the weakest links in your organization—those who, when their competence gaps are filled, can amplify the effectiveness of project teams and stakeholders. Our experience is that even minor adjustments in middle-management and other key stakeholder competences can make important differences in Delivering the Promise to Project Teams and Stakeholders.

Our Third Audience, Enterprise Managers and Executives,
first of all, expects that project stakeholder needs are met. We also expect greater transparency into project efforts, and demonstrated return on investment. More importantly, we expect the promise to be kept, that Projects are the actions that implement our strategies. And yet, we see huge gaps between that vision and the reality. Between the promise and its delivery. As a result, too many of us have added even more layers between our role and the role of “those people down there who do projects.” A tragedy, because the opposite action is what is more-often needed.

For many enterprises, the vision of the all-enterprise portfolio, that joins capital management, operations, and projects and programs, is far away. Early adopters will quickly embrace the approach, but the vast majority will not soon do so. Why? They have poor management information before, during and after most of their projects. To help Deliver the Promise, aPRO, the asapm Performance Rated Organization standard, together with its sister product IPMA Delta, an organizational PM assessment and certification service, both support top-down assessments of the way you manage your project environment. They help identify actions needed to measurably improve—and certify—organizational PM maturity and performance. With aPRO and IPMA Delta, Managers and Executives have new ways to Deliver the Promise.

Our Fourth and Last Audience, Nations and Society,
has great expectations of us all in Delivering the Promise. We, as project and program managers, build the infrastructure that helps developing nations feed, shelter and care for their citizens. We improve fresh and waste water processing, for both developing and developed countries. Improve Energy Management. Help nations prosper through projects that improve national competitiveness in an increasingly global economy. All these expectations involve projects, and some are far less successful than our nations’ citizens deserve. Our discipline of beneficial change should also be the hope and dream in our society of every citizen, every student, every worker, every entrepreneur, every jobless person, and every retired senior. But only when we can consistently Deliver the Promise.

Delivering the Promise includes improving PM Learning in developing countries, adding our insights of the importance of the soft side of PM. It includes working with our IPMA Federation of Member Associations to help project managers, contractors and government officials to connect with and receive essential learning. It means an ongoing in-country support system to perpetuate the learning beyond the classroom, and into desperately needed projects. In those projects, it also means recognizing Project Excellence in initiatives around the globe through the IPMA Awards Program—you see, too many people think PM success is an impossible dream, until we highlight your successes in your own neighborhood.

Anyone can make promises, but Delivering the Promise involves managing successful change. Each of our four audiences look to our Project and Program Managers to be their Change Agents. And because of the efforts of asapm in the USA, and of tens of thousands of other IPMA members in over 50 countries, we are well-prepared to meet their expectations, in Delivering the Promise!

Your Comments?

On July 4, 2011 we noted asapm’s ten-year anniversary. We reflected on our intentions, progress, and achievements in our first ten years—and then, looked ahead at the next ten years. This article focuses on our intentions; but we cannot help but mention our progress. Not only have we helped to advance the practice of project and program management (an ongoing goal), we have inspired others to follow our lead: They are now also promoting (their own interpretation of) most of our Five Foundations, and many of our innovations.

We founded asapm after having been among the key drivers of success of other professional organizations, including Project Management Institute (Institute in the rest of this article). Many of us remained members of that great organization, and still do to this day. But we felt it was time for change. And what are project managers, if not change agents?

The Need For Change
Factors in 2000-2001 contributing to the need for change were many, a handful of them became our rallying points; they were also ingredients for our business case analysis in deciding whether to found a new organization, or to continue working to improve existing ones.

• PM advancements, innovations and their sharing had significantly slowed;
• Intellectual Property Ownership issues discouraged involvement of the most-talented practitioners;
• Training and learning funds appeared to be shifting from project and program performance improvement to test memorization;
• Association governance moved from member-driven to organization-CEO controlled;
• Emphasis shifted from all pm sectors to favor Information Technology;
• Levels of engagement shifted from advanced interaction of long-time practitioners to mass-training of simple subjects to newcomers.

asapm Founders
asapm was founded by a group of long-time pm practitioners with a variety of backgrounds: Practicing project managers; Managers of project managers; pm consultants and trainers; educators and authors. Founders of chapters and officers of other organizations, the average pm industry experience of the founding group in 2001 was around 20 years, with some going back 35 years and more.

Most had earned the Institute’s certification (Lew Ireland wrote its first exam). And we realized that there was a lot more needed than an exam to accelerate needed organizational benefits from our discipline. Many of us worked internationally, so we had a grasp of the status of pm practice in many other nations of the World. Thus, a dedicated group set out to advance the practice of project and program management in America.

Michael McClain, who became asapm’s first President, was a manager in a telecom company, and prior to that, an accomplished project manager. He was the key person in the founding of the Institute’s Colorado Springs chapter. Part of the reason he led the founding of asapm was that he saw the need for more than what organizations were offering members.

Lew Ireland had been President of the Institute, and shepherded it through the change in governance that moved it from member-driven to CEO-managed. This was viewed at the time as crucial to growth, as the capacity of Board Members to manage all activities in their areas of responsibility was a key weakness for the growth the organization was experiencing.

William Duncan was the driving force behind, and the principal author of the PMBOK® Guide, 1^st edition. Building upon Max Wideman’s work from 1986-87, Duncan established the Process Groups as a way to better integrate the elements of project management. Duncan was and continues to be a primary factor in the advancements of the practice of project and program management for the last 20 years (our opinion, based on being a competitor 25 years ago). When Duncan was not busy advancing the practice of project and program management, he was a successful international pm consultant.

Bob Youker, a long-time contributor to the practice of project management, ranging from prolific publishing of articles and speaking at conferences for over 20 years, helping developing countries grow their infrastructure through projects funded by World Bank, to managing a company that marketed some of the first project management tools (Planalog), and more. A strong contributing member to the Institute from its earliest days, rumor is that Bob should be a Fellow, except for the concern that he was heavily involved with IPMA, International Project Management Association, originally called INTERNET. That was viewed as competition.

Larry Costello, an associate of Michael’s was also an experienced pm practitioner, and designed the first version of the asapm website. Since we had been founders of multiple chapters, we vowed not to compete with our own successes, so we turned instead to websites and web-based collaboration. Larry was central to that strategy.

Melissa Hunter, our first Marketing Director, gets credit for our asapm logo, our first major expense, and a lasting image. We had such great discussions about the checkmark.

Pat Morgan was interested in establishing affiliations, and in an International footprint for asapm.

Dan McKee, Secretary-Treasurer, brought order to our finances and recordkeeping. Most of the asapm founders paid for Life Memberships, to help provide operating capital for the fledgling organization.

Roger Summerlin, who coined our name. Later, we realized that it could be used in other ways. For example, “Are You Competent As A PM?

Linda Marchione, who was Michael’s right hand, participated when she was not on assignment; she was on the fast track to Captain in the military.

Stacy Goff provided the conference room for our dozens of lengthy meetings to develop the strategy, charter, offerings and support materials for a new organization—thanks to Duncan’s and Youker’s willingness to repeatedly fly to Colorado. Stacy, an international consultant with pm methodologies, tools and workshops, became Vice President and Director of Education.

The IPMA Connection
Some of our founders were strong proponents of joining IPMA from the start; others wanted to establish another strong global competitor. This was one of the few disagreements we had in our first few years, and we resolved them with a series of actions. We reached out to quite a few established groups, and received a reply from some. After some adventures; we applied to be the USA’s IPMA Member Association. Our primary purpose: To embrace an internationally recognized, professionally-assessed, advanced, role-based performance competence-oriented certification system.

The Five Foundations
In our strategy sessions, we established a vision, then built the foundation for realizing it. Our vision: Appropriate and effective elements of PM performance are widely demonstrated and acknowledged, not just by PM practitioners, but by all individuals in all organizations. We established five foundation statements; they are, in the tense of 2001:

• Practitioner-Focused and Practitioner-Driven: Even though we participated in the change in governance in the other organization (deemed essential for its growth), the market needs a professional society that focuses on the needs of practitioners, and remains practitioner-driver.
• Retain Intellectual Property Ownership: The authors and owners of intellectual property should retain the rights to their work, to encourage sharing, and building upon the innovations to establish new breakthroughs. Recent patterns of gaining control of intellectual property have choked off the voluntary sharing of information and advances, retarding pm practice.
• There is More to PM Learning than Certification: The alarming move towards spending pm training funds on short-term exam memorization has reversed the trend of improvements in project success.
• PM Performance Competence Is Our Target: While knowledge-based workshops and exams can be an excellent foundation, they do not, by themselves, achieve needed business results. Experience, on-the-job competence development and coaching, and measured project performance is our target. And, those competences must include interpersonal skills, not just process steps and formulas.
• Project Management is a Global Discipline. The most effective project and program managers recognize the cultural differences and strengths in all nations, rather than just pushing a USA-centric view on the rest of the World. asapm will reflect and respect a Global perspective.

In 2000-2001, these were significant differentiators. To some extent, they still are, but here is an observation: Each of these Five Foundations has seen progress in other organizations since 2001. Of course, we do not take full credit for these innovative approaches. But we have shown the places where we can all do the most good to improve project and program practices. And, don’t worry about us giving away our family secrets; in the last few years, we have added a new set of foundations–while continuing to support our initial five.

Closure
We are pleased when others perceive us and refer to us today as the thought leaders in project and program management in the USA. We are also gratified that other professional organizations are following our lead, by embracing (in part because of clear market demand) our five foundations. We have had an interesting, busy and results-measured first ten years. The next ten, we expect to do even more.

Your suggestions can help us plan the next Sustaining Initiatives for asapm’s advancements of the practice of project and program management in the USA. We know that our readership includes the best and brightest, as well as the most outspoken and strong opinioned, in our practice. What do you think are today’s Change Agent marching orders?

Happy Ten Year Anniversary to asapm and to all our members and friends!

Your Comments?

PMBOK is a registered trademark of Project Management Institute in the USA and other countries.

Our recent series of IPMA (International Project Management Association) meetings and events in Asia was rich with the opportunity to meet great people, dialogue about the benefits of our chosen practice or profession, and with innumerable sudden insights. Not to mention a wealth of topics for this often-longer-and-deeper-than-normal blog.

In this case, the setting was an early Sunday morning flight over the Himalaya mountains of Nepal. Sponsored by PMAN, Project Management Association of Nepal (thank you again!), it was a beautiful morning, and on takeoff, we saw the city of Kathmandu waking up. Soaring to mountain heights, and rising above the clouds, we were able to track each of the peaks jutting above the clouds. Showing the benefit of a plan, we each had a map of the mountains we would see in our journey from North to South. 

The Stakeholder View
The first mountain we saw barely peeked through the clouds. The next several were progressively higher. From our window seat in the small plane, those on the left side of the plane had a decent view out of the tiny windows. Those on the right had a more obscured view. We all had other obstacles, such as the wing of the plane blocking a portion of the view.

Similarly, in many projects, our key Stakeholders don’t always have the same clear view of the project as does the team. The Stakeholders are often part-time participants. They don’t have time to read all the documents, and may miss important meetings, “because of pressing priorities.” They do not have the clear project vision they deserve.

One quick discovery made a difference in our blocked view. If we looked out-and-back, rather than out-and-ahead, the wing was not in the way. Of course, this was difficult, because it was clear that the route of the plane was taking us to ever-increasingly tall mountains, so in our eagerness, we were still often looking, even straining, to see what was coming.

Unfortunately, in many projects, we see the opposite problem. Key Stakeholders, and some team members, spend much of their time looking back, in this case, at the way things were—and the problems of the past. Because Projects and Programs represent the discipline of managed change, we need teams, stakeholders, project managers (and their managers) who are comfortable and competent at looking ahead. And yet, most not-yet-competent project managers spend far too much of their time looking behind them. Just look at most status reports!

The discovery improved our view. Of course, our progress was also bringing us to taller mountains, just as project progress adds clarity, and a better understanding of needed results. And of course, for those of us on the plane, being friends and being fair, we took turns with those seated on the right side of the plane so they too could see the grand view. We were still limited by the tiny porthole size of the airplane window. It was big enough for a camera, but not for two people to look at the same time.

The Project Manager’s View
I had noticed that one by one, each of the passengers was invited to see the view from the cockpit. I was in the back of the plane, so was one of the last to be invited forward. Timely, because we were approaching Mt. Everest, the tallest mountain in the world. My first glance out the pilot’s window was stunning! It was a 180 degree panorama, as opposed to the tiny view out the side porthole-sized windows. And, straight ahead, I could see Mt. Everest well enough to see that its South face was devoid of snow. Such a difference between the tiny, 6′ side-window wide porthole of the Stakeholder seats, and the 120 degree, 6 foot wide view of the pilots!

This is one of the times I wish I had the photopower that Les Squires wields; my “brownie” snapshot was thwarted by the autofocus “seeing” the airplane’s windscreen, not the mountain. But to my eye, the difference between the pilot’s view and the tiny porthole view was overwhelming. Which inspired this article. Here is the analogy: Competent and performing project managers have the pilot’s full-180 degree panorama. Stakeholders have a tiny 18 degree view of most projects. The challenge: How to increase the field of vision for all Stakeholders? Also, how can we improve the forward vision for those project managers who focus on the past? Of course, we have posted guides to these preferred behaviors and competences, here and elsewhere for years. Yet, most projects that fail do so because of ignorance of these insights.

Among the Actions
Primary among the actions needed, both by Project Managers and key Stakeholders, is to understand and trace project scope, from inspiration through benefit realization. Some have recently discovered the importance of this, but this was common sense in the mid-1980s, as my business partner Dan Myers, a Requirements Management expert, and I, with my ProjectExperts firm, generated a range of commercial PM methodologies that solved the problem for the government agencies, small, medium and large consultancies, and smart businesses, that adopted our methods.

The actions did involve some project manager training; that training (or learning, as we prefer) certainly covered technical topics, such as how to scope and estimate a project, but it was focused more on leading teams, emphasizing interpersonal skills, engaging key stakeholders in organizational change, and how to communicate upwards so middle and executive managers knew how to support delivery of business benefits. While this was the mid 1980s, those competences remain important in any organization, and our experience is that for many, they are the essence of PM Performance. And, in fact, this is why my peers and I who founded asapm were attracted to the IPMA way: It was very compatible with the factors that increase project and program success.

And yet, where have you spent your project improvement funding? What has it gotten you? We have reported frequently on the tens of billions of U$D spent on classes that have absolutely no connection with improved PM Performance. Foolish managers, unfortunate companies. And, as we have reported, smarter managers and companies are changing their patterns, to only embrace actions that measurably improve project business results. Some did this 25 years ago. Others have recently discovered this and are trumpeting their discoveries at conferences and in periodicals.

And the majority remain mired; they have not yet discovered the IPMA way.

Improving the Stakeholder View
So how do we improve the key Stakeholder view from the tiny, blocked side window, to the Pilot’s Panorama? One way we did that 25 years ago was to make a key Stakeholder the Project Manager. We found that it was easier to teach (and perform follow-on coaching and learning) key Stakeholders to manage projects, than it was to teach most technical project managers how to manage the results of a business or government agency. That remains an option today. Another alternative is to focus your project managers on business needs, not just memorizing processes.

There are many more actions that will contribute, but they are out of scope for this article. They do include improving the core PM competences of managers, mid-managers and Executives, but we are separately engaged in that challenge. For our key Stakeholders, I can think of a dozen more actionable items, but that will be some future article. What do you think it takes, to help key Stakeholders to become panoramic, forward looking pilots of your projects?

Your Comments?

This article continues impressions from our recent trip to China, to honor PMRC, the Project Management Research Committee, and to celebrate their 20th Anniversary. And while we earlier mentioned the TerraCotta Warriors, a must-see adventure for any visitor to this part of China, there is much more to know about the founder of Xi’an, the heart of China’s governance for 2000 years.

We did our research before our visit, not wanting to be ignorant about this important part of China. Books in English about the area are not as common as those covering Beijing, Shanghai, and other parts of this fascinating nation. Among the books we read, we found a very useful book, Xi’an, Shaanxi and the Terracotta Army, by Mooney, Maudsley and Hatherly, published by Odyssey Books and Guides, 2009. We liked this book because of its great blend of geology, geography, art, history, politics, intrigue, and its description of the culture, tourist attractions, foods, and other facets unique to the area.

But the most interesting part was the story of Ying Zheng’s ascendence to his father’s throne as King Qin Shi Huangdi (Qin is pronounced Chin) in the year 246 BCE, and creation of a portfolio of projects that set the stage for unifying China as a nation. He began this at the age of 13—he would not yet even qualify for IPMA Young Crew. Over the next 25 years, he brought together (in battle) the Seven Warring States, and became China’s first Emperor.

Before proceeding, let’s clear up a bit about Emperor Qin’s name. Ling was his family name. Qin was the name of the state. Huang came from legends of three saintly sovereigns; Di came from legends of five saintly emperors. Shi? That means, the first. Such branding! Emperor Qin’s lasting impact was only partly based on his strong military power—his Dynasty was relatively short in duration—it expired quickly after he did. It is his wonderous portfolio of project results that has endured–such that still today, over 2000 years later, China benefits from his peoples’ achievements.

Emperor Qin’s Project Portfolio
The projects in Qin’s portfolio are numerous. We will highlight just a few:

• Standard Weights, Measures and Common Currency
• Road System and Public Works
• Closing the Gaps in the Great Wall
• The TerraCotta Warriors
• Qin Ling Mausoleum

Any one of these projects would drain the resources of a lesser Project Executive. In combination, they transformed his Empire while, admittedly, taxing its resources. While we will not recreate the entire story of each achievement, we will relate the parts that have the most relevance for project and program management today. If you desire more information, the book mentioned above is a great reference. And of course, the web has a vast supply of information. But back to our story, his strategy for success: Military strength, public works, and food production. His approach: Rely on good people, and reward them well. At the same time, he was a strict and sometimes cruel ruler.

Weights, Measures and Currency
After uniting the Seven Warring States, improve cross-empire trade, Qin established common weights and measures, and a common currency. A unique aspect of the currency was a square hole in the center of each coin, for stacking on a stick, enabling counting and carrying. What better way to increase prosperity, than to ease and accelerate trade! The EU has benefited greatly from the common currency of the Euro, as the USA did when we united our states and currency.

Road System and Public Works
Just as Rome rose to power during this era due to rapid transportation throughout the empire, Qin did the same. With Shovel Ready projects, including new roads and other public works, such as construction of new palaces, Qin completed many results that benefited the economy. Not all the workers were willing, but with over 20 million people in the Empire, there were still many who were willing to perform the needed work. As part of the palace projects, the crafts and arts were also highlighted, improved, and rewarded.

Closing the Gaps in the Great Wall
This project involved two facets: One was to remove the walls between the former Warring States. An interesting strategic move, this both increased interaction, and reduced the possibility of rogue states separating. If the defensive walls were gone, it was more difficult to escape the Emperor’s wrath. The other part of the project was to fill the gaps in the wall that fortified each state against marauders from the North. This had been a continuing problem, and the walls did help fend off the strong horsemen who invaded regularly. We don’t know if the removed walls were close enough to be recycled for the new walls; if so, this was clever re-use.

The TerraCotta Warriors
The pits containing the TerraCotta Warriors were to accompany Qin in his afterlife. They were the result of a massive multi-decade project ending around 208 BCE. They were damaged several times, first by the rebels who removed weapons and precious items soon after Qin’s death, then later by treasure seekers. In 1974, a farmer, drilling for water, opened the site to the world. Today, you can see what a massive undertaking this construction and artistic design project was. As many as a hundred thousand people worked for decades on this project. Now this was a mega-project! But we never did find the project plans during our tour.

Pit one, which contained over 7000 fired-clay figures (each soldier is unique, but the horses are identical), is in  renovation, with hundreds of the figures reconstructed, and the remainder still in shards. Pit three, the smallest, appears to have the greatest number of undamaged or reconstructed figures. Note that 2000 years later, Project Executive Qin is still providing jobs for his people in this reconstruction project. Of course, if we hadn’t read our books, there are many of the fine points of the site we might have missed, even with our excellent tour guide.

Qin Ling Mausoleum
The TerraCotta site is a stellar attraction, but Emperor Qin’s top priority project was his Mausoleum, which he began when he ascended to the throne. What vision! Would you like that insight in your Project Executives? But while the site is visible and in the open, it is not-yet explored. There are a number of reasons, including concerns about degradation of items inside exposed to the air.

There may be a bit of superstition: It is said there are booby traps throughout the Mausoleum to protect the treasures within. Also rumored: There is a river of Mercury at the lowest level—evidenced by traces of Mercury in the ground of the site. Perhaps our great, great grandchildren will have a chance to explore the mysteries of this fascinating structure in several hundred years.

Managing the Portfolio
Emperor Qin had the best talent available, some loyal (and some not so loyal) leaders, and a sometimes eager workforce. He had a limited amount of time: less than 40 years from his ascendency to his natural death. His Empire did not last much longer. But his successes were significant. What made the difference between him, and other leaders? Perhaps a handful of actions, many of which every Project Executive and every Project Manager can adapt today.

• He fed his people. He harnessed irrigation systems that increased the yield from the land, understanding that hungry people don’t work as hard as those with something in their belly. And, more food = stronger troops.
• He balanced praise and punishment in proportion for the time. Admittedly, he was somewhat of an angry tyrant, but that was often the model in those days. We still see some like that today.
• He had a vision, and made the decisions needed to assure that everything he did moved his Empire in that direction; sure, he had tough prioritization decisions, but he also had focus.
• He established meritocracy in the military, with each person rewarded based on their performance, not on their clan, or social status. Recognizing and promoting PM Performance can probably be traced back to Qin.
• He was able to build on the momentum and reforms of his predecessors. This is important in projects, and in organizations. There were hundreds of years of achievement by the people of his state, notably Shang Yang, and the people largely trusted leadership.
• He relied on others, and when he could not, he found new others whom he could trust. While he may have micro-managed in the areas most important to him, that is nothing new today, is it?
• He used a series of targeted projects to grow his Empire, first in battle, then in commerce and in the other parts of the portfolio we discuss here, and in other cases we have not covered.

Qin’s Epilogue
In our over 25 years of helping Project Executives to plan, build, prioritize, execute, monitor and evaluate their project portfolios, we have worked with many great Leaders. Few were as ruthless as Emperor Qin, and many have done similar service to their organizations. However, the wonders of Qin’s portfolio of projects benefited an entire nation, not just one organization.

And what is the outcome, over 2000 years later, of Ying Zheng’s career as Emperor Qin? Among other achievements, the forming of a nation. Advancing the economy. Progressing the arts, and highlighting the artists. Developing a transportation system; creating defensive barriers. Establishing common weights, measures, coinage, and something more significant, and not yet mentioned, establishing China’s common written language. All in all, a good career’s work!

These are key elements for the infrastructure of an entire society. And the list of contributions goes on: Xi’an in 2011, a bit East of the center of China, was the hub of culture and Dynasties for centuries. Xi’an was the beginning of the Silk Road, and the origin of the industry that now thrives worldwide. Qin probably did not invent noodles, but Xi’an is their source. Today, Xi’an’s attractions, including the TerraCotta Warriors and several great museums, draw tourists from around the world, and help the people, the economy, and us tourists, as we grow to respect the accomplishments and wonders of a master Portfolio Manager.

To true historians, who find errors in the above observations, we apologize, and request your corrections. Thank you!

Your Comments?

This article is about the second half of my recent Asia trip, which in this case includes China.

Hong Kong Stopover
I used Hong Kong as my pivot point for multiple flights and connections; it had the best routing for my multiple flights. And, I had not been to Hong Kong since the late 1980s, so it was interesting to see the changes. Internet connections can be difficult in Hong Kong, but the best that I had in my time there was on airport bus A21, which offers free wireless internet connections!

Everything is far more expensive in Hong Kong than when I last visited. But it still has the same vibe, the same crush of people, and the same unlimited options for meals. As a wine enthusiast, I think I have found the world’s most expensive place to purchase wines–but the selection is grand.

Super Xi’an
I flew to Xi’an to keynote and participate in a conference celebrating 20 years of PMRC, the Project Management Research Committee, IPMA-China. It was also the 10 year celebration of China’s use of IPMA’s advanced, Four Level PM Certification system. The Conference theme was The Rise of Project Management. IPMA was well-represented by Chair Brigitte Schaden, who spoke on PM Standards, and yours truly, who discussed the differences between organizations where PM rises slowly and those where it rises quickly. Brane Semolic, Research Management Board Chair, and Les Squires, our RMB social/business networking guru, were also at the Xi’an Conference, where they held a Festival of Knowledge event (mentioned below).

The conference format included initial statements, keynotes, special presentations, and then break-out sessions in separate rooms. The majority of the presentations were in Chinese; our own keynotes had sequential translation from English to Chinese, and the translation time allowed more flexibility than I usually have during a presentation to gain eye contact with many of the 500-700 attendees. I chose to stand center stage, as opposed to standing behind the speaker’s podium at stage left. In case they were recording, this time I used the microphone.

I have known Xue Yan, the long-serving China representative to IPMA, and now IPMA VP of Certification, for years. In all that time, I did not know what a great interpreter she is. I have worked with several different China interpreters (and many others in other languages), and she was great for all of us. I also really enjoyed seeing Professor Qian Fupei again, and especially, to meet his delightful wife, Gui Yeying. Fupei is the legendary leader of PMRC. And, we met, dined with, and enjoyed talking to the members of PMRC’s leadership team.

Among the highlights of the Conference was a Festival of Knowledge, hosted by Brane Semolic and Les Squires. The unique format of this event combines a bit of presentation with more interaction and discussion–more like an honors college forum than a conference presentation. I finally got the chance to see just how great Les Squires is in front of an audience. Among the topics were a discussion of the impacts of China’s move from a planned economy to a market economy, with deep insights by the participants. IPMA and asapm will be holding a September Festival of Knowledge in Detroit. It will highlight the automobile industry, with a look to the future of PM.

Much of the time we spent in China revolved around food. I observed that the point is not just to eat, but to use the food as the backdrop for discussions and relationship-building. Because of the celebratory nature of the event, there were many toasts. And, due to the multiple anniversaries this Conference, The Rise of Project Management celebrated, they were all very appropriate.

Hospitality
The hospitality in Xi’an was absolutely great! We had the opportunity to see the famed Terra Cotta Warriors, and I think this showpiece deserves an honorary IPMA Award! We did a bit of shopping in the downtown area, and my student volunteer guide, Wan, was terrific. Her strategies for finding a taxi in rush hour Xi’an were superb! Thank you again Wan!

And Chunjing Ji (Natalie) demonstrated why her name badge says 0001. She is number one in everyone’s mind! From our initial emails, to managing the visa documents, to arranging translations, to enlisting and managing volunteer guides (they adore Ms. Ji), she is exceptional! Thank you!

China Closure
One memorable aspect of our visit to China was meeting Mr. Gu Shiyang, who was Executive Sponsor of the project for the Opening and Closing Ceremonies of the 2010 Asia Games. An engaging and creative person to talk to, he shared a DVD of the events with the PMRC leaders, and with us visitors. Some parts of the DVD were shown in fast-forward mode, which evokes the pace at which much of China seems to operate. These opening and closing events projects had challenges: They had a stellar Beijing Olympics to follow, for example. And yet, he and his team innovated in ways that will re-set the bar for similar events. I would not want to be the Korea Project Manager who follows his teams’ achievements with the next Asia Games.

The Asia Games Ceremonies project has already been honored by China’s Awards program. Those of us who attend the IPMA World Congress will likely encounter them in the Brisbane Awards Gala Ceremony. I would recommend the recorded DVD of the ceremonies to anyone who is interested in the state of the art in Events Project Management. Mastering Land, Water and Ether, to me, this is the pinnacle of performance management. Of course, the IPMA Awards Judges are more disciplined than I am.

As I said in my keynote, China is rising, and some teams, and some organizations, rise much faster than others, based on the choices they make. These choices involve their PM foundations, the way they develop their talent, the priorities and staffing decisions they make, and the support they receive from managers and executives. Of course, those are key differentiators in IPMA’s range of services. China’s great practitioners and managers in project management that I encountered contribute to this nations’ efforts, helping to further accelerate its pace.

Your Comments?

Two weeks in Asia changes one’s perspective about many things. And when it is as eventful and enlightening as my last two weeks, it can be soaring and exhausting, at the same time. This article is about the first half of my trip, which was in a literally soaring country, Nepal.

PMAN Conference
The occasion was the Project Management Association of Nepal conference, where the IPMA Executive Board (ExBo) members held one of our meetings, and spoke at the conference. In part, we did this to support our Nepal Member Association, and to honor our IPMA Young Project Manager, Shailesh Nepal. Shailesh won this award at the 2010 IPMA World Congress, and it was a tough competition: All the three finalists were great! As an aside, the 2011 Young Project Manager award applications are due June 15. Have you submitted yours?

Each ExBo member who presented has a unique style. It is not difficult to tell us apart. I chose not to use the microphone, and Bill Young, President of AIPM, the Australia IPMA Member Association, was in the front row. As I started up with my “Stacy voice,” he was blown into the 4th row. Taking a hint, I turned down the volume a bit. No one fell asleep during my presentation.

The PMAN leadership team did a great job, pulling together this, their first major conference, in 6 months. Congratulations to Saroj, Suraj and Tika, of PMAN, Project Management Association of Nepal!

Meeting Meg
One of our asapm members, Meg, lives in Nepal with her husband; she is involved with the IPMA Awards program, and will be helping start it in Nepal and in the USA, as well as managing the production of some IPMA promotional materials for awards. It was a pleasure to meet Meg, after several months of emails, and a special pleasure to hear her speak at the conference. She did a great job of proclaiming the strengths of project management in non-technical terms. Her subject was a recent project, assisting Masters Candidates in planning, researching, reviewing and on-time completion of their Masters Theses. Meg is a treasure for Nepal!

Transition Tales
I had been having trouble coming up with an appropriate transition in one part of my presentation, which jumped from the unique features of IPMA’s advanced PM certifications to IPMA Delta, an organization assessment. In an inspiration in the middle of the night (a benefit of jet lag, I guess), it came to me. The day of the presentation I vetted the allegory with a local member, and enlisted Shailesh in finding the appropriate prop, a water bucket.

In the presentation, I covered the Advanced certification topic, then, paused, and drank from a glass of water. The audience watched quietly. Then I held up the glass: “Pure, fresh water!” I pointed to the water in the bucket, proclaiming that it was from a pond in the forest, and was polluted, perhaps deadly. Then I asked: “If I pour this pure water into the polluted bucket, will it cleanse the polluted water, or will the polluted water overcome the pure drinking water?”

The audience response was immediate: “The pure water will be polluted!” Then I poured the water into the bucket, watched it a bit, and looked back at the audience with a sad face.

Next, I pointed at the Certification slide, which still showed on the screen, and I said: “Similarly, if we have a pure, competent and performing project manager, and we place him or her in a polluted organization, what will happen? I received the same response: “The organization will overcome the project manager.”

The transition: Switching to the next slide, where we introduce IPMA Delta, I said, “This is why we offer IPMA Delta, to help improve the effectiveness of the entire organization, and maximize, not minimize, the benefits of competent project managers.”

In a part of the world where the ground- or streamwater can harbor viruses, deadly bacteria and protozoa, this was an incredibly powerful analogy. The audience impact was huge. They “got it.”

PWOMAN
In my equal-opportunity way, I took note of the fact that there were quite a few professional women in the audience. In my presentation, I mentioned PMAN, the name of the organization, and then mentioned “and of course, we have PWOMEN, too.” A too-cute play on words, this one mention spawned dozens of repetitions over the next six hours and long into the night. I fear I may have started something!

Madhur’s Meeting
One conference participant, Madhur, is a good example of the type of young person who is helping transform developing and developed worlds. He asked if I would speak to his group while I was in Nepal. I noted that he was from a not-for-profit organization, so said yes, I had a bit of time on Monday afternoon. He called Monday morning to verify that I was still available and willing to speak. He picked me up, and we drove for over an hour to the other side of Kathmandu. Traffic was difficult, but no worse than Delhi, Boston or Rome.

He wanted me to share my perspective of what project management is, and its benefits for the people of Nepal. The audience was 35 people sitting in a U-shape in a small room. They ranged from young students to an Architect, a Civil Engineer, and a Government Official. We went around the room introducing ourselves; then I asked a few questions, and talked a little about project management. I gave out small rewards for those who had answers to the questions.

In summarizing, I asked them to explain to me, “what is project management?” One young lady (Madhur has provided her name; she is Pramila Shakya) proclaimed: “Changing things from the way they are… to the way they ought to be.” That pretty much boils it down, doesn’t it! Such insight! I did talk a little about who chooses the “ought;” sometimes the owner, boss or manager is involved with that part. And this bright young lady, Pramila Shakya, thanks to her insight, is hereby perpetually proclaimed to be a Change Agent.

Your Comments?

We’ve used the Journalist’s Six W’s for over 25 years now in project kick-off, to help business case analysis and bring all the stakeholders onto the same page. And recently, working with a stellar group of Managers in the Middle, those people who manage project managers and their teams, we came up with a new (for us) use of the Six W’s.

Background on the Six W’s
Originally established as part of our IT Methodology, THE Guide, and Co-Pilot: Small Project Guide in the mid-80′s we use the Six W’s to perform opportunity analysis. We’ve used the right selection of the W’s, in the right sequence, with many, many classes of project managers, customers, managers and team leads. The W’s we use, in the only correct sequence for project delegation, are: What, Why, Who, Where, When, and How. We admit to playing loose with the w’s, when people point out that How is an H, not a W. We assert that it has its W at the end because How is the last W to understand.

Some of the learning dialogue that accompanies the W’s is that there may be multiple Whens:

• When does the organization need the result (the must)
• When can the team deliver it? (the can)

We assert that the competent team can always show how they could beat the must (deliver faster) by 25%. In fact, if they cannot perform this simple analysis, we doubt if they understand enough about the project to manage it successfully: They are not yet competent. This is the type of learning, that causes Executives who see it to ask: “This is powerful stuff! Do our people know how to do this?” The answer is usually something like, yes, they do this in each project they begin, but you have six layers of managers between your teams and you, and part of their job is to filter out the information they think you don’t need. But we may be getting ahead of ourselves. We’ll come back to that thread below.

Kathy Zarr’s Contribution
In the early 90′s I was working with Kathy, an HR Director at a major insurance company, on a two-day Executive session for the Executive Sponsors and the Project Managers of the company’s largest, most important projects. We had worked together at that point for over six years, and she knew my curriculum well. She insisted that we expose the executives to the Six W’s. I agreed; they always get great insights from them. And then she did a magnificent leap of common-sense application: The Six W’s were also the most-appropriate framework for an effective Project Communication Plan. We sketched out the way it would work, and both she and I have used it ever since.

Just in the last few years, I co-wrote, with Florian Dorrenberg, the Communication chapter for IPMA-Germany’s “Big Book.” This 35 page chapter (50 pages after translation to German) covers most of the current topics related to project communication. The full bookset is four volumes, and is the foundation for all advanced PM certification in Germany. So now, the Six W’s, as the framework for a project communication plan, are part of the required learning for all IPMA-certified, competence-assessed project managers, senior project managers and program managers in Germany. The Six W’s have traveled far and wide since the mid 1980′s. And, thank you again, Kathy, for your recycling of them for another useful purpose!

Our Latest Six W’s Recycling
In this recent class, we were discussing the role of Managers in the Middle. These are the people who are the enablers of two way communication in successful companies and government agencies. They are the blockages in less-successful ones—the cholesterol in project communication, as it were. And, we discussed managing upward, managing downward, and the nature of the information they must convey if they are to be effective, and audience-focused, rather than ineffective. It was the mid-afternoon, and the sugar-rush from lunch was wearing off—the class was lethargic. So I came up with an exercise.

I wrote the Six W’s in random sequence on a flipchart: How, Who, When, Why, Where, and What. And I showed a simple org chart. Then I asked the teams to answer these questions:

1. Which W’s is each tier, A, B, and C, responsible for?
2. What should you do if you are not getting the right W’s from those above you?
3. What happens when you try to give those below you the wrong W’s?
4. To manage upward, should you  communicate mostly tier B or tier A information?
5. What does this suggest about improving your role  effectiveness?

We’ll leave it to you to decide what your answers are to the above questions. In our class, it quickly became very clear that Managers in the Middle who understand all the Six W’s, and use the right W’s with the right people at the right time are those who add value to every project in their domain. And those who do not, do not.

We first encountered this role-specific responsibility for the W’s many years ago, but didn’t recognize the opportunity. We were working with a Health Insurance company, that had a great strategic plan, but were frustrated that they could not implement anything in it. It turned out that none of the Managers in the Middle were strategic thinkers—they did not understand the same W’s the Executives were excited about. We solved their problem by identifying people at the Executive, Mid-Management and Project Team levels who could master and communicate all the W’s. Essentially, we established cross-level translators.

And, in one of our blog articles a bit over a year ago, when we posed the question, Is Project Management Strategic, we responded, Of course it is: But are You? Many very competent PMs are not strategic–because they focus on the W’s that tier C is responsible for. But they find people on their team, or above them, who can communicate what tiers A and B need to know.

The Bottom Line On the Six W’s
The Journalist’s Six W’s are a great project tool. Like any tool, they benefit from situationally considered use. Too many people, especially when under stress, tend to communicate (if they do at all) what they would need to hear. Effective project managers, team members, managers and executives communicate what is expected from their role, and what the audience needs to hear. less-effective ones merely communicate their favorite W’s, and ignore the rest. And for those who aren’t sure they have the answers to the questions above, I’ll tell you this: Tier C should not be hearing mostly When and How from tier B.

Your Comments?

Last month’s article, where we interviewed Knowledge, and gained many new insights about her and her family, must have been an interesting one. It received even more “hits” than normal, and not just from spammers… The time viewers spent on the page was also higher than most, a good indicator of perceived value—or maybe they were trying to figure out that strange anthropomorphism of Knowledge. But let us tie up a few loose ends on the themes we covered, and then finish with the importance of the Opposable Thumb.

Discoveries at the NASA Knowledge Forum
I had taken a copy of last months’s article along with me to the Knowledge Forum; I reported on that event in last month’s asapm newsletter. I shared the article with Larry Prusak, one of the key people in Knowledge Management (KM) practice. When he got around to reading the article, he sent a polite email that suggested that the data to information to knowledge relationships are more complex than my simple assertions. I agree, and will leave it at that. After all, that was a 30+ year-old story.

At that NASA event, I figured out that there is quite some difference between my own naive interpretations, and those of a bunch of really bright people in the KM practice. And, there were some striking parallels. For example:

• My perspective about Knowledge is mostly on the individual side: How individuals grow, develop, and improve their performance. My realization at the event is that the KM discipline is much more oriented to the organizational accumulation and sharing of knowledge.
• They view Knowledge very much along the lines of a complete Bloom’s Taxonomy of Learning, where at the higher levels, you are dealing with synthesis. In other words, they are speaking of “Big K” Knowledge, not drill-and-test memorization—”little k” knowledge. That was a big aha for me.
• My former KM biases were based on this: Far too much of my time spent in helping project teams (and their organizations) succeed has been spent overcoming the flaws of “little k”knowledge. This is often manifested by people who merely memorize enough to pass an exam, rather than to really understand how to apply the topic in a project.
• In the NASA event final exercise, where all participants worked in teams to identify ways to improve the success of organizational Knowledge Management, I had another aha! moment. We were all identifying exactly the same Change Agent actions I have coached executives, project management offices and functional managers in for years. In what context? To help organizations adopt and adapt project management methodologies—to improve organizational PM performance.

The take-away: Project Management and Knowledge Management have many strong parallels. And, success in improving one in your area will also help in improving the other—for those who are so inclined. We saw exactly the same pattern with the successful Quality movements of the 1980s. Here is an example of the mutual reinforcement of KM and PM: Lessons Learned are one of the greatest opportunities for sharing knowledge in any organization. And yet, in too many cases, they are merely recorded—and then the same “learnings” are repeated in project after project, over again. That shows nobody learned anything. With a KM approach that actually institutionalizes applied prior knowledge, all projects will benefit, and performance will soar.

This is one reason why every one of our dozens of PM methodologies, both those we developed, and those we tuned for others for over 25 years, has a unique project kick-off action: Review the Lessons Learned from similar projects, including those with this team, this technology, and this customer. This might be a good KM policy for you to implement in your organization, if you do not already follow this savvy practice.

Counting the Knowledge-Related Words
Also in last month’s article, I realized, as I read through it later, that I used many words that are surrogates for Knowledge. Such words as reflect, understand, insight, grasp, content, perspective, absorb, concept, material, abstraction, components, decisions, assimilate, mastering, cognitive, learner, answer, intelligence, application … And that is just in the first half of the article. Clearly, Larry Prusak is right: Knowledge is much broader and more complex than I imagined!

The insights I gained at the NASA Knowledge Forum caused me, on my return home to go online to Amazon.com and order a bunch of the books written or edited by the people I met at the conference. I never thought I’d be this eager to learn more about this knowledge, no, Knowledge, that I had long deemed to be merely the entry-level step of the PM success progressions I promote.

About the Opposable Thumb
A confession: In last month’s article I cheated, when I placed Performance as the top step in the Performance Progression. It is not at all the top step in a progression, but is, in fact, a whole ‘nuther thing. I did make the assertion that all the other items in the progression are merely Inputs. I often repeat the difference between evaluating all the inputs and processes, versus just evaluating the results; pointing out how it is just smarter (and more cost-effective) to do it that way. And, this is true whether you are evaluating learning development, assessing a competent project manager for PM Certification, or identifying the strengths and opportunities for improvement of an entire organization. As we do, for example with aPRO, the asapm Performance Rated Organization, an organizational assessment of PM Performance.

About the Opposable Thumb: Rather than Performance being a similar step at the top of the Intelligence Progression, it is a different thing altogether. Just as is the opposable thumb. How many fingers do you have on one hand? Some say four, some five; others may have a different answer. Is a thumb just another finger, or a special category of its own? Thumbs have similar attributes to the “other” fingers, but also have very special characteristics. Thumbs can do a lot more than the other fingers, including repositioning and circumduction. And, thumbs differentiate primates from many other animals—they work with the fingers to strongly grasp, to allow us to use tools; to apply our motor skills, to write, or type, even! These differentiations are so important that Bloom, in his taxonomy, had a separate six-level scale for motor skills!

In the world of projects and programs, PM Performance is not just the top of the Intelligence Progression—it is the opposable thumb. Those who master it wield the tools needed for the team to deliver to executives, internal or external customers, and all other stakeholders exactly what they want: Business results. These key stakeholders don’t care about all those inputs, they disdain the mystical processes; they want their project results when they need them, and your PM Performance in achieving that is what counts.

Outside of projects there are many other uses for this opposable thumb. See the “thumbs-up” sign, at right, for example. It is curious, however, that the difference between the thumbs-up earned by the successful and performing project team could be confused by the uninformed with the hitchhiker’s futile thumbed request. And as a side note: There are a few marsupials, reptiles, amphibians, and others, that also have opposable thumbs. Some even have opposable thumbs on their back feet, something most of us have not yet achieved. But they do not write blog post articles—or hitchhike—yet.

Your Comments?

This posting was inspired during a trans-Atlantic air travel dialogue with a young lady whose job responsibilities include Knowledge Management in an alternative energy company. We explored, and brought together, a range of the relevant terms and disciplines involved with knowledge acquisition, assimilation, retention and application. Upon my return, and reflecting on the unresolved parts of our discussion, I scheduled an interview with Knowledge. This was more difficult than I thought, even though I had long-ago attributed traits of anthropomorphism to her. Finding Knowledge was easy. Getting dedicated time to interview her was the difficult part. Her? Of course, Knowledge is feminine in gender. Few men really understand more than Facts, the younger brother of Knowledge.

Our Interview with Knowledge
My first question was the title of this posting. She asserted that “No one ever asked me!” She expressed concerns that many of those purporting to “manage knowledge” do have some insights, but most do not understand the entire story. She pointed out that Knowledge is only one member of her large family of Intelligence, and some of her senior siblings are even less-understood than she. And, she asserted her deep concern that there are whole industries, educational systems, software support, and even certifications based on just her part of her family. While some, such as Peter Senge, come close to deep understanding, many of his followers only grasp the obvious parts. And, especially disconcerting to Knowledge was her belief that man has had few new insights about her for several thousand years, since the illuminations in China, India, Greece and Egypt. The interview, while wide-ranging and deep in content, was a firehose blast of perspective, all absorbed in a 5 second interview. Ms. Knowledge had other pressing commitments elsewhere.

The Taxonomy of Data
The interview led me to reflect on my own journey toward Knowledge and the rest of her family many years ago. In the late 1970s I performed presentations to various professional groups. One of my favorite presentations, especially for groups involving data and information systems, was The Taxonomy of Data. I did not invent the concept; undoubtedly I had read something in the mid ’70s that inspired me. And, I recently saw something our dear friend Max Wideman had written on the subject—but I have not been able to track it down again.

The presentation (recalling a now-30+ year old memory) starts with Data: Common as the sands on the beach and in the oceans. Data has potential value, because similar to the art glass of Murano (near Venice) it begins with a common material, then goes through a morphing process to produce a thing of beauty and wonder. We morph Data to derive Information. Part of the role of computer systems (as I said then) is to compile, select, sequence and present Data to targeted audiences, such that it becomes useful Information. Information is a higher level of abstraction (and combination) of related basic components. With Information, plus other inputs, people can make decisions. Better Information results in better decisions.

But there are more steps in the sequence. Decisions rely on more than just Information. There are actions required to bridge the gap. Information is external to the decision-maker: You read it, hear it, see words, charts, and numbers. All in the quest to internalize that Information: Establishing or increasing Knowledge. And, different people respond to different methods of presentation. There is also an acceleration factor that is evident. If the decision-maker has prior Knowledge, and the new Information can be related to that Knowledge, it is easier to quickly assimilate the Information. If not, it takes longer to build the “tags,” the indices that help in retrieving, comparing and acting upon the Knowledge. And yet, even with the presence of accumulated Knowledge, there is still something missing in effective Decision Making.

In my interview with Knowledge, she asserted that one of the eldest in her Intelligence family is the least understood. Different civilizations over the millennia labeled her with different names, but the ultimate extent of the Taxonomy of Data, as currently understood, could be labeled Wisdom. And how does Knowledge contribute to Wisdom? This clearly involves mastering the external-to-internal transition, correlating new Knowledge with existing Knowledge, and then applying it. Following that, applying judgement (thanks to Larry Prusak for this key step); reviewing how this new insight works in a given situation, and then adjusting and applying it all again. Note that as we move from Data, to Information, to Knowledge, to Wisdom, we see increasingly higher levels of cognitive behavior, as measured by Bloom’s Taxonomy of Learning (the 2001 update is more-applicable for adult learners).

The Performance Progression
The above offers a foundation in the creation of knowledge—and beyond. And in truth, this is not really just a taxonomy, or classification system, but a progression, isn’t it! But we have called it a taxonomy for over 30 years. So how does this relate to PM Certification? And how does this reflect asapm’s and IPMA’s focus on progressing from the above-mentioned Knowledge to advanced, professionally assessed Performance Competence? This time the answer is one that applies a systematic, traceable, coachable, assessable progression. Now that we are aware of the senior siblings in Ms. Knowledge’s Intelligence Family, how does one move from basic Knowledge, to Competence, to Performance?

When my company (ProjectExperts) developed a PM Competency Model in the early 1980s, we described a progression towards what we then called PM Effectiveness, and now call PM Performance. It begins with Knowledge, and her attributes. Already, we are near the top levels of the Taxonomy of Data described above. Knowledge is an essential beginning point, because she relates and organizes external information into potentially useful intelligence. Yet there must be more. As we have said many times, Knowledge is like Potential Energy (remember your Physics? By itself, Potential Energy accomplishes nothing). And, Knowledge can have a very short half-life. We have said for years that Knowledge acquired, but not used, has a half-life of six weeks. We recently found that we have been wrong: The current research says two weeks.

When you apply Knowledge, you are introduced to her big sister, Skill. Skill is like Kinetic Energy: She accomplishing things. Skill has a longer half-life, but is harder to claim. She is also harder to assess. One key to sustaining Skill is recognition, which reinforces your commitment to keep her closeby. Thus, the next-higher level in the progression, the reinforcing Attitudes. Here we see a key role of managers, who recognize and reward a practitioner’s application of classroom-based or other learning. The three ASK sisters (Attitudes, Skill, Knowledge), are are well-known in instructional design, competence development, and performance assessment. But there are progression steps that are missing, and these are crucial steps in any organization’s PM Performance—beginning with Behavioral and other Interpersonal, Skills.

The diagram to the right looks similar to the one we showed above. One item is the same, and others are different. You can see that Knowledge, Skills and Attitudes, mentioned above, are part of the Progression to Performance. But look closely at the Attitudes item. Your Behavioral and Interpersonal Skills, which we group as Attributes, are also an essential part of the progression. During the 1980s, most organizations did not wish to engage this key ingredient, preferring to focus on technical PM Knowledge. Today, seemingly everyone is realizing that how you relate to your stakeholders has more impact in project and program success than all the technical PM factors combined. So because of the symbiotic relationship between reinforcing Attitudes and the Behavioral Attributes, we combine them in the Knowledge-to-Performance Progression. And I hear you asking, “are we there yet?”

Not quite. Knowledge, Skills, Attitudes & Attributes, when appropriately applied, can result in what we call Competence. This does not necessarily happen the first time you try it; but it can result from multiple experiences. Given multiple opportunities, and the resulting experiences, you move toward the next level of the progression, Competence. And, this progression is still not-yet complete.

Inputs Versus Outputs: All the above members of the Intelligence Family, including those we discussed in the Taxonomy, and those from this Progression, are merely inputs. They are the ingredients. Inputs or ingredients of what, you ask? They are the inputs to the success Executives, Managers, and other Project Stakeholders seek. They are the means to an end. Certainly they are important, indeed essential, yet what our stakeholders really want is the outcome: Performance. Results. Success. Thus, all training, all coaching, all certifications, all tools, all processes, all other inputs, that do not contribute to Success, are dispensable. Even worthless, when they do not contribute to success, or when they actually detract from it (as too often happens). This Output, or Performance orientation is a theme throughout our asapm initiatives, from our Advanced PM Certifications to our Assessment and Certification of Organizations, using aPRO: asapm Performance Rated Organization.

One Combined Intelligence Progression
So now, dear reader, we have moved from the outrageous (an interview with Knowledge) to irreverent (suggesting that most of the members of the family to which Knowledge belongs are mere inputs, or ingredients). How far, you wonder, will he go, to offend everyone equally? OK, here goes. These are not two separate frameworks, but different viewers’ perspectives of one Intelligence Progression. Don’t worry: Ms. Knowledge’s place in the progression is secure, because she appears in both frameworks, and is essential in each. But, let us put the two frameworks together, so we can see how they support each other, and interact. Review the new progression below, and note that Knowledge is a higher-end player in the Taxonomy stream and the entry player in the Performance Progression. Note also a new assertion: That Wisdom and Competence are closely-related; perhaps they are even the same; or at least twins.

The implications: Knowledge Management is an important part of every organization’s success. But the right selection of Knowledge requires application, needs reinforcement and rewards, demands re-use (an oft-missed attribute); seeks adaptation, improves with each opportunity of use, and most-importantly, is used not just for the sake of use, but for the increasingly improved outcome your organization seeks. Everything you do in PM training, learning (often two different actions), certifications, decision-making and other support, that does not achieve organization success contributes to Ms. Knowledge’s frustrations. Not to mention the ongoing disappointment of the enterprise in this discipline we call Project Management. Here is another insight in the Intelligence Progression: The lower path moves from outside self to deeper inside. The upper path leads from inside to increasingly visible and outside. Want evidence? The arrowhead wraps around, and Performance is measured by… Data.

Relevance to the asapm Cause
We in asapm have understood the above-described Performance Progression from our founding; indeed, advancing our practice and its results was part of our original goals. We joined IPMA because we saw that this Global Federation of PM societies not only understands the relationship between the progression steps, but has established a way—far beyond exams—to assess the penultimate achievement: PM Competence, across 46 Elements of PM success. Are there more, undiscovered steps that will add to this Intelligence Progression? Time will tell.

As to the original question, whether Knowledge wants to be managed, we all understand that Knowledge, first of all, wants to be free. But part of that freedom is to enjoy her useful and proper place in the Family of Intelligence, contributing where she does the most good. And now, based on our air travel dialogue, our insights from our interview with Knowledge, and our reflection on formerly disconnected models, we have good news. The good news for the advancement of PM is that now, there is a discipline, populated by passionate professionals and experts, of Knowledge Management. The practitioners do not yet have all the answers, but they do now have most of the questions. With their assistance, and with the help of others, everyone who wishes to do so can move up the Intelligence Progression. This is a win for all, don’t you think?

Your Comments?

For over 25 years, this writer has campaigned for improved project and program results, through increased PM competence, better processes, and smarter upper management practices. Our audience has not been limited to pm practitioners, but includes every project and program stakeholder, from team members, to resource managers and sponsors, functional managers, executives, and beneficiaries of projects. And we have seen massive success in those organizations that respond to the clarion call for increased role-competence, and PM performance. Or, as we call it at ProjectExperts_®, PM Per4mance (the 4 stands for Project, Program, and Portfolio Performance).

Now, converging forces suggest that the era for PM competence is approaching. Four recent events are a “heads up” for all PM practitioners in the USA, and around the world:

1. asapm Publishes a Research Report on FAC-P/PM Competency
2. Two Papers Identify What Executives Really Want in IT PMs
3. PMI_® Updates the PMP_® Exam, Moving Toward Competence
4. asapm Completes Our Suite of Role-based, Advanced PM Certs

In this posting, we briefly explore these four converging forces.

1. asapm Publishes a Research Report on FAC-P/PM Competency
Over the last year and a half, an asapm team has worked with USA Federal government officials across multiple agencies, to explore the strengths and opportunities in one federal certification for Program and Project Management, FAC-P/PM. Among the purposes of the FAC-P/PM program is to overcome a common situation, faced by many organizations in the USA today. Peter R. Orszag, in an OMB Memorandum for Heads of Executive Departments and Agencies, said on June 28, 2010: “Federal Information Technology (IT) projects too often cost more than they should, take longer than necessary to deploy, and deliver solutions that do not meet our business needs.”

The asapm report, researched and written by Dr. Brent Hansen, Dr. Morgan Henrie, Timothy Jaques, and Michael O’Brochta, offers US Government Officials a roadmap to improve this situation. We think the US Government is already far ahead of many other organizations, including many enterprises: With this program they have embraced a competence-based approach, that goes beyond exam-based testing of pm knowledge. Further, the FAC-P/PM program targets levels of competence to roles, as has IPMA and asapm (IPMA-USA). The Moving Government Forward report is available for download at the asapm website.

The report recognizes the progress made in program and project management in the US Government; it cites findings and recommendations for acceleration of the program, and improvement of results. In the interests of even-handedness, the report does not explicitly recommend the addition of asapm’s 4-L-C, Four-Level Certification program. Our program assesses multiple specific roles of Program and Project Managers, with professionally assessed, advanced, PM performance competence-based Certifications. Any observer with an understanding of the US Government’s competence objectives, and of asapm’s certification offerings, would readily embrace our program. Such an action could measurably boost the FAC-P/PM program’s progress, and overall PM Performance. For that matter, it would do the same for any other government agency, in the USA and other nations.

2. Two Papers Identify What Executives Really Want in IT PMs
During the same period that asapm researchers were exploring the competence and performance improvement opportunities in US Government, another team of researchers, from Northeastern State University in Oklahoma, were researching what recruiters and organization executives seek in IT project managers. The researchers, Dr. Deborah H. Stevenson and Dr. JoAnn Starkweather, published their findings in two professional journals, IPMA’s International Journal of Project Management, October 2010, Issue 7, and the February 2011 Project Management Journal, from PMI. Sorry that we cannot link you to these two papers; they are protected by their publishers.

The two papers are well-worth reading for anyone who cares about improved pm competence, and improved pm results. The audience of the two papers differs a bit, so the papers, based on the same research, emphasized different aspects of the researchers’ findings. Our interpretations and observations (you must draw your own conclusions from these excellent papers) include:

• While recruiters appear to use easy-to-assess screening criteria, such as education and exam-based certifications, executives value those criteria as very low, viewing as much more important and relevant such factors as competence in leadership and interpersonal skills.
• It would appear that the combination of technical, contextual and behavioral elements that IPMA and asapm certify are exactly what organization executives seek most in their Project Managers.
• Of course, this is no surprise to asapm. One of the primary purposes for our founding is advance the practice of program and project management, with emphasis on performance competence.
• It also follows that, while knowledge-testing exams can be a useful starting point, our more rigorous use of professional assessors, emphasis on interpersonal and leadership skills, and demonstrated competence, coincides with executive expectations.
• The survey and papers are oriented towards Information Technology project managers; our experience is that the findings are probably just as valid across most other pm disciplines.

We look forward to the next research paper by Drs. Stevenson and Starkweather, and you can help. They are seeking qualified IT respondents to a research project that seeks the secret of Project Success. While the survey is long, you will find it fascinating to see the myriad factors that scholars have associated with IT project success. More importantly, your insights will help to refine the definition of project success. Please complete this survey before March 25, 2011.

3. PMI Updates the PMP Exam, Moving Toward Competence
In a separate, yet related event, the Project Management Institute has announced that, as of August 31, 2011, the exam for the Project Management Professional certification will change. Among other changes, it will now include test questions around “Cross cutting knowledge and skills.” These include competence elements that IPMA (International Project Management Association) and asapm have deemed to be important for years. Demonstrated competence in these elements is crucial to earning our advanced, role-based, professionally assessed certifications.

PMI has been on this competence path for a few years:

• In 2003 PMI entered into a strategic relationship with IPMA to explore our certifications.
• Since then, the word competence or competency has appeared on an increasing basis in exam specifications, articles about certification, and on the website.
• PMI was, for a time, involved with the GAPPS initiative, Global Alliance for Project Performance Standards.
• The 2nd Edition, Project Management Competency Development Framework, published in 2007, is a great reference for those with a project management certification who wish to improve their PM competence. It balances behavioral skills with technical areas of assessment. How do we know of this useful reference? We participated in the project to create it.

As a PMP and IPMA Level-D_® certificant, this writer welcomes these market-driven moves. And, it appears from events 1 and 2 above, that these moves are timely. Gee, one of asapm’s taglines of the last 10 years, Celebrate the Competence Difference, is even more powerful than we thought!

4. asapm Completes Our Suite of Role-based, Advanced PM Certs
Your most useful of the four converging forces is asapm’s certification program completion. In this first Quarter of 2011, asapm has completed our full suite of role-based program and project manager certifications. We have been working on this portfolio of projects for over eight years: First, Ron Waller moved asapm certification forward, while William Duncan helped to found and structure the above-mentioned GAPPS. Then, Duncan (who was also primary author of the original PMBOK_® Guide) assumed the lead role in asapm’s certification program. Thanks to Duncan, Waller, and all our other contributors!

What is in this unique asapm certification program?
asapm’s certifications begin with exam-based PM certifications, and then progress to advanced, professionally-assessed certifications:

• IPMA Level D®, Project Associate; an exam-based certification for team members
• IPMA Level C_®, Project Manager; includes an essay-based exam, and professional assessment
• IPMA Level B_®, Senior Project Manager; for Managers of complex projects
• IPMA Level B®, Program Manager
• IPMA Level A_®, Senior Program Manager; for Managers of complex programs

Our exam-based IPMA-D certification is a firm foundation for developing PM competence and performance. And, in addition to being great for beginning project managers and team members, it is perfect for practitioners in project-related disciplines, such as proposal management, business development, engineering or architecture. The IPMA Level D exam does not require a certification preparation class; it requires grasp of the USA National Competence Baseline, and an additional recommended reference. Most-important is to practice competent project management for several years. For those who need a brush-up, we can recommend asapm Competence Enablers, learning and training organizations that can help you develop PM Competence, with IPMA Level-D in mind.

asapm’s advanced certifications are more rigorous than some people expect. We require a portfolio of evidence from a completed project; the certificant must demonstrate, to professional assessors, their role in the delivery of each of the required criteria. They must show end-to-end management of the initiative, not just part of it, and not just serving as a task manager. They must be able to respond to follow-on assessor questions that one cannot prepare for—without having demonstrated results. Those who can demonstrate their performance in their role receive a PM certification that helps them truly stand out from the crowd of PM certificants.

PM Competence Convergence in the USA is due to the efforts of many. These are practicing project managers, who have insights into the need for improved PM Performance in the USA, in business and in government. This convergence is accelerated with the drive for improved project and program results, that every organization deserves and increasingly demands. PM Competence and the resulting Performance–highlighted by the converging forces mentioned above–is increasingly important for every PM Practitioner today.

Your Comments?

PMI, PMP and PMBOK are registered trademarks of Project Management Institute in the USA and other countries. IPMA Level-D, C, B and A are registered trademarks of IPMA in the USA and other countries.

If you have not reviewed parts 1-3, we suggest that you go do that before continuing here. Some following this series are a bit incredulous. One week or less, huh? What a pipe-dream! Some teams spend an entire week and get 10% that much information, much less the needed levels of management commitment. We mentioned our Rapid Initial Planning processes. Many organizations perform this type of quick-start approach today, so our method is no longer anything new. The RIP (as we called it, although some thought that meant Rest In Peace…), is a way seek the prerequisites that smart project managers assure for every project.

Case Application: Product Data Management System
In the early 1990s, one of the few remaining US-based military shipbuilding companies had a mandate: Update to an end-to-end PDM (Product Data Management) System within several years, or lose their ability to bid on new warfighter systems. A PDM supports the entire process, from concept, through Design Engineering, to Construction, Sea Trials and Validation, Delivery, and importantly, Parts Inventory Management for the life of the resulting product; in this case, a warship. One could say that this was an Information Technology project, because IT was involved. We felt it was a business survival strategy, because the future of the entire business was at stake. Besides, while their shipyards were vast, their IT staff numbered fewer than 20 people.

A business partner, Dan Myers, of Requirements Solutions Group, engaged the client for one week, meeting with Business Executives. They performed an intensive Data Requirements-gathering session, papering the walls with all aspects of their ship-building business. These busy Executives dedicated an entire week, full-time, to understand everything about the ingredients of success for their business.

The following week, we went in, and spent four days working with that same group. We used our Project Initiation Rapid Initial Planning session. In a totally non-technical way, we parsed the massive program into subprojects (based primarily on timing and sequence of information flow across the organization), identified and measured scope of each project in the program, discussed strategies and approaches, including use of software packages, contracting out to “Big Six” consultancies who had relevant experience, identified assumptions and estimated the project multiple ways, stepped back and identified risks and responses, and developed fairly detailed project plans for each phase of each project of the program. In three and half days.

Our cost estimate was under $200 Million. The schedule was 3 years. Peak staffing was 80 people (remember, they had fewer than 20 IT staff). The chances of success within the several-year deadline period (2+) were less than 50%. The Executive Group spent the afternoon of the fourth day preparing a presentation to the company’s Board of Directors. Their recommendation: Sell the company to a competitor, that already had a viable and compatible Product Data Management System. The Board accepted their recommendation, sold the company, and that company thrives today as a division of the acquiring organization.

This is one of the shortest programs I have ever been involved in. Was it a success or a failure? We say it was a tremendous success. Some might say it was a failure, because IT didn’t even get to write code (I was a coder the old days, thus my remaining fixation with code). But what would have happened if they spent 2+ years and $200M trying to deliver? Chances are high that they would have failed. But here is the key: We accomplished all the items on that extensive list from Part 2, with a team of Executives who knew their business thoroughly, but were not experienced in the Initial Planning efforts they were applying to their Make-or-Break program.

The difference between this program and its projects, and many others is the prerequisites these Effective Executives put into place. They demonstrated a level of commitment that every project or program worth doing should have.

Helping Tools
Of course, such intensive efforts require more than full-time commitment of the right people, including decision-makers. We also had the use of a PM tool that we developed, licensed to our customers, and used in all our project and consulting engagements. We call it Plan By Example, and it was originally based on the concept of 90% reusable project plans, that merely need to be adapted to the current project. You can see a quick video of PBE at work at the ProjectExperts website. While many such tools are available today, this one benefited from collaboration with Edmund Dante, who developed Project Bridge, a primary success driver for ABT’s Project Workbench.

Your Bottom Line
This example shows several things. First, the things you do in the first 10% of the project can have more impact than everything else we practice in Project Management. Second, that those “things” always must include an organizational commitment to succeed. There is little sense in doing a project if that commitment is not there. Third, that in some or many cases, you can shorten that long list of items in Part 2 to a mere checklist if you institutionalize the PM practices we have described. By the way, we have never called these Best Practices; we call them Competitive PM Practices. We believe that best practices always vary with the situation.

You have heard the classic phrase, “There is never time to do it right, but there is always time to do it over.” The time to do it right starts at the beginning of every project and program you touch. Even though stellar talent, long and hard overtime and heroic efforts can sometimes bring a project to a somewhat-successful conclusion, the tangible business benefits are often still missing. You, your Executives, Managers, Customers and project teams deserve more than that, don’t you?
Your Comments?

In the first two parts of this series, we discussed the timing and actions of the first portion of any successful project. We made assertions about a number of useful actions, that some people might find to be overwhelming. Is it really necessary to do “all that stuff?” Could some be skipped? Certainly, you could skip much of that, and “hero” your way through every project. Many organizations still operate that way, even after 25+ years of smarter approaches. Yet, there are exceptions, counterpoints and illustrations of the assertions we made in the first two parts of this subject.

Agile PM
Agile PM is thought to be a “new thing,” and is often proclaimed to be an alternative to BDUF, Big Definition Up Front mentality suggested by the first two articles in this series. Despite the claims of newcomers, Agile PM began, not in the mid-1990s, but in the early 1980s. Of course, we were early advocates of Ken Schwaber’s Scrum in the early 90s, and Kent Beck’s work with Extreme Programming later. But way before those advancements, there were two camps in Information Technology projects that were in favor of leaner PM methods:

1. Development-oriented talent, who did not understand the importance of the fuzzy front end of a project, including estimating, funding, staffing, requirements definition and design alternatives. Often, the resistance to these actions was fierce, because they obviously didn’t generate code, and thus, only delayed getting to the good part of the project. Indeed, many of the “new agile methods” of the early and mid-1990s repeated this theme. I recall heated disagreement about the need to understand the existing situation, the flow of data, and the business processes, because “any adept developer can respond to those discoveries.”
2. Many savvy and experienced project managers of the early 1980s resisted using the in-vogue massive methodologies that were designed for 35,000 hour, multi-year projects. Why? These 1970s artifacts would crush the emerging 3,500 hour, done in six months efforts that became the norm in the 1980s. Thus, they intelligently selected the PM actions that did the most good in achieving business results, while imposing the least overhead.
   This ability became an essential competence for performing project managers. While not going to such extremes as “the code represents the dynamic requirements and documentation”, they moved away from the process-driven and forms burdened approaches they encountered.

   Further, as organizations increasingly recognized that as many as half their people were working on 8-360 hour Small Projects, there was another order-of-magnitude of scaling needed. And as part of their new-found awareness of lean PM and the need for scaling method to project size, they also discovered that the most-important PM skills and competences also totally shifted at repeatable levels of project scale.

Organizations and practitioners realized that several factors should cause competent and performing project teams to scale down or skip the monolithic process-and-forms-driven methods they identified factors to consider to map the rigor needed to the nature of the project:

• Size of the projects. Methodologies selected that are appropriate for the project’s size (and risk).
• Prerequisites in place. One purpose of the list of early-project results in the preceding post is to assure that the prerequisites for success are in place—at the right time to do so. To a great extent, today’s useful and productive Agile PM methods, assume an entire range of prerequisites.
• Those include:
  o The right talent is available, ideally, full-time
  o You have continuous access to the right internal Customers
  o Clear business requirements are available, whether on index cards or in some other format
  o Funding and schedules are flexible, within reason
  o The business case and project priority is clear to all participants
  o Little or no interruptions will deter the team from their project role
  o The team members have the interpersonal skills to work well together, even under pressure
  o Approval of needed changes will trigger changes in funding and timelines, as needed
  o The solution can be incrementally delivered, so useful business benefits appear quickly.

In today’s Agile projects, what would be the consequences if those items are missing? These were the smart practices of competent and performing project managers from the early 1980s through the present. And, this is in all disciplines, not just Information Technology.

One purpose of the first 10% of any project is to establish those prerequisites. That action will help keep any agile project from turning into a fragile one. Of course, some project results, by their nature, cannot really be delivered in an incremental manner. Imagine incremental delivery of a Manned Mars Mission program, for example. At a certain point, we must have all the parts ready for a blast-off, and doing a “house-call” is difficult en-route.

So we assert that even in an Agile project, the extensive list from our Part 2 posting is also a useful checklist for the Agile Team, to understand their Risks, and act to resolve them. We have seen entire organizations that can quickly go through that extensive list from Part 2 in one week or less for major projects, and move on to product deliverables. Your Comments?

If you have not reviewed part 1, with the project scenario, go do that before continuing here. Hopefully, you analyzed the scenario and answered the question, at least for yourself, about the additional take-aways from the scenario. They include:

• The importance of taking the latency out of the period from project inspiration to initiation.
• The value of clearly defined preliminary scope and business benefits from prioritization forward.
• Confidence that, when you identify the talent and their needed availability, that you actually get it.
• The impact of Customer/Manager engagement early in the project.
• Assuring that the project team hears the project owner’s statement of its importance.
• Verbal reassurance by the Resource Managers of all team members, about the project’s priority.
• A focus on achieving Benefit Realization.
• The partnering with internal customers from project initiation to benefit realization—and the celebration for achieving those benefits.

And those are just the obvious ones, from our year-old scenario. There are many other things to assure that  you achieve in the first 10% of any project; or, as we discussed in our corollary to Goff’s Law #1, that you should verify on the first day you are on any project. Let us take a look at those precious early ingredients of success.

Early Ingredients for Success
This list of early items is for a medium or larger project. It is in addition to the take-aways from the scenario discussed above. Project teams that assure that they complete these project ingredients consistently achieve project success:

• A one-page Project Charter that identifies the Sponsor’s view of the project’s purpose, primary outputs, key team members, and the levels of authority of the project manager.
• A definitive problem or opportunity analysis, that includes at a minimum, a clear understanding of the project’s purpose, measurable outcomes, and a stakeholder list.
• A list of clear project objectives, and the Business Driver (the single, most-important “why” of the project), that all participants, customers and managers agree with.
• Measurable preliminary scope, or at least a foundation for scope traceability. It is better for scope to be traceable than to be presumed to be accurate, early in the project, before business requirements are verified.
• Early range estimates of effort and cost, with documentation of the assumptions that drive them. We recommend 3-4 different estimating methods in medium or large projects, if managing Time and Cost is important.
• An overall project timeline and needed staffing level that is consistent with the effort needed to deliver the project. See our Project Management Success Profile (the Project Success Diagonal) at the ProjectExperts website.
• The right internal Customers involved with and responsible for the selection of early project activities that assure successful Organizational Change Management. These clearly include requirements definition and prioritization, plus key decisions about design alternatives.
• Commitments of needed time and attention of the right project Sponsor(s). So it is not just assumed to be a token role, we assign benefit realization to the Project Sponsor.
• Flexibility with schedule and cost at major Milestones or Stage Gates, as Scope discovery requires it; or, flexibility with deferring scope to later releases.
• An initial strategy or approach for the project, to be reviewed either after requirements prioritization, or at design. This includes such approaches as staging, to offer early release of some tangible business benefits, plus some analysis of buy vs. build vs. contract for all or part of the project results.
• Participation by Customers and Resource Managers in Risk Assessment and Response Identification. Then, follow-through when risk responses are needed. After all, everything the project manager and team can manage is not a risk.
• A high-level schedule for the entire project, that shows the approximate timing of each phase or stage, accepted by Customers and Managers. And, based on another Goff’s Law, an accelerated schedule that shows how you could (with Management support) beat the project due date by 25%.
• A work plan for the next immediate phase or stage, at the work package or individual assignment level of detail, based on clear structuring into bite-sized efforts, listed responsibilities and assignments (listing their hours per day or % commitment), estimates of activity effort and duration, with assumptions, lists of incremental reviews and reviewer roles, planned communications,
• Based on the preceding, a detailed schedule for the next immediate phase or stage, showing which activities have slack and which are on the critical path. Of course, schedule and resource use is optimized. It is scary how many teams just move bars on a Gantt Chart or PowerPoint slide until it is “good enough for management approval”.

An Overwhelming List?
I recall a period in the mid-1980s, when Information Technology project leaders freaked out at a list like this. They thought it was overwhelming—especially when their primary interest was in writing code, and these actions had no apparent relationship to the code they desperately wanted to begin working on. Even Managers worried that it felt like analysis paralysis. And what is your reaction? Is there anything there on the list you would skip?

And even if you could get some of the right people together (we say that is part of the Resource Managers’ job, based on the information from the Project Manager), how long might it take to do all this, say on a medium project of 2000 hours of effort, with the team assigned half time? Go ahead and guess, before you continue reading. Don’t cheat…

In our classes, even with the assertion that Resource Managers get all the right people in the room, guesses range from two weeks to several months. For the project size we cited, our PM Methodologies all slate this effort at one week. Now this does assume that the participants have experience in doing this type of work. And for larger projects, say 12K hours of effort, we say, two weeks (with the team working full-time) at most. The reaction we often get: “No way!” Of course, the secret, including getting the right people together, is to focus on the project, rather than all the other non-project interruptions that damage project productivity in most organizations.

For larger projects, we (in ProjectExperts) have offered a facilitated service, Rapid Initial Planning , that gets the right people together for a larger project, producing most of the above PM results, in a 3-4 day period. These are intensive, full-time, offsite if needed, sessions. I say “most of the above results” because some of the pre-work and concurrent effort includes a problem or opportunity analysis with wide-ranging stakeholders.

Worth the Effort?
What do you think the benefits might be, of spending even less than the first 10% of your project’s effort on the selection of those items listed above that would help you the most? Even if you spend 2 weeks preparing for a nine month project, would it serve you well? And, what would it take to get all your customers, managers and team members up-to-speed enough to participate in such an activity? And, what do you think this approach would have on project time and cost changes? On benefit realization?

Those organizations that are in the business of managing projects as part of their business (or government) differentiation, have embraced this concept of investing the first 10% in project success. Those that are perennial laggards skip much of the needed preparation, and as a result, too often exceed planned time, cost, scope, quality and benefit realization targets. For over 25 years now, the smartest project teams manage their project from the very beginning, rather than merely doing them.

Your Comments?

We have long asserted that “doing the right things” in the first 10% of any project is 90% responsible for project success. There are over 250 unpublished “Goff’s Laws,” that provide insights on key parts of this first 10%, and beyond. Those insights include:

“1. You can get away with anything, on the first day of your project.”

The dialogue around this law (really just a common-sense observation) assures that you can move any deadline, ask for any budget, obtain unobtainable talent, or anything you need, if you identify that need on the first day of the project–especially if you have not yet said, “Yes! I will do this project!”

There is a corollary to the above Goff’s Law, that can be of some comfort to those who are assigned somewhat later in the project:

“1a. You can get away with almost anything, on the first day you are on the project.”

Of course, the next 10-15% of the project is important, too, because that is where most project teams establish great business requirements. There is another Goff’s Law about this; this one has been borrowed from other, more-experienced folks:

“12. You will spend 25% of total project effort getting good business requirements. Competent project teams spend most of that 25% in the first part of the project.”

But when is this first part of a project? What is it, that great project teams should assure that they do, during this first part, to assure project success? And, why are these important actions and key results so often skipped? We will begin to touch on these questions in this multi-part (it will require several sections, over time) Change Agent posting.

When Does a Project Begin?
We have discussed this dilemma for years. Different people have different opinions, and the answer you select has significant bearing on what should be present. For example, in Construction, or in most bidding projects (everything from a Defense initiative to an IT subcontract), for the Seller, the project essentially begins with a bid award sometime during the Buyer’s Design phase or stage. We’ll skirt that issue by focusing on an internal-to-your-organization project. To see our perspective, see the scenario we posted over a year ago. Go to When Does A Project Begin? and review that posting. Then, return here.

Scenario Questions
1. The most obvious question, when did this project begin? At inspiration? When your Manager heard about it? When you first spoke to the Functional Manager? When the team first got together in the face-to-face meeting? Note that each participant may have a different point of view. From the Team’s standpoint, this was a two month project. From the Functional Manager’s view, it took anything from 2-10 months (Inspiration through Benefits Realization).

2. Everyone wants their results faster. We covered this at that link, but what is the best way to accelerate the business benefit? Put a tight deadline on that 2-month project, from July 2 to September 2. Silly? Absolutely, but this is what often happens. Clearly, get the latency out of the period from January 2 to September 2.

3. But, your Manager complains, how can we do that? It took all that time because of all the other initiatives we are working on. Answer: Look–this project returned 3:1! Let’s use some of that return to acquire the talent to do more high-return projects (Realizing, of course, that not all projects are high return. Some are regulatory, some are political)!

Of course, this Scenario is just a simple example. We see many cases where a year or more passes between the March 2 and May 2 events. And clearly, most of your projects take more than two months. But many of them take longer than needed, and return less than you deserve, because your project processes and staffing leave room for improvement.

Scenario Take-Aways
When we speak of the first 10% of a project, we are talking about the first 10% of project effort. The first take-away from this scenario is to compress the latency out of the front end. If a project is worth doing, it is worth starting quickly.

Another take-away is the importance of the information gathered in that discussion between the project manager and the Functional Manager. Especially important is the information about scope measures, and the business benefits. This allows easier prioritization, both for the project team and the business unit.

There are a bunch more take-aways from this scenario. What are they? And, what do they suggest about some of the most-important things to do, early in every project?

Your Comments?

A Comment to the ChangeAgents, 10/16/2011, by Terry Schmidt

You are spot on about the importance of starting a project off right. You never have to recover from a strong start, but can spend way too much time stumbling from the effects of a poor start.

While writing my book STRATEGIC PROJECT MANAGEMENT MADE SIMPLE: PRACTICAL TOOLS FOR LEADERS AND TEAMS (Wiley, 2009), I came across 100 Informal Rules for PM’s compiled over the years by NASA PM’s. I love their Rule #15….

“A review of most failed projects indicates that the disasters were well planned to happen from the start.  The seeds of problems are laid down early. Initial planning is the most vital part of a project”.

I’m sure that any experienced PM would agree. Like raising a baby or housebreaking a puppy, if you are systematic about doing it right at the beginning, the rest of the job is easier.

–Terry