Project Management Survival, a Practical Guide to Leading, Managing and Delivering Challenging Projects, is a new book by Richard Jones and published by Kogan Page publishers. According to the inside cover, Project Management Survival is about successfully managing real projects. The book is not written for people in charge of straightforward, neat projects where team members are hand picked, where there are never any problems with management, and where everything goes right.

According to the announcement received by PMForum, the book explains what to do if one starts or inherits a project where resources are scarce and time is short. Mr. Jones provides practical advice on getting the right diagnosis, developing a genuinely workable plan, and managing people so the project stays on track. Taking a pragmatic approach, he shows how to succeed in even the toughest project situations.

Richard Jones is a founding partner of Ventura Team LLP. Richard has led under-fire teams across four continents, managing or turning around major programmes and projects in telecoms, electronics, software, oil, medical devices and other industries. He has spearheaded technology development and implementation projects for major companies including Shell, Universal Studios, British Steel, and British Telecom. Richard Jones has a degree in electronics, diploma in engineering and MBA.

Project Management Survival, a Practical Guide to Leading, Managing and Delivering Challenging Projects, (ISBN 978-0-7494-5010-6), published by Kogan Page, is available through most book channels. List price: US $49.95; UK £25.00. Hardbound, 182 pages.

Editor’s note: A review copy of the book was provided to PMForum by Kogan Page, to be reviewed through PMForum’s book review alliance with the graduate program in project management at the University of Texas at Dallas. Authors and publishers of project management books who want their books reviewed should contact editor@pmforum.org

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“Wave Planning” by David Dombkins, PhD. According to the author, “Wave planning is a methodology for planning complex projects. It brings together the characteristics of waves, cycles and chaos. I developed Wave Planning to help explain how project management could be used to implement change projects.” A/Professor Dr David H Dombkins, MPM, Doctor of Technology, Master Project Director, FAIPM, is the immediate past National President of the Australian Institute of Project Management (AIPM). Dr. Dombkins is the founder of the College of Complex Project Managers in Australia and the proponent of a new standard for managing complex projects. He believes that project management needs to deliver a better solution than simply using more of our traditional approaches, and that if project management is to help our world, we need to step up to the mark with useful project management methodologies to deal with complexity and chaos.

“Time Is Up: Assessing Schedule Performance with Earned Value”
by Robert Van de Velde, PhD. According to the author, “Earned Value has proven effective for evaluating cost performance, but it fails for schedule performance. A recent breakthrough, called Earned Schedule, corrects the problem and raises project time management to new prominence.” Rob received his Ph.D. from the University of Toronto and a B.Sc. from the University of Manitoba. His current research interests include techniques for managing time-driven projects, automation of project status analysis and reporting, and the use of advanced features in MS Project. He resides in Toronto, Canada.

 

“Critical Success Factors for International Projects” by Sue Freedman, Ph.D. and Lothar Katz. According to the authors, “The future of project management involves an ever increasing number of projects that require the cooperation of geographically and culturally diverse teams. As experience with these international project partnerships grows, the organizational competencies needed for success are emerging.
Most prominent among them are the knowledge and skill to select the right projects and the right project partners for international efforts, as well as the ability to select, develop, and support leaders for projects and programs who have the skills and flexibility to make cross-border collaboration successful.”

Sue Freedman and Lothar Katz both teach in the University of Texas at Dallas’ Project Management Program. Together, they developed and are frequently instructing “Managing Projects Across Borders”, a series of workshops on methods and best practices for success in an international project environment.

 

 

“Product Centric Project Management: The Missing Link to Business Results”, by Curt Raschke, PhD, PMP. According to the author, “In reality, there are two critical links in between project activities and the desired results – creating a product with the proper attributes to enable the results and effectively using the product to achieve the results. Because explicit consideration of these two product centric links is often missing in project planning and execution, I call them the “missing links” to business results.” Curt Raschke has over 25 years experience in managing new product development projects for several high-technology companies in the Dallas / Fort Worth area, USA. He is an adjunct instructor at the University of Texas at Dallas in the Project Management and Project Lifecycle Management Executive Education programs and has been an officer of PMI’s New Product Development Specific Interest Group for almost 10 years, including three years as SIG chair.

 

“Churchill the Agile Project Manager: Churchill Personally Communicates”, (Part 14 in the Series) by Mark Kozak-Holland. According to the author, “Most people are very familiar with Winston Churchill but may not be familiar with his “agile” approach to project management and his skills as a PM in the summer of 1940. Part 13 looked at how Churchill put in place a communication plan to bolster morale in the Government, media, and public. This article discusses how Churchill personally communicated using both verbal and non-verbal communication to fight the mood of defeatism, build confidence, and get buy in into his plan.” Mark Kozak-Holland is is a Senior Business Architect with HP Services and regularly writes and speaks on the subject of emerging technologies and lessons that can be learned from historical projects.

 

“How Male Machismo Shaped Project Management” by Bas de Baar. According to the author, “There is no denying that the most popular way of doing projects is described in PMI’s Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK). In Europe, PRINCE2 is widely used. Both are examples of plan-driven approaches. One has to ask, though, why plan-driven methods are currently the most widely-accepted. Why do we manage projects the way we do?” Bas de Baar works as a Project Manager in the publishing industry. Since 2001, he has been the editor of a popular website dedicated to Software Project Management. His latest book, “Surprise! Now You’re a Software Project Manager”, was published in September 2006 and became an international best seller. He holds a masters degree in Business Informatics and lives with his wife in the coastal town of Zandvoort, The Netherlands.

 

“Interview with Max Wideman, Part I” Max Wideman is a retired Canadian professional engineer and project manager with experience in systems, social and environmental projects, as well as design, engineering and construction projects. He is a Fellow of the Project Management Institute, of which he is past president and chairman, and for whom he developed the 1987 version of the Project Management Body of Knowledge. He also enjoys Fellow status in the Institution of Civil Engineers (UK), the Engineering Institute of Canada, and the Canadian Society of Civil Engineering. Max has lectured or presented papers in many countries and has contributed articles, books, chapters, and papers on many project management topics over the years. His latest book is A Management Framework for Project, Program and Portfolio Integration, Trafford, BC, 2004. Be sure to catch part 2 of our interview with max in this mont's issue.

The October edition of PM World Today also contains three letters to the editor, one Viewpoint article, six PM Tips & Techniques articles, two second edition (previously published) papers, three PM book reviews, regional reports from international correspondents in 12 countries, and news articles from around the world of project management. PM World Today is published by PMForum as a service to authors, organizations and individuals seeking professional knowledge in the project management world. The October edition can be found at www.pmworldtoday.net where you can also sign up for a free subscription.

 

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The AMA Handbook of Project Management, Second Edition, by Paul C. Dinsmore and Jeannette Cabanis-Brewin, editors, has been awarded the 2007 PMI David I. Cleland Literature Award. One of the most authoritative guides to project management in the world, The AMA Handbook of Project Management presents concepts and theories that all project managers must master. Now revised to reflect the accelerating pace of the current project management environment—as well as the most recent changes to the Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK® Guide)—the book provides practical, how-to-do-it information on everything needed to succeed in the complex, constantly growing field of project management.

Paul C. Dinsmore is an international authority on project management and organizational change, with more than 30 years of experience as a project manager and educator. He is president of Dinsmore Associates, an international consulting and training firm based in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and was honored with PMI’s Distinguished Contributions Award as well as the prestigious Fellow Award by the Project Management Institute (PMI®). Paul has authored, co-authored or edited 17 books on management and project-related topics. He is also a global advisor for PMForum and the project management eJournal PM World Today.

Jeannette Cabanis-Brewin (jcabanis-brewin@cbponline.com) is editor-in-chief of the Center for Business Practices, the research and publishing division of PM Solutions, a well known project management consulting and training firm based in Ohio, USA. A former editor and staff writer for PMI, Jeannette has authored or edited a wide variety of project management articles, books, reports and publications. She lives in Cullowhee, North Carolina.

The formal presentation of the 2007 PMI David I. Cleland Literature Award was made at the PMI® Global Congress 2007 – North America, in Atlanta, Georgia, USA, on Saturday afternoon, October 6, 2007. The PMI Global Congress North America is PMI’s largest event and one of the largest PM conferences in the world each year. Other PMI Global Congress are held annually in the Asia Pacific Region, Europe-Middle East-Africa Region, and in Latin America.

With 240,000+ members in over 150 countries, the Project Management Institute (PMI®) is the world’s largest and best known project management professional organization. PMI is actively engaged in advocacy for the PM profession, setting standards, conducting research and providing access to a wide variety of PM-related information and resources. PMI also promotes career and professional development and offers certification, networking and community involvement opportunities. PMI was founded in the USA in 1969, but is now a global organization with members, chapters and offices worldwide. For more information, visit www.pmi.org.

We at PMForum want to congratulate Paul and Jeannette for their important contribution to the project management literature and profession, as evidenced by their winning this prestigious award. The AMA Handbook of Project Management, Second Edition, was published by AMACOM in the USA in 2007. (ISBN 0-8144-7271-0) For more information or to purchase the book, visit
http://www.amanet.org/books/catalog/0814472710.htm or
http://www.cbponline.com.

PMI® and PMP® are registered trademarks of the Project Management Institute.

 

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Ongoing research shows that whilst 90% of large companies are conducting global projects, less than one third of them have effective, established practices to help project managers and team members working over a distance. Global projects should allow organizations to take advantage of distributed skills, around-the-clock operations and virtual team environments. Currently many of these organizations struggle to reach the required levels of quality and effectiveness from these projects because their structure and their methodologies are not adapted to a global multi-cultural environment, where most communication is in writing and asynchronous. Global Project Management describes how to adapt organizations and projects to thrive in this environment.

The text is filled with real-life examples and case studies to illustrate how to initiate, plan, execute, control and close a successful global project.

Jean Binder is a certified project manager (PMP®) and has more than 20 years of experience working in project environments, most of them living abroad and communicating in multi-cultural and multi-language environments. He has particular experience of managing global projects, having implemented collaborative tools and techniques in a number of global organizations. The Global Project Management Framework that served as a basis for this book was developed by the author at the Heriot Watt University in Edinburgh.

For more information visit http://www.researchandmarkets.com/reports/c67056

 

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Max Wideman has announced the latest updates to his popular project management website. According to the email from Max this month, here are the items that Max discusses this month.

Is your brainstorming getting the best results? Try Kishore Dharmarajan's Eight-step INNOVATE approach to Supercharged Brainstorming.

In Part 3 of our Ten Steps to PPM Paper we discuss the PPM environment including the role of the Project Management Office and the Project Portfolio Steering Committee in Projects, Programs, Portfolios and Strategic Direction.

Our Guest, Michael R. Wood draws on his experience in the IT sector for Developing IT Project Metrics from the Top Down where it is particularly relevant to the tracking of project portfolios.

Max has added one new Issacon* this month:

• 1365c - Politics, Power & Control

The following Issacons* have been updated:

*"Issacons" stands for "Issues and Considerations" that are presented in bullet form for quick and easy reference by project managers.

Have you seen Max’s book
A Management Framework for Project, Program and Portfolio Integration?
For information or to order a copy, visit http://www.maxwideman.com/papers/framework_book/intro.htm.

Do you have a project management question?
Find the answer at: http://www.maxwideman.com.

 

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