Dear Friends,
This Simple Goal Planner 2012 will help you to Plan your Goals, and Track it with milestones periodically. Give me your comments.
I wish you everything success in this New Year 2012.
All the best.
Download your copy here
Showing posts with label General. Show all posts
Showing posts with label General. Show all posts
Friday, December 30, 2011
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
m.yoursite.com or www.yoursite.mobi
m.yoursite.com or www.yoursite.mobi - which would be your preference for your mobile website? I see many US based companies are using m.yoursite.com but Europe adopted .Mobi as a standard.! What would be your preference in personal or corporate mobile web domain..!
Thursday, July 7, 2011
How to do self-appraisal using Google Forms
Self appraisal is nothing but an evaluation of employee himself – It gives the fundamental feedback / views and points regarding his performance in given period of time at work. It analyses the strengths, weaknesses, accomplishments, problems faced, training and development needs for every member in team. The self appraisal document is normally a simple excel sheet.
Google Forms is an excellent alternative for static Excel sheets – mainly for this kind of processes. You can create a Form and share it with multiple members without any duplicate efforts.
We used Google forms in a small size organization – for 150 members. It gave us interesting results effort wise. We finished the self appraisal process in 2 days using this. We used the following sections for self rating (1 to 5) simply and added a notes section at the end of it for comments.
- Satisfaction in current responsibilities held by the employee
- Clarity in Goals for the next appraisal period
- Accomplishments score
- Training need for his current role
- Support from his Manager for challenges in Work
- Leadership skills Score
- Inter-personal and communication skills
Steps to create Google Forms
- Click on ‘Form’ in ‘Create New’ Menu – from the home page of Google Docs.
- You can edit the title, add description, add Question Titles, Question Types (basically answer type – Text, paragraph, multiple choice, check boxes, scale, grid etc)
- You can even select themes for colorful forms.
- After all your create Form processes – you can publish it in email to your team
- You can see responses in Summery or Spread sheet mode
Try it, and give me your feedbacks. If you need any help in doing it first time – just ping me.
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
3 Gifts from my CSC Team
As many of you already know, I am not in my responsibilities of Photon and CSC Roles from Feb 4 2011. I resigned from Enterprise project management Office role, and now looking for opportunities in Delivery Management and Operations - also supporting to few SMEs as Consultant. My CSC Friends gave me a good party and few good books too – as a gift. Thanks to Neel, Veera, Shajahan, Sambit, Anthony, Kumbesh, Elumalai, selva and others.
I am yet to read these books but I am happy to share its titles to everyone.
1. JACK – straight from the gut – This book is written by Jack Welch. As CEO of General Electric for the past twenty years, he has built its market cap by over $500 billion and established himself as the most admired business leader in the world. His championing of initiatives like Six Sigma quality, globalization, and e-business have helped define the modern corporation. At the same time, he's a gutsy boss who has forged a unique philosophy and an operating system that relies on a "boundaryless" sharing of ideas, an intense focus on people, and an informal, give-and-take style that makes bureaucracy the enemy. This book is laced with refreshing interludes, such as "A Short Reflection on Golf," that capture Jack's competitiveness and the importance of friendship in his life. JACK: STRAIGHT FROM THE GUT is destined to become both a business classic and a deeply personal journey filled with passion and a sheer lust for life.
2. The Management Gurus – Lessons from the best management books of all time – Chris Lauer - Insightful summaries of fifteen outstanding management books.
3. The New age of Innovation – C.K. Prahalad, M.S. Krishnan - Named one of the "Best Books on Innovation, 2008" by "BusinessWeek" magazine. From the greatest minds in business today comes a groundbreaking new blueprint for executing the next stage of customer-created value. C.K. Prahalad, the world's premier business thinker, and IT scholar M.S. Krishnan unveil the critical missing link in connecting strategy to execution--building organizational capabilities that allow companies to achieve and sustain continuous change and innovation.
Once again, Thanks to everyone. All the best for a great time.
I am yet to read these books but I am happy to share its titles to everyone.
1. JACK – straight from the gut – This book is written by Jack Welch. As CEO of General Electric for the past twenty years, he has built its market cap by over $500 billion and established himself as the most admired business leader in the world. His championing of initiatives like Six Sigma quality, globalization, and e-business have helped define the modern corporation. At the same time, he's a gutsy boss who has forged a unique philosophy and an operating system that relies on a "boundaryless" sharing of ideas, an intense focus on people, and an informal, give-and-take style that makes bureaucracy the enemy. This book is laced with refreshing interludes, such as "A Short Reflection on Golf," that capture Jack's competitiveness and the importance of friendship in his life. JACK: STRAIGHT FROM THE GUT is destined to become both a business classic and a deeply personal journey filled with passion and a sheer lust for life.
2. The Management Gurus – Lessons from the best management books of all time – Chris Lauer - Insightful summaries of fifteen outstanding management books.
3. The New age of Innovation – C.K. Prahalad, M.S. Krishnan - Named one of the "Best Books on Innovation, 2008" by "BusinessWeek" magazine. From the greatest minds in business today comes a groundbreaking new blueprint for executing the next stage of customer-created value. C.K. Prahalad, the world's premier business thinker, and IT scholar M.S. Krishnan unveil the critical missing link in connecting strategy to execution--building organizational capabilities that allow companies to achieve and sustain continuous change and innovation.
Once again, Thanks to everyone. All the best for a great time.
Saturday, May 7, 2011
Management Magazine Websites
In today’s world, the knowledge is the key. Knowledge comes not only through own experiences but also from continuous reading – Yes, I mean Magazines. Magazines will help us to understand the current trends, market and business strategies, views and focus points etc. Many of us are not reading even news paper now days – we all watch it in TV. But reading is a good habit per me. At least – 30 mins of reading can give a message / idea / or solution even. Fine, let me introduce few online magazines – for business managers. Try to visit these websites at least once in a week – or get the RSS feeds.
- Perdido - Features articles, profiles of organizations and their programs, and book reviews in the fields of leadership, human relations, and management
- Selling Power - Magazine for professional selling skills, motivation and sales management know-how in the business- to-business environment.
- strategy+business - Delivers penetrating insights and practical guidance about management, innovation, public policy, strategy, and more.
- Workforce Management - Provides information on employment law, human resource development and human resource management.
- Chief Executive - Magazine written for CEOs and their peers. Provides ideas, strategies and tactics for top executive leaders seeking to build more effective organizations.
- Perdido - Features articles, profiles of organizations and their programs, and book reviews in the fields of leadership, human relations, and management
- Selling Power - Magazine for professional selling skills, motivation and sales management know-how in the business- to-business environment.
- strategy+business - Delivers penetrating insights and practical guidance about management, innovation, public policy, strategy, and more.
- Workforce Management - Provides information on employment law, human resource development and human resource management.
- Chief Executive - Magazine written for CEOs and their peers. Provides ideas, strategies and tactics for top executive leaders seeking to build more effective organizations.
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
Scope Management
Scope Management is an important knowledge area for PMP masters. It is all about making sure that the project includes only the work required to complete the project successfully. Here the success is Time + Quality + Content. To be effective in scope management, the manager must learn to control what is and what is not in the scope of the project. There are some best practices I learned from my discussions with many mangers in recent years.
1. Collect requirements in early stage itself and get a sign-off – It happens by clearly understanding the business of client, by understanding the needs of the stakeholders and the capabilities and constraints of our resources. I suggest interviews as best method of requirement collection. The manager must ask questions about stakeholder’s views of the finished product, the deliverables they expect to receive and mainly the schedule of the project.
2. Change Management Board – Change Control or Change Management board is a group of members including the key technical and management team of the project. The scope of the project should be well defined in a document and shared. Any amount of variation in the scope of the project can affect the project schedule, budget and ultimately the success of the project. The change request should first come into CCB for a discussion. The impact analysis results should be discussed. The approved Change should be published with its impact on other areas to all stakeholders. The change should be logged for any further clarifications. The roll-back scenarios should be planned.
There are more, lets discuss in coming days.
1. Collect requirements in early stage itself and get a sign-off – It happens by clearly understanding the business of client, by understanding the needs of the stakeholders and the capabilities and constraints of our resources. I suggest interviews as best method of requirement collection. The manager must ask questions about stakeholder’s views of the finished product, the deliverables they expect to receive and mainly the schedule of the project.
2. Change Management Board – Change Control or Change Management board is a group of members including the key technical and management team of the project. The scope of the project should be well defined in a document and shared. Any amount of variation in the scope of the project can affect the project schedule, budget and ultimately the success of the project. The change request should first come into CCB for a discussion. The impact analysis results should be discussed. The approved Change should be published with its impact on other areas to all stakeholders. The change should be logged for any further clarifications. The roll-back scenarios should be planned.
There are more, lets discuss in coming days.
Thursday, December 16, 2010
Project Management and Trends
Changing or additional requirements are the leading cause of project delays, according to the results of a recent Survey Says online poll by ProjectsAtWork. Project management practitioners also cite lack of stakeholder involvement and poor communication as common reasons that projects fall behind schedule.
The September 2010 poll found that 41 percent of respondents said that “additional or changing requirements” were the No. 1 reason for project delays, followed by “lack of stakeholder involvement or knowledge” (30 percent) and “poor communication” (24 percent). Only 5 percent said “new or unfamiliar processes or technologies” were a cause for project delays.
Asked to choose the No. 2 reason for project delays, 35 percent of respondents chose changing requirements, followed by poor communication (29 percent), lack of stakeholder involvement (21 percent) and unfamiliar processes (14 percent).
The September 2010 poll found that 41 percent of respondents said that “additional or changing requirements” were the No. 1 reason for project delays, followed by “lack of stakeholder involvement or knowledge” (30 percent) and “poor communication” (24 percent). Only 5 percent said “new or unfamiliar processes or technologies” were a cause for project delays.
Asked to choose the No. 2 reason for project delays, 35 percent of respondents chose changing requirements, followed by poor communication (29 percent), lack of stakeholder involvement (21 percent) and unfamiliar processes (14 percent).
Friday, October 29, 2010
Book Review: THE LEADER WHO HAD NO TITLE – Robin Sharma
I am a great fan of Robin Sharma through his books “The monk who sold his Ferrari” and “The Greatness Guide”. Robin Sharma – for more than 15 years, has been sharing with fortune 500 companies and many of the super-rich in success formula that had made him one of the most sought-after leadership advisers in the world. This book helps us to understand how to work with and influence people like a super star, regardless of our position. It supports us with real world ways to defeat stress, build and unbeatable mind-set, unleash energy, and balance our personal life. There are few good posters inside – worth to stick in our desk to motivate ourselves. The language is little complex, but manageable.
Saturday, October 2, 2010
Conflict Management – Key Guidelines for Managers
Conflict Management in Office Workspace is a critical challenge for many managers – including me. Conflict is when two or more values, perspectives and opinions are contradictory in nature and haven't been aligned or agreed about yet, including:
1. Within yourself when you're not living according to your values;
2. When your values and perspectives are threatened; or
3. Discomfort from fear of the unknown or from lack of fulfillment.
Conflict is inevitable and often good, for example, good teams always go through a "form, storm, norm and perform" period. Getting the most out of diversity means often-contradictory values, perspectives and opinions.
"Conflict is not the same as discomfort. The conflict isn't the problem - it is when conflict is poorly managed that is the problem."
Conflict becomes a severe problem when it:
1. Hampers productivity.
2. Lowers morale.
3. Causes more and continued conflicts.
In my experiences, the primary managerial actions that cause Workplace conflicts are Poor communications and leadership problems.
Poor communication makes the following causes.
a. Employees experience continuing surprises, they aren't informed of new decisions, programs, etc.
b. Employees don't understand reasons for decisions, they aren't involved in decision-making.
c. As a result, employees trust the "rumor mill" more than management.
Leadership problems including inconsistent, missing, too-strong or uninformed leadership (at any level in the organization), evidenced by:
a. Avoiding conflict, "passing the buck" with little follow-through on decisions.
b. Employees see the same continued issues in the workplace.
c. Supervisors don't understand the jobs of their subordinates.
Fine, these all happens with most of the situations – but how to manage it. My mentor suggested few Key Managerial Actions / Structures to Minimize Conflicts. I am listing them below.
1. Regularly review job descriptions.
2. Intentionally build relationships with all subordinates and discuss about accomplishments, plans, challenges and issues.
3. Develop procedures for routine tasks and include the employees' input - review with employees, and distribute it. If required provide training.
4. Regularly hold management meetings, for example, every month, to communicate new initiatives and status of current programs.
5. Consider an anonymous suggestion box in which employees can provide suggestions.
More few ways for Conflict Management – from the people I discussed about this challenge. Actually, there is no one best way to deal with conflict. It depends on the current situation.
1. Avoid it. Pretend it is not there or ignore it.
2. Accommodate it. Give in to others, sometimes to the extent that you compromise yourself.
3. Competing. Work to get your way, rather than clarifying and addressing the issue. Competitors love accommodators.
4. Compromising. Mutual give-and-take
5. Collaborating. Focus on working together.
The case by case challenges can give us more lessons – learning it solves many issues, and makes us good managers in future.
1. Within yourself when you're not living according to your values;
2. When your values and perspectives are threatened; or
3. Discomfort from fear of the unknown or from lack of fulfillment.
Conflict is inevitable and often good, for example, good teams always go through a "form, storm, norm and perform" period. Getting the most out of diversity means often-contradictory values, perspectives and opinions.
"Conflict is not the same as discomfort. The conflict isn't the problem - it is when conflict is poorly managed that is the problem."
Conflict becomes a severe problem when it:
1. Hampers productivity.
2. Lowers morale.
3. Causes more and continued conflicts.
In my experiences, the primary managerial actions that cause Workplace conflicts are Poor communications and leadership problems.
Poor communication makes the following causes.
a. Employees experience continuing surprises, they aren't informed of new decisions, programs, etc.
b. Employees don't understand reasons for decisions, they aren't involved in decision-making.
c. As a result, employees trust the "rumor mill" more than management.
Leadership problems including inconsistent, missing, too-strong or uninformed leadership (at any level in the organization), evidenced by:
a. Avoiding conflict, "passing the buck" with little follow-through on decisions.
b. Employees see the same continued issues in the workplace.
c. Supervisors don't understand the jobs of their subordinates.
Fine, these all happens with most of the situations – but how to manage it. My mentor suggested few Key Managerial Actions / Structures to Minimize Conflicts. I am listing them below.
1. Regularly review job descriptions.
2. Intentionally build relationships with all subordinates and discuss about accomplishments, plans, challenges and issues.
3. Develop procedures for routine tasks and include the employees' input - review with employees, and distribute it. If required provide training.
4. Regularly hold management meetings, for example, every month, to communicate new initiatives and status of current programs.
5. Consider an anonymous suggestion box in which employees can provide suggestions.
More few ways for Conflict Management – from the people I discussed about this challenge. Actually, there is no one best way to deal with conflict. It depends on the current situation.
1. Avoid it. Pretend it is not there or ignore it.
2. Accommodate it. Give in to others, sometimes to the extent that you compromise yourself.
3. Competing. Work to get your way, rather than clarifying and addressing the issue. Competitors love accommodators.
4. Compromising. Mutual give-and-take
5. Collaborating. Focus on working together.
The case by case challenges can give us more lessons – learning it solves many issues, and makes us good managers in future.
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Executive EPMO Dashboards
Executive Dashboards are key IT requirements now days in many EPMO Groups. It is a tool that provides you with a graphical view of the progress of your project, so that you can see at a glance whether you're on track. It's basically a set of Charts that gives you the current status of the project at any time. You can create the Charts manually in Excel, or use smart software that does it for you.
Recently I delivered design specification for a client, for their Executive EPMO dashboard application. Let me share some observations regarding constructing a dashboard, so that it can be helpful for those, who are into same kind of processes.
Define the success criteria of Project: list the things that determine the success of your project – for example schedule, quality, resource loading, budget tracking, key milestones etc.
Collect required data from real time: The project data needed to measure the success criteria we have already defined. The data can come from project plans, quality reports, issue spreadsheets, budget reports, Timesheets, Change/Issue/Risk Logs etc.
Model Graphical Views: Filter your data, sort them into groups and file it all in one place – mostly a database. Use Reporting engines to generate appropriate graphical views. There are many available for .NET and Java based platforms. I see many for PHP / Open source too.
Let’s see some most wanted Charts required in Executive EPMO Dashboard.
Time Charts: Required for schedule tracking. Planned versus actual completion status for key milestones can be showed. Critical Paths and their status can be added here. Summarized view of this data will help to find out whether the project is ahead of behind schedule. A detailed Task level progress chart can be a presented in drill-down manner. Group them in “Not Started”, “Not Completed”, “In-Progress” and “Complete” - and show dependencies always.
Budget / Cost Chart: Required for Budget Management. I suggest calculating the total cost of resources, materials, equipments and any expense forms completed by staff and present them single view. Earned value, Cost comparison charts can also be added.
Resource Usage: This report can be generated from Project plans. The resource graphs from project plans gives us clear view about over-loaded or underutilized resourced.
Risk Reports: Give a graphical view of Risks, Issues and changes that will have impact on delivery timelines. Show dependencies wherever required. This report can be generated from Log Files. The data in graphical view should be grouped as low, medium and high impact.
There are many Executive Dashboards available in online for reference – I suggest projectmanager.com – just give a try.
Let us discuss more about defining best practices in working with Dashboard development in near future.
Recently I delivered design specification for a client, for their Executive EPMO dashboard application. Let me share some observations regarding constructing a dashboard, so that it can be helpful for those, who are into same kind of processes.
Define the success criteria of Project: list the things that determine the success of your project – for example schedule, quality, resource loading, budget tracking, key milestones etc.
Collect required data from real time: The project data needed to measure the success criteria we have already defined. The data can come from project plans, quality reports, issue spreadsheets, budget reports, Timesheets, Change/Issue/Risk Logs etc.
Model Graphical Views: Filter your data, sort them into groups and file it all in one place – mostly a database. Use Reporting engines to generate appropriate graphical views. There are many available for .NET and Java based platforms. I see many for PHP / Open source too.
Let’s see some most wanted Charts required in Executive EPMO Dashboard.
Time Charts: Required for schedule tracking. Planned versus actual completion status for key milestones can be showed. Critical Paths and their status can be added here. Summarized view of this data will help to find out whether the project is ahead of behind schedule. A detailed Task level progress chart can be a presented in drill-down manner. Group them in “Not Started”, “Not Completed”, “In-Progress” and “Complete” - and show dependencies always.
Budget / Cost Chart: Required for Budget Management. I suggest calculating the total cost of resources, materials, equipments and any expense forms completed by staff and present them single view. Earned value, Cost comparison charts can also be added.
Resource Usage: This report can be generated from Project plans. The resource graphs from project plans gives us clear view about over-loaded or underutilized resourced.
Risk Reports: Give a graphical view of Risks, Issues and changes that will have impact on delivery timelines. Show dependencies wherever required. This report can be generated from Log Files. The data in graphical view should be grouped as low, medium and high impact.
There are many Executive Dashboards available in online for reference – I suggest projectmanager.com – just give a try.
Let us discuss more about defining best practices in working with Dashboard development in near future.
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Success in Fixed Bid Projects
Improving the success rate of fixed bid Projects is a challenge for any project manager in IT services. Most of the service projects come with tight deadline and requirements unfreeze. In my experience, in most of the small and medium size organizations, the pre-sales and sales team decides the timeline based on their rough estimations. The project comes to project manager as a semi-finished document, with fixed final delivery date. The success rate improves with quality management, scope management, communications management, and of course Issue management. Let us discuss few important points, which can help the project managers to achieve success rate in their fixed bid projects. This can be applied to T&M, and Retainer projects too, based on few or no modifications.
1. In the project Initiation meeting, make sure that your customer defines their requirements in detail – at the maximum level. You need to know exactly what it is that must be delivered, to whom and when. Try to make it specific, write it up formally and get them sign it off. This document will become the basis upon which to measure your success.
2. Try to involve your customer throughout the entire project lifecycle – including analysis and planning as well as executions. Inform about every status, including the risks. This helps us to manage their expectations. Make sure the communication is happening with right information at right time. Weekly status reports, regular weekly calls and use defined templates as much as possible.
3. Plan your delivery timelines short and more realistic. I suggest never agree to lengthy timelines. If possible, split your project into “mini-phases” – and keep them short – less than 4 weeks. This keeps everyone motivated and focused on targets. Let every “mini-phase” include a milestone and add delivery deadlines to your milestones. Try to deliver the commitment on every deadline, no matter what. If you can’t deliver, inform your customer about it as early as possible and give them realistic re-scheduled plan.
4. Organize a small change control board which includes your sales team, account manager and customer. Only authorize changes to your project scope if there is no impact on immediate and final timelines. Get approval from Change control board and then get their buy-in to extend the delivery dates if you need to.
5. Let the Quality be the most important achievement anytime. Keep it high with your deliverables as much as possible. Constantly review quality and never let it slip. Implement “peer-reviews”, external reviews, and web-Ex demos with customer to improve the solution, and to meet your customer’s needs.
6. For every phase – including the mini-phases, with their integrated phases – hand it formally over to customers and get them to sign an acceptance form to say that it meets their expectations. It makes your deliverable 100% complete.
7. Issues Management is an important phase – in support level. Plan about handling your issues and risks as soon as they are identified. Prioritize and resolve them before any impact in project. If required, prepare a separate issue management plan and publish regular burn-down chart.
Share with me, your experiences and techniques in improving success rate of fixed bid projects. It can help us to discuss more.
1. In the project Initiation meeting, make sure that your customer defines their requirements in detail – at the maximum level. You need to know exactly what it is that must be delivered, to whom and when. Try to make it specific, write it up formally and get them sign it off. This document will become the basis upon which to measure your success.
2. Try to involve your customer throughout the entire project lifecycle – including analysis and planning as well as executions. Inform about every status, including the risks. This helps us to manage their expectations. Make sure the communication is happening with right information at right time. Weekly status reports, regular weekly calls and use defined templates as much as possible.
3. Plan your delivery timelines short and more realistic. I suggest never agree to lengthy timelines. If possible, split your project into “mini-phases” – and keep them short – less than 4 weeks. This keeps everyone motivated and focused on targets. Let every “mini-phase” include a milestone and add delivery deadlines to your milestones. Try to deliver the commitment on every deadline, no matter what. If you can’t deliver, inform your customer about it as early as possible and give them realistic re-scheduled plan.
4. Organize a small change control board which includes your sales team, account manager and customer. Only authorize changes to your project scope if there is no impact on immediate and final timelines. Get approval from Change control board and then get their buy-in to extend the delivery dates if you need to.
5. Let the Quality be the most important achievement anytime. Keep it high with your deliverables as much as possible. Constantly review quality and never let it slip. Implement “peer-reviews”, external reviews, and web-Ex demos with customer to improve the solution, and to meet your customer’s needs.
6. For every phase – including the mini-phases, with their integrated phases – hand it formally over to customers and get them to sign an acceptance form to say that it meets their expectations. It makes your deliverable 100% complete.
7. Issues Management is an important phase – in support level. Plan about handling your issues and risks as soon as they are identified. Prioritize and resolve them before any impact in project. If required, prepare a separate issue management plan and publish regular burn-down chart.
Share with me, your experiences and techniques in improving success rate of fixed bid projects. It can help us to discuss more.
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
PMO for Medium Size Organizations
PMO – Project Management Office is becoming an interesting keyword now days in many medium size organizations too. When a project manager hears that PMP is going to be established, the first thought would be “MORE ADMIN WORKS”. Actually … NO it is NOT.
Let’s see the Top 7 advantages of PMO in medium size organizations
1. Improve project portfolio management. A PMO can help you select the mix of projects that will most effectively meet strategic objectives. IT leaders need to make sure that their IT projects are not in a silo, but connected to the company's larger objectives.
2. Provide project support. A PMO can be a conduit for project management guidance to project managers in other business units. Think about the pockets of project management excellence that you have and how powerful it would be to spread the expertise around.
3. Create a project management process and methodology. A PMO can develop and implement a consistent, standardized process so that you aren't constantly reinventing the wheel.
4. Conduct training. A PMO can build training programs and develop a staff of program managers who can manage multiple projects across the enterprise. This is especially important for IT leaders in a world where technology is a critical part of an organization's efficiency.
5. Establish a home base for project managers. A PMO can create a centralized office from which project managers operate as a cohesive team that works across the organization.
6. Become internal consultants and mentors. A PMO becomes valuable when it can share best practices and help to educate managers throughout a company.
7. Assess project management software tools. Part of a PMO's job is to select and maintain project management software that will be useful for the capabilities of the staff.
PMO creates work with a value – in fact a meaningful work. It needs to be a living breathing system within any organization. The overall control and accountability are important outcomes.
Let’s see the Top 7 advantages of PMO in medium size organizations
1. Improve project portfolio management. A PMO can help you select the mix of projects that will most effectively meet strategic objectives. IT leaders need to make sure that their IT projects are not in a silo, but connected to the company's larger objectives.
2. Provide project support. A PMO can be a conduit for project management guidance to project managers in other business units. Think about the pockets of project management excellence that you have and how powerful it would be to spread the expertise around.
3. Create a project management process and methodology. A PMO can develop and implement a consistent, standardized process so that you aren't constantly reinventing the wheel.
4. Conduct training. A PMO can build training programs and develop a staff of program managers who can manage multiple projects across the enterprise. This is especially important for IT leaders in a world where technology is a critical part of an organization's efficiency.
5. Establish a home base for project managers. A PMO can create a centralized office from which project managers operate as a cohesive team that works across the organization.
6. Become internal consultants and mentors. A PMO becomes valuable when it can share best practices and help to educate managers throughout a company.
7. Assess project management software tools. Part of a PMO's job is to select and maintain project management software that will be useful for the capabilities of the staff.
PMO creates work with a value – in fact a meaningful work. It needs to be a living breathing system within any organization. The overall control and accountability are important outcomes.
Friday, May 28, 2010
Top 10 smartphones of 2010
Smartphones are hot right now and no matter what carrier you are with there are excellent choices available. Check out these press photos of the top 10 available or announced and stay tuned for even more great phones coming soon. http://content.techrepublic.com.com/2346-13630_11-426342.html?tag=nl.e004
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Enterprise Program Management Office
In recent days, whenever I introduce myself to anyone as EPMO project planning manager, they ask - “What is EPMO?” - :-). Enterprise Program Management Office is really new to many of the small and medium size organizations, because of less experience in such big projects. Let me take this opportunity to discuss few major points about EPMO and its operations here.
What is EPMO, and its responsibilities?
As a quick view Enterprise Program Management Office helps to speed up project implementations within existing company guidelines and improves efficiency in the realizations of the business delivery.
The main responsibilities of an EPMO regarding the different programs are basically
1. Strategic Resource Planning
2. Inter-project co-ordination
3. Overall project oversight
4. Cost estimations
5. Contingency planning
6. Quality Assurance
7. Resource Management
8. Professional Development
9. Coaching & Guidance of Management
10. Process and Change Management
11. Tool Support and Training
In our future articles, let’s discuss more about every single functional sections of EPMO…
What is EPMO, and its responsibilities?
As a quick view Enterprise Program Management Office helps to speed up project implementations within existing company guidelines and improves efficiency in the realizations of the business delivery.
The main responsibilities of an EPMO regarding the different programs are basically
1. Strategic Resource Planning
2. Inter-project co-ordination
3. Overall project oversight
4. Cost estimations
5. Contingency planning
6. Quality Assurance
7. Resource Management
8. Professional Development
9. Coaching & Guidance of Management
10. Process and Change Management
11. Tool Support and Training
In our future articles, let’s discuss more about every single functional sections of EPMO…
Friday, April 9, 2010
10 Social Networking Tasks you can do with Opera
Yes, Opera – the well-known champion in Web and Mobile Browser World, is now offering Social Networking site. The best thing is it can be connected through computers, also via Mobile devices. There are many social networking websites available around us, and everyone is providing almost same types of services. Let’s see, what Opera provides us
1. 1 GB Space – store everything you want…!
2. Sync Notes, Favorites, Speed Dial Links – create quick notes in your Opera Desktop browser and sync them with your mobile mini browser, also store them in your profile for community sharing. The same you can do with your favorites and Speed Dial URLs. Take your personalized stuff with you anywhere.!
3. Blogs – Post your blogs from Desktop, share them with your friends – also from your mobile. Opera offers excellent Moveable Type API for mobile and desktop blogging. This is the first mobi blogging social network website with their own tools for mobile and desktop.
4. Create new photo albums and share them with your friends – as mentioned earlier- you can do this with your mobile too.
5. Invite friends – create a group with specialized interest and share your blogs, albums. Create your own groups with excellent graphical templates.
6. Opera Unite services - You can use Opera Unite services in many ways, for example to share photos directly from your computer to another computer, without having to upload them to the Web. All you have to do is to install and run the Opera browser.
7. Connect with Facebook and Twitter – now you can connect your facebook and twitter with opera social network and reflect your opera updates to friends in twitter and facebook.
8. An Open forum to discuss about your questions, suggestions, Opera tools and services, updates from opera, development support, widgets, etc.
9. A free email – can be accessed from mobile.
10. Opera Mini 4.0 supports not only for high-end mobiles – but also for simple feature phones – for ex: nokia S40 series devices
URL: http://my.opera.com/community/
I invite you all to explore these services and suggest opera for more quality services.
Note: Re-post from SiliconIndia Blog
1. 1 GB Space – store everything you want…!
2. Sync Notes, Favorites, Speed Dial Links – create quick notes in your Opera Desktop browser and sync them with your mobile mini browser, also store them in your profile for community sharing. The same you can do with your favorites and Speed Dial URLs. Take your personalized stuff with you anywhere.!
3. Blogs – Post your blogs from Desktop, share them with your friends – also from your mobile. Opera offers excellent Moveable Type API for mobile and desktop blogging. This is the first mobi blogging social network website with their own tools for mobile and desktop.
4. Create new photo albums and share them with your friends – as mentioned earlier- you can do this with your mobile too.
5. Invite friends – create a group with specialized interest and share your blogs, albums. Create your own groups with excellent graphical templates.
6. Opera Unite services - You can use Opera Unite services in many ways, for example to share photos directly from your computer to another computer, without having to upload them to the Web. All you have to do is to install and run the Opera browser.
7. Connect with Facebook and Twitter – now you can connect your facebook and twitter with opera social network and reflect your opera updates to friends in twitter and facebook.
8. An Open forum to discuss about your questions, suggestions, Opera tools and services, updates from opera, development support, widgets, etc.
9. A free email – can be accessed from mobile.
10. Opera Mini 4.0 supports not only for high-end mobiles – but also for simple feature phones – for ex: nokia S40 series devices
URL: http://my.opera.com/community/
I invite you all to explore these services and suggest opera for more quality services.
Note: Re-post from SiliconIndia Blog
Professional communications
Now days, the Indian economy is getting better after the big bad recession times. It is good for everyone to get into business. Everything goes fine in many small and medium size organizations – but I feel adding little more values in good communication makes most of the work flow, and performance even better. I would like to share few suggestions here about building a good communication for small and medium size business clients’ management.
1. A simple communication plan should contain following information
a. Stakeholder Information – I prefer to have names, email IDs and phone numbers
b. The objectives, schedules and mode of communication – what information will be communicated in what schedules. For example: Weekly Status Calls, Status Reports, monthly reports, Issues and risks discussions, etc.
2. Use your minutes of meeting document
a. Have a clear agenda – this saves times in meetings
b. Summary of Discussions – important comments from stakeholders
c. Action Items and Status monitoring
d. Have an action Item log for continuous follow ups and results
3. Weekly Status Report
a. I prefer to have content from Project plan here.
b. What is completed, what is re-scheduled and what is not completed / not started should be informed. Not started and not completed should be rescheduled and communicated.
c. Achieved milestones should be mentioned
d. Issues, Risks and concerns should be notified
e. Important decisions made by stakeholders should be added in every week status report
4. Customer Calls – Conference calls, Mobile Calls
a. I suggest to take calls as much as possible from inside closed room – this gives chances to listen clear and white board important points
b. Listen carefully – most of client communications will not be clear enough – sometimes, language, sometimes their way of presentations and sometimes because of their understanding of situations. [This is based on my personal experience J]
c. Talk loud and clear – Don’t talk fast – be slow, and if required get confirmations for his understanding
d. Record your call – if possible.
e. Circulate Minutes of Meeting as early as possible after the call
Note: Re-post from SiliconIndia Blog
1. A simple communication plan should contain following information
a. Stakeholder Information – I prefer to have names, email IDs and phone numbers
b. The objectives, schedules and mode of communication – what information will be communicated in what schedules. For example: Weekly Status Calls, Status Reports, monthly reports, Issues and risks discussions, etc.
2. Use your minutes of meeting document
a. Have a clear agenda – this saves times in meetings
b. Summary of Discussions – important comments from stakeholders
c. Action Items and Status monitoring
d. Have an action Item log for continuous follow ups and results
3. Weekly Status Report
a. I prefer to have content from Project plan here.
b. What is completed, what is re-scheduled and what is not completed / not started should be informed. Not started and not completed should be rescheduled and communicated.
c. Achieved milestones should be mentioned
d. Issues, Risks and concerns should be notified
e. Important decisions made by stakeholders should be added in every week status report
4. Customer Calls – Conference calls, Mobile Calls
a. I suggest to take calls as much as possible from inside closed room – this gives chances to listen clear and white board important points
b. Listen carefully – most of client communications will not be clear enough – sometimes, language, sometimes their way of presentations and sometimes because of their understanding of situations. [This is based on my personal experience J]
c. Talk loud and clear – Don’t talk fast – be slow, and if required get confirmations for his understanding
d. Record your call – if possible.
e. Circulate Minutes of Meeting as early as possible after the call
Note: Re-post from SiliconIndia Blog
Nokia OVI
Are you using your Mobile phone just for the communication with your contacts? Do you want to do more with it useful? Well, Nokia gives an option to use your “NOKIA” mobile device more useful - as an Appointment manager, Birthday reminder, Notes manager and Contacts Database with more detail information such as address, website and others.
I heard your voice – almost every mobile phone around us is having all these facilities – what is the special with Nokia..!!
The common problem with all other phones: Mobile Keypad. Typing content in small mobile keypad is a painful thing – so many of us never use it for detail content typing. We use it for quick small data typing only. Now the Solution: How about using your computer for data entry – that too in a web site – so, no junky download required.
Visit Nokia OVI website (www.ovi.com), register yourself with you mobile information. Now you can create and manage contacts database, Appointments and reminders, also notes for quick information reference. If you have GPRS enabled Nokia mobile device – Go to “Settings”-> “Sync-backup” –> “server Sync” and select your required options – Notes, Contacts, Calendar. The next step will connect with remote OVI site – with your username and password – to sync up whatever you created in remote website. Your Mobile device is fully loaded with required information now. You can use it as an Appointment / Birthday manager, Quick notes manager also a detail contacts manager.
Hope this will help everyone to use their simple mobile device just like any other costly mobile sets.
Why spend in costly mobile devices – go to Nokia simple devices less then Rs. 10,000 and use it as your best content manager.
I heard your voice – almost every mobile phone around us is having all these facilities – what is the special with Nokia..!!
The common problem with all other phones: Mobile Keypad. Typing content in small mobile keypad is a painful thing – so many of us never use it for detail content typing. We use it for quick small data typing only. Now the Solution: How about using your computer for data entry – that too in a web site – so, no junky download required.
Visit Nokia OVI website (www.ovi.com), register yourself with you mobile information. Now you can create and manage contacts database, Appointments and reminders, also notes for quick information reference. If you have GPRS enabled Nokia mobile device – Go to “Settings”-> “Sync-backup” –> “server Sync” and select your required options – Notes, Contacts, Calendar. The next step will connect with remote OVI site – with your username and password – to sync up whatever you created in remote website. Your Mobile device is fully loaded with required information now. You can use it as an Appointment / Birthday manager, Quick notes manager also a detail contacts manager.
Hope this will help everyone to use their simple mobile device just like any other costly mobile sets.
Why spend in costly mobile devices – go to Nokia simple devices less then Rs. 10,000 and use it as your best content manager.
5 Points – why Gmail for Mobile is the best
Google released its official application for mobile email. The website [http://www.google.com/mobile/products/mail.html#p=default] suggests only high level phones – window mobile, IPhone, Android, Blackberry, Nokia S60 and other. The word “other” made me try it in my feature phone – Nokia S40 – 3210 Classic. Surprise – it works. The performance is more than expected.
1. It is fast – loads very fast, and shows clean fonts.
2. It connects with GPRS only while loading your inbox with new email, sending emails, refreshing your inbox or opening attachments. That means, it disconnects while you are just browsing email headers. This helps a lot in saving GPRS cost.
3. Multiple Accounts management – Wow – a great thing I expected. With Gmail for mobile – you can create multiple profiles with your account information (I have 3 gmail accounts), and switch your inbox anytime. No need to enter your username and password each time when you want to check other account.
4. Gmail for Mobile contains almost all the features you see in web mail. Reply, Reply to all, forward, Star, drafts, Search emails, etc etc.
5. It works with feature phones too - (ah, the personal benefit…) .. Feature phones are cheap compare to Smart phones and those high level blackberries… but now a days I am happy to see many vendors are providing apps for feature phones too.
An extra valid point – It is “FREE”…
Just give a try and send me your comments.
1. It is fast – loads very fast, and shows clean fonts.
2. It connects with GPRS only while loading your inbox with new email, sending emails, refreshing your inbox or opening attachments. That means, it disconnects while you are just browsing email headers. This helps a lot in saving GPRS cost.
3. Multiple Accounts management – Wow – a great thing I expected. With Gmail for mobile – you can create multiple profiles with your account information (I have 3 gmail accounts), and switch your inbox anytime. No need to enter your username and password each time when you want to check other account.
4. Gmail for Mobile contains almost all the features you see in web mail. Reply, Reply to all, forward, Star, drafts, Search emails, etc etc.
5. It works with feature phones too - (ah, the personal benefit…) .. Feature phones are cheap compare to Smart phones and those high level blackberries… but now a days I am happy to see many vendors are providing apps for feature phones too.
An extra valid point – It is “FREE”…
Just give a try and send me your comments.
Thursday, April 8, 2010
6 Microsoft Office Live Workspace Services for Better Project Management
Every project - regardless of its complexity and budget, requires lots of planning, organization, co-ordination and communication between members. In early days we used MS-Excel for scheduling and tracking tasks and member activities, after few years - it moved to MS-Project standalone and MS-project server editions. Now days, there are many small and medium size organizations, working into Web 2.0 and Mobile Development projects and their investment is less – practically the implementation of project management server is becoming a costly thing. But they have requirements to plan, organize and share contents with stakeholders. Microsoft Office Live workspace helps here with lots of useful services – all for FREE.
1. Visit here [http://workspace.officelive.com/en-GB/ ] and use your Office Live ID or MSN ID to log-in. Don’t have an ID – No problem. Create a new ID for FREE.
2. Free Web Space to Store and Share Documents – It is good to store and share your SRS Documents, Bug Reports, Log Files, Specification documents in one place. Microsoft Office Live Workspace helps you with 5 GB space. You can Store your documents, Sheets, scripts and Presentations and share them with access limitations – if required. You can also use this space to deploy your content to clients – Just like an FTP.
3. There are many free Pre-built template Web-spaces available for quick start. You can choose from one of them and start working on documents. For every new project I suggest to have separate Workspaces.
4. You can create Small Notes, Lists, Tasks Lists, Contact Lists, Event Lists
a. Small Notes – helps you for quick information storage – I suggest this for instructions management – for example: Release notes, Updates in current build etc.
b. Lists – General list – it can be books list for reference, web links, or sample data for testing etc.
c. Tasks List – Create a simple Work Breakdown Structure of Tasks and set priority with due dates. You can share this with your tea m and stakeholders. It helps to give better visibility of planned works to everyone.
d. Contact List – Store Phone numbers, Email IDs and share them for quick reference.
e. Event List – Schedules of your releases, builds, holidays, milestones etc.
5. You can also store, edit and share familiar MS word, MS Excel and MS Power-point files.
6. For Quick communications – use comments pane. Add comments and it is visible to everyone. Use this for instructions, quick requests etc.
7. You can use “Add Documents” for uploading files from your Desktop. It can be shared via a centralized workspace.
I hope this will help many project leaders to handle their projects and deliver things efficiently.
1. Visit here [http://workspace.officelive.com/en-GB/ ] and use your Office Live ID or MSN ID to log-in. Don’t have an ID – No problem. Create a new ID for FREE.
2. Free Web Space to Store and Share Documents – It is good to store and share your SRS Documents, Bug Reports, Log Files, Specification documents in one place. Microsoft Office Live Workspace helps you with 5 GB space. You can Store your documents, Sheets, scripts and Presentations and share them with access limitations – if required. You can also use this space to deploy your content to clients – Just like an FTP.
3. There are many free Pre-built template Web-spaces available for quick start. You can choose from one of them and start working on documents. For every new project I suggest to have separate Workspaces.
4. You can create Small Notes, Lists, Tasks Lists, Contact Lists, Event Lists
a. Small Notes – helps you for quick information storage – I suggest this for instructions management – for example: Release notes, Updates in current build etc.
b. Lists – General list – it can be books list for reference, web links, or sample data for testing etc.
c. Tasks List – Create a simple Work Breakdown Structure of Tasks and set priority with due dates. You can share this with your tea m and stakeholders. It helps to give better visibility of planned works to everyone.
d. Contact List – Store Phone numbers, Email IDs and share them for quick reference.
e. Event List – Schedules of your releases, builds, holidays, milestones etc.
5. You can also store, edit and share familiar MS word, MS Excel and MS Power-point files.
6. For Quick communications – use comments pane. Add comments and it is visible to everyone. Use this for instructions, quick requests etc.
7. You can use “Add Documents” for uploading files from your Desktop. It can be shared via a centralized workspace.
I hope this will help many project leaders to handle their projects and deliver things efficiently.
Wednesday, April 7, 2010
USB Flash Drives – The maximum usage
Many are using USB Flash Drives, just to store mp3 songs, PDF files and other backup files. But it can be used for many official purposes – some of them are cost effective for your business too.
Portable application Suite – Imagine, if you can use your browsers, office applications, media players, IMs, and email clients from an USB drive. The advantages are – you can carry them with you anywhere – not only the applications, but the bookmarks, settings and personalized configurations. You can work in your favorite applications from anywhere – even from the browsing center computer – no need to check for any software there – all you have it in your USB.!! Yes – the free Portable application suite from portableapps.com makes this possible. Just install your required applications in USB and take it anywhere – plug-in to any windows PC – and start working..! Wonderful, Isn’t it..!!
Secure PC/Laptop – Use your USB drive as a Hardware security key for your Personal computer or Laptops. There are many tools available but “Predator” performs well here – While working on Windows PC/Laptop, just plug-in your USB Drive – ‘Predator’ auto-starts – You can continue your work. When you are away from your PC/Laptop – just remove the USB drive, the Keyboard and mouse will be disabled and the screen will become dark. To bring it back to life – just plug-in USB drive again. No one can access your PC/Laptop when you are away from your place – because all the input and output devices are disabled. PREDATOR disables the Windows task manager when you unplug the USB drive. Nobody can stop it with Ctrl-Alt-Del. Also this tool frequently changes the security codes recorded on your USB drive. If an intruder manages to copy your stick, this copy will not work because the codes on your own stick will have changed in the meantime.
Use your USB drive more intelligent ways and save the cost - Personally and Professionally.
Note: Re-post from SiliconIndia Blog
Portable application Suite – Imagine, if you can use your browsers, office applications, media players, IMs, and email clients from an USB drive. The advantages are – you can carry them with you anywhere – not only the applications, but the bookmarks, settings and personalized configurations. You can work in your favorite applications from anywhere – even from the browsing center computer – no need to check for any software there – all you have it in your USB.!! Yes – the free Portable application suite from portableapps.com makes this possible. Just install your required applications in USB and take it anywhere – plug-in to any windows PC – and start working..! Wonderful, Isn’t it..!!
Secure PC/Laptop – Use your USB drive as a Hardware security key for your Personal computer or Laptops. There are many tools available but “Predator” performs well here – While working on Windows PC/Laptop, just plug-in your USB Drive – ‘Predator’ auto-starts – You can continue your work. When you are away from your PC/Laptop – just remove the USB drive, the Keyboard and mouse will be disabled and the screen will become dark. To bring it back to life – just plug-in USB drive again. No one can access your PC/Laptop when you are away from your place – because all the input and output devices are disabled. PREDATOR disables the Windows task manager when you unplug the USB drive. Nobody can stop it with Ctrl-Alt-Del. Also this tool frequently changes the security codes recorded on your USB drive. If an intruder manages to copy your stick, this copy will not work because the codes on your own stick will have changed in the meantime.
Use your USB drive more intelligent ways and save the cost - Personally and Professionally.
Note: Re-post from SiliconIndia Blog
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