Mastering Your Work

David Allen is known for great training and tools to help people and organizations efficiently manage work.  Check out David Allen's website for some great information!


David Allen wrote an article for the NYT this past weekend. Check it out here!


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Estimating Project Management Tasks

As stated so eloquently by Bob Lewis in his book "IS Survival Guide", There is no way for you to successfully estimate projects. Take that as a given. It can't be done, and for a very simple reason: Every one of your projects is one-of-a-kind. Mr. Lewis makes a very good point, however in my experience, I have yet to have met a manager that will let me get away with saying "I can't estimate this project".

SO WHAT IS A PROJECT MANAGER TO DO?

I like to call the solution to this problem rolling-wave estimating. By that I mean when the project is in the initiation phase and you have very little information your estimate should reflect that fact. This means very early in the project your estimate(s) could be off by as much as +200/-75% (or more). As you progress through the project planning phase you will breakdown the project into smaller, more manageable pieces of work (decomposition). This process helps to narrow the range of your estimates.

Do not be fooled into thinking that because you have broken down your project into phases and/or small manageable pieces of work that you can just add up the estimates and have a total overall project estimate. Many times, especially on IT projects, there are integration issues that are difficult to estimate and are usually ignored in the planning phase. Do not forget to add time for these critical integration activities. Also, while padding of estimates is a no-no, don't forget to account for risk in your project estimates. PMI advocates for contingency and management reserves to account for risk events, but I have not worked in an environment where these exist so I have to plan for risk in my estimates.

Be smart when estimating and realize that in the IT world estimates are always wrong and tasks are always underestimated.

What is Project Management Value?

Project value can’t be dictated; it must be planned, agreed upon, and easily recognizable.  We can't be told something has value.  We must be shown its value and left to form our own opinions.  In all cases the value of a project must be measurable.

IT IS EASY TO BE SUCCESSFUL WHEN SUCCESS HAS NO MEASURE!

Projects that produce little to no value aren't unique to any one industry or business segment.  They are often a result of a project manager or project team with the mentality that says we know best, and we believe we are smarter than everybody else.

We can sum up this type of behavior in one word...Arrogance.

As taken from the website the Inner Frontier:

ARROGANCE - "Those to whom much has been given sometimes suffer from arrogance; or rather the people around them suffer. Arrogance is doubly a pity, because the talents of the arrogant serve primarily themselves. The arrogant assumes his views and opinions are The Truth. In arrogance, natural confidence goes sadly awry. Rather than the self-assurance born of knowing his own strengths and limitations, arrogance admits no limits. The arrogant brooks no weakness in himself and may even secretly rejoice to find flaws in others."

Don't be arrogant and don't manage a project that doesn't have value.