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Working out who does what on your project can be a challenge. A RACI chart is a project management tool that helps you do exactly that. At the end of this article there’s a link to download my free roles and responsibilities document template. Scroll to the bottom to get it. In this article I’ll give you everything you need to know about producing a RACI chart for your project.
Many project managers feel overwhelmed with emails, phone calls, and meetings. They often work overtime, but few feel as though they are making progress. Although we are all given the same amount of time each day, some project managers are able to produce greater value for their organizations. Some are more engaged. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock (edited in Canva).
Whether internal or external, successfully meeting client deliverables is a primary goal behind projects. Deliverables may be different for each project depending on industry, nature of the project, project size, company strategy and a host of other variables. That said, there are multiple shared factors that can easily compromise these deliverables and ultimately client satisfaction.
Imagine that you are planning a multi-day road trip across the country to a town which you’ve never visited before. Chances are that you will load your smartphone with maps to help you navigate the journey as well as identifying some points of interest and regularly spaced hotels along the way. What are the odds that you will plan your trip down to the hour?
AI adoption is reshaping sales and marketing. But is it delivering real results? We surveyed 1,000+ GTM professionals to find out. The data is clear: AI users report 47% higher productivity and an average of 12 hours saved per week. But leaders say mainstream AI tools still fall short on accuracy and business impact. Download the full report today to see how AI is being used — and where go-to-market professionals think there are gaps and opportunities.
Now, let's here it for common sense! More and more I see this asset creeping into the advice we get about Agile, and even more so about how to handle the various things that show up in a sprint. The latest: trying to "freeze" hard the sprint backlog may be impractical. It may be more slushy than a hard freeze. [Didn't we all know that all along?
Posted in General Tools. As a digital project manager, a huge part of your role is to create project plans to help you keep projects on track. But that’s not all a project plan should do. A project plan is arguably the most important document created on your project. At its core, a plan should communicate your project approach and the process your team will use to manage the project according to scope.
Posted in General Tools. As a digital project manager, a huge part of your role is to create project plans to help you keep projects on track. But that’s not all a project plan should do. A project plan is arguably the most important document created on your project. At its core, a plan should communicate your project approach and the process your team will use to manage the project according to scope.
Getting the right collaboration tool for your team is really important – as is knowing how to use it. It’s something that my book, Collaboration Tools for Project Managers , goes into in a lot of detail because if you get it wrong it’s a massive waste of expense and energy. But I don’t have the monopoly on knowing how to do it. I talk to a lot of project managers about the software they use and there is often a common theme: they are pushed into finding something better because they can’t carry
Are you a project manager who focuses on gaining control of your project risks? Some project managers start their projects with a strong focus on risk management. However, somewhere along the way they lose steam. They increasingly spend more time dealing with issues and implementing workarounds. They are frustrated and filled with anxiety. Other project managers start out strong.
It has been an interesting few months working with clients and listening to some of the issues course participants face: My sponsor takes a too hands on/off approach and I find it difficult to deal with. I have a team member who despite saying they will deliver simply does not. No matter what I do they always fail to deliver and this is becoming concerning and demotivating for the team.
Lemon. When house hunting, savvy shoppers quickly learn the meaning of some seemingly innocent phrases found in listing descriptions. For example, lots of potential means that you will have to spend a lot of money to make the house livable. Quaint implies that no upgrades have been made since the house was originally built. When taking over a project from another project manager, similar rules apply.
Speaker: Chris Townsend, VP of Product Marketing, Wellspring
Over the past decade, companies have embraced innovation with enthusiasm—Chief Innovation Officers have been hired, and in-house incubators, accelerators, and co-creation labs have been launched. CEOs have spoken with passion about “making everyone an innovator” and the need “to disrupt our own business.” But after years of experimentation, senior leaders are asking: Is this still just an experiment, or are we in it for the long haul?
Looking to hone your people skills and tie into SCRUM? Here's a seminar -- free even you are not a member -- that is more or less on the theme: "SCRUM is about people". Read in the library at Square Peg Consulting about these books I've written Buy them at any online book retailer!
With 10 interconnected knowledge areas that incorporate the use of 47 processes organized into five process groups, project management can be a multifaceted maze to navigate. Developing a deeper understanding of this discipline can be an all-consuming and intimidating task at times, and just trying to find out where to turn for training can feel overwhelming. 5.
I’m off to Barcelona at the weekend as I am part of a panel debate at the PMI Global Congress in Spain next week. My session is on collaboration tools and tech for project managers. Today I’ve got 5 tips (and a personal favourite bonus one at the end) about how to get the most out of attending a conference. You make a big investment in going to conferences so it helps to do a bit of thinking and planning about how to benefit while you’re there. 1.
Many project managers do a great job of identifying risks. Some even evaluate risks and develop response plans. However, project managers get busy as their projects progress and fail to control risks, resulting abandoned or wrecked projects. So, what does it mean to control risks? Photo courtesy of Adobe Stock (edited in Canva). Here’s the Merriam-Webster dictionary definition: control: to direct the behavior: to cause to do what you want.
Construction projects are high-stakes operations where even minor inefficiencies can lead to costly delays, safety concerns, and budget overruns. Managing risk in construction has always been a challenge, but as projects grow in complexity, traditional methods no longer cut it. Enter Digital Transformation - a game changer approach that replaces inefficiency with AI-powered analytics, real-time monitoring, and automated workflows to proactively manage risk.
Extract from my book ‘Project Branding’ published by RMC Publications, Inc. The project name is important in setting the tone and personality of the project, and this name can be a powerful marketing tool, or even a major part of the brand for a significant project. The name should reflect the overall goals and objectives of the project—what the project is about and what it’s meant to deliver.
The cynical among us might feel that special days like Mother’s or Father’s Day were created to boost the profits of greeting card companies, however there’s no doubt that we owe a great deal to our parents. Giving birth to a child meets the usual definition of a project in that it is a temporary and unique endeavor, it consumes resources, is fraught with uncertainty and yet is expected to deliver great value.
"Managing project value" has been a theme I've written a lot about -- I've even written a whole book about it (Did you notice the book cover below?) So, I was fascinated with a series on the Kahn Academy about the value of a start-up. Admittedly, venture start-up is a little off the bore-sight of a project, but not that far off.
OMG, we did it again! We’re thrilled to announce that LiquidPlanner won TWO SIIA Software CODiE Awards this week. For the second year in a row, we won the CODiE for Best Project Management Solution , and yesterday added a new award to the trophy shelf: the CODiE for Best Project Management Mobile Application. What it means to win a CODiE. This is big news and we’re excited for a number of reasons.
Large enterprises face unique challenges in optimizing their Business Intelligence (BI) output due to the sheer scale and complexity of their operations. Unlike smaller organizations, where basic BI features and simple dashboards might suffice, enterprises must manage vast amounts of data from diverse sources. What are the top modern BI use cases for enterprise businesses to help you get a leg up on the competition?
Yey! I love this time each month when I get to interview a fantastic woman doing something amazing in the world of project management. Today it’s the turn of Christine Unterhitzenberger, a practitioner-turned-academic who is researching the social dynamics of project teams and how fairness affects project success. Let’s get started… Christine, how did you get into project management?
Project managers may fail to achieve their project objectives because they don’t know how to take a look backward and forward at their risks. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock (edited in Canva). Some project managers only look backward. If we only look backward, we will miss opportunities that lie before us, and we will likely be blindsided by threats.
‘All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others’. That was a proclamation in the novel Animal Farm, by George Orwell and I offer up, not a proclamation but a declaration, followed by a disclaimer, but beginning with a statement – and that statement is ‘I am a worried man, no let me correct that, I am a worried project manager’. Worried that I am speaking too much, that others (like myself) are speaking too much, that we as a group might have become boring, irrelevant and pote
We start our projects with a small core team but as we proceed further down the rabbit hole we add team members to support planning and delivery activities. Then as work streams get completed, team size shrinks until we reach project closure where we are back to the original core team. On large, multi-phase projects, team expansion and contraction occurs frequently but even with much smaller projects, it is common to have team members exit before the project itself is completed.
Speaker: Jay Allardyce, Deepak Vittal, Terrence Sheflin, and Mahyar Ghasemali
As we look ahead to 2025, business intelligence and data analytics are set to play pivotal roles in shaping success. Organizations are already starting to face a host of transformative trends as the year comes to a close, including the integration of AI in data analytics, an increased emphasis on real-time data insights, and the growing importance of user experience in BI solutions.
Technical debt: we've all written about it; I've described in my book, Project Management the Agile Way (see below), but I guess the industry has never settled on a formal definition. I've always thought of it as a "punch list" that is a "debt" that must be retired in the future. stuff that needs to get DONE or fixed so that we can say to the sponsor: hey, it's DONE and the QUALITY is.
If you’re a project manager or lead, you’ve struggled to keep your team working on the highest priority task at some point in time. And you probably also need to keep work prioritized across multiple projects. Prioritizing work can be the bane of every project lead’s existence but it doesn’t have to be the status quo. Here’s a scenario for you—sound familiar?
General Information. Name: iMindQ. Vendor: Seavus. Hosting options: Windows, Mac, online. Cost and plans: Online version is free. Windows single-user perpetual licence is €109. The Mac version is cheaper at €73. Languages: English. Currency: n/a. Mindmapping Made Easy. iMindQ is a mindmapping product. You can create mindmaps and flow diagrams for anything.
Ever have this sinking feeling that a bad moon is arising on your project? You’re not sure what the problem is, but you know things are out of control. Image courtesy of Abobe Stock (edited in Canva). One of the strongest telltale signs of project trouble is increasing numbers of project issues. The negative events that you were concerned about have occurred.
Speaker: Nikhil Joshi, Founder & President of Snic Solutions
Is your manufacturing operation reaching its efficiency potential? A Manufacturing Execution System (MES) could be the game-changer, helping you reduce waste, cut costs, and lower your carbon footprint. Join Nikhil Joshi, Founder & President of Snic Solutions, in this value-packed webinar as he breaks down how MES can drive operational excellence and sustainability.
Posted in General. Risks are ugly little things. They’re the things you never really want to talk about. But if the risks become issues, you’ll be in a bit of bother. So the temptation is just to sweep them under the carpet, never talk about them to the client and hope for the best. That’s a recipe for impending doom. Managing risk (or Management of Risk, sometimes helpfully abbreviated to MoR) is such a big deal that you.
In large organizations it takes a village to deliver a project. There are multiple internal stakeholders who must collaborate and contribute to generate project success. Many of them will have requirements of their own which they expect will be met. Some of these relate directly to the project’s underlying business rationale whereas others satisfy regulatory or policy compliance needs.
Empathy is an important attribute in Design Thinking. In order to solve our customer's problems, we really need to understand them. We need to walk in their shoes. But there's a limit to how far we can take this. We can spend hours talking to an astronaut, but we will never truly understand what it's like to walk in space. Agile has this idea of the Product Owner, but you don't see much written in agile about empathy.
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