The old Perry Como* chestnut refers to the Italian word “tomorrow” and is the Italian way of repeating–in a more romantic manner–Keyne’s dictum that in the “long run we’ll all be dead.” Whenever I hear polemicists talk about the long run or invoke the interests of their grandchildren trumping immediate concerns and decisions I always brace myself for the Paleolithic nonsense that is to follow. While giving such opinions a gloss of plausibility, at worst, they are simply fabrications to hide self-interest, a form of tribalism, or ideology, at best, they are based on fallacious reasoning, fear, or the effects of cognitive dissonance.
(more…)program management software
Brother Can You (Para)digm? — Four of the Latest Trends in Project Management
At the beginning of the year we are greeted with the annual list of hottest “project management trends” prognostications. We are now three months into the year and I think it worthwhile to note the latest developments that have come up in project management meetings, conferences, and in the field. Some of these are in alignment with what you may have seen in some earlier articles, but these are four that I find to be most significant thus far, and there may be a couple of surprises for you here.
(more…)More on Excel…the contributing factor of poor Project Management apps
Some early comments via e-mails on my post on why Excel is not a PM tool raised the issue that I was being way too hard on IT shops and letting application providers off the hook. The asymmetry was certainly not the intention (at least not consciously).
When approaching an organization seeking process and technology improvement, oftentimes the condition of using Excel is what we in the technology/PM industry conveniently call “workarounds.” Ostensibly these workarounds are temporary measures to address a strategic or intrinsic organizational need that will eventually be addressed by a more cohesive software solution. In all too many cases, however, the workaround turns out to be semi-permanent.
A case in point in basic project management concerns Work Authorizations Documents (WADs) and Baseline Change Requests (BCRs).
(more…)
Life, Project Management, and Everything 