Integrated change control procedures are made to allow for consistent change control from project to project. This allows for the same change control protocols to created once, and used between projects. Change control procedures should be used in every project because they provide a constant method of change metrics as well as reduce the time [...]
There are a few different ways to estimate in projects but a general rule of thumb is to use the most accurate method available. There’s the rough order of magnitude, top down, budget/engineering. Rough Order of Magnitude This type of estimate is of a top level conceptual nature. It is generally used when not many [...]
Accurately estimating future costs of a project is crucial in the project planning phase because it helps accurately predict a project’s benefit. In my experience there are three major common cost categories: Fixed Costs Variable Costs Operating and Maintenance Costs Fixed Costs Fixed costs are costs that do not vary with the output of production. [...]
While reading Project Scheduling and Cost Control, by James Taylor, one thing that stuck out for me was how it is critical to update a project’s schedule no matter what type of network diagram or chart you decide to employ. It never really struck me as an issue because I haven’t worked on “huge” time [...]
Work breakdown structures are extremely useful way to simplify complex tasks that need to be accomplished in a project by their individual components. They can also be combined with scheduling data to generate a Gantt chart (the end result is something similar to the Microsoft Project interface). The United States Department of Energy’s official definition [...]
Fred Engel is a technology entrepreneur that has sold a business and taken another public. He’s currently starting a new green technology venture that centers itself around reclaiming lost energy efficiencies in commercial building’s HVAC systems. His systems analyze feedback from the building automation systems using software to help building owners achieve cost savings through reduced [...]
I used to work at MD Anderson Cancer Center where I developed web applications. Part of my job was to directly interface with customers and take their requirements and develop them into finished products. Our team of developers each had their own projects to work on, and could decide if they wanted to interface with [...]
A scope statement is a document that details a project’s deliverables and describes it’s major objectives (Wikipedia). This document is essentially a high-level overview of what the entire project will encompass (including what it will not cover). In order to develop a project scope document, certain key pieces of information need to be discovered. These [...]
The biotech industry is notoriously hard to fund a startup when you have little to no proven successes. Capital is hard to come by when it may take $1B over 15 years before the investors start to see any returns if the product is approved for the intended use. Here we will examine a hypothetic [...]
I recently read a case study for a small and growing business called UndergroundHipHop.com I obtained from Ivey Publishing. UndergroundHipHop.com is a company started by a college undergrad student in his dorm room. The company started out as a project of passion that lead to a large online community that all had interests in underground hip hop [...]
I came across an interesting topic while reading “Trading and Exchanges”, by Larry Harris. It dealt with shifting cash flows in time. I personally love learning of new topics, and this definitely was a paradigm shifter for me. I decided to dig a bit deeper to see what else I could learn about the topic. [...]
I think one of the most challenging aspects of portfolio project management (PPM) is actually implementing a PPM system. In my experience, changing the culture of an organization that is used to ad hoc project selection/project management requires a significant ROI, and even then may not be implemented because management is not comfortable with such [...]
Project management can be a difficult enough endeavor, but managing a multi-cultural project team can add additional differences as well. It’s important to remember that not all of the differences that arise are negative. The three main differences are: Team member motivation (Anbari 2010) Communication style Heterogeneous idea generation Team Member Motivation According to Geert [...]
My current company manufactures hardware and develops software that assists Athletic Trainers perform their job duties. They have numerous projects that run concurrently to design and develop new hardware and software revisions. Every fiscal year management develops a list of key strategic goals that will improve the company over the next year. Each proposed project [...]
