9780814417362

Great managers are experts at getting bottom-line results, but often do not understand their role in the success or failure of their organization's projects. They balk at the arcane terminology and are unaware of how to use valuable project management techniques and toolsa knowledge gap that can be a serious career barrier! Functional managers with even basic project management (PM) knowledge are the best people for keeping projects business-focused. This new book demystifies the jargon and processes, encouraging managers to jump into the PM arena and arming them with strategies for increasing the business value created by their company's projects. Readers will discover: Advice for switching gears from passive bystander to active owner of projects Insights into four critical PM skills, including business analysis techniques, work breakdown structures, program sequencing techniques, and risk management methods Step-by-step guidelines, case studies, and illustrations for mastering these skills Project Management for Non-Project Managersprovides easy-to-read, in-a-nutshell explanations of all the PM basics that managers need to achieve project success.

Acknowledgments	p. vii
Introduction	p. ix
The Critical Role of the Functional Manager in Project Success	p. 1
What the Functional Manager Should Know About the Project Organization	p. 3
Who Is the Functional Manager?	p. 4
The Challenge of Integrating the Project Team into the Organization	p. 6
The Functional Manager's Role in Creating an Integrated Project Organization	p. 10
The Three Types of Organizational Structure	p. 15
The Functional Manager's Impact on Project Success or Failure	p. 23
The Importance of Project Planning	p. 29
Creating Foresight	p. 29
Why Do You Need a Plan?	p. 30
What Is a Good Plan?	p. 32
Basic Steps to Planning Projects	p. 37
Summary of Project Planning	p. 57
Project Plans and Vendors	p. 57
Project Planning Tools: What They Do and What They Don't Do	p. 62
Challenges to Getting a Good Plan	p. 64
Multi-Project Systems	p. 65
Understanding the Business Side of the Project	p. 69
The Connection Between Business Knowledge and Requirements	p. 69
Writing Good Requirements	p. 73
Scope Creep	p. 82
Stabilizing Requirements Through the Business Process	p. 83
The Ideal Functional Manager in the Project Organization	p. 85
"Get It" … or Risk Getting Moved Out	p. 86
Four Critical Project Management Skills for Functional Managers	p. 109
The Project Management Mystique Unveiled	p. 111
A Shared Language	p. 111
Project Management Demystified	p. 120
Demystifying Methodologies	p. 135
Articulating the Real Customer Need and Business Case for the Project	p. 143
Producing a Mission Statement That Conveys Urgency and Vision	p. 145
Creating a Meaningful Current and Future State Comparison	p. 151
Case Study	p. 161
Base Your Requirements on the Business Process	p. 163
Prepare a Realistic Business Case	p. 163
Staying Focused on Project Deliverables	p. 169
The Deliverable Structure: A Portrait of the Work	p. 169
Creating Deliverable Structures	p. 172
Case Study	p. 183
Understanding Key Project Dependencies	p. 191
Telling Your Story of the Work	p. 193
Case Study	p. 207
Being Proactive About Project Risk	p. 213
Basics of Risk	p. 213
Pushing the Risk Discussion	p. 218
Case Study	p. 224
The Power of the Principles	p. 231
Index	p. 235
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.

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<html><head></head><body>Introduction The most common vehicle for implementing change within an organization is the project, or a combination of projects known as a program. Projects are becoming more strategic in nature and scope, and an increasing number of traditional white-collar workers are involved with projects in some fashion. These projects often require unprecedented collaboration within an organization’s lines of business, and across the business enterprise. This dynamic is creating a need for functional managers to work in collaboration, communicate effectively, and appreciate the best practice methods of project teams. Project executives, sponsors, middle managers, and functional managers are expected to be involved in an organization’s projects— over and above their duties of managing budgets, operations, and personnel. Functional managers’ job responsibilities, if not formally written, often implicitly include the implementation of positive change, delivered through projects. However, little attention is focused on the importance of functional managers’ understanding of how projects should work. Despite this, functional managers are the bridge to successful organizational change. Unfortunately, project managers and their teams have embraced their own project management idiom. They communicate successfully among themselves using their own dialect and project management jargon. These project teams are often trained in organizational project management methodology and industry standards (e.g., they have read A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge, the PMBOK Guide), and their jargon can isolate a functional manager from his or her project team. This can lead to a lack of understanding of fundamental project processes on the part of functional manager and can result in poor communication, unhealthy conflict, project rework, schedule delays, cost overruns, and lost business opportunities. While project management has grown rapidly as a career and core competency, with organizations embracing industry certifications such as the Project Management Professional (PMP), project management methodology and processes have done little to improve the working relationships between project teams (providers) and business units (customers). As a seasoned project management consultant and instructor for American Management Association, I have worked with countless functional managers attending project management classes, looking for a way to demystify project management so that they can improve the way that projects are performed in their organizations. These functional managers tell stories of being thrust into project teams and even project leadership positions with no training. Although they express no desire to achieve a project management certification, they recognize the importance of consistently delivering business value through the projects they work on. What they are missing is basic project management knowledge; they need core skills explained and taught with a commonsense approach to managing business change. This book provides a practical guide for functional managers to learn what project managers and teams are doing—or should be doing—and to acquire the four critical project management skills to be an active, value-adding participant to the project organization: 1. Articulating the real customer need and business case for the project. 2. Staying focused on project deliverables. 3. Understanding key project dependencies. 4. Being proactive about project risk. This book will motivate readers to take ownership of their project role and engage productively with project managers and teams to increase the business value being created from the project. Furthermore, it will enable functional managers to unveil the ‘‘what’’ and ‘‘why’’ of project management methodologies, processes, and deliverables and become active participants in increasing the value of these components, while eliminating the unnecessary project work that often slows them down. The first four chapters discuss why you as a functional manager must take a more aggressive role in managing your projects. Drawing on my years of experience, I describe the value you need to bring to the project and why you are often the only one who can bring this value. In the remaining chapters, I explore the core project management skills (listed above) that functional managers must use to succeed when they find themselves in strategic organization change projects. Each skill is taught by walking through a typical organizational project involving business process change, technology, and impacts to business partners and customers. At the end of each chapter, I use my own experience and case studies to reinforce the concepts. My hope is that this book will help you to be much more project savvy, to embrace your role in your project organization, to partner closely with project teams, and, ultimately, to be a spearhead of change in your organization. </body></html>

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Project Management for Non-project Managers

Project Management for Non-project Managers

0814417361

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