Posts under ‘Leadership’

In Project Management circles there is an increasing awareness that some projects aren’t just about producing deliverables, they are about delivering “change”.  Project’s in today’s business world are often changing the way business is done and the failure to recognize how hard it can be to change work habits, or organizational structures, is one of [...]

“As Project Manager, juggling all of the balls is important, but keeping your eye on the right ball is the key to delivering truly successful projects” – RG While understanding the causes of project failure is important, without a common definition of “success”, there is no clear basis for differentiating a success from a failure. Clearly [...]

Lesson learned: Be careful what you measure and how you measure it. Category: Project objectives / Decision making. The following post is a “Lesson Learned” that comes from the analysis of the failed projects documented in the “Catalogue of Catastrophe” or from the experiences the editorial team have had working with clients around the world. The post [...]

The Sponsorship role is perhaps the most important in a project. The Sponsor owns the project and has a direct responsibility for ensuring that the desired business outcomes are achieved. In discussing project failures with people, one of the common complaints I hear is that the Sponsorship role is either non-existent or weak in their organizations. [...]

The decisions made during project initiation are among the most critical in a project. They set the direction for the project, establish the project’s objectives and establish how the project is to be approached. Mistakes made at this early stage can be fatal. Sadly all too many projects do go wrong at this early stage [...]

Lesson learned: Quantify a candidate’s experience. Category: Leadership development / hiring. The following post is a “Lesson Learned” that comes from the analysis of the failed projects documented in the “Catalogue of Catastrophe” or from the experiences the editorial team have had working with clients around the world. The post is published here to spark discussion and [...]

Project Management is a field that has experienced rapid growth in recent years.  Although the origins of Project Management lie in the field of construction, the value of Project Management is now being recognized by organizations throughout the economy. Recent data attained from a major Canada wide job posting website demonstrates that growth and shows [...]

I’ve just finished reading a book about the Apollo missions that put man on the moon (Apollo by Charles Murray and Catherine Cox). The Apollo project was initiated by President John F. Kennedy in 1961 when he announced to the US Congress his believe that the United States “should commit itself to achieving the goal, [...]

Being something of a Systems Thinker, I often find myself reflecting on events to see if I can understand the cause and effect relationships that drive the outcomes we attain. Working in the field of education, that interest has caused me to look deeply into the way individuals learn and how different modes of teaching [...]

One of the fundamentals taught in Project Management class is the need to define what the success of the project will look like. Only by establishing a picture of the desired end state are we able to establish project scope properly and make effective decisions about how to manage the project. In Project Management class [...]