Category Archives: earned value

FREE ENTRY: IBR Book launch & PMC SIG AGM Packages

PMC SIG – Bringing Projects to Life

PMC SIGAPM Planning, Monitoring and Control Specific Interest Group will, as always, be supporting eVa again this year. This event has arguably become the most prestigious conference in the project professionals’ calendar. It is two full days of the best speakers, fine food, good company and a venue steeped in hundreds of years in history.

It is the 21st anniversary, so to celebrate this, and in recognition of PMC SIGs continuing support and special relationship with the event, we have agreed organised two special offers. After all, eVa is the spiritual home of Earned Value!

1. Integrated Baseline Review Book Launch [16 June]

Stephen JonesAt the end of a packed conference programme on day 1 [5.30pm on 16 June], we plan to launch the PMC SIGs latest publication, a guide to conducting an Integrated Baseline Reviews, also known as the IBR Guide.

To mark the occasion and make it extra special, we will hold a short food and drinks reception, hosted and sponsored by our friends at Deltek.

There will be an opportunity to meet the authors; who will be more than willing to sign your FREE copy of the IBR guide.”

Book now to reserve your free place and book copy. You are very welcome to spend the entire day learning and networking with us. So book your free place below and choose a package that suits you!

Book now


A Guide to Conducting Integrated Baseline Reviews

IBR blue coverA Guide to Conducting Integrated Baseline Reviews (IBR) describes the process of performing a technical and schedule review to establish a balanced understanding of the planning maturity of the project. The IBR will review:

  • the project management plan;
  • the methods and metrics used to measure contract performance or progress;
  • the management control processes that operate during the project’s execution;
  • the technical merits of the schedule;
  • the risk associated with the baseline.

Based on tried and tested techniques developed by the military, it is applicable to projects of all sizes in all industry sectors.

Tim BanfieldTim Banfield, Director of Strategy at Infrastructure and Projects Authority, says:

“The book guides the reader through the review process, suggesting what the review should be looking for, and how the output should be used not only to improve the project under review, but rather how outputs can be collated to prevent common issues from reoccurring.”


2. PMC SIG Annual General Meeting Package [17 June]

Stephen Jones says …

“Any full APM member registering on the APM event page to attend the SIG’s Annual General Meeting, scheduled to take place immediately after eVa on day two [5pm on 17 June], will be eligible for FREE entry to the Friday afternoon conference programme.

However, I would strongly recommend that you attend the entire conference, including the book launch and conference dinner on day 1.

Use the button below to choose a package that best suits you.”

Book now

 

 
>> Conference Programme <<

Putting the value into earned value

Earned Value is a misnomer, that conflates “Budget” with “Value”

Value Destruction - Matt WilliamsIn industries where the disciplines of Project Management evolved, such as defence and infrastructure, it was probably a reasonable assumption to make, as delivery of the project’s output was intrinsically linked to building business value.

However, with the explosive growth of the use of projects as a vehicle to deliver business change and improvements, starting in IT departments and expanding to all projects that contribute to transforming a business to an improved delivery state, it is a fallacy to link Budget and Value together.

In fact, there are many well-known instances of projects, across both the public and private sector, where projects ended up not just creating less value than the budget allocated to the project, but actually destroying business value, and in extreme cases, the businesses themselves.

“Projects end up not just creating less value than the budget allocated to the project, but actually destroying business value, and in extreme cases, the businesses themselves”

Therefore, to properly measure the “Value” that a project delivers, we must first identify and define the expected value (financial and/or non-financial) that an organisation expects to receive from undertaking the project.  This is usually to be found in the Business Case, as the Benefits portion of the Cost/Benefit Analysis.

The mindset change that must now occur is to move from using Business Cases to not only ‘justify’ the project expenditure, but use the planned Benefits as the baseline against which we measure and forecast the true value created by a project.

In the same way, we should use a project’s schedule and budget as the baseline against which we measure project delivery performance.

Matt will be speaking at Bringing Projects to Life on 16 June [See Conference Programme] and will be running a benefits mapping workshop entitled Benefits Management: Visualising the Pathway from Projects to Benefits on 21 June.

“Benefit mapping is a tool to visualise an investment story in enough detail to enable decision-makers to understand complex investment programmes.”

About Matt Williams

Matt Williams is the Managing Director of Connexion Systems, an Australian-based provider of innovative services and systems that enable project organizations to maximize business value generated from portfolios of capital investments.

Matt has spent the past 15 years advising PMO’s on governance and controls, and is a regular speaker at PMI, AIPM (Australia) and APM (UK) events on the topic of Benefits-led Portfolio Management.

 

London Mozart Players

Building High Performance Teams

London Mozart Players

lmp-logo-webOur leadership and team development programme uses the orchestra as a platform to explore and develop leadership and team work within businesses. Presented as a workshop based session, team members are placed amongst the different sections of the orchestra, so they can experience how each individual musician, family of instruments, and indeed the conductor, can affect a performance.

biog-LMP-Photo-web

By drawing parallels between the basic mechanism of an orchestra and their business, colleagues and business leaders can explore the results of effective communication, team
work and leadership, perhaps informing new ways of thinking about their own roles.

 

>> Conference programme <<

The Project Manager’s NEC3 Legal Toolkit

It’s tough out there being a Project Manager, isn’t it?

A day in the life

Sarah Shutte 3Picture this: you are engaged on a project and you are told you are an essential part of its successful delivery, but not a day goes by without a communication or 10 crossing your desk, notifying you of some anticipated risk event or updating you for the umpteenth time on one you already know about, but haven’t had time to assess yet. Some of the notices appear very petty, which makes you cross, but also nervous. You know you need to be looking in 3 directions, controlling what’s happening right now, containing what has happened and anticipating what’s likely to happen: what a headache!

On top of this, you have to assess the programme, manage risk and act as a go-between for the parties. How are you going to assess the programme, and on what do you (should you) base your assessment? What should you do about notified or suspected risks? How can you encourage the parties to collaborate when they are fighting like cats in a sack?

You’re coming under pressure from all sides. Of course you are: the project is based on an NEC3 contract!

You are not alone: it’s difficult!

A lot has been written about the theory of NEC3, and its contracts are used on high-profile public projects with an eye-watering number of zeros. But research repeatedly tells us that NEC3 disputes are linked to failures to understand and read the contract properly, and to manage it well.

The all-round entertainer

As an NEC3 PM, you are all-singing and all-dancing. You’re expected to live and breathe the project, bring “added-value” to the client, and deliver “best value” to the public purse. Your own organization expects you to make a profit. Sometimes you feel like you’re in a circus, spinning plates! The responsibilities to shaking hands on a NEC3 contract are broad and deep, and are fiendishly difficult to discharge properly.

Differentiate yourself: you’re worth it

NEC3 is like no other contract currently on the market at the same level of popularity. You can’t ignore it, and only a fool would, given that c. 40% of the annual industry spend emanates from the public purse. Its use in increasing, and with it comes a demand for competent and experienced PMs. This environment makes NEC3 PM skills extremely valuable. So it is worthwhile taking the time to invest in dedicated NEC3 training for yourself, in upping your skill-set to enable you meet the challenges illustrated. You need to know how the contract works, and the legal mechanisms available in order to demonstrably go from being a “good” NEC3 PM to a “great” one.

Build your own legal toolkit

NEC3 Tool kit

Against the backdrop of current market conditions, and the practical reality described above, I have created a half day workshop for APM eVa21 centred around the PM’s role in the NEC3 form of contract and this year’s theme of “Bringing Projects to Life”.

Come along and join me on Wednesday 22 June (morning) to explore the fundamental legal principles associated with the NEC3’s core PM functions of planning and programming, collaboration and change management. We will dissect the issues, which cause you pain, exchange best practice techniques and debate real-life case studies. You will gain confidence to better manage yourselves, and your projects, clients and stakeholders through understanding your duties, and how to play an active, competent part in avoiding and resolving disputes.

I will bring my decade of practical industry experience and in-depth legal knowledge, and will help you to create and takeaway your own NEC3 legal toolkit.

Sarah Schutte

Sarah SchutteSarah has over 15 years’ experience as a construction and engineering solicitor, including almost 10 years in industry. She works with a wide variety of industry clients, law firms, seminar organisers and educational establishments to support their projects, disputes, corporate and project risk management and insurance strategies and training programmes.

Sarah advocates confident and competent contract and commercial management, and focuses on putting law in its practical and purposive context so as to equip clients and training delegates with accurate knowledge and essential skills.

Shutte Consulting LimitedSarah is a regular conference speaker and contributor via social media, and writes a monthly “Industry Insight” column for LexisPSL. She is particularly interested in psychology, and how project outcomes are affected by behaviour and culture.

Agile Project Management under the Microscope

Agile Project Management under the Microscope

The Agile Manifesto was signed 15 years ago but  the last couple of years has seen; a proliferation of interest the use of agile methods and language in project management.

As agile has grown in popularity and become more widespread in it use – way beyond software development – this has not been accompanied by sufficient levels of knowledge, understanding, and experience within the work force. In many cases there has been an over-optimistic view of what can be achieved. Agile has been deployed on some the biggest and most complex projects and occasionally these projects have failed to deliver.

There is no doubt that Agile Project Management is here to stay – so perhaps it is the right time to put it under the microscope!

Delivering Major Projects: The Agile Experience

In a recent Public Accounts Committee hearing on Delivering Major Projects in Government [See NAO report] the committee heard evidence from John Manzoni, Chief Executive of the Civil Service, and Tony Meggs, CEO of the Infrastructure and Projects Authority. Watch the short excerpt from Parliament TV below where the use of agile in major projects is discussed. [Read the full transcript here – See Q. 17 & 18 pp. 9 & 10]

John Manzoni, speaking about three projects in the government major projects portfolio [GMPP] that had ‘fallen into difficulty’ namely; Common Agricultural Policy Delivery, e-borders & Universal Credit, stated that this had occurred ‘at the moment that we were [all] learning … about how the new and digital technologies could be applied to big, big business processes.’

He explains “What I mean by that is that the gated process had hitherto been completely best practice in all major projects across the private sector and the public sector, but it was then said, we are Agile now; we are not Waterfall.

Now we know that no project is either Waterfall or Agile; they are a good mixture of both. The judgement and the decisions about how you do each front-end bit might be Agile, but some of it is Waterfall.

Those three occurred right at the moment that everybody was learning that. That is not an excuse, but it is partly an explanation. We are beginning to learn minimum viable product. For example, when we don’t know what the end state will be. Universal credit has been built in a minimum viable product way, in a digital sense, and now it is going to be expanded and built.”

City AM Business Supplement

Steve Wake - City AM picSteve Wake Chair, Association for Project Management, in his contribution to an expert panel discussion on the Adoption of Agile in makes the observations below.

[See full story on APM site Download City AM’s Agile Business Report]

What are the key milestones you predict for Agile in 2016?

For me the greatest indicator will come when agile is treated as completely normal, accepted and understood. It needs to be communicated better. APM sees that and is helping by working with DSDM and our agile and project experts and practitioners to produce a small handbook of practical advice that works.

The faster we all try it and use it, the faster we will know how, when and if to use it. Learning by doing. That’s agile. My hunch is that many non-agile users do it already. They just don’t call it agile.

How does an organisation get started on the Agile journey?

The real trick to using any method is like playing golf. You know the target and you know the terrain. There are obstacles, but you know and understand them. You choose the right club for the right moment.

I would deploy agile at moments of greatest uncertainty in the early stages of a project. I would link it to risk assessments. The greater the risk, the more likely you are to deploy agile. Simple. And make sure it fits properly into governance so you can monitor, assess and manage up and down the line.

How can organisations ensure that Agile delivers real business value?

If a method delivered value, then Prince2 would rule the earth! On my planet it does not. Value is delivered from humans, by humans, to and for humans. Generally clever, lucky or rich ones.

Great ideas can be made better by methods such as agile or earned value management [EVM]. Bad ideas just get the accident delivered faster and more visibly.

One consolation for those with the courage to do it: fortunes can be saved by early cancellation. But, it’s better to make sure the idea was a good one in the first place.

So what are we going to do about it?

PMC SIGTo get the ball rolling APM Planning Monitoring and Control SIG [PMC] is intending to work with DSDM, led by Steve Messenger to produce something of value to all who come into contact with agile. It might be a work-group. It might be discussion or a workshop and it might end up as a document. We are open-minded.

I would encourage anyone who is interested in getting involved to Get in touch with the PMC SIG if you have an interest in some way. We’ re just setting this up.

I am certain that the next project to save the planet, or push forward the boundaries of the possible, will involve agile in some way. It is here to enhance and improve what we currently do. It took more than 40 years for the APM to produce a proper guide to planning. We guarantee that we will beat that time-scale for this work!

Bringing Projects to Life [with Agile] #eVa21

Bringing Projects to Life - eVa21Steve Wake is the organiser of long established the eVa Major conference for project controls knowledge, know-how and networking. The conference is now in its twenty first year – hence #eVa21- and this year is being run in conjunction with a number of hands-on workshops.

Once again agile will be on the conference programme. Karolina Jackson-Ward, Projectplace, will provide insights on how ‘Effective leaders create value-driven teams’ and Hugh Ivory, DSDM will provide his a new perspective. Representatives from PMC SIG will be on hand to share knowledge and experience.

Steve says “This is certainly not a story of doom and gloom. Last year, at our Putting down roots for good governance conference, [#eVa20] we heard from Robin Yeman, who is the Agile Transformation Lead at Lockheed Martin. She gave a compelling account of Enterprise-level Agile Delivery as she explained where agile fits within an organisation of 130,000 employees that ‘builds very big things; such as fighter jets, space shuttles and surface ships.’”

Speaking on the topic of ‘Integrated Performance Measurement Baselines for Agile Programs’ Robin explained

“One of the mistakes project teams make is the assumption is that Agile is only utilized for software development. In fact, agile supports solutions to complex problems through cadence, synchronization, and rapid feedback loops.”

Watch presentation on PM Channel here [See Roots for Good Governance, 2015 section]

Robin Yeman - eVa20.jpg

At APM PMC SIG Energising your project projects conference [January 2015], Steve Messenger, DSDM, summed up agile project management rather nicely as he concluded:

‘The purpose of Agile Programme Management is to deliver what is required, when it’s needed, no more and no less.’

His presentation can be found here

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Hugh Ivory

Hugh IvoryHugh Ivory is a co-founder and Managing Partner at Agilesphere, an Agile Transformation consultancy which provides tailored services and great people to help organisations embed agility and Digital by Default. Agilesphere is a DSDM and APMG ATO.

Hugh specialises in the use of Agile methods to deliver portfolios of change, and has worked with a number of organisations in UK and Ireland including AIB Group, Daiwa Capital Markets, EBS and Axa Insurance.  Recently, Hugh spent 18 months working in the Transformation Team at the UK’s Government Digital Service, the organisation responsible for implementing the Government Digital Strategy.

Whilst a director at DSDM Consortium (2005–2009), Hugh was a member of the core working group responsible for the development of DSDM Atern, the most radical upgrade to the DSDM method in over a decade and the foundation for the Agile Project Management Framework.  Hugh is certified as an Agile Leadership Practitioner, an Agile Project Management Practitioner, Scrum-master and Prince2 Practitioner.

 

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Reinhard Wagner

IPMA, President

Reinhard Wagner is President of the International Project Management Association [IPMA], Past President and Honorary Fellow of GPM the German Project Management Association], and founder and CEO of Projectivists, a PM Consultancy.

Reinhard’s Proven Record

Reinhard WagnerHe has been active for more than 30 years in the field of project- related leadership, in such diverse sectors as Air Defence, Automotive Engineering, and Machinery, as well as various not-for-profit organizations.

As a Certified Projects Director (IPMA Level A), he has proven experience in managing projects, programmes and project portfolios in complex and dynamic contexts.

He is also an IPMA Certified Programme and Portfolio Management Consultant, and as such supports senior executives in developing and improving their organizational competence in managing projects.

P3M International Standards

For more than 15 years, he has been actively involved in the development of project, programme and portfolio management standards, for example as Convenor of the ISO 21500 “Guidance on Project Management” and the ISO 21503 “Guidance on Programme Management”.

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Dr Mandy Walker

Mandy WalkerMandy is the founder of QiResults. She is a leading practitioner in understanding how people behave during change, and has demonstrated her expertise in how to raise and sustain workforce morale in difficult environments.

Her doctoral studies demonstrate that change is a shift of one thing to another, whereas transformation includes a shift of thinking. She is acknowledged as an expert in transformation and culture shift.

By profession Mandy is an applied psychologist and specialises in finding practical solutions to complex soft problems. She works to reduce and remove the waste caused by unhelpful behaviours and limiting cultural norms in the workplace. She has gained a reputation for measurably improving workplace effectiveness in complex projects in public, private, and third sectors, particularly where the tax payer is ultimately paying the bill for the service or goods being provided.

She leads a specialist consultancy team of engineers, strategists and psychologists, expert in helping organisations develop their internal practices and processes to deliver efficient, value for money output, with maximum behavioural impact.

She survives this complex world in which she operates because of strength drawn from steadfast friends, a passion for skiing, a wicked sense of humour, a firm faith in goodness, and the grounding that comes from being raised in a South Yorkshire coal mining family.

Additionally, Mandy has two adult children who are professionals she describes as “my anchor in stormy weather, and simply two wonderful people who enrich my life far more than they ever impoverished my bank account!”

 

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Antonio Nieto-Rodriguez

Antonio Nieto-Rodriguez

Professor Instituto de Empresa, Director Global Head of Global PMO

Antonio Nieto-RodriguezProf. Antonio Nieto-Rodriguez currently works as Director Head of PMO at GlaxoSmithKline Vaccines. Previously he worked in the banking sector, for BNP Paribas Fortis, where he implemented Project Portfolio Management practices to help the Executive Committee select, prioritize and execute 150+ projects and a budget of 100 mio euro yearly.

Prior to that he was Head of Post Merger Integration, leading the largest takeover in the financial service history: the acquisition of ABN AMRO.

During 1997 and 2007 he worked as senior manager at PricewaterhouseCoopers, becoming the global lead practitioner for project management.

Chair of Project Management Institute [PMI] Board of Directors

In 2013 Antonio was elected as Chair of Project Management Institute Board of Directors, the largest project management association in the world. Currently he is the Chairman of the PMI Board.

Antonio authors articles in business magazines, including Strategy Business Review, Singapore Management Institute, PM Journal, PM Network® and The Economist.  In 2012 he published the book “The Focused Organization” to help organisations improve the way they manage their strategic initiatives and increase their focus.

 

Born in Madrid, undertook undergraduate studies in Germany, Mexico, Italy and the United States. He has a degree in economics and an MBA from London Business School.

Academic & Speaker

In parallel, Antonio has developed a career in academia: teaching and delivering executive programs to leaders of more than 30 multinationals. He is visiting professor at the #1 executive education school in the world, Duke CE, and other leading business schools such as Instituto de Empresa, Skolkova and Vlerick.

Antonio is also a seasoned keynote speaker (TeDx; London Speaker Bureau) at international events where he speaks on the strategic value of project management. This year he participated in the leading Strategy Conference in the Middle East together with Bob Kaplan, founder of the Balanced Scorecard.

Website & Book:    www.antonionietorodriguez.com
LinkedIn & Blog:    be.linkedin.com/in/antonionietorodriguez
Twitter:                  @ANietoRodriguez
Think-tank:            StrateXecution – www.linkedin.com/groups/2548095

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Chris Pond

Chris PondChris Pond is a Senior Solutions Specialist for PPM at Microsoft. He has over eighteen years of experience working with customers to help them understand the benefits and value of Project Portfolio Management.

His role at Microsoft focuses on leading Microsoft Office 365 Project Online cloud sales engagements in enterprise organisations across industries, while supporting the wider sales community with good practice when discussing Portfolio and Project Management (PPM).

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