Project Hero Blog - Weekly Best Practices and Tips

Project managers, coordinators, and administrators are three distinct roles that often get blurred within an organization. It is important to understand the distinctions:

1. Project Manager (PM): Ultimately responsible and accountable for all aspects of a project and its successful delivery, including planning, executing, monitoring and controlling, and closing, or some component of these in the ...

Whether you are a project manager or a business analyst, these five open-ended questions posed to the project sponsor and other senior executives can get you vital information you need for project success in a short amount of time:

1. What does success look like to you? – Learn what is most valuable to manage the triple constraints appropriately.
2. What are your biggest challenges and opportunities
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Agile is popular, but good project leaders know that there is not a “one size fits all” method.  If you are going to use Agile, consider how it may need tailoring to meet project goals better.

• List the 12 Agile principles and consider how each might impact project objectives, positive or negative
• Decide which principles to keep and which to reject
• Analyze the results and see how Agile may nee
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As Agile and iterative methods grow in popularity, it is easy for those with a solid project management background to work in a new environment.  These 5 tips will help:

1. Question traditional PM practices: everything you know still applies, but question how to tailor and improve past practices for the new environment.
2. Use pictures over words: lighter Agile documentation benefits from images and
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For over 10 years, stakeholders tried to make the Denver International Airport Automated Baggage Handling project work before giving up. The cost of continuing was around $120M, on top of an already over-budget project that was too complex to fix. Project leaders should know when to give up and cancel a project. Here are 5 circumstances that signal the necessity of cancellation:

1. Project objecti
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Decades of Project Management research shows that lack of user involvement/ executive sponsorship and requirements management are consistently high on the top 10 causes of project failure list. Over time, there has been a modest uptick in project success rates, but still, large percentages of projects fail to meet their goals. Why? Here is a short candidate list to consider:

• Not enough of the r
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You have accrued far more than the required three years of experience, have taken some classes in project management, and just learned about the PMP® certification. This is the same roadmap I followed in 2001 and passed on the first attempt. It's inexpensive and you can "opt-out" at any step to pursue more learning if necessary, before investing too much time.

1. Check eligibility. Download the Ce...

Seeking a leadership career? Embarking on a career in Project Management and earning a PMP® is a good path PMs typically earn more than "experts," and PMPs typically earn more than non-PMPs. The skills you learn will benefit any future management positions. You can wait to become an "accidental" PM or be proactive and follow this high-level roadmap:

1. Gain minimal knowledge. Learn the vocabulary
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The execution phase of a project, while not immune to issues, can be as effortless as possible if you follow these principles:

1. Do the right amount of planning: too little and things "fall through the cracks", too much planning risks "analysis paralysis".
2. Get the right team: people that want to do the work, have the skills and have a supportive network.
3. Exercise key soft skills: delegation, fo
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Always do the right thing. It demonstrates integrity and ethics. You want to be known for this type of behavior - it builds trust, makes it easier for you to lead and negotiate, and creates project success.

What is the "right thing"? Here are some examples:

• When requesting an initial project budget, don't guess. Use your best estimating skills to get it right so the organization doesn't suffer
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