Stained glass window at Naperville Settlement Church

Nothing to do with project management- but I certainly admire the workmanship and history related to this church window. I can imagine the detail, the hours invested, the architectural drawing (I imagine it existed) from which the artisan or artist based his or her work on.

In our microwave and disposable society, most things are not made to last anymore. The things that last typically have the following characteristics: timeless beauty, painstaking hard work invested, quality materials, superior quality control and quality management.

For anything to last, the cost may be initially higher. But the cost of ownership will certainly be a lot less. Something to remember and think about.

Naperville settlement church

My wife and I just attended a church wedding at this church building now located in Naperville historic settlement. This tourist attraction is a collection of varied historic buildings originally built in or around Du Page county Illinois.

Although this church is small in comparison to old churches in Europe- I do wonder what project management tools did the builders employ? Who was the business sponsor? Was the town financing the cost of the building? Did they have to submit an environmental impact study? What permitting process did they employ? Was there a building inspection process by a governing body?

If they had a simpler building permit process, is it possible for us to revert to such process?

Finally, did they have a project manager then? Or was it just a construction manager?

Day after Thanksgiving 2010

As we walked and window-shopped at Oakbrook center mall, it was interesting to see how people actually purchased items. Based on initial network news reports, this year seems to be a better year- a lot more shoppers are out and making purchases. It remains to be seen what the actual numbers are, coming from Shoppertrak (a data mining company in Chicago, which counts retail customers' traffic) or Experian.

It is a catch 22. 2/3 of the US economy is driven by consumer or domestic consumption. If the US consumer puts away their credit cards, there is a domino effect on US businesses, employment, utilities consumption, etc. However, this over consumption and overspending by the US consumer really is untenable. The unabated home equity loans to finance a new car and vacations to Mexico is no longer possible.

Will 2011 be better than 2010 for the US consumer? Is saving actually better for the US economy or is it better for the US consumer? Should there be a balance? Where is the balance?

Black Friday Shopping Strategies

Most of you are probably done with your shopping, and most of these strategies are probably well-known and no longer a secret--but I will write down my thoughts nonetheless:

1. Make a list,
2. Set a budget,
3. Pay with cash,
4. Use the latest tools to get the possible pricing, i.e., do your due-diligence,
5. Map out your route, get in and get out.

Call this a stretch but these tips do have a corollary Project Management principles:

1. Making a list is akin to having a project plan, and a WBS (work breakdown structure). Making a list helps one not to be dissuaded or side tracked by impulse purchases.
2. Setting a budget helps one to set a cap on how much one can spend, i.e., a project budget. This means the shopping spree is not an open checkbook deal. It will certainly help not getting depressed in January, not having to pay for the bills that come due in January (if one overspent using credit cards).
3. Paying with cash makes one feel the "pain" of the purchases. Business owner or sponsor, writing out the checks or payments to project vendors certainly keeps everyone in line to make sure project is within budget.
4. Using the latest tools such as RedLaser and pic2shop (allowing a consumer to scan the UPC code on a merchandise via an Iphone and comparison shop) are just one of the few apps that an informed consumer can use. There are a lot of tools (software such as MS Project or Earned Value) in the project management space. There are freeware as well that mimic MS Project.
5. Map out a route--there are apps that show mall maps, deals and coupons available for download on the Apple App store (am confident the Android store has the same or comparable apps as well) that can aid in mapping a shopper's route. This is actually an extension of #4, but the goal is to spend less time on the tasks and get home quicker, i.e., spend more quality time with family.
Which is what Thanksgiving holiday is about.

Learning Curve

It has been weeks since I met with a former co worker. We discussed an important issue that seemed to hit me. Learning curve. In light of today's economic environment, these questions seem to beg answers (more so for project managers seeking employment):
1. Is your PMO willing to invest time and money to train a project manager, i.e., needed for more complex projects that require a more technical PM role ,
2. If yes, how much time is your company or PMO willing to invest time wise,
3. If no, why not?
4. How does one measure ROI in training a PM or a functional manager?
5. What is a reasonable amount of time to train a PM or any employee for that manner?

I remember a media article that companies nowadays are sitting on a pile of cash; that managers and executives are still wary of ramping up hiring to meet increase in business volume.

Having been in this role as well, I was leery of hiring someone not trained nor had the experience in my industry, nor someone who had done project management in the past. It becomes a catch 22 for most seeking employment. They won't get hired if hiring companies are loathe to invest in worker training nor see the value in hiring someone from another industry (and thus will not invest in worker training either for a new technology nor application). Further, I doubt companies nowadays still provide the benefit of tuition reimbursement (for employees working on a college degree or master's program).

Am looking, or most are looking forward to normalcy whereby employers see the benefit of worker's training, education, and employee retention. There's more at stake here but I will address them for later, e.g., business continuity, CRM, customer satisfaction, and plain workers sense of happiness at their jobs.

Or is this the new normal whereby no one sees the ROI on workers training and education?

Disaster Preparedness and Risk Management

This is the latest news regarding the disaster unfolding in Louisiana. Excerpted from Foxnews.com. "British Petroleum downplayed the possibility of a catastrophic accident at an offshore rig that exploded, causing the worst U.S. spill in decades along the Gulf coast and endangering shoreline habitat.

In its 52-page exploration plan and environmental impact analysis for the well, BP suggested it was unlikely, or virtually impossible, for an accident to occur that would lead to a giant crude oil spill and serious damage to beaches, fish, mammals and fisheries.

BP's plan filed with the federal Minerals Management Service for the Deepwater Horizon well, dated February 2009, says repeatedly that it was "unlikely that an accidental surface or subsurface oil spill would occur from the proposed activities."

And while the company conceded that a spill would impact beaches, wildlife refuges and wilderness areas, it argued that "due to the distance to shore (48 miles) and the response capabilities that would be implemented, no significant adverse impacts are expected."

There will be more questions about risk projection, risk assessment, risk assessment, risk analysis, and finally--the person who signed off on the Risk Assessment Report. I am not surprised there wasn't a disaster preparedness plan. There wasn't any probability of a disaster occurring in the first place.

Oil Spill from offshore rig off Louisiana

This week, the news on explosion, sinking of an oil rig off the cost of Louisiana, loss of lives, an unfolding environmental disaster--has been at the forefront of network news. MSNBC reported on 4/29th: "The oil leak triggered by a deadly rig blast off the coast of Louisiana has the potential to cause more environmental damage than the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill, one of the largest ecological disasters ever recorded, some observers say." Beyond the ecological impact, the total economic impact needs to be considered as well. "Experts said the spill could also destroy the livelihood of commercial fishermen and shrimp catchers and impact recreational fishermen. According to the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, the state’s fishing industry is worth $265 billion at dockside and has a total economic impact of $2.3 trillion."

BP was operating the Deepwater Horizon, which was drilling in 5,000 feet of water about 40 miles offshore when it exploded last week. Eleven crew members are missing and presumed dead, and the government says 5,000 barrels of oil a day are spewing from the well underneath it. Right now, the focus has been on capping the oil head, prevention of oil slick or oil from reaching shoreline--the blame game has not begun. I can just imagine what is going through BP's Risk Managers' mind, as they conduct meetings and come up with quick resolutions on how to mitigate this unfolding disasters. It is easy to pose the following questions, 1) how did this happen? 2) was this human error or was this equipment failure? 3) where in the mitigation plan did we fail? 4) how many back up or redundant systems do we currently have, both human and automated processes? 5) at the government policy level, does this change our policy to continue and open offshore drilling within US territory, knowing the risks to wildlife and ecology, at what cost? 6) to the BP Risk Managers and US COO, can we statistically predict offshore drilling disasters given past historical data? Beyond these questions, what do you tell the surviving family members for BP employees and contractors who lost loved ones.

Easy questions to pose. Harder to answer these questions.

project milestone tracking

So for the past two months, I have been involved with larger scale, longer duration projects. I have been wrestling with our current project reporting and status reporting from the field. I have seen varied customer types. Some want detailed reporting on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis. Some want just the end-result in a master database or spreadsheet. Some want daily detailed reporting. If the project reviewer is higher up the "food-chain" or "chain of command", typically the level of detail is looser or lost to some degree. The more complex the project (no, we have not been using Microsoft Project which complicates my situation even more), the more quantity of projects one is juggling at a given time, the lesser project monitoring is done.

This is just a function of capacity and human bandwidth. The dilemma then becomes, do you monitor a project status quantitatively or qualitatively. Being a melancholy by nature, I prefer the quantitative measurement of milestones hit and achieved. Instead of a descriptive text-type reporting of project status, issues log, project reporting, I have come up with a template (simple Microsoft Excel template) for the field engineer or field technician to populate. It is a simple yes or no, for specific milestones completed/not completed. This will be a weekly report to be submitted to the PMO. As a project manager for a different industry, what is your preference? What industry are you in, and what type of reporting do you prefer?