PM Practices July - August 2004
On Program Management
We define program management as “the coordinated management
of interdependent projects over a finite period of time in order to achieve
a set of business objectives”.In the high-technology, aerospace and
automotive industries, program management is a critical business function
that provides the means by which new products are conceived, developed and
brought to market in order to achieve a major share in the profit.Outside
of these core industries however, program management is not well understood.In
fact, there is much confusion between the disciplines of program and project
management. ... The PM World Today Program
Management Series by Martinellii and Russell
Donna Fitzgerald and Nimble Project Management
Donna
Fitzgerald is the creator of the Nimble Approach to Project Management and
is a partner with Knowth Consulting. Prior to joining Knowth she held a variety
of jobs with such companies as Oracle, Sun Microsystems, Rolm, and Verizon
in finance and product management. She is the cofounder of the NewGrange Center,
a web based nonprofit project management society with worldwide membership
and the author of frequent columns where she explores the practical details
of agile project management.
The Editor Comments: I use Builder.com to to keep me up to date on what is useful in the software and web building business. In using the search string "project management" in the Builder.com search engine I came across a series of articles by Donna Fitzgerald styled " Nimble Project Management".
I read her assessment of Peter Senge's book on the learning organization with interest, especially as I am a fan of the Pete Senge approach to establishing a learning organization, as it applies to the corporate learning of project management. Check the Builder.com web for this interesting "Nimble Project Management™" series.
David Curling
Editor PM World Today
Prepare Your Business Plan A Free Interactive Business Planner
The Interactive Business Planner is an online business planning resource specifically to entrepreneurs prepare a 3 year business plan for their new or existing business.
With the IBP, you are guided through each section of your business plan using a question and answer format; learn definitions and tips, and view sample business plans to help you to write your own plan; have financial projections prepared for you, based upon the information you provide; and use the power of the Internet to assist you in researching your business plan.
The IBP will help you identify and collect information on marketing, management, regulations, risk and financing of a small and medium-sized business.
The IBP is managed by the Canada Business Service Centre Network The IBP is described as
"Building on the success of the pilot project, a national version of the Interactive Business Planner was developed which includes regional contents and links for every province/territory in Canada as well as a French language version. Funding for the development and current maintenance of the national version is provided by the National Secretariat for the Canada Business Service Centres. The Interactive Business Planner is the joint property of the Government of Canada and the Government of British Columbia.
The Interactive Business Planner was created to support the development of small business. As a tool accessible through the World Wide Web, the Interactive Business Planner meets the needs of individuals who do not have easy access to the resources needed to produce a business plan. The IBP links these individuals to applicable resources and provides them with a framework to guide them in expressing their business idea.
The IBP uses forms and tables, makes limited use of JavaScript, and does not use frames. Newer version browsers are best able to take full advantage of the features built into the IBP.
The IBP consists of a database program and over 300 CFM pages. The database was written in Oracle 8.1.6 using the ColdFusion Web application server 4.5. A limited amount of the development was done with Pro*C with CGI interface. The system features fully secure multi-user concurrency."
For an introduction to how to express your business ideas with a formal Business Plan visit the [Interactive Business Planner.]
The NewGrange Archive
Donna Fitzgerald the owner of the NewGrange email discussion list writes...
"NewGrange is an active project management mailing list that is essentially dedicated to a discussion of software development practices. Recent exchanges have been on Agile PM Management and Extreme Programming. A tour of the NewGrange archive and over 4,000 archived email exchanges will provide a rich source of information for those that are willing to spend the time mining the messages.
If you are in the software development business there are tips on practices and useful contacts for follow up on IT management issues. See http://groups.yahoo.com/group/newgrange"