Microsoft Project Professional for Collaborative Project Teams
Glen Alleman
Glen
Alleman near Snow Mass Mountain west of Aspen USA
The idea of a seamlessly integrated distributed collaborative team has been the holy grail of project management. US Federal agencies have used Integrated Project Teams (IPTs) for some time, even mandating their use (DOE 413.1, DOD 5000.2-R)
“… I am directing fundamental change in the way the Department acquires goods and services. The concepts of IPPD and IPTs shall be applied throughout the acquisition process to the maximum extent applicable.” – SECDEF memo, 10 May 1995.
The use of integrated project teams is no common place in civil and defense procurements is now moving to commercial projects. With subcontractors being turned into “project partners,” Joint Ventures, Small Business Administration style mentor / protégé relationships, and even concurrent internal development. Each of these projects structures requires some form of collaborative exchange of project, design, test, and fabrication data.
My experience has been primarily in large collaborative ventures using Microsoft Project Professional. The server based version of this product provides a collaborative environment to manage schedules across the enterprise. As well Share Point Services (SRS) provides a rudimentary document management and work control system. I say rudimentary since the version control, virtual document assembly, and “electronic vault” found in document management systems.
SRS along with the Web Access capabilities of Project Professional provides a foundation for distributed project management. I have some trouble with the term “virtual,” since the participants in the project have offices with desks, laboratories, and shippable products. Since the teams are not co-located, their interactions are “across the wire,” therefore may be considered virtual.
Using SRS on a Real Project
Like all good things in life there’s always a difference between the brochure and the experience. Microsoft Project Professional is a powerful set of tools focused on managing schedules and resources across the enterprise. The SRS components provide a collaborative environment based on these project schedules.
But there is a price to pay more than the monetary costs. The complexity
of SRS is a bit too high for a casual users and the feature set is a bit too
low for a truly enterprise solution. This is the “Mama Bear” solution.
Letters To Glen Alleman
"The Herding Cats monthly column is designed to stimulate exchange of observations on project management topics. To promote such exchange a Weblog called " Herding Cats Letters " is available where your comments may be posted and I can directly respond. The purpose of the weblog is to capture conversations. As in any agile process, thoughts evolve and revisiting past issues in light of new information will be valuable to the community"... Glen Alleman
About the Author:
Glen
currently works for Steven Meyers and Associates (www.smawins.com)
as an IMP/IMS (Integrated Master Plan/Integrated Master Schedule) lead for
NASA planetary and deep space programs. SM&A's Consulting Services provide
merger and acquisition support, litigation consulting, interim management
services, competitive processes implementation, business/marketing plan
development and implementation, full-service business capture solutions
and mentoring. Glen’s most recent engagement is on the Hubble Space
Telescope Robotic Recovery Mission.
Glen’s previous position was Vice President Program Management Office with CH2M HILL. This role managed the IT portion of the closure of Ricky Flats Environmental Technology site in Golden Colorado. Prior to this Glen consulted with a boutique firm for 9 years, managed system integration groups for software vendors, lead software development groups for mission critical software products, and wrote code of radar, sonar and realtime control systems for aerospace and process control firms. glen.alleman@niwotridge.com
Follow Glen Alleman's practice of Agile Project Management through his recent PM World Today Viewpoints Columns.