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ASPE PMP Boot Camp Day 2

It became clear on Day2 of the ASPE PMP Boot Camp that the PMI world revolves around page 43 of the PMBOK.  Just as I suspected.

If you’re still reading, you may be following my personal experiences of the ASPE PMP Boot Camp class in Denver, Colorado.  I’m taking the training course for the purposes of sitting the PMI PMP exam, but I’m also sharing my thoughts along the way.  Hopefully, this will help others who journey down this road.  Just exactly what does this course cover?  How much does it cost?  What requirements does it expect of the students?  And how will you personally feel when going through it?  Those are the topics explored in this series.  This is Day 2, so scroll down for earlier posts to catch the dialogue.

So… back to my premise… PMBOK page 43 is King!  What’s on page 43 again?  Page 43 of the PMBOK is the grid of Project Management Process Groups and Knowledge Areas.  In other words, the processes that PMI project managers use to initiate, plan, execute, monitor, control, and close a project.  When taking this PMP Boot Camp seminar, you will spend all four days examining page 43 from a hundred different angles, yeah a thousand angles.  Everything you study comes back to it, so make sure you study it well.  Memorize it early.  Forward and backward.  Be able to write it out upon demand.  In fact, you are allowed to do just that within the first ten minutes of the PMP exam to use as a cheat sheet.

The ASPE instructor handed out 50 flash cards, which I found very handy for quick study.  You’ll use them to name the 42 PMI processes, each having inputs, outputs, tools, and techniques.  You must memorize every word of this or risk exam failure.  And don’t try to write these out during class because you’ll miss too much of the lecture.  Do it the night before.  Unfortunately, understanding the general flow of processes is not enough for success.  There are simply too many unfamiliar terms to mentally juggle.  You’ll have to memorize too.

Make no mistake about it, this class is a Boot Camp just like its name says.  Marine Corps Boot Camp.  As I stated in my Day 1 post, this is very, very intense.  The 42 PMI processes are just the beginning.  As I said earlier, each one has inputs, outputs, tools, and techniques you must understand and memorize.  But it doesn’t end there!  Each one of those has a tidy list of 2 – 10 items encapsulated within: project documents, breakdowns, formulas, methods, theories, plans, etc.  Want to count the cost?  Multiply processes times your list of inputs, outputs, tools, and techniques, and again times those encapsulated lists and you’ve got thousands of pieces of information at your fingertips.  You’ll literally be hit with scores each day.  And you’ll be expected to recall them from memory for the exam.

This course will tax every resource you can muster, most notably: time.  Don’t expect to have any kind of real life for these four days.  Remember, this is Boot Camp not play time!

Okay, that’s probably enough about the hardships.  Further posts likely won’t even mention that aspect unless I suffer a complete nervous breakdown and am dying to tell you about it.  Instead, I’ll focus on other aspects of the course.  But I wanted you to get the full picture of what you might experience in taking this course.  It’s a doozie!

Are the hardships worth it?  Of course!  Gosh, it’s only four days.  Anyone can survive that.  So don’t let this discourage you.  Sure it’s hard but survivable.  Just remember, anything worthwhile is hard, or at least seems that way when you’re in the middle of it.  Later, you’ll look back and realize it wasn’t all that bad.  So stick with it and you’ll be glad you did!

You should also know that the Boot Camp course it not the end of your journey to the PMP exam.  After this four days of classroom instruction, you should expect to 2-3 weeks in the ASPE Study Guide and PMBOK.  Make sure to factor that into your near-term plans.

Plan to love the PMI methodology, at least for the duration of this undertaking.  I mean love it!  Dig in like a toothless redneck at a pie eating contest.  Focus all your attentions on the PMI way of doing things.  There’s a reason I say this; it’s a subtle but important one…  If you get the notion in your head that this methodology doesn’t work for you, or can’t be justified in real life, or won’t work for your company, or any other reason to hate it, you will not have the fortitude to continue.  You must (at least temporarily) set aside your personal beliefs and love this PMI approach like it’s you own.  Imagine yourself as a highly paid PMI project manager at the top of a Fortune 100 company, or whatever it takes.  Just love this stuff for a season.

During all this, I have gotten a renewed respect I got for the ASPE instructor, Dave Caccamo.  Not only did he write the 850 page Participant Manual and Slide Guide, but delivers it with flawless execution.  That’s no trivial occupation.  Pray you get this guy.  Seriously.  He’s good.

Okay, that’s it for today.  I’ve got 20 flash cards to write up, 43 processes to memorize, and five formulas to refresh my memory on.  I hope you’re enjoying the series.  Click the “About” page link to let me know what you think!

 

My Notes From Day 2:

Start right out writing out the Project Management Process Groups and Knowledge Areas Mapping matrix on page 43 of PMBOK.  Write out matrix in shorthand and put X’s where there is a process.  9 x 5 grid, 26 processes.

Flash cards came in real handy because we went over all the planning processes.  Inputs and outputs were on the cards, and very handy to refer to in class.  Write these out the night before!  If you don’t, you can get lost in the pace.  There are 42 processes.  Must know all inputs and outputs.  Instructor spends most time on Day 2 explaining inputs and outputs.

But flash cards only cover some of what you’ll cover.  There are deep discussions of tools and techniques that are not on the cards.  Much of that has to be studied and memorized as well.

Inputs and outputs of processes are so numerous and unfamiliar that memorization seems like the only way to get them.  They are natural and logical, but just too numerous to mentally juggle.  That means a huge amount of study.

Memorization is destroyed by adrenalin

There were a fair number of descriptions of the sneaky ways PMP questions can be posed.  PMI will sneak in adjacent inputs or tools and techniques to trick you into a wrong answer.

There were several discussions amongst students about when they could take the PMP exam.  Wait too long and forget everything.  Try to take it too soon and risk not studying enough.  Plus, there’s work  and personal schedules to account for.  Bottom line: this is a big commitment with a fair amount of risk.

Quick recall is the premium skill for this course.

Links to previous ASPE PMP Boot Camp posts

 

Disclaimer: The thoughts and feedback for the ASPE PMP Certification Exam Boot Camp associated with this series of posts are my own. In exchange for providing my feedback on this community forum, ASPE has provided benefits related to my course attendance.

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ASPE PMP Boot Camp Day 1

“Intense” is the operative word for the ASPE PMP Boot Camp Day 1.  Or maybe “panic!”  Actually, I never reached a full state of panic.  Maybe “bracing concern” is a more accurate description.

Remember in yesterday’s post here, I agreed to share my experiences in the 4-day ASPE PMP Boot Camp.  So here it is!  Day 1.  Don’t get scared!

The first thing you should know  about this course, which I gradually discovered about 1 – 2 hours into it, is that it is not a general purpose project management course.  It is not a Cliff Notes of the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK)® guide.  You are not coming here to learn all the latest theories on how to make successful projects, on how to manage a project team, on the correct way to manage projects.  You are here to learn PMI’s way to do things.  You are here to learn the PMI terminology and process.  And more specifically, here to learn how to pass the PMP exam.

Throw away everything you think you know about project management.  It will not help for the next four days.  In fact, it may hurt you.  Again, you are here to do it the PMI way.  Anything else will only hinder that singular goal: learn PMBOK so you can pass the PMP exam.

As you may have read from my first post, I was unsure what to expect when I signed up for this.  Would I get a foundational course in project management including all the terms and philosophies?  Would it be a crash course in all the techniques for successful project execution?  I wasn’t entirely sure.  But that all became clear within the first few hours.  No!  This course is focused almost entirely on getting a person up to speed with PMI’s PMBOK, which is the basis for the PMP exam.

Another thing became clear within the first few hours of the ASPE course; you cannot cram the entire PMBOK in to 35 hours of instruction.  Even if you turn it sideways!  On Day 1, I’m left wondering if you can even survey it in that amount of time.  So what is your best use of four days in the classroom?  I guess, hit the highlights, and point students to the places where they can study for the test.  Sure, there’s more to it than that, but that is certainly a major component of this class.  You get that right away.  The ASPE instructor’s number one goal is your success in sitting the PMP exam.  I certainly give the instructor high marks for a good mix of humor, depth of personal knowledge, and the ability to deliver a large amount of information in short bursts.  Kudos to ASPE!  These guys are good.

After the first day, you sort-of feel it’s possible to pass the PMP exam.  But only after dozens more hours of study.  I expect to get a good start for that in the classroom, but don’t expect to be able to run right out and sit the exam the next week.  There’s just too much information to absorb.  After all, the PMBOK is almost 500 pages!

It has become acutely obvious that a huge amount of memorization is necessary to pass this test.  The class professor understands this and points that out on Day 1, which brings on a strong feeling of panic, which they say gives way to resign on Day 2, and then to confidence on Day 3 and 4.  The full scope of memorization just isn’t clear on Day 1, and you look at that huge PMBOK that could choke a horse, and you’re not sure if you can pass or not.  It just requires dedication, they say.

So after posting this tonight, I’ll hit the books.  I’ve got to fill out a series of flash cards and then memorize the “Project Management Process Groups and Knowledge Areas Mapping” grid on page 43 of the PMBOK.  After that, I’ll read through the 190 pages of the “ASPE Participant Manual/Slide Guide that we covered today.”  Of course, I’ll do most of that during the boring 2-hour meeting I have to attend tonight.  Then maybe I can sleep!

 

My Notes for Day 1 of ASPE PMP Boot Camp Seminar:

Course Instructor: Dave Caccamo, M.Econ, PMP, CSM, Network+
35 hours of instruction

PMP Exam: 175 questions, 4 hours, passing grade: 61% or 106 correct answers, before exam 20% of applicants will be audited for further certification

20% of questions will not be in PMBOK.  Look at 1,000 questions before taking test.  ASPE goes over about 500 questions.

While studying: keep a sheet of paper that you fill out for every question you miss that contains “the one piece of knowledge” that would have helped you get the questions right.

Don’t expect to cram during the prep course and then pass the exam immediately after.  Take it as soon as possible, but you must study.  15 – 25 hours of extra study and memorization are necessary.  Don’t read the PMBOK before exam.  Much of it won’t apply.  You must already be a good project manager to pass the PMP exam.  Memorization is not enough.

PMI asks questions like no one else.  Evil questions.  Think like PMI, not necessarily how things work for you in practice.  Questions are always according to PMI lists, not personal experience.  Trick questions will include fake answers from real-world.  Use PMBOK answers instead. Don’t get into the mindset teaching PMI the “right way” to do project management.  Tricky and picky.

There is a ten-minute period just before the exam where you can write down anything you want.  You can use that as a cheap sheet.  You cannot bring in anything.  They will give you pencil and paper.

PMBOK pg. 43: Table of Process Groups verses Knowledge Areas, memorize this page!

Study following the class:
First 3 days after 4-day class: Daily warm-up: write out matrix, study cards
For 10 days: read study guide chapters for ten days
Last 3-4 days: Online assessment, 2 closing processes, read appendix G to see buzzwords, read domain tasks directives

Memorize:

  • PMBOK Page 43
  • 16 Formulas
  • Inputs and outputs

 

Course materials:

  • 1. The Project Management Professional (PMP)® Certification Exam Boot Camp 3-ring binder, 846 pages
  • 2. A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK® Guide) Fourth Edition, 467 pages
  • 3. Flash cards, part of study guide, quick reference
  • 4. The Complete Project management Professional (PMP 4.0)® Study Guide, 332 pages (for use after the class is finished for study and memorization for the exam)

Links to previous ASPE PMP Boot Camp posts

 

Disclaimer: The thoughts and feedback for the ASPE PMP Certification Exam Boot Camp associated with this series of posts are my own. In exchange for providing my feedback on this community forum, ASPE has provided benefits related to my course attendance.

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The ASPE Project Management Professional Boot Camp

Okay, I’ve decided to do it!  I’m attending the ASPE Project Management Professional (PMP)® Certification Exam Boot Camp in Denver, Colorado!  It is part of a twelve-city tour by ASPE, Inc. to educate and prepare would-be project managers for the PMP Exam.  Cool!

Wouldn’t it be neat to read the unbiased personal experiences of somebody who had been through the course before taking the plunge yourself?  That’s exactly what I’m offering in this series of blog posts.  You’ll get my unvarnished daily experiences of the entire PMP Prep seminar.  After reading them, you can decide if this is for you.  I expect to enjoy myself, so you probably will too.

I’ll be posting my personal experiences every day I attend.  You’ll get a firsthand look at the whole process: the course materials, the homework, the hardships, and the excitement along the way – everything one might expect when taking such a course to prepare for sitting the PMP exam hosted by PMI.  See links below to check out the ASPE course I’ll be taking.

Honestly at this point, I just have a sketchy view of the week ahead.  I sort-of know what to expect, but not exactly.  I’ve been doing project management for longer than I care to divulge, but have never taken the PMP exam, and never formally studied the disciplines of project management.  Of course, having worked in engineering shops since college, I know much of the terminology and probably apply the principles on a daily basis.  So I’m coming from a different perspective than those who may just be starting their careers.  Honestly, I wish I’d done this a long time ago, but it’s never too late to improve your career with training like this.

To prepare, I read through the ASPE PMP Boot Camp overview and course outline (see link below).  I learned that there are four very full days of coursework – from 8 AM to 6 PM.  (I’m expecting to drink from a fire hose.)  The course outline lists 68 topics grouped into 8 areas.  We’ll cover such lofty subjects as Project Management Overview, The Project Management Life Cycle, The Knowledge Areas, The Elements of Project Management, The PMP Exam, The PMP Certification, and The Credentials.

After finishing the course, they say 97% of ASPE students pass the PMP examination.  That’s reassuring.  It probably means I could too!

The cost is $2,395.  Honestly, I think that’s a small price to pay to advance your career.  I mean really… if you plan to spend any time around projects for next forty years, this is probably a good idea – it doesn’t matter what your role is.  You’ll certainly earn it all back, especially since it launches you on a fast-track to higher management positions.  And PMI claims a PMP certification it directly impacts your salary.  Who doesn’t want that?  This little-understood fact is a big deal for career advancement:  Get all the training you can handle.  And get it early in your career!

Helpful links:

http://www.aspe-sdlc.com/courses/pmp-boot-camp/

http://www.pmi.org/certification/project-management-professional-pmp.aspx

http://www.projectteamblog.com/?p=239

Links to previous ASPE PMP Boot Camp posts

 

Disclaimer: The thoughts and feedback for the ASPE PMP Certification Exam Boot Camp associated with this series of posts are my own.  In exchange for providing my feedback on this community forum, ASPE has provided benefits related to my course attendance.

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Engineering Begins with Prototypes

I was talking with a senior software developer last week about the importance of early prototypes to define products. We concluded that it is pointless to begin developing any real architecture or engineering until the prototypes are finished and signed off. You must put your ideas into tangible form before you can trust them to the discipline of engineering. And customers must see examples of the finished product before you can move forward with deep development. Here’s why:

Under-the-hood engineering depends entirely on what you plan to sell. Notice I did not say what the developers thing might be cool or trendy. It’s what you plan to sell. Period. It doesn’t matter if you are selling transmissions or skyscrapers or operating systems; you have to know what the customer wants before you can build the most efficient version of that. Just try to dream it all up alone on a deserted island – without any input – without customers telling you what they will pay for and what they will not. That’s a lot like what you’d get if the developers in their Tommy Bahamas island shirts said, Oh, yeah! That’s so cool. Let’s make that!

Prototype Prototype

Take the automobile transmission for example. If you designed it on a deserted island, and sent the designs straight into production, the risks would be enormous. The finished product would likely have extra gears, “cool” new ideas, and “special” modes that the customer never asked for. And won’t pay for. All those extras make the product less efficient, more costly to manufacture, and more costly to maintain. You probably can’t afford that. Only the most efficient and cost effect designs survive. In other words, only what the customer asked for – nothing more.

Sure, you can get creative and throw in some extras. I call that “programmer candy.” The product doesn’t have to be a total bore. But make sure your core competencies are taken care of first.

 

Prototype

 

Also, it should be understood that prototypes can rarely be morphed into shipping products. (Managers don’t get that.) They are usually throw-away models, so expect to add that extra time to your overall project schedule. For instance, take the old clay automobile models as an extreme example. Remember them from the 1950’s? Even after sanded and painted, they still couldn’t serve as production automobiles. It’s almost humorous to imagine. But still, it has always been a strong desire in engineering circles to go from prototype to shipping product with the stroke of the pen. After all, the prototype looks so real, why not just clean it up and ship it! That’s what the manager usually ask for. Actually, that goal is not far off in computer-aided design, like software development, because editing is so easy. Not so with clay models.

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False Front Prototypes

When you watch the old Westerns like ‘3-10 To Yuma’ you are usually treated to a Main Street with old-time businesses and homes on it. Horse drawn wagons lumber by. Victorian dress is on full display. A child taps an iron barrel ring down the dusty street with a stick. There’s the obligatory livery station, bank, gunsmith and hardware store, and cobbler. They all sport a nice tall false front, as the turn of the Century buildings often did. It’s exactly like “real life” in 1880.

But what you don’t see is the backs of those buildings. The Hollywood cameraman never goes back there. Guess what? There’s nothing back there! The buildings are literally just false fronts. You couldn’t actually live in one of those houses or do business in one of those stores. Sure, there are a few sets where you see characters going into and out of those businesses, but those movie sets may be in a completely different sound stage. Nothing is as it seems; it’s all staged for the camera.

Got your attention? Now consider how this happens in engineering…

In engineering, we build prototypes to help people see what a finished product will look like. What people? Customers, potential investors, buyers, company executives, project stakeholders. Everyone needs an idea what a product will look like when the engineering is complete. It gets everyone on the same page, and dispels misunderstandings. Sure, the prototypes have a few warts. It can have reduced functionality, but it must *look* like the finished product, and must allow the sales force to tell the story and make the sale.

The problem with these prototypes is that they have almost none of the proper engineering – much like a Western movie set. Sure, they look good, and may even appear to work. For the purposes of a First Look, they satisfy everyone curiosity and need to see something tangible, and they get everyone thinking in the same vein. But they may not have any of the correct functionality! That fact alone leads to a false sense of completion.

Project managers, engineers, project stakeholders, and everyone alike can be lulled into a false belief that these systems are just a step away from completion. In actuality, they are like false front Western movie sets. You could never consider actually using them for everyday purposes. But after looking at them for an extended period of time, you come to a false belief that you could. You forget how far they are from reality.

It’s that “one step to final product” illusion that gets everyone into trouble — especially the engineers. They are the ones tasked with readying the product for release. Everyone around them believes the product is almost there – almost finished. But it’s not. The stakeholders have big money riding on a swift move from prototype to production. Customer expectations have been set, and they are waiting – sometimes not so patiently. Problem is, there is no swift move. The prototype must be thrown away and the “real” engineering begins. It’s like throwing away the Hollywood false front hardware store and building a real one. You can’t just build onto the false cardboard buildings. They have none of the real factors that go into a real building. Real hardware stores are expensive! And they take a long time to build! They are nothing like the quickie cardboard movie sets.

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Overtime: The Devil’s In The Details

I keep running into the same old product development story: All the developers meet for a status update to compare with the project schedule (and this isn’t just a fault of project schedules… it happens with scrum stories as well) but the engineers are just a little behind schedule. Gee, what’s new? They all have just a few more tasks to complete their stories, just a few more details… And that goes on and on and on… It’s enough to shake my faith in project management methodologies. Not enough to shake my faith in the project team, just the narrow ruts we find ourselves channeled into. It’s the same old story. The program manger doesn’t have a full grasp of the detail that team members must face to complete their tasks. In fact, you can’t know that level of detail until you are the one doing the tasks. And sure enough, every one has 50 – 100% more detail than initially scheduled for. So… the schedule blown, and everybody is in trouble. And working overtime. Who made that up? Okay, I complete get that companies have to fight hard for an advantage. Overtime is a necessity just to survive sometimes. If you don’t do it, you shrink back into oblivion. So yes, overtime is good. But I’m not sure I like how it’s arrived upon. It’s always “our” fault because we haven’t completed our tasks, so there’s a mad scramble to complete the project on time. Overtime is never pitched as something good for the species. Or necessary for survival. Instead, it’s simply because we haven’t competed our tasks in a timely manner. Ooo, gosh.  I guess I’ve been complaining, huh?  🙂

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Hook a Timesheet to MS Project

PMO’s and project managers, have you ever considered hooking a timesheet to your MS Project MPP file? You spend a good deal of time pouring over your MS Project files, scheduling tasks, and assigning hours, but are you ignoring the ‘Actual Work’ field?

Do you have an automated way to input actual work?

Hooking a timesheet to the Actual Work field turns your static project schedule into a living, breathing document. You’re now releasing the beast into the wild, and you might be surprised at what it turns into! What, exactly, does that mean to release the schedule into the wild? It means letting employees enter their own actual work against their own tasks. It means hooking a timesheet to your project schedule. See this timesheet program for an example.

 

Getting actual working hours from employees might completely surprise you. Many project managers are uncertain how long tasks take. They have a good intellectual guess, or even some estimates from the actual engineers on the ground, but actual hours from employees can be a huge eye-opener. They are almost never what you expect. Project tasks often double or triple from their initial baseline estimate. No kidding! And when that begins to happen on a regular basis, panic sets in! You now have to either rein back your initial proposal or force employees to be more efficient.

See what I mean by setting the beast lose in the wild?

When engineers blow past your estimates, or even their own, they have no particular malice in mind. They are just doing their jobs. They may have no idea how those bloated task hours fit into a larger picture, or how they may affect a static project schedule. Again, they are just doing their jobs to the best of their abilities. And if that means a little extra work, then so be it. Problem is, stakeholders and project managers are freaking out as the schedule blows up. I once heard a manager say, “At this rate, we can only do a quarter of what we hoped.” That’s project management panic!

So back to hooking a timesheet to your MPP file… Sure, panic may set in for a while. You may need to rethink your plan. But you’ll be much more educated than if you had left the schedule in an “open loop” system without actual hours from employees. Ignorance is bliss!

A timesheet is the best thing ever invented for a project plan. They are so closely related, they should be in the same package! Fortunately, with this timesheet app, they are. In fact, you don’t even need MS Project. You can create your own project schedules with full hierarchy and project tasks, and then track time to them. You’ll instantly compare estimates with actuals, and avert most of the panic associated with a blown schedule.

Getting “Actual Work” feedback early is the best answer to project management panic!

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Three Reasons to Track Project Time

Time tracking, for the purposes of project management, is an overhead some companies are not willing to undertake.  (Read this as an exploitable mistake!)  We all know that some level of administrative overhead is necessary to maintain a healthy organization.  And some level of process or methodology is also necessary.  In this article, I’m suggesting that time tracking should be part of that process.

There are three primary reasons to track project time that apply to all organizations.  It matters nothing whether your company is a consultancy, manufacturer, government agency, non-profit, or otherwise.  Time tracking is valuable to all.  Here are the top three reasons to track project time.   1) Reduce budget overruns, 2) Prioritize projects, and 3) Learn your own business.

I’ll discuss these three project tracking benefits in detail.  Feel free to skip to the ones that interest you most.

1) Reduce Budget Overruns
Human beings are curiously bad with two things: time and money.  A huge number of cottage industries are built around helping people manage time and money.  Why?  Because almost every one of us does it badly.  Admit it… your bank account scrapes bottom almost every month.  And you’re late for at least one event per month.  That’s so easy to predict, I don’t even have to know you to feel confident in its reach.  Everyone suffers from the same poor time and financial accounting.

Unfortunately, we carry those same poor principles into our work life.  I’ll venture to guess that your boss, and his boss above him, is also a poor manager of his personal time and money.  Just because he’s a boss, doesn’t mean he’s any better at time management, or money management, than you are.  We’re all crap.

But if you’ll just subject yourself to a little time tracking discipline, you can avert the most common budget overruns.  It’s the low-hanging fruit you’ve heard so much about.  Just track the time you spend.  That time translates into salaries.  Now you know the project cost.  Don’t spend more than you take in.  Simple.

I know a great time tracking product for this.  It’s named Standard Time.  Click here for Timesheet and Time Tracking Software.  You can install this on everyone’s workstations, and start tracking project time.
You’ll see why it’s important in the next two reasons to track time.

2) Prioritize Projects
Instinctively, you know which projects are strategically important to your company.  You know which ones represent a strategic investment that will pay off big-time in the future.  Even the lowest employee knows that.  (Although it’s the company executives that should enforce the participation in such projects.)  So, are they doing that?  Are you doing that?  (Hint: if you’re a low or mid-level manager, here’s your chance to advance:  Talk “strategic projects” at every meeting.)

“Secondary projects” are nice to do when you’ve got time and money to burn.  Have you got time and money to burn?  If not, you must focus on the strategic projects.  They’re the only ones that make money and keep people employed.  And how, exactly, do you do that?  You track time to them!

Collect all your hours for every project you work on, and then run a report that shows you which projects are getting the most time.  You might be surprised!  Even better, categorized your projects as “strategic” and “non-strategic” and run the report again.  Which category is getting the most time?  Are you surprised yet?

If you’ve already downloaded Standard Time (see link above), you can get all these reports for free.

3) Learn Your Own Business
Last thing: learn your own business (LYOB).  It takes 2 -3 years to really learn a business.  You may have a good guess within your first six months of employment, but you won’t truly know it for another two years!  Tracking your project time chops a year off that.  Here’s why:

When you track time to company projects, you learn what makes them efficient, and what makes them inefficient.  You learn the gritty details because you see everything that goes into the work you do.  My advice: pour over the descriptions in every time log entered by every employee.  Submit yourself to the excruciating pain of studying these details.  You’ll perfectly hate it!

But even as you hate it, you’ll love it.  You’ll become an expert on your business and will soon have the information you need to make improvements.  Time tracking provides the information you need.

Best Time Tracking Program

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Task Drivers

Microsoft Project as a simple method to find out which tasks are driving the ‘Start Date’ for a selected task. These are called “Task Drivers.” In other words, predecessor tasks that affect successor tasks.

Here’s how to find the task driver for a selected task:
    1. Click on any task that has predecessors
    2. Click in the “Track” menu button in the tool bar
    3. Choose “See what is driving the start date of a task”
    4. A panel appears at the left, showing the tasks that drive the selected on

 

 

Here, you can see that “Task 1a” drives “Task 2”, even though “Task 1b” is also a predecessor.  Task 1a is a “Task Driver” to Task 2.

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Don’t be the DIA and BAE Baggage System

Remember the expense delays in opening the brand new Denver International Airport?  Many case studies have been done examining the intricate reasons for such a colossal failure on a grand scale.  DIA was to be the most efficient airport in the world, able to accommodate over 50 million passengers per year.  One of the key components was to have a fully automated baggage system…eliminating the tug and trolley system.  This would cut a planes turnaround time by 30 minutes and would be a key component in creating more efficiency with flights and passenger throughout.  The chief project manager, Walter Slinger had his heart set on this shining new system and romanticized about the notoriety the state of the art airport would bring to the city of Denver.  BAE also liked the idea of designing a system that would garner great attention and further their own reputation for building baggage systems.  Again, you could read many in depth case studies about the key decisions that led to the cascade of delays and failures.  However, I would summarize them in a single manner, tunnel vision.  Both parties fell in love with an idea and ignored many internal obvious warnings about the baggage systems feasibility.  The delays were numerous and cost billions of dollars.  In the end, after many attempts to partially use the automated baggage system, it was virtually scrapped for the more economical tug and trolley method.  We all know the old saying that our eyes are bigger than our stomachs?  If you’re a project manager, make sure your love of an idea isn’t greater than your team’s ability to design and implement the idea.  Don’t be afraid to change directions.  Otherwise, you may be the next DIA, which is still one heck of an airport!