Paraphrasing a well-known concept in project management, one might say, “Planning is indispensable, but plans are useless. Hence, inspect and adapt.” Traditional plans are driven by dates – most likely with an end date being the primary driving factor. In traditional project management, you gather the requirements from your stakeholders, build the scope of the…

Background Does your organization need to specify a unique method of tracking progress for each type of Enterprise project in Project Online? Many years ago I worked with an electrical utility company that managed two types of projects using the Microsoft PPM tool: design projects and construction projects. They wanted to manage each type of…

Introduction This article discusses Project and Excel integration points, specifically in the following areas: How to import data from Excel to Project Importing an initial last list How to export data from Project to Excel Exporting a to-do list for resources Exporting time-phased data for reporting   Why Bother with Excel? First things first! My…

  As we discussed a few weeks ago, planning for, taking, and passing the Project Management Professional (PMP®) exam can stressful. We hope you enjoyed the article on How to Avoid the Seven Most Common PMP Exam Mistakes, and learned something, too. Now, let’s consider the sample question below:     Question You are assigned…

Let me start by asking a few questions… Do you want to get your projects done? Do you want people to enjoy working for you? Do you consider yourself a performance-based leader? Project Managers need to be able to lead a team to achieve results on time and on budget. Your team members may not…

Background Information Several months back, a user posted an interesting question in my company’s Microsoft Project user forum. The user was managing a project in which there were tasks that needed to be scheduled to occur on the first working day of each month. He indicated that he knew he could use a Start No…

No matter the industry or size of the project, every project manager is tasked with juggling multiple day-to-day operations. Even small-scale projects can be complex, comprised of hundreds of cross-functional activities that need to be executed under tight timelines with budgets at stake. As a project manager, you’re a change agent working with your team….

With many forms and faces and with a variety of roles, stakeholders are a valuable part of any project. Based on a recent article by Robert Youlker, stakeholders comprise people both inside and outside of an organization who have an interest in a problem and its solution. Fractured relationships with stakeholders can create a fragmented…

Originally published on Wrike Blog. Used with permission. Many people see project management as a complicated tangle of work breakdown structures, spreadsheets, critical path timelines, risk assessments… There’s a reason they give out certifications for this stuff! But as David Allen astutely points out everyone is a project manager — especially on Thanksgiving Day. What…

First things first! At the start of any project, you need to decide how and with which tool you will manage your project. At BrightWork, our recommendation is that SharePoint is the best collaborative platform with which to manage a project. For more experienced Project Managers, SharePoint will not have all the project planning capabilities…