Gestión Eficaz del Alcance de un Proyecto

 
Imaginemos un equipo de gestión del proyecto que gestiona eficazmente el alcance. ¿Qué actividades realizaría?

Ejercicio: Describa cómo gestionó el alcance el equipo de dirección del proyecto, en 9 párrafos, usando las siguientes palabras clave:

1. taller de requisitos, prototipos, documento de requisitos, matriz de trazabilidad de requisitos
2. generación de alternativas, entregables, enunciado del alcance del proyecto
3. miembros del equipo, paquetes de trabajo, EDT, cuentas de control
4. plantilla EDT, diccionario de la EDT, línea base del alcance
5. miembros del equipo, códigos de cuentas
6. scope creep
7. control del alcance, grado de avance, desviaciones sobre la línea base, sistema de control de cambios
8. sistema de gestión de la configuración, validación del alcance, aceptación del cliente
9. entregables aceptados

The Agile Project Manager (and III)

... read the previous post

Agile methods will not fade away. They have been practiced for more than 15 years with outstanding results, not only on software projects but on many other fields. Some projects, especially knowledge worker projects occurring in fast-moving or time-constrained environments, call for an agile approach. If you take a course in Scrum, for instance, you will have solid resources to face an adaptive project. Being invented in the product management arena, agile methods can also be used in project management.

By means of the new credential PMI-ACP (PMI Agile Certified Practitioner), PMI is getting back the Project Manager on stage as the main character, also for adaptive projects. In order to get the credential, the candidate has to demonstrate they have real experience on agile projects, and also that they are capable to apply the whole set of tools, techniques, knowledge and skills needed on agile projects.

So far, PMI has not published a new standard to manage agile projects (there is no Agile Project Management Body of Knowledge), and there is no communication implying that. Instead, PMI recommends a series of 11 reference books, true master pieces on agile practices. With so good literature available, maybe this is the right approach (but those books are quite focused on software, though). On the other hand, unfortunately for those not having a good level of English, those 11 books are not translated to any language, and even worse, currently the PMI-ACP exam does not have translation aids. Nowadays, the candidate has to study lot of books and practe a lot of tests, in English.

Moreover, as far as I know, there are not many books aimed to PMI-ACP exam takers and also for those not needing the certification but to learn how to manage agile projects. Those books will come. Meanwhile, you cannot wait. Sooner or later, an agile project is going to cross your path. You better get prepared.

There is no other profession in the world more goal oriented than project management. Project Management is definitely not quite a rewarding profession: If goals are met, as they have to be, that is the reason you are in charge, then no one praise you. But if goals are not met, then the fault is only yours. While everything is doing okay, nobody says a thing, but if the outcome is not good, suddenly, everyone is talking about risk management, poor documentation, poor leadership, quality audits, communication problems, lack of social skills, convenience of coaching, etc. The result is always the same for the poor Project Manager: Everybody blames us and we don’t have good defense.

Project Managers don't need to reinvent the wheel. All they may need is already invented yet. This is the same case for adaptive projects. We don't need to invent methods to manage them. You need to adapt yourself to this new way of managing. If you don't, the next time somebody blames you for managing an adaptive project the traditional way, you will have to admit it this is entirely your fault!

Click here to read the Spanish version for this article

Click the label English to read other English written articles

The Agile Project Manager (part II)

... read the previous post

So, finally the project was a success, not because of you, but despite you. You wanted to impose unwise methods, now you realize that. Fortunately your team did not obey you. Now you know they were right, and you were not. You are also worried about the near future. Nowadays it is not very uncommon that projects are under continous change by nature. Knowledge workers have to give the most within the least time, adapting efforts to the changing needs from customers. Moreover, you feel this is not only a trend: this is like business as usual more and more. You recently did some research about agile methods. To your surprise, these methods are simple and easy to understand (the challenge is not about knowing them, but practicing them properly). You enjoy specially practical videos explaining the job of a product owner: http://goo.gl/NHYZWL; and this other one on daily stand-ups: http://goo.gl/EiXCGo

Why not using your project management knowledge, skills and experience on this kind of projects? 

The Agile Project Manager (part I)

Imagine this: You are a project manager with a lot of experience managing projects. You really love your job and consider it as a profession. You got your PMP® more than 10 years ago. Your boss and clients are used to congratulating you at project closures. You are a regular speaker on congresses about risk management, Microsoft Project, etc. You volunteer from time to time for PMI® projects and events. Everything seems to show that you are a highly rewarded professional: When you talk about project management, everybody listen. Many colleagues appreciate your expert judgment.

Now you have just closed your last project, but you are not happy at all. It was a consulting project for a big company, aimed to beat the competition through a new technology. Client representatives knew for sure that they could not remain as-is, but they did not know how to change what. Dissapointed by the poor progress of an internal SME team, they decided this was a case for procurement. Your company won the bid thanks to a project plan based on flexibility, adaptation and collaboration with the customer team throughout the project. Your company also included some experienced agile CVs.

From the very beginning, you were aware it was going to be easy to complete the requirements baseline. Very soon you realized that the client team would never sign off a document like that, not to mention the scope statement, WBS, cost baseline, detailed schedule, etc. How on earth could you avoid scope creep? The only planning information you had was about some given milestones and the final project deadline in nine months!

Regarding costs, the contract specified person-days by category, that's all. Having so much uncertainty, how would you develop the project plan? The customer wanted biweekly follow-up meetings. How would you report progress? Comparing to what baselines? Your boss told you not to worry because the team members had succeded on analogous projects before. You could trust them. They should do a great job...

However, you wonder: So, what am I supposed to do?

ISO 21500 vs. PMBOK

En el post anterior Navegando por la Norma ISO 21500, les proponía descargarse un fichero pdf con enlaces dentro del mismo fichero para navegar por los procesos. Esta forma de representar los procesos está basada en un estándar de modelado de procesos llamado IDEF0. IDEF0 es un método sencillo de especificación formal de procesos, que permite la descomposición de procesos a través de un análisis descendente (top-down). Yo ya utilizaba este modelo para representar la Guía del PMBOK®. En el enlace http://goo.gl/XQeIeB pueden descargar un fichero PDF titulado “Navegador de la Guía del PMBOK”. Una de las primeras diferencias entre ISO 21500 y la Guía del PMBOK®, es que los procesos de ISO 21500 se representan mejor.

Lo bueno y lo malo de gestionar riesgos

La disciplina formal de gestión de riesgos es tan antigua como las empresas de seguros. Como fue inventada por y para aseguradores, comencemos por examinar la idea en su contexto inicial. Si usted fuera un ejecutivo en alguna compañía como AXA, Allianz, MetLife, Aviva, Aegon, Mapfre, etc., usted pensaría en gestión de riesgos desde el punto de vista agregado de cartera de riesgos. Sus riesgos no se gestionan bien si muchas de sus pólizas están sujetas a pérdida debido al mismo evento catastrófico. Así, por ejemplo, una elevada concentración de pólizas de hogar en la costa de Florida le expone demasiado: Si no hay huracanes, usted gana dinero, pero si hay un huracán lo pierde todo. ¿Qué puede hacer para diversificar el riesgo? ¿Qué paso daría para asegurar que su caso peor es aceptable sin renunciar a todo el beneficio posible del caso mejor (esos cheques y recibos bancarios y todos esos beneficiarios pagando)?

ISO 21500 Navigator

Last December I gave a training course entitled “Introducing ISO 21500 in practice”. With this post I want to share some byproduct from that course: a PDF file with 40 slides you can download from my Google Drive at: http://goo.gl/g1ECqm 

You can view the content directly at Google Drive, but I recommend that you download it to your computer to use it properly. This file will allow you to navigate through the 10 subject groups and the 39 processes described in the standard ISO 21500:2012 Guidance on Project Management. If you click the boxes representing processes or process groups, you can get a dynamic vision of processes, their details and dependencies. I hope this can be useful for you.

If you prefer the Spanish version of the standard UNE-ISO 21500:2013 Directrices para la Dirección y Gestión de Proyectos, you can download this other equivalent file in Spanish at: http://goo.gl/bkNta8

I'm the author of this stuff and it's free to use and distribute. I encourage you to do that. The only thing I ask in return is that you notice me about mistakes. I'm sure there are some of them.

Click here to read the Spanish version for this article

Click the label English to read other English written articles

Navegando por la Norma ISO 21500

A finales del año pasado impartí un curso titulado “Introducción práctica a la norma ISO 21500”. En este post quiero compartir con ustedes un subproducto de aquel curso. Se trata de un fichero PDF con 40 diapositivas. Pueden descargarlo desde mi carpeta de Google Drive en el enlace: http://goo.gl/bkNta8

Aunque pueden visualizarlo directamente en Google Drive, les aconsejo que se descarguen el fichero en su ordenador antes de abrirlo. Este fichero les permitirá navegar por los 10 grupos de materias y los 39 procesos que se describen en la norma UNE-ISO 21500:2013 Directrices para la Dirección y Gestión de Proyectos. Pulsando en las cajas de los diagramas, que representan procesos o grupos de procesos, podrán obtener una visión dinámica de los procesos, sus detalles y sus dependencias. Espero que les resulte de utilidad.

Si prefieren la versión en inglés de la norma ISO 21500:2012 Guidance on Project Management, pueden descargarse otro fichero equivalente en inglés en el enlace: http://goo.gl/g1ECqm 

Este material lo he preparado yo mismo, y su distribución es libre y gratuita. Les animo a que lo difundan. Lo único que les pido a cambio es que me avisen de posibles errores, que seguro que los hay.

CEO at MYPROJECT Inc.

Somewhere I read that a Project Manager should think and act like a CEO of a small company, being that enterprise the project itself. How should you behave when appointed as a CEO at MYPROJECT Inc.? 

• If you have the habit of committing, then you will feel responsible of effectively managing resources (money, people, materials, etc.) entrusted to you. 
• If you have the habit of planning, you will know better than anyone about the vision, mission, values, short and long term objectives, potential threats and opportunities, relationships with third parties, process assets, quality standards, etc.

Those two habits (committing and planning) are really important, but for a CEO, it may be more important the habit of “getting things done”.

Ya ha salido PMBOK® v5 en español

Si es usted socio de PMI, ya puede descargar gratuitamente un documento PDF con la nueva versión en español de la Guía de los Fundamentos para la Dirección de Proyectos.

Después de introducir su usuario y contraseña en www.pmi.org, pulse aquí, introduzca su clave de PMI y ya podrá comenzar la descarga. Obtendrá un fichero PDF encriptado con su clave de PMI y con su nombre al pie de cada página.