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New benchmark study on project management offices shows consistent, two-year trend in delivering quantifiable value, with upwards of $400,000 in savings per project.

A new study shows that more than a third of projects are at risk and, not surprising, a key factor for recovering troubled projects is the actions of the project managers.

If you have not been a project manager on a contingent worker status, you're missing a great deal of experience. If you are ready to jump into the consultant PM life, what should you be aware of so that you are happy in the long run?

There’s more to vendor management than deliverables and deadlines. Let's look at a few basic concepts that will help PMs avoid some of the biggest pitfalls.

A project management office can operate on a continuum, from providing project management support functions in the form of training, software, standardized policies and procedures to actual direct management and responsibility for achieving the project objectives. Here, we look at some of the key responsibilities and features of a typical PMO.

We seem to be moving from the “every PMO is different” model to the “PMOs fit into one of several types” model. However, since the heady days of Y2K the world has changed a lot--and created a lot of opportunities for PMOs to reinvent themselves and create a new model. This writer may be a power-crazed egomaniac, but he thinks PMOs can run the organization (if not the world).

The three most dangerous words in project management: out of scope. When you're done screaming, read on to find out why that one simple term should be avoided like the plague.

Developed in conjunction with a project plan, resource plans help provide tactile information on what is needed, when and for how much--thus making them huge assets during the activate phase of project management.

Why do PMOs have such a high failure rate? It's time to take a look at the top 10 PMO worst practices--and advice on how to avoid them.

In the next few years the PMO is going to evolve considerably as EPMOs become the new norm. The concept of an EPMO is gathering support in a lot of different environments, and the recent economic challenges have only accelerated the process. In this article, we look at what that might mean for traditional PMOs and identify some of the things that you can do for the arrival of an EPMO in your organization.

What if you could get an "international passport" that allows for the transportability and mutual recognition of project management qualifications no matter where in the world you work?

Do you have a dual personality? A PM that also has a foot in the business analyst camp has a “leg up” on the competition for jobs--and has more job security.

When it comes down to it, does the “rock” of domain experience really beat the “paper” of project management skills?

As you embark on your next project journey, what techniques and tools do you absolutely need to succeed? Acknowledging that every initiative is different and some require more “items” than others, three project management veterans share their PM Survival Toolkit, packed with the bare necessities to bring most projects safely home.

Is project management a profession? If not, should it be? And what would differentiate a professional PM from all the others managing projects? In this article, we explore what constitutes a profession, and whether project management should be considered one.

Agile methods are all about delivering value. We work on the high-value items first and prioritize the backlog based on business value. Everything is value driven, aiming to maximize value delivered. Risks, on the other hand, are like anti-value--they have potential for value-robbing down time, rework and even project failures. Here we look at how to use Risk-Adjusted Backlogs and Risk Burndowns to illustrate and prioritize risk within agile projects.

Global professional resourcing and project-based solutions leader turns to Compuware’s Changpoint to manage growth and complexity with streamlined resource planning, project management, and time and materials tracking.

Employers often look only at their own industry when hiring, because not every PM can make the jump--and if they can’t, things can get very bad very quickly. So what should employers look for--and by extension, what should PMs demonstrate that they are capable of doing? Does industry matter in your career? How transferable is the project management skill set?

Project managers usually tend to focus on the methodology for executing the technical part of the project. However, a good understanding of a practical SOA landscape and its associated challenges can help a technical PM make the SOA adoption on technology projects run even smoother.

So you want a career in project management? What will it take to be successful, and what about earning potential? This article will explore the pursuit of a career in project management, including looks at characteristics of successful PMs, what employers are looking for and salaries.

What sets PM Masters apart from the rest of us? Is it their learning, innate talents and aptitudes or is it more? In observing those who exhibit PM mastery this writer has found they share some common traits and capabilities that provide some interesting insights.

This article will explore how to establish the right governance process so it will be utilized and maintained within a business team.

Forget what the PM's background is, forget where their expertise lies. What is the optimal amount of business knowledge that a PM should have on a project? How well do they need to understand the business to be successful? Are you becoming the man or woman who knew too much?

“Project manager” does not mean “stakeholder gatekeeper”. The PM always seems to control that relationship, but there is a better way: When the relationship between team members and stakeholders is working, it’s the PM’s responsibility to stay out of the way.

The environmentally conscious PM doesn’t have an easy time of it, but they can still do their part.

For most IT investments, business cases are either missing or unbelievable. In the first of a series of articles, John Finneran explains what has gone wrong and outlines how to fix the business case.

How do you lead and develop resources across the miles? Having a strengthened project team can be hard enough if everyone is located in the same location, but how do you ensure success when the project is global in scope? In this article, we explore different aspects of team and individual development and leadership--and some of the specific challenges that are introduced in a global project.

Frustrated by project charter meetings that feature overly textual, often generic descriptions of what the team can expect and how to accomplish it, a project manager applied the agile concept of User Stories to better describe project interactions and inject more real-world meaning into a kickoff document.

Need help scheduling agile delivery dates? We’ll examine a pragmatic way to derive a schedule (and subsequently a project cost) for a process framework that is inherently flexible--but one that still must plan for a release date. The approach covered will hopefully satisfy both your management and your team’s desire for practical schedule planning.

Doing more with less people, less tools and less funding has become the norm--and 2012 doesn’t look to be much different. How can you continue to service a growing backlog of project requests in the face of static or shrinking budgets and a dwindling pool of project professionals? Believe it or not, there are things that can be done and ways to keep progress moving forward. Here are 10 tips you might find useful.

Ever stop to ponder all the different PM frameworks that have been developed over the years and which one you should be using in your organization? Is there really one best framework out there? The options are dizzying, so here we take a look at four of them in depth. What can they do for you? Remember, one size does not fit all...

After more than 20 years in the financial services industry, this writer thought he knew exactly what to anticipate moving into his new role as a software vendor project manager. He was wrong...

Successful business execution is dependent upon having timely and accurate financial information. But too often, little thought is put into how to present the data in a meaningful way. From a project or portfolio perspective, what does a C-Level executive expect to see from the PMO for actionable decision-making?

A new benchmark study on the value of project management offices reveals increased maturity can drive major savings per project. Additional findings suggest significant increase in executive influence.

Business-as-usual financial processes don’t address the unique realities of managing project costs. Here are some project accounting best practices, which can help bring project managers, sponsors, clients and the company bean counters closer to one version of the truth.

The social engagement of the project is what underlies every aspect of the project process more so than normal. In social PM, collaboration, transparency and mutual participation is central--with the assumption that if this socially engaging environment and the necessary collaboration tools are in place with a clearly defined project goal, then success should follow. But in order for social PM to work, some principles and guidelines need to be incorporated.

Is there a "best" way to start a career in project management? Assuming that you have started a career in an organization already, how should you focus on it? If the "by accident" approach isn't for you, there are two very distinct planned paths.

As the paths of traditional and agile project management merge, there are some bumps and scrapes as the two groups come to terms with each other. This article explores the circumstances that ease integration.

How long do you wait until you press the panic button on a project? Some recent news sheds some light on the answer.

One of the most important roles of PPM is budget management, and financial management is a key skill for portfolio managers. But at the portfolio level it’s not that simple. Here we offer some thoughts on how portfolio-level budgets should be planned and managed.

Is there any advantage to using Cloud-based project management tools to manage projects? Is it cheaper and more effective? Are the tools more feature-rich? And what about the disadvantages? Here is what some research has revealed…

This article describes how an IT organization from a Fortune 500 manufacturing company applied the framework to its portfolio of accounting and finance applications.

Let’s face it--business has an insatiable appetite for all kinds of technology projects and as a PM you usually end up caught in the middle. How can you balance competing requests and demand for limited resources? One way is to ask for intercession of governance.