The Three Ts

Tom's latest eBook has been released on Amazon: "The 7 Myths of IT Integrations". Tom is also a Program Director for a large Midwest corporation and has been an adjunct faculty member at Walsh College. He has managed global web initiatives, data center moves and large multi-million dollar programs.

  Communications Management   Cost Management   CRM   Knowledge Management   Lessons Learned   Stakeholder Management  

What is it about working in IT and managing projects that always seems to leave a few scattered entries on our resumes that we drench with enough syrup and powdered sugar to make them all sound like they were just three steps short of a Nobel Prize?

Those saccharin-soaked efforts probably had their fare share of technical challenges, and rightly so. But I would be willing to bet that sometimes one of the bigger hurdles was with the end-user adoption. Why are some projects (particularly IT upgrade projects) so feared by most end users and so mis-communicated by project managers that the disconnect turns into one of the project’s biggest stumbling blocks?

In response to one of my project briefings, I heard an executive lament once, “Look, just tell me what this project is going to save me: time, trouble or treasure? If I don’t save anything, then why are we doing it?” That got me to thinking, is there a way to hit what matters most to your clients and convey your projects benefits at the same time? If we use the executive’s words as a guide, then there are three simple things that all customers value.

The First “T”: Time
Time is the one thing our clients and customers don’t have enough of. Time can’t be made and it can’t be borrowed. Customers are looking for somebody--anybody--to be able to give them …

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