Project Management 2.0

Situation: You think "there's got to be a better way."

Peter Taylor is the head of a PMO at Siemens Industry Software Limited, a supplier of global product lifecyclemanagement solutions.  He does a lot of speaking and writing on the subject of ‘The Lazy Project Manager’ .   His elearning modules are available online as are his free podcasts on iTunes  .

So most people would think that being lazy is not something you would want to be known for.  Peter thinks differently.  We recently caught up with to find out why...

Q.  You talk about the Pareto 80/20 rule in the book, but finding that critical 20% is always a trick.  How did you identify the critical parts of PM that are most important?  Do they share common attributes?  Generally speaking, are they the easiest things to do or the hardest?

A:  Answers to each question in series -

• I tell people to just think back to the previous working day and they will most likely be able to identify two or three things that delivered the most impact or produced the most momentum on their project.
• We all have ‘to do’ lists and the moment we enter the office we will get distractions through conversations, meeting invitations and so on. But it is important to focus and deal with the most important things first. If you don’t then whilst you may cheerfully clear many other tasks from that ‘to do’ list you will still have the big one left to do and you just won’t feel good about that. Get the big one out of the way and the pressure will be off, progress will have been made, and more than likely you will ride a wave of positive feeling that will see you clear the ‘to do’ list with ease.
• You asked were these the easiest or the hardest. Well I guess they will be typically nearer the hard end of the spectrum but sometimes procrastination can turn a simple thing in to a hard thing. By just getting on and starting something you realize that it wasn’t so hard at all (sometimes at least).

Q.  You also discuss the way that the leadership potential of Prussian Army officers was judged according to their intelligence and their laziness.  You go into some detail about how laziness and high intelligence in combination makes for good leadership.  Does that mean you believe in born leaders?  Are 3/4 of project managers doomed to be poor or mediocre leaders?

A:  Answers to each question in series -

• Born leaders? Well yes I guess there are people who somehow naturally take the lead in things without too many concerns or worries and other people tend to follow them happily. That said they are in the small minority. No I think that the majority of project managers, myself included in my early days, combine a lot of activity with a reasonable level of intelligence. But that isn’t the most productive or sustainable way of managing projects in my opinion.
• 'Progress isn't made by early risers. It's made by lazy men trying to find easier ways to do something.' Is the quote that I use - Robert Heinlein. It is about working smarter and not harder – it is about a decent work/life balance – and it is about giving yourself the chance of keeping control of your project by not being at capacity all of the time.
• So are all project managers doomed to be less than good project managers? Not at all. We can all learn to be better just as a golfer can learn a new swing to become a greater golfer then project managers can learn what I call The Art of Productive Laziness.

Q.  You use a tool called a power grid to assess a project sponsor.  How does that work?

A:  Well it is all about how to control your greatest asset and potentially your biggest threat. Critical to any projects success is having a good project sponsor, but, like the saying goes ‘you can pick your friends but you can’t pick your relatives’ and the same is true of project sponsors.

So what makes a good project sponsor and how do you deal with the one you have just inherited for your project?

The Project Sponsor is the key stakeholder representative for the project and provides the necessary support for the Project Manager with the primary responsibility of achievement of the project objectives and benefits. An inappropriate choice of Project Sponsor can seriously impact the possibility of success of the project and provide you, the project manager, with an unwanted additional overhead. Now you can’t practically ask a sponsor for their CVand put them through a formal interview process, nice as it would be sometimes to utter the phrase ‘I’m sorry but I just don’t think that this is the job for you right now’. But you should evaluate the sponsor you have and complete, in a subtle way of course, a ‘Strengths and Weaknesses ‘assessment so that you can adapt your project approach and communication methods to maximise their sponsorship support for the project that you now manage.

Tip: At your first meeting with the sponsor don’t ask ‘hard’ project questions but ask ‘softer’ and more open questions: ‘What are your hopes for this project? What are your fears about this project?’ – You will learn a whole lot more.

But let’s not be pessimistic, that isn’t going to happen to you, you won’t get an extreme case of project sponsor and they won’t fail the ‘interview’. So, what is your next move? Well perhaps you should consider the power base that your project sponsor has. Use the power grid to assess your project sponsor, assess their rating of interest in this project from high to low and their actual power in the organisation, also from high to low.

This will give you an indication of the way in which you should work with them. Actually this power grid is for all project stakeholders and if you end up with a project sponsor that is in the ‘low interest’ and ‘low power’ quadrant you really have a problem. It is unlikely that this sponsor is ever going to support your management endeavours.

Q.  What's the single most important take away from the book?

A:  Well people tell me they love the stories at the end of each chapter as they show real situations where I pretty much got it completely wrong but lived to tell the tale and learn a very good lesson.

But if I was to pick one thing that project managers should do it would be to work on your communication. At least 70% of a project managers time is spent in communicating so if you are going to be productively lazy anywhere do it here. That doesn’t mean communicate badly but communicate more effectively and that can often mean less effort overall.

Oh and ‘be lazy’…

Situation: You feel like there's something wrong with the way you hire.

Two weeks ago, at the PMI research conference, 

Dr. Joana Geraldi, Senior Research Fellow at Cranfield School of Management, International Centre for Programme Management gave a presentation entitled Finding the Right Person for the Job: Rethinking Work-Worker Fit in PPM.  The presentation was based on a research paper she co-authored with Harvey Maylor, Sergio Pellegrinelli and Scot Colquhoun. We recently asked her a few questions about how we can put her findings into action.  The answers to the questions below are her personal opinions, but closely tied to the research findings.   Her perspectives, both here and in the research paper are pretty thought-provoking.

Q. During your presentation you discussed the problems with the way that "fit" is judged. (a worker's fit with a work profile, or work fit to a worker's profile) Could you briefly discuss how that fit is currently  determined and the problems with that approach? 

A. Current most common approaches to achieve fit between work and worker are:

• Work-oriented (define the work and based on that, define what the worker would need to do, one of the main problems with this one is that it assumes that one can define all activities that are to be undertaken be the employee, what we know is not possible in project/programme context, moreover, the bridge between the specific tasks and competences is missing) 
   
• Worker-oriented (focus on the worker and then define what would be the job that would fit personal competences. This is interesting, and still much used and powerful, for example, the manager would explore what their employees can do well and make sure he/she explores their talents. The problem here is that it can produce descriptions of competence that are too general or abstract. 
   
• Worker-Work fit (contingency): here we look at the job characteristics and at people's competence. This is a more elaborated concept, and of much use, the problem is that it takes the job and person as static. 

But in general, all the three approaches are set within a rationalist frame.   In relation to project and program management, a number of implicit assumptions may be called into question: 
 

• Objectivity: it is possible to define and measure work, worker, fit and performance objectively; 
   
• Independence of work and worker: there are no mutual influences or dependencies between the work and the worker; 
   
• Causality and Fit: there is a best fit between work and worker and this will lead to higher performance; 
   
• Focus on static nature of the relationship work-worker: the fit is measured at a point in time.

1. Focus on the delivery of project/programme 
    
2. Looks also at the impact of the project/programme in the organisation 
    
3. Preoccupation with high level outcomes of the project/programme 
    
4. Explores the development of organisational capabilities beyond the project/programme 

• A significant number of managers, working on the same project/ program, should be interviewed to allow some assessment of convergence, either across the group, or a within conceptual level. The nature of convergence and divergence would yield insights into the subjective nature of the work and its complexity. 

• A number of instances (projects/ programs) should be examined to explore the existence or otherwise of trends in assessing complexity based on conceptual level. In particular, it would be interesting to discover whether on some projects and programs all parties perceived approximately the same degree and type of complexity, while on others it varied according to conceptual level.
   
• A number of projects/ programs should be tracked over time to explore if and how perceived complexity and conceptual level changes over the life of a project or program. It would be also interesting to understand the dynamics of the worker-work relationship and if and how project and program managers enact their work and transform the complexity of their project. What is the extent of possible agency? Does this relate to the existing or acquired (higher) conceptual level? 
  
   

Situation: You occasionally wonder whether we're moving forward as a profession.

PMI's mission, roughly speaking, is to have business leaders view project management as essential for businessresults.  Obviously, the best way to do that is to show increasing success over time.  That's why I found this particular PMI research report interesting.  Are we getting any better? Comparing project management in the years 2000 and 2008 was a report produced by Erling S. Andersen and present two weeks ago at the PMI Research conference.  Mr. Andersen was kind enough to answer a few questions for us recently about the research he conducted.

Q. Your research was conducted using the X Model, could you tell us a bit about how that works? (both at the micro and macro level) 

The intention of the X Model is to give a comprehensive view of the present situation of an enterprise or an organization. It is extremely valuable for a manager to get such a condensed picture of how the organization is performing and that it is presented in a way that makes it possible to discuss why the situation is as depicted. The X Model was originally development in the 1970-ies with firms in mind. Many years later I started to apply it to projects. The strength of the X Model is that the present situation is presented on one page of paper and that it allows for causal analysis. It is easy to discuss why the results are as we see them. The results must depend on the way we conduct our work processes, and the work processes are affected by personal and factual premises. 

I have quite recently written an article which presents the ideas of the X Model in more detail: Erling S. Andersen (2010): Describing and assessing projects: The X model. International Journal of Managing Projects in Business,3 (3), pp. 369-386. 

At Norwegian School of Management BI we have given Masters-level courses in project management since the middle of the 1990-ies. I have taught our students, who are experienced practitioners from industry and government, the X Model. Many have used it in their Master theses to assess projects they have been writing about. The students have used it on a micro level (to assess their real world projects) to get a better understanding of their projects and discuss improvements. After a while I thought might be interesting to collect all the X Models that the students were making. Then much later the idea appeared that it would be interesting to compare the situation of 2000 and 2008 by looking at all the models from these two years. I then did what we could call a study on the macro level to see if it was possible to identify significant changes over time. And as you see from my paper we are getting better. 


 

Q. You concluded that some areas of project management have shown improvement, saying specifically that team members are more knowledgeable about project work, project objectives are more clearly expressed, project organization is more appropriate, most work processes are improved, team members experience project work as rewarding and are more motivated for future projects, and the results of the project are more balanced. Why do you think this is true? Do you credit PMI? Better Training? Stiffer performance requirements from employers? 

My research does not look into why we have become better. I would think that many factors contribute to progress. Project managers and team members are better educated and have more extensive experiences compared to ten years ago. Of course the professional associations like PMI deserve credits. They have argued strongly for professionalization, use of standards and certifications. 

 

Q. You also talk about areas for improvement, specifically, in achieving the project mission and goals or keeping to the project schedule and budget. Why do you think this is the case? 

It is of great importance at the start of the project to discuss what we mean by project success. Our research shows that there is too little interaction between the project owner (the sponsor) and the project manager. Often, the purpose of the project is not clearly stated. The project manager tends to focus solely on the project constraints (time, cost, and quality), but the project owner is focused on value creation. Better and close cooperation between the two parties always improves value creation.

 

Q. Do you know of other recent and important research in this area? Do you know of other studies being conducted now that might be of interest? 

I have been fortunate to have taken part in two very interesting research projects: "Value of Project Management", chaired by professor Janice Thomas, Athabasca University (the results are presented as a special issue of Project Management Journal, 2009, issue 1) and the UK-initiated project "Rethinking Project Management" (the results are presented as a special issue of International Journal of Project Management, 2006, issue 8). Many international researchers took part in both projects and they have affected the way we think about project management. 
 

Situation: You Like to Get Your Head Around the "Big Questions" in Project Management.

Hey PM Thought Leaders >> Take a look at the list below and let me know if one of the topics could really help you tackle the challenges you face every day.

Earlier this week I attended PMI's Research & Education Conference 2010.  The event has asubtitle - "Defining the Future of Project Management".   While I'm not sure that anyone can "Define the future" of anything, I think there were some interesting presentations.  I plan to interview some of the researchers, but I was hoping to get some feedback (either here as a comment or via email, whichever is easier) on what you might find interesting.  During each interview I'll be attempting to identify who the research findings might be interesting to and what practical actions you can take based on their findings.

PMI presented awards for work in the following areas:

The 2010 Project Management Journal® Paper of the Year Award
PMI's 2010 Project Management Journal® Paper of the Year Award was presented to Terence J. Cooke-Davies, Ph.D., Lynn H. Crawford, DBA, MTCP, and Thomas G. Lechler, Ph.D. for their article Project Management Systems: Moving Project Management From an Operational to a Strategic Discipline.  The article was published in the March 2009 issue of Project Management Journal.

          
2010 Student Poster Award
Jefferson Leandro Anselmo, Ph.D., M.Sc., PMP® is the winner of PMI's 2010 Student Poster Award for his submission, Project Management In Project-Based Businesses: An Integrated Proposal for the Management of the Operational, Organizational and Strategic Dimensions.
         

Topics presented at the conference

1. Applications of positive psychology to teaching project management and leadership
2. Supporting interaction in the classroom – Using personal response units
3. The use of Skype and other communications technologies to deliver international project management education.
4. Online programme delivery – A case study
5. A New Route to Professional Development: Overcoming the Immunity to Change
6. Inter- and Intra- Project Knowledge Transfer – Analysis of Knowledge Transfer Techniques
7. A Proposed Construction Design Change Management Tool to Aid in Assessing the Impact of Design Changes
8. Predicting Team Performance based on Past Individual Achievements using Artificial Neural Networks
9. Change Management in Project- based Organizations - a case study of a construction company
10. Relevance of Project Marketing Activities to Project Management Practitioners
11. Interactions-based Risk Network Simulation for Project Risk Prioritization
12. Identifying Forces Driving PMO Changes
13. Attitude-Based Strategic Negotiation for Conflict Management in Construction Projects
14. Aim Fire Aim - Planning Styles in Dynamic Environments
15. Managing projects practitioner development – a successful university- industry partnership
16. The PMO Maturity Cube, a Project Management Office Maturity Model
17. Social and Behavioral Influences on Project Team Process
18. Managing Complex Public Projects: Timing Norms, Temporal Misfits, and the Role of Project Management
19. Building a Positive Classroom in Graduate PM Education
20. Exploring PMOs through Community of Practice Theory
21. Cultural Differences in Projects
22. Early Warning Signs in Complex Projects
23. Project Management Education, Training, Working & Learning: a longitudinal study into the experiences of British Army officers in UK defence related projects
24. Strategic priorities and PMO functions in project-based firms
25. A Conceptual Model of the Emotional Valuation of a Project
26. Classifying Improvisation: Some comments on Managing chaotic Evolution
27. Project Management in Academia: Friend or Foe? An Exploratory Study of the Social Sciences and Humanities
28. Project portfolio management (PPM) – strategic and operational agility through projects
29. Change Management & Project Management
30. The relation between organizational & professional commitment in the case of project workers: implications for the project management profession
31. Project Portfolio Management: Comparing Practive with Theory
32. World Bank projects’ critical success factors and their interactions: an empirical investigation
33. 25 Years of Stakeholder Theory in Project Management Literature (1984-2009)
34. Project Value Mindset of Project Managers
35. Interdependencies among projects in Project Portfolio Management: A content analysis of techniques
36. Are we getting any better? Comparing project management in the years 2000 and 2008
37. I Can’t Get No... Satisfaction:Moving on From the Dominant Approaches to Managing Quality in Complex Programs
38. Human Resources in Project- Based Firms: Moving In, Moving Out, Moving On
39. Managing Projects in Context: Responding to Strategic Drivers
40. Role of project maturity and organizational culture on project success
41. Problem-based learning in advanced project management education
42. Using Performance Evaluations to Raise Individual Accountability on Project Teams
43. Project Management Maturity of Croatian Companies: Is There Any?
44. Why Information Systems Development Projects are always Late
45. Using Web 2.0 in large cohort project management education: panacea or empty promise
46. Finding the Right Person for the Job: Rethinking Work-Worker Fit in PPM
47. Dynamic capability: Understanding the relationship between project portfolio management capability and competitive advantage
48. The program manager’s leadership competence and program success: A qualitative study
49. Simulation as a Teaching Tool for Quantitative Risk Analysis
50. Improving project team performance through team learning
51. Key drivers to the effectiveness in managing multiple projects: An empirical investigation in an IT organization of a world largest financial institution
52. Program Benefits Management in Practice: an exploratory investigation
53. A case for project management education as a catalyst for sustainable development in developing countries
54. Project Management in Small to Medium-sized Enterprises: tailoring the practices to the size of company
55. Organizational Control and Project Performance
56. The Impact of a Project Benefit Methodology on the Project Management Discipline
57. Structuring Risk into Projects
58. Influences of Environment and Leadership on Team Performance in Complex Projects
59. Contribution of Individual Project Participant Competencies to Project Success
60. Integrating Performance Measures to Exert Effective Leadership in Managing Project Portfolios
61. The Accuracy of Hybrid Estimating Approaches?—Case Study of an Australian State Road & Traffic Authority
62. Implementing Organizational Change Using Action Research in Two Asian Cultures
63. Demographic Determinants of Project Success Behaviors
64. The Time Dependence of CPI and SPI for Software Projects
65. The Role of Project Collaboration Quality and Knowledge Integration Capability in Multi-Partner Projects
66. Project Champions in the Context of Socio-Political Issues of Project Management
67. Project Portfolios in Dynamic Environments: Sources of Uncertainty and Sensing Mechanisms
68. Re-Thinking Project Management Maturity: Perspectives Gained From Explorations Of Fit And Value
69. Knowledge entrainment and project management: Understanding project management as knowledge integration under time pressure
70. Factors that influence and are influenced by change projects
71. Balancing value-for-money and operational performance of Public- Private Partnerships projects
72. Relating sustainable development and project management: A conceptual model
73. Knowledge Production and the Success of Innovation Projects
74. Understanding and Managing Conflict in a Project Environment
75. Dimensions for Project Success Enabled by the Sponsor / PM Relationship
76. How does modern project work really affect our societies, our organisations, and us a individuals?
77. Knowledge Management Practices in IT Projects: An Exploratory Assessment of the State of Affairs in the Caribbean
78. Integration of 3-D Web and Semantic Web Technologies: A New Structure for Communications Plans
79. The influence of project front end management and project complexity on project success - A contingency approach in project management research
80. Creating knowledge of end-users requirements
81. Climate of Innovation in Government Communities of Practice: Focusing on Knowledge Gains and Relationships
82. An Empirical Identification of Project Management Toolsets and a Comparison among Project Types
83. The influence of the gap between project manager and executives on project results
84.  It’s Not My Fault!: Exploring the role of the client in program performance

Anything jump out as just what you were looking for?  Let me know and I'll drill down deeper for you.

Situation:  You're a serious Mac user with serious project work to do.

Macs are gaining traction in many business environments, yet there aren't that many choices when it comes to project management software.  Many of the SaaS options work whether you run Windows or OS X - but what if you need more horsepower?  I've also wondered if there is a fundamental difference when developing for a Mac user or a Windows user in the PM space.  Are there differences in they way "Macs" and "PCs" manage projects?  

We recently had the opportunity to interview Dennis Bilowus, CEO and president at AEC Software.  Here's what we found out...

Q.  Thinking about what your software does - Do you feel that the projects that Mac users generally work on are different (or require different functionality) than PC users?  A recent Macworld review offered the following Pros and Cons for your product (see below).   Are these driven by the needs you see as specific to Mac users?  Can you tell us a bit about your approach to development? 

A:  We here at AEC Software have been developing project-focused software for Mac since 1986 and for Windows since 1993. Because of the close contact that we maintain with our users, we know that Mac users generally work on the same types of projects as Windows users. Sure, there is a bit more emphasis on media and graphics by Mac users, and we definitely have some Mac-specific features. The core features provided by FastTrack Schedule 10 are cross-platform, Mac and Windows. However, we take advantage of the strengths of each platform and provide some features that are unique to each system. 

For example: FastTrack Schedule 10 has a different User Interface on Windows than it has on our Mac version. On Windows, we provide the user with a choice of 2 interfaces, the new Ribbon interface and a traditional Menu-based interface. The user can select the interface that they are comfortable with. Interesting side note, FastTrack Schedule 10 was the first PM scheduling application to adopt the Ribbon interface (released a few weeks ahead of MS Project 2010). On Mac, FastTrack Schedule 10 provides a Mac UI complete with a context-sensitive Format Bar and parity with the UI look and feel of Apple’s iWork Suite.  

Every project encounters delays that affect the schedule. The ability to easily make adjustments is important on any project. Both Mac and Windows users would like to have expert-level controls over their projects, together with the means to easily make adjustments.  The new features and enhancements in FastTrack Schedule 10 provide a better workflow experience for our users as they track and manage their projects. The software is easy to use for both experienced project managers as well as the PM newcomer. 

We did a lot of research on the needs of users and incorporated their feedback into the way default layouts are built into files, and we developed an extensive set of project templates to help them get started quickly on their projects. For example, the default file has 40 built in Layouts. For ease of use only 15 of the 40 are displayed in the menu. We simplify the interface, but provide our users with accessible pre-set functionality should they want to utilize more powerful features of the program.  After all, if we can provide our users with a great template for their project we can make them more productive. 

Communication of the project details and team involvement are paramount in successful project management. As such, we also build-in great visual reporting features such as summary graphs, image fields, and enable graphics, logos, and pictures to be placed into project plans which adds a lot of life to a schedule. Too often project schedules are presented as drab spreadsheets – where key project messages and data are lost as they blend into the schedule background. With FastTrack Schedule 10, communication is clear and vibrant.  Graphs, images, and graphics foster a sense of involvement and accountability. Schedules are organic: living, breathing, and changing. Users can create fun, visually appealing schedules that bring out the creativity in all of us (and when was the last time the words ‘fun’ and ‘creativity’ was used to describe a project management tool or technique). Our Resource information form provides a Resource Image for a picture of the resource. Resources are not just names or employee numbers they are people. They are team members, and they are accountable for their performance. If everyone on the project buys into the project schedule, if everyone is involved with the schedule creation and schedule updates, then there is more transparency and accountability by all team members. That leads to successful projects. 

With our Project Consolidation feature, team meetings and stakeholder updates are a snap. It allows for the easy merging of various sub-projects into a single master schedule and provides a comprehensive view of overall project health, insight into potential bottlenecks, and promotes proactive decision-making. The power of this feature is that the users of the sub-project files never need to stop working and close their file. The consolidation occurs with live files. This provides an excellent tool for a manager to accurately monitor all project activities, costs, and resources. It is really powerful, but at the same time easy to use. 

Improving and streamlining workflow is one of our primary objectives when developing new versions of FastTrack Schedule. One such feature we’ve had great response to in FastTrack Schedule 10 is our Automated MS Project save option. With this feature, your project schedules are automatically saved as both a FastTrack Schedule file and MS Project file. This is a great time-saver when it’s implemented as part of a company’s standard template. 

Another innovative feature is our drawing layer in Print Preview. With the drawing layer in Print Preview users can place company logos, legends, or schedule titles that enhance the presentation-quality of their project plans—thus, leaving their primary workspaces (the Gantt, Resource, and Calendar views) uncluttered.  
 

Q: Who is the ideal user of your software?  Is there a project-size, industry, or other attribute that it's particularly good for?  Who is it not good for? 

A:  FastTrack Schedule is uniquely positioned as an easy to use project management solution—one that’s ideal for both the PM newcomer as well as the experienced PM who are frustrated with complex, enterprise-level PPM tools. For both these types of project managers, FastTrack Schedule is simple to learn and use, provides more flexibility for customization, and offers superior presentation and reporting capabilities.  

FastTrack Schedule users range from the largest of companies with deployments in the thousands, to single person companies. Projects range from multi-year space exploration plans to advertizing campaigns; residential and commercial construction to entertainment/feature film special effects productions; manufacturing to pharmaceutical clinical trials, governmental planning to defense industries, IT to higher education as well as sustainability initiatives. Well…you get the picture! FastTrack Schedule is used by all types of industries on all types of projects. 

That’s the great thing about the project management space – everyone can use our software, because everyone is touched by a project, some way, some how.  No matter if you are a distant or hands-on stakeholder; accidental project manager or experienced PMP, everyone can make use and be productive with an easy to use and flexible project management tool. 

It is not appropriate if someone needs project management software that is fully integrated with customer billing or has portfolio management requirements. 

Q. How does your software compare to other PM players in the Mac market, such as Merlin or MindManager? 

A:  FastTrack Schedule 10 is a tenth generation product that was originally developed on the Mac first (before our Windows version a few years after). As it stands, FastTrack Schedule is the longest running project management application on the Mac platform.   

Unlike other Mac only project management tools, FastTrack Schedule offers a compatible Windows version. After all, project team members can be Mac-based or Windows-based and there should be no barriers to collaboration and achieving project objectives. 

We have put careful consideration into the design of this version, balancing an easy to use interface with enormous flexibility and powerful tracking tools. With each release of FastTrack Schedule, we have always included features that are firsts for any project management tool on the Mac. With features such as Image Columns, an iMedia Browser, Resource Contouring and the Format Bar (to name a few) this version is no different than its 9 previous versions in its offering of innovative features. 

There is the unsurpassed flexibility and style of creating a project schedule that communicates all of your project/task details – which not only makes your schedule stand out, but also provides a unique sense of ownership in the schedule. The clearest example that I can think of, is the creation and modification of your bar styles. In FastTrack Schedule, not only are you provided with an unlimited number of milestones, bars and bar points to choose from, but you can create your own!  If you want to use a company logo as a project delivery milestone, then import the picture in and watch it become part of your selection of customized bar styles.    

Many of our customers work with mind mapping programs to brainstorm during the project planning phase. FastTrack Schedule integrates with the leading mind-mapping program, MindManager, providing an ideal “Concept to Completion” process model. FastTrack Schedule 10 provides full integration with both the Mac and Windows versions of MindManager enabling users to open MindManager files and automatically converts the maps into a traditional Gantt chart. Once in FastTrack Schedule, project plans can be adjusted as needed and rounded out with dependencies, resources, and costing details and then effectively tracked during the execution phase. And FastTrack Schedule will also export a schedule as a MindManager file.   
 

Q:  Why would a PM use your software versus a SAAS offering?  Wouldn't that be a better choice in a mixed PC/Mac environment? 

A: No SaaS software offers the speed, sophistication, flexibility, security or unparalleled presentation-quality of FastTrack Schedule 10. Many SaaS solutions are rigid and do not allow for much customization. When you purchase licenses for FastTrack Schedule 10, you pay one price. There are no recurring monthly fees. FastTrack Schedule 10 provides the UI appropriate for each platform. Users are not dependent on having an Internet connection to manage or update their projects – which is a large downside for project managers on the go. We have desktop speed; users are not at the mercy of their Internet connection and their confidential schedules are stored on local computers or secure corporate servers.   

Q:  How do you see your software evolving over the next year?  

A:  We have some interesting concepts in the pipeline. As with most software companies, we are not at liberty to discuss specifics about future products. We’re excited by the opportunity that amazing mobile devices such as the iPad, iPhone and Android phones offer for project collaboration. Stay tuned.