If anyone is telling you that you are going to
win big right away with a project management
enterprise system when the organization has not
already demonstrated a high level of project
management maturity, you need to question either
their motivation or experience. Maybe both.
Be prepared to take baby steps to build a
foundation of consistent, compliant use by each
system role. Ensure that you designate one or
more individuals with the authority and
responsibility to ensure consistent and
compliant use. This brings up the adage "carrot
and the stick." Performance management experts
have long done away with labels like
operant conditioning, but call it what you want
you are going to have to find out a way to
encourage and reward the behavior you need
and negatively reinforce undesirable or low
performance. Remember that the US government
spent billions of dollars trying to convince
us to buckle up and it wasn't until
individual states starting passing out
seat-belt laws and handing out tickets that
a significant percentage
of drivers started to comply.
Words of wisdom regarding oversight - Be mindful
of not having the fox guard your henhouse. The
individuals tasked with oversight should have a
direct line of authority from senior management.
Individuals tasked with project management
oversight also ensure work is performed in
accordance with corporate strategy, not the
wishes of some rouge department head.
Be mindful of not engaging passive-aggressive
management to spearhead your project management
initiatives. Be straight forward and above the
table. Tell people precisely what you need them
to do, when you need it, and why. As Aristotle, the father
of persuasion argued, become a "giver of
reasons." Even Colin Powell in his doctrine of
war states: "Every solider, when they are asked
to lay their lives on the line, ought to be
given the reasons why." We are assuming he means
the "real" reasons why.
Consider the three primary ingredients to
deriving valid metrics from project server:
consistency, compliance and oversight. If your
organization is not willing to spend the time
and money to focus on developing these
ingredients, your project management system is
just a simple data storage device as your
portfolio metrics are crap. To put it much
simpler, one cannot report across apples,
oranges and pears as it offers no value.
Individually yes, but we had that project
management functionality many, many years ago.
