SHELVING GUIDE: Project Management This hands-on guide is written for project professionals seeking to find an optimized way of performing project management. It provides answers to such critical questions as: Why should an organization apply project management? What is the value of project management in the broader context of an organization? Is project management as successful as some advocates suggested or is it a waste of time and resources because of the many extensive and bureaucratic processes? Which project management approach should our project team adopt: predictive or adaptive, waterfall or rolling water, extreme programming or Scrum? This book aims to provide an optimized view of project management by balancing and blending competing methodologies (e.g., traditional versus Agile), lengthy methodologies and broad principles, processes and practices, and the need to understand versus the need to apply. It includes project management templates, an integrated case study illustrating how to apply tools and concepts, and a glossary of key terms. Optimizing Project Management is for both aspiring and practicing project management professionals. It covers the core concepts, practices, and skills that are useful for developing new ideas, planning activities, implementing projects, and conducting planning and controlling of schedule, budget, and scope. The text is particularly useful for students, project professionals wanting to refresh their knowledge, and those pursuing project management certifications. This book is aligned with common project management standards such as the Project Management Body of Knowledge and the ISO 21502: Project, Programme and Portfolio Management — Guidance on Project Management.

Thousands of project management–related books have been written. Why is Optimizing Project Work, Management, and Delivery different? This book represents the authors’ experiences gained from looking at the problem of project management for 50 years and wondering why projects cannot be more successful. Experience from various management models and techniques has helped but still does not fit reality or provide accurate forecasts. Industry surveys have compiled the root causes of project failure, and yet they persist. Is there no answer to this problem? As the book explains, the management solution is not in the models or the theory but is found in how they are mapped against the actual target project characteristics. This is the book’s unique strength. There are major coverage gaps in current project management models that also need to be recognized. All of the existing models are correct in some ways, and yet each is also wrong. The book starts by reviewing popular models and related topics that help construct the building blocks of an integrated model structure, which is at the core of this book. The integrated model described here is meant to be a decision-oriented view related to the project life cycle rather than a cookbook of success steps. Project management is too complex for a cookbook approach. This text helps managers find that right path.

“Strategic Benefits Realization never loses focus on the ultimate goal of any organization—to achieve business benefits that endure. Craig Letavec’s common sense approach and practical guidance can be applied throughout the entire benefits realization life cycle to ensure true business value from project investments. Business and project professionals can apply the author’s business-focused techniques immediately—a must read in today’s highly competitive global marketplace.” —Marc Resch, President, Resch Group, and best-selling author This desk reference offers practical guidance for program managers, portfolio managers, and business leaders in the implementation of benefits realization management in organizations. Aligned with global standards, this book extends the knowledge contained in these standards through practical implementation guidance, examples, and additional detail created to assist organizations in implementing benefits realization management as a business practice to support the achievement of strategic business benefits. It also addresses important considerations in organizational change management, providing insights on leveraging key principles to guide successful implementation of the business change required to realize benefits through project and program work. Leveraging benefits realization management at the business portfolio level is covered as well. This book is ideal for organizations beginning to implement benefits realization management and those that wish to mature existing practices. Strategic Benefits Realization provides a practical approach to implementing benefits realization management in organizations that is aligned to PMI’sStandard for Program Management and other global standards, and is presented in the context of program and portfolio management. The guidance offered supports effective governance and execution management to deliver business value.

If where an organization allocates its resources determines its strategy, why is it that so few companies actively manage the resource allocation process? "Optimizing Corporate Portfolio Management: Aligning Investment Proposals with Organizational Strategy" goes beyond platitudes about why you should use corporate portfolio management (CPM) by offering a practical methodology to bring this powerful discipline to your organization. "Optimizing Corporate Portfolio Management" takes an expansive view of where CPM can be utilized by demonstrating that it can be used across any business line, product group or functional area, e.g., IT, R&D, innovation, marketing, salesforce, capital expenditure, etc. CPM is appropriate anywhere discretionary investments are being selected and executed. As a result, other terms used to describe portfolio management such as IT portfolio management, enterprise portfolio management, and project portfolio management are all merely subsets or slices of CPM. The book is written by Anand Sanwal, an expert on CPM, who has led American Express' CPM discipline (referred to as American Express Investment Optimization). American Express' CPM efforts are widely recognized as the most extensive, substantial and progressive deployment of CPM across any organization. Sanwal avoids academic theories and consultant jargon to ultimately deliver pragmatic and proven recommendations on how to make CPM a reality. The book features a foreword by Gary Crittenden, former CFO and EVP of American Express, and several case studies from leading financial services, technology, and government organizations utilizing CPM. Additionally, the book has received significant praise from thought leaders at Google, HP, American Express, The CFO Executive Board, Gartner, Accenture Marketing Sciences, The Wharton School of Business and many others.

Optimizing Human Capital with a Strategic Project Office explores the SPO's potential to transform an enterprise by making the most of people within an organization. This volume provides an exhaustive review of topics such as the hiring, retention, measurement, training, and professional development of knowledge workers in project management

This book provides a broad overview of project and project management principles, processes, and success/failure factors. It also provides a state of the art of applications of the project management concepts, especially in the field of construction projects, based on the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK). The slate of geographically and professionally diverse authors illustrates project management as a multidisciplinary undertaking that integrates renewable and non-renewable resources in a systematic process to achieve project goals. The book describes assessment based on technical and operational goals and meeting schedules and budgets.

A valuable guide to making better IT decisions within business Optimizing and Assessing Information Technology is designed to be both easy-to-use and immediately useful. Engaging and accessible, this book has been created to help you focus on improving business project execution through effective IT optimization and assessment. While it skillfully outlines a framework for optimizing and assessing IT, it does not get into specific technologies per se, given the rapid and increasing pace of technical change across the world today. Optimizing and Assessing Information Technology involves a step-by-step process whereby various aspects of IT are evaluated. In addition to the book itself, a companion website offers templates, checklists, and related materials for your reference and use. With this book as your guide, you'll be able to generate an accurate and reliable assessment of a company's IT operations and identify areas on which to focus to optimize IT. Topics such as "against what to assess operations" and "optimized as compared to what" will be addressed throughout the course of this reliable resource. Introduces the concept of the IT Pillars Model (IPM) for optimizing and assessing IT and examines where and how the IPM fits into the overall operations of a business Filled with the author's experience of working across the field of IT in both small and large companies Offers the most detailed, hands-on user's guide to the principles and practice of the IPM by examining each aspect of the IPM in the context of case studies Covers the topic of tools and reporting, including analytical tools such as ROI, benchmarking, and metrics Optimizing and Assessing Information Technology provides valuable insights into this discipline, but the coverage of IT in this book extends beyond technology itself. It also covers various aspects of the people, processes, and technology components associated with IT as a whole.