Seminars / Project Management

 

Improving Your Project Management Skills: The Basics for Success

Seminar # 6503

 

April 29 - May 1, 2009    AMA Houston

June 10-12, 2009            AMA San Francisco

Instructor:  Randall L. Englund

 

Cope with the complex demands of today’s project management practice!

 

More than 60,000 nontechnical professionals have turned to this best-selling seminar to help them deliver basic project management solutions with higher quality, greater value and better accountability. You’ll cover everything, from defining scope and gathering requirements, to planning and budgeting, to utilizing scheduling and control tools. Plus, you’ll get hands-on practice, exercises and real-world examples.

You’ll return to work with all the basic project management help you need to get your projects—and your career—off the ground and running.
 

How You Will Benefit

• Set practical goals for your projects—goals you can achieve regardless of “hitches”

• Set realistic schedules that you can meet

• Develop a project plan—and get that plan implemented

• Stay on top of schedules, workloads and “people problems”

• Save time and energy by “building in flexibility” rather than “putting out fires”

• Cope with budget and time constraints

• Delegate in a fair and practical way within the project team

• Build your credibility with top management

Seminars / Project Management

Best Practices for the Multi-Project Manager Seminar # 6523

Put the best concepts, tools and techniques available for multi-project management to work for you!

Discover how to balance resources across multiple projects and minimize risks while improving performance. You will examine two Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award (MBNQA) winners—and learn the best practices they share and how to put them into action in your organization. Find out the common characteristics of successful multi-project environments—such as ensuring communication from top-to-bottom and bottom-to-top…encouraging change…and establishing accountability.
 

How You Will Benefit

• Recognize the best practices in project management and how to incorporate them into your operation
• Discover how to establish an environment that supports effective multi-project management 
• Optimize resources across projects and other business processes
• Support your organization’s core values and strategic direction
• Learn how to provide for continuous project improvement

• Discover the benefits of a Project Management Office,steering committee and gate review teams

December 1-3, 2008 AMA San Francisco Center.
San Francisco, CA Register Now

Instructor:  Randall L. Englund

Information Technology Project Management

Seminar # 6515

 

08/25/2008 - 08/27/2008    AMA San Francisco Center    San Francisco Marriott

10/8/2008 - 10/10/2008      AMA San Francisco Center    San Francisco Marriott

Master the skills needed for top-notch information technology project management!

From planning, scheduling and controlling IS/IT projects…to managing critical interfaces with users and vendors…to balancing development needs with system maintenance…you’ll find your information technology project management solutions here!

In this course, discover how to optimize IT development and delivery processes so that you can bring every information technology project online more effectively, more quickly and on budget.

December 12-14, 2007   San Francisco Wells Fargo Conference Center

Instructor:  Randall L. Englund

How You Will Benefit

• Maintain control of your projects with proven scheduling techniques
   

• Deliver quality systems on time
   

• Plan for the unexpected
   

• Budget more effectively
   

• Keep conflict at a minimum
   

• Expertly use PM software tools

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Project Summit, San Francisco   October 14, 2008

Project Summit, Boston   October 27, 2008

Speaker:  Randall L. Englund

Topic:  Managing Up the Organization

What can you do when support is not present or adequate or politics appear to rule? Take the initiative!

Get clear understanding about roles and responsibilities to ensure that all projects achieve successful outcomes. Develop a plan to work with sponsors on a regular basis and seek a better outcome from this interaction. The discussion addresses how project managers manage their sponsors as well as how sponsors do their jobs to optimize project success.

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Career Management Seminar

 

12 Jun 2008 5:30 PM 8:30 PM

 

UCSC Extension in Silicon Valley, Sunnyvale Campus
1180 Bordeaux Drive
Sunnyvale, CA 94089
USA

Topic: Managing Up the Organization

Event Sponsor

Last Date of Registration: 06/10/2008 10:00pm Pacific Time

Description :

The accidental project manager role is well known, and the same applies to accidental project sponsors. An effective sponsor can have a tremendous impact on project success. Management support is always needed during project life cycles. In every project, the project manager and his/her team needs management support. However, the sponsor role appears confused in many organizations. Making changes and speaking the truth to those in power may not appear viable. Results are difficult to achieve when emphasis appears to be on controls. What can you do when support is not present or adequate or politics appear to rule? Take the initiative!

Get clear understanding about roles and responsibilities to ensure that all projects achieve successful outcomes. Develop a plan to work with sponsors on a regular basis and seek a better outcome from this interaction. The discussion addresses how project managers manage their sponsors as well as how sponsors do their jobs to optimize project success. Case studies, checklists, surveys, sound and video clips illustrate how PMs can (and have!) successfully manage upwards. The desired end result is to dramatically and sustainably increase the probability of project success, especially in political yet innovative environments. The bottom line message is…take the initiative. Learn how in this session.

By attending this event, Professionals will be able to:

• Increase benefits delivered
• Accelerate project performance
• Improve project predictability
• Reduce project failures

Come experience an energetic, actionable, and memorable session that will positively change your approach to managing upwards in your organization.

About the Speaker: Randy Englund
 

Randy Englund is Executive Consultant for the Englund Project Management Consultancy. He learned many of his lessons while a senior project manager at Hewlett-Packard Company for over 20 years. He’s the author of three best selling business management books that positions him to “bring the concepts from way up there, to right down here, equip you with the tools, and empower you to act.”

 

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About the CBP Summit

Exchange Best Practices with Your Peers
 

CBP Summit- Strategy & Projects

June 24-26, 2008

Hyatt Regency Scottsdale, AZ

Hosted by the Center for Business Practices, the CBP Summit is an intimate gathering of senior practitioners sharing knowledge and learning how to effectively deliver business results through projects. You'll get an inside look at successful operations from fellow senior practitioners on what's worked (and what didn't) in their organizations. Unlike most conferences, the Summit fosters collaboration and sharing, helping you build a network of colleagues that will last throughout your career. You'll be motivated and energized with new ideas that you can bring back with you.

The CBP Summit is an invaluable opportunity for senior-level portfolio, program, project and strategy management executives to examine and debate the most critical issues their organizations are facing today. Participants will discover cutting-edge best practices in managing strategy and projects from knowledgeable senior practitioners.

Best Practice Cases and Special Events
Knowledge-sharing activities at the Summit include:

• Keynote Address: Gopal Kapur, Center for Project Management
• PMO of the Year Award Celebration and Keynote
• In-depth Case Studies from Senior Project Practitioners
• Best Practice Exchange among Participants
• PMO Forum
    Panel Discussion featuring Best-Selling Authors and Thought Leaders
  • Dr. Ginger Levin
  • Dr. Parviz Rad
  • Randall Englund
• CBP Research on Resource Management
• Sponsor Showcase
• Advanced Workshops

Visit the CBP Website for More Information

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Next Meeting
Thursday, April  24, 2008
6:30-9 PM, Dublin, CA

Speaker:  Randy Englund

Fee members: FREE EVENT
Fee Guests: $10.00

eBIG is a not-for-profit organization and its mission is to create a dynamic community that taps into the local resources and knowledge of area businesses, professionals, city and local governments, entrepreneurs, technically skilled employees, venture capitalists, and industry experts to benefit from a shared involvement in the electronic information era.  The Project Management SIG focuses on Project Management skills, styles and approaches.  It provides a forum and platform to all professionals either in the field of project management or pursing an education in Project Management.  Its goal is to provide tools and techniques offered by PMI, Agile & other styles and provide a good learning experience for all those who desire to understand and discover what practices and processes fit best in their organization.

Professionals from all fields are invited to learn as well as share their knowledge of project management.  Randy’s talk (vividly presented with animation, video, and music) draws upon personal as well as experiences from many colleagues in case studies, examples, questionnaires, checklists, and templates to depict how to dramatically and sustainably increase the probability of project success via excellence in sponsorship.  The bottom line message is…take the initiative.  Learn how in this session.

Project Management SIG Presentation Title:    Managing Project Sponsorship

Many executives are assigned as project sponsors, but their organizations do not spend time training and explaining their expected roles and responsibilities during project life cycles.   The accidental project manager role is well known, and the same applies to sponsors.  An effective sponsor can have a tremendous impact on project success.  However, reality presents quite a different picture.  The sponsor role appears confused in many organizations.  Sometimes the sponsor is not very involved in the project.  On the other hand, sometimes the project sponsor is too involved and acts or tries to act as a super project manager, generating more conflict and problems.  Management support is always needed during the project life cycle.  In fact, the sentence: “we need more management support” is very common in most organizations.  In every project, the project manager and his/her team needs management support.

 

The topic of effective project sponsorship has emerged as a KEY CHALLENGE in every organization doing projects, especially when you wonder why projects are not producing desired results. As experienced practitioners, co-author Alfonso Bucero and I wrote Project Sponsorship:  Achieving Management Commitment for Project Success to describe the roles and responsibilities of sponsorship and cover how to obtain, sustain, train, and mentor a sponsor.  We draw upon personal as well as experiences from many colleagues in case studies, examples, questionnaires, checklists, and templates.

 

A sponsor commits to define, fund, defend, and support major activities from the start of each project to the end.  The task continues to ensure the benefits that the project intended to produce are realized.  A key concept is proactive sponsorship, meaning sponsors who are committed, accountable, serious about the project, knowledgeable, trained, and able to walk the talk.  Their values are transparent and aligned with the organization and its strategy.  They protect the team from disruptive outside influences and back the team up when times are tough.  An organizational culture committed to this approach is a desired goal.  Do sponsorship right the first time and save yourself grief later on.  The best way to sustain good sponsorship is to start out with good sponsorship.  Anything less is remedial.

 

One audience for this presentation is upper managers and executives—it provides you with the knowledge, tools and practices to be an effective sponsor.  Get clear understanding about your roles and responsibilities to ensure that all projects achieve successful outcomes.  Another audience is project managers who work with sponsors on a regular basis and seek a better outcome from this interaction. The discussion addresses how project managers manage their sponsors as well as how sponsors do their jobs to optimize project success.  An ideal audience is project manager and sponsor attending together.  Case studies illustrate how PMs take the initiative to manage upwards.  This material builds upon previous books on Creating an Environment for Successful Projects and Creating the Project Office.    Project Sponsorship (Jossey-Bass Publishers, 2006, ISBN 0787981362) is available from any online book seller or directly from www.englundpmc.com.

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Randy Englund made a return presentation on March 19, 2008 at Cisco on "The Importance of Project Sponsorship" at a lunchtime skill building workshop.  He previously presented to Cisco October 3, 2007 (shown in picture above) on "Effective Project Checkpoint Meetings."  He also was scheduled to appear in the June 18, 2008 program on "Managing Virtual Teams", together with Jeff Richardson and Jim Sloane.

presents

Project Sponsorship Workshop

Download Project Sponsorship brochure

Cadence President John Patton, Alfonso Bucero, Cadence COO Connie Plowman, and Randy Englund at the PMI Global Congress 2007 in Atlanta Georgia USA

Randy Englund and Alfonso Bucero presented "Building Executive Support:  Keys to Achieving Project Success" at the PMI Global Congress EMEA 2007 in Budapest on May 15, 2007.  The sold out presentation elicited an encore presentation the next day, making it a "best of Congress" paper.  We then did a two day workshop on “Creating Excellence in Project Management” that one person suggested re-titling as “An Excellent Workshop on Creating Excellence.”

We next went on to Trieste, Italy to present "Project Management for Executives" at the MIB School of Business, together with Gary LaGassey, another contributor to our book on Creating the Project Office.  This presentation evoked a comment as "the best presentation this year at the MIB business school."

On October 9, 2007, Randy and Alfonso presented "Managing Project Sponsorship" at the PMI Global Congress North America in Atlanta, Georgia USA.

On October 16, 2007, Randy Englund presented "Do You Know Where Your Sponsor Is?" to a standing room only audience at the PMI Portland chapter meeting, hosted by Connie Plowman of the Cadence Management Corporation [hint:  most sponsors were missing in action (MIA)].

Alfonso Bucero & Randy Englund, enjoying Southern hospitality after the PMI Global Congress 2007 in Atlanta:

Presentation for the PMI Silicon Valley Chapter Meeting

July 16, 2007

Mountain View, CA

www.pmisv.org

Aligning Projects with Strategy

by Randall L. Englund

“Too much of too much” continues to plague organizations that depend upon results from projects to create or sustain its vitality.  In the rush to market (or to make money), people launch more and more projects, somehow thinking that will get the job done.  The result:  delays…failures…more projects...perhaps a hastily conceived project office, and the organization fails to execute its strategy.  In reality, by doing fewer projects at a time, over time more projects get done.  This is the promise of aligning projects with strategy.

A good strategy is the first imperative.  Learn how to recognize an effective strategy.  The second imperative is a process that includes prioritization and criteria to ensure each project aligns with organizational (and individual) goals.  Learn a simple process that works at every level in the organization.  The third imperative is to implement and sustain the process.  This is where project management really earns its keep.

This multimedia presentation provides the opportunity to experience simple tools and techniques that are immediately effective and efficient.  Share insights that include the why, what, and how of converting strategy into action.

The Speaker:  Randy Englund is an executive consultant for the Englund Project Management Consultancy (www.englundpmc.com) and a Professional Associate for the Stanford Advanced Project Management (SAPM) program, specializing in converting strategy into action and effective project management offices.  He delivers custom workshops, speaking and consulting engagements world-wide, especially for SeminarsWorld sponsored by PMI.  Randy’s experience stems from 22 years at Hewlett-Packard Company, where he was a senior project manager and part of the corporate Project Management Initiative to lead continuous improvement of project management across the company; he also served as a program manager in high tech new product development.  His most recent book is on Project Sponsorship:  Achieving Management Commitment for Project Success.  Previous books he co-authored include Creating the Project Office:  a Manager’s guide to Leading Organizational Change, and Creating an Environment for Successful Projects (Second Edition).